Su Qing felt that she had recently become like one of those pathetic stalker side characters in a detective novel.
(￣▽￣*) Although, she technically already was one.
However, she was not stalking a murderer; she was investigating Shen Qingyue.
She used her meager authority in the Student Council, combined with a little bit of… well, Money Power.
The people she hired were very professional, sending reports every day complete with both text and pictures.
Shen Qingyue’s daily routine was simple: Home — School — Library — Home. Occasionally, she would visit a bookstore or a convenience store, and her purchases were always either reference books or stationery.
‘Boring,’ Su Qing had muttered at the time, tossing the report aside.
It wasn’t until this afternoon that a new report arrived with a set of high-definition photos — candid shots of the inner pages of Shen Qingyue’s Physics Notes.
Su Qing had originally been idly scrolling through her phone screen, calculating how she would “accidentally” ask Lin Mo about today’s group study session later that evening.
Should she pretend to care about his grades, or should she just say, “My mom made something delicious again”?
Then, her finger stopped.
Her pupils constricted sharply.
She zoomed in on the photo, then zoomed in again. The focus landed on a pencil-drawn, crooked Yawning Doodle in the margin of the notes.
Time seemed to hit the pause button.
This doodle…
She was far too familiar with it.
A scene flashed through her mind.
It was during the third grade, on Lin Mo’s birthday.
She had saved up her allowance for a long time to buy an ugly robot model (back then, Lin Mo was obsessed with Bakusō Kyōdai Let’s & Go!! and Gundam). Feeling that the gift was too meager, she had also tinkered together a handmade birthday card.
She folded the cardstock in half, drew a wobbly cake on the cover with colored markers, and wrote inside with a pencil: “I wish Brother Lin Mo a happy birthday and eternal happiness!”
After writing it, she felt the page looked too empty, so she doodled a little stick figure next to her signature. The figure was propped up by one hand with its mouth wide open and its eyes squinted into slits — a little person yawning.
As she drew it, she had thought to herself: ‘Will that idiot Lin Mo yawn too when he sees this? Heh heh heh…’
What expression did Lin Mo have when he received the gift? He seemed to dislike the robot for being too ugly, but he stared at the card for a long time. Then, he ruffled her hair and said, “It’s drawn so poorly, but… thanks.”
Where did that card go afterward?
Su Qing couldn’t remember. Perhaps it had been tucked away by Lin Mo in some box of trinkets, or perhaps it had long since been lost.
But that doodle, though she had drawn it casually, was unique — a doodle infused with a hint of her mischievous spirit…
How could it appear in Shen Qingyue’s notebook?!
(╯°□°)╯︵┻━┻ ‘This is unscientific!’
Su Qing stood up abruptly from her chair and paced back and forth in the Student Council Office.
‘Calm down, Su Qing. Calm down.’
She forced herself to take a deep breath. ‘Right, it could be a coincidence. Aren’t all stick figures drawn by children roughly the same? A yawning little person… maybe many people draw it that way.’
She grabbed her phone again and stared intently at the doodle.
It was too similar.
‘This isn’t just “similar”; it’s a total carbon copy!’
A chill crawled up her spine and settled at the back of her neck.
Had Shen Qingyue… seen that card?
How was that possible? Only she and Lin Mo had that card. ‘Did Lin Mo… did Lin Mo show it to her?’
The moment this thought appeared, Su Qing had already mentally constructed an entire plotline. (In fact, if Su Qing were to write a novel, she would certainly be better than the author; her imagination was simply too vast.)
Had Lin Mo shown Shen Qingyue the card that belonged to the two of them — a relic of their childhood containing her naive handwriting and blessings?
Why?
To share childhood anecdotes? To show off by saying, “Look how cute my childhood friend was”?
Or… was he reminiscing in front of Shen Qingyue about “the little girl who used to always follow behind me back then”?
A powerful sense of crisis surged within her.
It was a panic and rage born from her territory being invaded, her memories being stolen, and her uniqueness being stripped away.
The small, warm fragments of the past she cherished most between her and Lin Mo — the treasures she thought were locked securely in the safe of their shared memories… Someone had picked the lock, taken them out to examine them, and even… imitated them?
“Heh…” Su Qing let out a short, cold laugh.
She sat back down at the computer, her expression terrifyingly cold. She pushed her authority as the Student Council President to its absolute limit.
Shen Qingyue’s library records were pulled up. She scrolled through them line by line; most were competition question banks, academic journals, and literary classics… until she saw a title:
*Children’s Psychological Drawing: Analysis of Unconscious Graffiti and Emotional Projection*
Borrowed date: four months ago.
Su Qing’s heart sank.
It wasn’t a coincidence.
Shen Qingyue had borrowed this kind of book. She was studying… doodles? The unconscious? Emotional projection?
A more terrifying hypothesis surfaced: Shen Qingyue hadn’t just seen the card; she was actively researching Su Qing’s doodles. Was she trying to analyze something from those childish lines? Was she analyzing her feelings for Lin Mo? Or… learning how to imitate them?
Su Qing felt a wave of nausea.
She switched windows and logged into a secondary social media account she rarely used. The only person this account followed was a user with a blank profile picture and an ID consisting of a string of random characters — it was Shen Qingyue’s private burner account, which Su Qing had spent quite some effort to locate.
There was very little content inside. The latest post was from one month ago:
‘I want to become the light. Or, become that flicker of light in his memory.’
*Boom—*
The strings of her “reason” snapped completely.
So that was it.
It wasn’t just about the present.
What Shen Qingyue wanted wasn’t just Lin Mo’s current attention and admiration.
She even coveted everything about Lin Mo’s past and his memories.
She wanted to use this method… to infiltrate. By imitating the handwriting… would she slowly erase Su Qing’s traces and then fill the space with herself?
“Want to become that flicker of light in his memory…” Su Qing whispered the sentence. ‘I see.’
She suddenly remembered that Lin Mo had once mentioned offhandedly that Shen Qingyue “seemed a bit familiar, as if I’ve seen her somewhere as a kid.” At the time, she had dismissed it as a cliché pickup line and laughed it off.
Thinking about it now… was it possible that some of Shen Qingyue’s unintentional small gestures were imitations of her childhood habits? Or, in Lin Mo’s subconscious, did he see a distorted shadow of a “childhood playmate” in Shen Qingyue?
(｀へ´*) ‘Disgusting. Truly disgusting.’
This was cheating. This was theft. This was a desecration of every precious memory between her and Lin Mo.
Su Qing leaned against the back of her chair and closed her eyes.
Images flashed before her eyes: the scene of Lin Mo carrying her on his back across a puddle after the rain when they were little; the scene of him picking the chicken leg from his bowl and giving it to her; the scene of the two of them burying a Time Capsule under the pomegranate tree in their old neighborhood…
Those images had once been the softest, most solid fortress in the depths of her heart.
Now, she felt as if she could see Shen Qingyue’s figure holding a shovel, attempting to dig a hole at the corner of that fortress wall.
“No…”
Su Qing opened her eyes. The last bit of struggle and hesitation in her gaze was replaced by a cold decisiveness.
She could accept Lin Mo admiring someone, and she could accept others having feelings for Lin Mo (though it would drive her crazy).
But she could absolutely not tolerate someone trying to tamper with, defile, or even replace their shared past.
That was her bottom line.
It was something she found even more unbearable than the thought of “Lin Mo might like someone else.”
After all, this was the World of Abilities. She couldn’t understand how Shen Qingyue was doing it, but the girl had already started.
“Shen Qingyue…” she whispered the name.
“You’ve touched something you shouldn’t have.”
Outside the window, the sky was growing dark. The lights cast flickering shadows across Su Qing’s face.
She picked up her phone and deleted all the investigation reports. For some things, simply knowing was enough. Evidence? She didn’t need it.
The last of the rationality in her heart was replaced by a cold “action plan.”
First, she had to confirm a few things.
Second, she had to take back what belonged to her.
Finally… she would make the person who tried to steal the light and shadow return to the darkness forever.
“Lin Mo,” she looked toward the direction of Lin Mo’s Classroom, her voice as light as a sigh yet as heavy as a vow, “no one is allowed to touch our past.”
“Whoever touches it, I will…”
She didn’t finish her sentence, but the corners of her mouth curled into an arc.
‘Hmph, this time, it won’t be as simple as a session of Hypnotic Counseling can resolve.’
(๑•̀ㅂ•́)و✧ The game has leveled up.
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