In the exhibition hall, as deathly silent as a cave, there was only the faint crackling of flames.
Jin Xueli's nerves were taut as strings; every faint crackle of fire felt like a fingertip plucking them.
She finished reading the long introduction to the phantasm "Candle Tears," then stood there thinking for quite some time before she barely managed to digest it.
She made another circuit of the underground exhibition hall, making sure no second attack would come lunging out of a corner or shadow-being attacked by herself once was quite unpleasant enough.
As she passed the corpse, she hurried past, then suddenly stopped and turned back.
The corpse of her dead self always made Jin Xueli feel deeply uncomfortable.
She did not want to see it, much less be watched by it, so she simply covered its face with a towel, veiling that accusation and scrutiny she directed at herself, before returning to the candle.
Melting such an enormous candle with a little flame naturally took considerable time.
By the time she finished her circuit of the hall, the candle had finally melted enough for the next step: the section representing early May 2026 was gradually softening and slackening from the bottom up, sagging heavily toward the floor like a belly at full term-except that its "skin" was slowly becoming translucent, with dark shapes drifting slowly inside, as though it were pregnant with a bellyful of ghosts.
Jin Xueli hurried over and bent down to examine the world of the past showing through the melted wax.
The first thing she saw was herself.
According to the phantasm's introduction, because she was the one who had touched the candle, what appeared in the wax was primarily her own personal history-the qualification "primarily" was necessary because no one could survive independently of their broader surroundings, so major events in her surroundings that had affected her would also appear in the wax.
The introduction had put it this way:
"...In today's highly integrated world, historical moments of pivotal influence and major change are often brought about by a small number of people. Mass movements, which occasionally achieved success in the past, are now almost impossible to replicate.
"The decisions of a handful of oligarchs, however, can influence and change the fate of all humanity. By the same principle, when it comes to personal history, the candle will faithfully portray the key figures and events that influenced and transformed the environment surrounding the individual."
That passage had seemed rather obscure when she read it, but after watching the history inside the wax for a while, Jin Xueli understood.
For instance, why had she met Anthony, that harasser, in early May?
The most immediate reason was that a female friend had invited her out to a bar that night.
Amber was not a Hunter and had no Pathway, but she worked in finance for the Morgan Faction. She had dealt with Jin Xueli a few times before, and the two got along quite well; it was that very night that Jin Xueli met Anthony, handsome on the outside and rotten within, at the bar.
But thinking a little deeper, why had Jin Xueli, who hated the smell of alcohol more than anything, agreed to go to a bar with Amber that day?
Because at the end of April, a regional war that had dragged on for years, driving inflation and exhausting the entire world, had finally ground to a farcical halt after untold bloodshed.
Although the outcome did not satisfy people of conscience-whichever side they supported, none were satisfied-after years of recurring, almost numbing tragedy, the entire world breathed a collective sigh of relief; on the day the war was declared over, there were plenty of celebratory parades and spontaneous public festivities, and even news anchors sounded a little more cheerful.
False Image Hunters had one foot in the Nest and the other in the human world, and their mindset always kept them a few steps removed from ordinary life; Jin Xueli was no exception.
But even she had felt as though sunlight were warming her during those days, her spirits brimming with the languor of the approaching summer-Amber wanted to celebrate with a drink, and, figuring she could have juice, she had readily agreed.
If the war had not ended, Amber would not have invited her out to celebrate; without going to the bar, she would not have met Anthony; if he had not become her stalker and harasser, Jin Xueli would not have entered the Nest, had a knife driven into her throat, stood beside her own corpse, or found this enormous candle.
Tracing everything she had endured today back to its source, it had actually all begun with a bald old man thousands of miles away who had started a war... so how could the people and events closer to her that had influenced her not be encompassed by the candle?
"When reshaping the contents of Candle Tears, you will discover that the greater the physical distance between you and your target, the harder it is to alter their past."
The introduction to "Candle Tears" continued with the following passage:
"The past of someone standing beside you is extremely easy to change. Reach into Candle Tears and manipulate its contents, or mold Candle Tears itself, and you can change their location, experiences, and actions. Their past will naturally become different.
"Someone half a city away from you can still be changed, with some difficulty, but you will find that the portion of Candle Tears surrounding them is somewhat stiff and uncooperative when molded. Details are difficult to alter, and at most you can change the broad outline-as for how much difference those alterations will ultimately make, that is even harder to say.
"What about someone on the other side of the earth? Unfortunately, even if such a person appears within your candle, you cannot exert any influence over their past experiences."
That doesn't matter, Jin Xueli thought as she watched the still slightly blurred scene inside the candle. The person I want to change is about to come out through the bar's back door and stand beside me.
The wax turned into transparent Candle Tears, stopping just before it dripped onto the floor, like a pool of gleaming water suspended in midair. She touched it lightly and found that it was not hot.
Reflected in that pool was a Blackmoor City night ablaze with lights; leaning closer, Jin Xueli could even smell the bar's distinctive mixture of alcohol, tobacco, and perfume.
Inside the pool formed by Candle Tears, the high-rises, bars, shops, and streets all resembled miniature models. A finger-sized version of herself was standing outside the bar's back door, gazing up at Blackmoor City's starless night sky.
This was it.
There was no need to manipulate Candle Tears further to find the right moment. She only had to wait-in that respect, operating Candle Tears was rather like using a video's progress bar: she could drag it backward or forward, or let it progress naturally with time.
She remembered that before she met Anthony, a convoy of several black Mercedes SUVs had driven past nearby. Even their windows had been reinforced against terrorist attacks, prompting her to take several looks; not long after the convoy passed, the bar's dark-red back door had-
Here it came.
The instant the bar's tiny back door opened a crack, Jin Xueli extended her little finger into Candle Tears and pressed her fingertip firmly against the door.
Her shortest finger was almost as large as the bar door, and it looked truly peculiar braced against it.
Through the door, the force of Anthony's repeated shoves felt like a little insect kicking against her finger pad; but how could such a tiny person inside Candle Tears push aside her enormous fingertip?
She leaned closer to Candle Tears and faintly heard a curse amid the loud music behind the door: "...What's wrong with this damn door?"
The tiny Jin Xueli taking a breather outside the back door paid no attention to the enormous finger stretching through the air beside her.
Hearing the swearing behind the door, she merely glanced back and moved a couple of steps away-any proper citizen of Blackmoor City maintained a certain wariness and coldness toward strangers, especially one who was swearing.
The future harasser behind the door shoved desperately a few more times before finally admitting defeat. He seemed to turn and leave, and quiet returned behind the door.
That should do it, right? Jin Xueli thought, not daring to withdraw her hand just yet and keeping it braced against the door.
As long as they never met in the first place, none of what followed would happen.
After witnessing "her own" death, the resentment and fury she had originally felt toward Anthony seemed to have been steeped in a shivering chill, losing some of their intensity; so her first priority now was simply to experiment with the candle, with revenge taking second place.
The phantasm's introductory material had explained in detail how changing history would affect the "present":
"...After the point at which a change occurs, history will continue to develop naturally along its internal trajectory, and a person's 'present' will change accordingly.
"There is a time-travel paradox concerning whether someone can return to the past and kill their own grandfather. If their grandfather dies, they will never exist, but that in turn means no one can go back to kill their grandfather... hence the paradox."
Whenever time travel and changing the past were involved, whether in films and television or in the Nest's phantasms, there seemed to be a great many things that required explanation.
"'Candle Tears' will not become trapped in such a paradox. This is because the candle is a fixed stretch of timeline, beginning with the birth of the person touching it and ending at the moment they touch it. Thus, you cannot alter the past before your birth.
"However, changing history through 'Candle Tears' will still affect the present; for instance, suppose you melt the section of candle from a month ago and crush the version of yourself inside Candle Tears to death. The instant you do so, you too will vanish from before the candle, and the candle will return to its original state.
"That is an extreme case. If you cause yourself to break a leg a month ago, then of course you will not meet a potential client while skiing a month later, correct? As stated earlier, history will always proceed according to its internal logic, producing the consequences that should naturally follow."
In other words, if she prevented herself from meeting Anthony that night, Jin Xueli would also disappear from beside the candle-without the harasser, she would lose her reason for entering the Nest; without entering the Nest, she naturally would not remain here.
"However, to ensure the continuity of the timeline, your memories of using 'Candle Tears' to alter history will remain fully intact. You will not lose these memories as a result of the changes you make to history."
In other words... if Jin Xueli prevented herself from meeting Anthony, she would not appear in the Nest today; but she would still remember meeting Anthony in the "previous version of history," entering the Nest, and changing history.
Preserving the user's memories could ensure the continuity of the timeline? Why?
Jin Xueli thought for a while, found no answer, and had to set the matter aside. Being able to retain her memories was a wonderful thing for her; good things did not bear scrutiny, so she only needed to accept it outright.
Only by retaining her memories could she return and find "Candle Tears" again; compared with such a precious phantasm, what did the disgusting memories Anthony had brought her matter?
Inside Candle Tears, the tiny Jin Xueli stamped her feet and turned around, apparently preparing to return to the bar.
Jin Xueli moved her little finger away and watched her tiny self pull open the door and disappear into the flashing lights and music beyond it.
Good. Everything was done. She could turn off the fire trough and let the candle solidify again.
Only once Candle Tears solidified again would it settle into a new time and history.
The transparent pool of Candle Tears suspended in midair slowly whitened and clouded, rising bit by bit as the candle drew it back into its body, becoming smooth and pristine again-however she looked at it, it seemed never to have melted at all.
Jin Xueli took one last look at the covered face of the corpse nearby, closed her eyes, and quietly waited for the entirely new "present moment" that would follow her alteration of history.
After a while, she opened her eyes.
She had not returned to Blackmoor City; she was still inside the Nest.
The pool of blood beneath the corpse with its covered face was nearly dry, dark purple-black. The candle stretched far into the distance, and the exhibition hall was deathly silent.
In her mind, the whole sequence of memories-being stalked and harassed by Anthony, entering the Nest, being copied by a resident, melting the candle...-remained perfectly clear, every one of them intact. Just as the introduction to "Candle Tears" had stated, they had not vanished.
Only one thing was different.
The place where she met Anthony had changed from the bar's back door to its front entrance.
I've been absolutely exhausted these past two days... I overdid it a while back and still haven't recovered. We eighteen-year-olds aren't young anymore, not like when we were seventeen. I can feel the strain on my body. Sigh.
When I'm tired, I can't tell whether I'm sleepy or hungry. I keep wanting to eat all day long, and whenever I eat, I inevitably pass out afterward, making things even worse... These past two days have really been so miserable...
(End of chapter)
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