AYLS -Chapter 153

“Don’t listen to him, I think he’s up to no good!” Fat Cat cried out anxiously.

It was extremely uneasy now, convinced that this local was about to cause trouble.

Lin Qiao directly blocked it out. Between Gu Huayuan and the cat, of course she trusted Gu Huayuan more. That damned fat cat was always lying to her anyway.

What bad thing could Gu Huayuan possibly do? At most… he might want to do something shameful with her.

Cough cough cough.

“Alright, I’ve driven everyone else away. What did you want to tell me? Just don’t say anything embarrassing,” Lin Qiao said, blushing.

Gu Huayuan asked, “Are you sure it can’t hear?”

“Mhm, pretty sure. Every time I block it, it never hears anything afterward.”

Lin Qiao added, “It’s fine. You’re not actually planning to do something, right…? If you are, you don’t need to worry. There are rules about this— it can only see mosaics.”

The game rules did state that. Such restricted content obviously couldn’t be viewed casually. Thinking of this, Lin Qiao’s face grew even redder.

They hadn’t even cleaned up the place, and besides, Gu Huayuan still had injuries.

While Lin Qiao was still tangled in her thoughts, Gu Huayuan took her hand, pulled her straight into his arms, and kissed her. “This way it can’t see anything, right?”

Lin Qiao foolishly nodded. “Mm.”

She closed her eyes, waiting for him to make the next move.

“You’re not an immortal, nor a spirit,” Gu Huayuan suddenly said.

“…”

Lin Qiao’s eyes flew open. What what what—did she mishear something just now?

“You’re human. A person, just like me. But you’re not from here, right?”

Now Lin Qiao wasn’t just looking at him—she was gaping at him.

Her heart thumped wildly. What was happening? How did Gu Huayuan suddenly know everything?! She panicked, nearly scrambling out of his arms, but he held her tightly. Then he loosened the collar by her neck and pressed his lips intimately against her ear.

“Don’t move. It’s safer like this. Everything we’re about to say can only be heard by the two of us.”

Lin Qiao: “…”

This kind of whispering was way too stimulating. But nothing was more shocking than what Gu Huayuan had just said. Nervously, she asked, “Why are you suddenly saying all this? Didn’t we agree before? No asking.”

Gu Huayuan continued, “That friend of yours isn’t an immortal or a spirit either. It’s on you—or rather, it’s been following you.”

Lin Qiao clutched her chest, feeling doomed. She waved her hands frantically, “Don’t say anymore. I can’t tell you anything, absolutely nothing. Otherwise something terrible will happen to this world.”

“It told you that?” Lin Qiao hesitated, then nodded. This much should be okay to say.

Understanding dawned on Gu Huayuan. “I don’t know if it’s true, but we should be cautious anyway. So I’ll talk, and you listen. I don’t want to probe into your origins, so you don’t need to say anything you think you can’t say. I only want to figure out the origin of that thing on you. So Comrade Xiao Qiao, can you tell me—was my guess just now correct?”

Lin Qiao looked like she was about to cry. At this point, lying seemed pointless. She hadn’t said anything outwardly, yet somehow Gu Huayuan had pieced everything together.

They had clearly come prepared. She nodded aggrievedly. “Yes… all right, everything you said is right. I’m still in a daze. Am I talking in my sleep? How do you know everything?” She’d always been proud of her cleverness, proud of fooling even Gu Huayan. Yet he somehow knew everything.

So when exactly had she given herself away?

Gu Huayan chuckled. “Of course I figured it out bit by bit. Ever since it struck at me, it caught my attention. Comrade Xiao Qiao, do you still not understand why it attacked me?”

Lin Qiao: “……”

So it was that damned fat cat who gave her away? Instantly, she felt better. She cursed the fat cat eight hundred times in her heart. After she was done cursing, she gave up hiding anything. “It always mixes truth and lies. I don’t know either. I doubted it too, but it refused to admit anything.”

This matched Gu Huayan’s guess perfectly.

“Of course it wouldn’t dare admit it. It can’t give you a reasonable explanation to earn your trust. It attacked me because of you—or rather, because it wanted something from you.”

Lin Qiao was stunned. “What could it possibly get from me? It’s way more powerful than I am. That photo last time—that was all it. Even me being brought here—that was it.” She didn’t dare continue. If she said too much, something might really happen. The fat cat lied often, but what if this part was actually true?

Fortunately, Gu Huayan didn’t need her to say it aloud. He had more or less guessed it. “Xiao Qiao, have you never thought about the possibility that it needs to attach itself to you in order to survive?”

Lin Qiao froze. “I…” She thought for a moment. “I only know that if I’m gone, it’s gone too.”

“Symbiosis is also a form of dependence. It has no body of its own, so it must draw energy from its host. If we describe it as a tree—you are the branch, and it is a worm burrowing in the trunk.”

Hearing that explanation, Lin Qiao instantly felt disgusted with the fat cat.

It really felt like she had a parasite in her brain.

She panicked. “So what is it eating from me?”

Gu Huayan gently patted her head. “Don’t be afraid. I don’t know how advanced your world is. But judging from what I’ve observed, I’ve imagined many possibilities. It’s likely feeding on emotion. Think carefully—has it ever deliberately angered you, made you unhappy?”

“……!!!”

Lin Qiao’s round eyes widened. “Yes! That damned fat cat! No wonder it always pours cold water on me and tries to crush my confidence. No wonder it made me live such a hard life. Every identity it assigned me was uncomfortable.”

At this moment, she truly understood.

A cat?

Gu Huayan took note but didn’t press for details.

He was focused on another issue. “Assigned identities? So you weren’t destined to be my fiancée from the beginning?”

Lin Qiao instantly covered her mouth, leaving only her big round eyes exposed as she looked at him.

No one could get angry staring into those eyes. Gu Huayan laughed. “So you chose your identity yourself?”

Lin Qiao nodded quickly and cleverly.

Gu Huayan smiled. “Very smart.”

Lin Qiao looked away awkwardly. She didn’t dare admit how much she regretted her choice back then.

And she would never talk about it again.

“Back to the point—now we’ve identified this parasite’s weakness. It needs your negative emotions to survive. So it targeted me to make you unhappy.”

Lin Qiao immediately agreed. “Exactly! Now that you say it, I remember—it kept trying to make me unhappy, but I was happy every day! Why would I be unhappy? It tried so many times and failed.”

Hearing this, Gu Huayan could already tell why the parasite had grown desperate.

Meeting someone as simple and pure-hearted as Xiao Qiao was its blessing—and its doom. Starting today, it was definitely doomed.

“Xiao Qiao, do you trust me?”

“I do!” Lin Qiao answered without hesitation. Here, the person she trusted most was naturally Gu Huayan.

“Then let’s suppress it together and let you completely take control of it. We must not allow it to control you.”

Lin Qiao grew excited, but then her face fell. “But I can’t catch it. Otherwise I’d have crushed it already. It’s in my head, but it says even if I cracked my skull open, I still wouldn’t be able to see it.”

Gu Huayan lightly pinched the back of her head. “Don’t say such things. Who would ever crack open your head? Since we know its weakness, everything becomes simple. Its energy cannot be infinite. In fact, it might already be running low, which is why it attacked me so recklessly and frequently.”

“It’s stupid!” Lin Qiao said disdainfully.

“Yes. Comrade Xiao Qiao is the smartest.”

Lin Qiao puffed up proudly, then asked, “So how do we catch it? It’s actually really powerful. It knows a lot.”

“Then does it know where Old Xu’s wife comes from?”

Lin Qiao almost fell off his lap. Her voice trembled. “Gu Huayan, how do you know so much?”

Gu Huayan said calmly, “Not that much. Ever since I found out my wife is a fairy, of course I’d pay attention to what kind of friends a fairy keeps. But mainly—it’s the things she brought out. She trusts you. I doubt even Old Xu knows what she can really do.”

That made sense. The people closest to you are often the ones you hide things from most.

In this regard, Old Xu’s wife handled things much better than Xiao Qiao.

“Does Old Xu’s wife know your identity?”

Lin Qiao shook her head foolishly. Now she felt Gu Huayan was more like a transmigrator than she was.

If the fat cat had bound itself to him instead, who knew what kind of chaos it would have created.

Gu Huayan asked, “Is Old Xu’s wife from the same place as you?”

“No.”

Gu Huayuan understood a bit more. It seemed Old Xu’s wife didn’t have anyone backing her, or perhaps the world she came from was of a lower level than Qiao’s. That was why Qiao knew about Old Xu’s wife, yet the other party knew nothing about Qiao.

But Old Xu’s wife seemed to know a lot about him… That part could be set aside for now.

“So that means the parasite can’t act through Old Xu’s wife. We can eliminate that possibility. We only need to start with you.”

Lin Qiao asked nervously, “Start with me? What can I do? If there really is a way, I really want to deal with it. It’s awful—it bullies me all the time.” She finally had the chance to complain.

“Lure it into continuing to target me. Drain its energy until there’s nothing left. Then it’ll only be able to cling to you. A parasite with no energy has to rely on you to feed it, so it’ll have no choice but to obey you.”

“Ah? It still has to target you?” Lin Qiao was unhappy. “You’ll get hurt.”

“Comrade Qiao, I’ll be careful. I won’t get hurt. And you need to understand—if we don’t deal with it, I’ll only be in even more danger later. There’ll be no way to guard against it.”

Qiao had just begun to feel sad when she suddenly remembered that the fat cat relied on her sadness to earn energy. She immediately forced herself not to feel sad, took a breath, and said, “I need to stay calm.”

Gu Huayuan lowered his head and kissed her. “Does this help a little?”

Lin Qiao: “…”

“From now on, whenever you’re unhappy, I’ll kiss you. So, let’s catch it together, alright?”

Lin Qiao touched her face, thinking Gu Huayuan was utterly shameless—actually using his beauty as a tactic. But she also knew he was right. She alone couldn’t stop the fat cat. If the fat cat really refused to give up, Gu Huayuan would be in real danger.

“Alright.” Once they caught that fat cat, she would make sure it suffered even more than she ever had.