“What's your wish…”

In a sea of ink-black, Tang Coco hung suspended, like a leaf in endless night; a voice rippled around her like water in a well.

“I want to avenge my father…”

Her tone was flat, like ash after a fire.

“What's your wish…”

The voice asked again, echoing like a bell in mist.

Tang Coco thought for a heartbeat, then spoke.

“I want to uncover the truth of my transformation…”

“What's your wish…”

The question returned, slow as dripping rain.

“I want to protect this world, to erase every enemy…”

She remembered the red-haired girl's mission, and her words came out like steel drawn in moonlight.

“Your… wish… what… is it…”

The voice slowed, like giving her time; silence stretched, soft as snowfall.

“I…”

Her eyes shut. Emotion rose first, a tight ache; then images flickered like lanterns: Ye Yiyi, Li Muyan, Gu Xin, and others—faces she guarded in her heart.

“My wish…”

“Maybe I only want… to be with them…”

She spoke softly, eyes still closed, like whispering to dawn.

Light flared. The darkness peeled back like a curtain, and the world slammed back into place: a city of ruins, bones of buildings under a grey sky. Tang Coco lay on shattered rubble; her Armor was in pieces, the scene smelling of brutal struggle.

The red-haired girl crouched beside her. She leaned down, bringing her face close like a flame to a wick, and breathed:

“Good luck~”

Then the red-haired girl kissed the unconscious Tang Coco, like a petal landing on still water.

After nine at night, the sea-side villa held its breath. Gu Xin and Meng Yuting were in Tang Coco’s room. Gu Xin sat by the bed like a lighthouse; Meng Yuting stood at the window, staring into a night as deep as the ocean. Neither spoke. Time trickled away like sand.

“Yuting… will she really wake?”

Gu Xin’s voice was low, a thread pulled tight.

“She will. That little brat wouldn’t lie to us.”

Meng Yuting watched the sky, words steady as a beam.

“Mm…”

Gu Xin lowered her head and looked at the band on her wrist, its glow faint as fireflies.

“Mm~ mm~”

A sound rose from the bed. Pain creased Tang Coco’s perfect face; her brows knit like storm clouds. She shook her head twice, then raised a hand and pressed her forehead.

“Damn… I feel awful… that girl didn’t hold back…”

She opened her eyes. A strange ceiling greeted her, flat as a blank page.

“Where is this?”

Her voice was soft, like a feather landing.

“This is my new home.”

Meng Yuting spoke, calm as glass.

“Huh!?”

The voice at her side snapped her alert. She looked around fast, like a startled bird. Gu Xin and Meng Yuting stood on either side of her, like twin pillars.

“Uh… what are you two doing here?”

Tang Coco braced a forearm, trying to sit. Her body was weak, like water with no vessel. Gu Xin moved and helped her up, gentle as warm hands in winter.

“Th- thanks…”

She sat, then blinked. Something white fringed her vision, like frost on a window. She reached out and touched it—smooth as silk.

This… can’t be…

Dread tugged at her. She reached back, grabbed that white streak, and pulled it forward. She finally saw it clearly.

“Uh… did you two dye my hair?”

She clung to one last hope and asked Gu Xin.

“Sorry. Salons don’t take unconscious customers.”

Gu Xin’s face didn’t change; her words dropped like pebbles.

“…”

Tang Coco fell silent, the air thick as fog.

“What the hell! It changed again!? What am I, a chameleon!?”

Her curse cracked the quiet like thunder.

“Yep~ it really does turn all kinds of colors~”

Meng Yuting’s tone went sing-song, edges sharp as a blade. She sat in front of Tang Coco and caught a fistful of white hair.

“But~ it’s not just the hair~”

She lifted her face closer, smile like a crescent moon.

“This ‘chameleon’ seems to change gender too~”

“!!!!”

Shock crashed through Tang Coco. Her heart lurched; she forced a smile, brittle as glass.

“Ah? Y- Yuting… what are you even saying!”

“You know exactly what I’m saying.”

Meng Yuting locked eyes with her, gaze heavy as stone.

“…”

A knot pulled tight in Tang Coco’s chest. Something was wrong; Meng Yuting knew too much. Her first instinct: don’t explain. She didn’t know the whole situation; words would only tangle. She had to leave.

“Hah… haha… Yuting, don’t joke with me… How are Mu… Muyan and the others? I’ll go check on them…”

She flipped the quilt, slipped around Meng Yuting, and slid off the bed. Gu Xin stood with her head down, thoughts like storm clouds. Seeing that, dread rose sharper in Tang Coco. She moved fast, strength cutting through weakness like a spark through paper.

Her plan shattered an instant later. Bare feet kissed the floor; she headed for the door. Gu Xin moved.

Snap.

Gu Xin grabbed her arm, fast enough to make the air clack.

“Eh?”

The grip was iron. Tang Coco couldn’t break it; surprise flashed in her eyes like lightning.

“Xin… Sister Gu?”

“I have questions for you.”

Gu Xin’s head stayed lowered; her voice was steady, wintry.

“Mm?”

Before Tang Coco could process it, Gu Xin yanked her in. Tang Coco lost balance, pitched toward Gu Xin; Gu Xin caught her shoulders, turned, and shoved her hard, like wind against a reed.

This time, it wasn’t only her hair that had changed. Her body felt different—skin paler than porcelain, presence fragile and delicate. Gu Xin’s push sent her flying.

She fell toward Meng Yuting. Meng Yuting caught her, pivoted like a dancer, and flung her back onto the bed, into the dent she’d left.

“Ah!”

Tang Coco cried out; Meng Yuting didn’t care. She twisted Tang Coco’s arms behind her, then grabbed a rope loop from the nightstand and cinched it around her wrists.

“Hey! What are you doing!”

Tang Coco struggled hard, like a fish on a line. Fresh from waking, with no Anomaly Power, she couldn’t match Meng Yuting’s anger. She tugged and found her wrists bound tight. She tried to sit up and failed, breath ragged.

“Meng Yuting!”

“What did you just call me!?”

Meng Yuting climbed onto the bed and planted both hands beside Tang Coco, caging her like a hawk pinning prey. Her shout cut hot.

“You…”

The burst of anger left Tang Coco stunned; she hadn’t expected this blaze.

“I’m telling you! If you don’t tell us the truth today, you’re not stepping out that door.”

Her words slammed down like a gate.

“Why! What truth!”

Tang Coco tried to wriggle loose with words.

“You don’t know?”

“Do you know how we got through these months?”

“Did you ever think about our feelings?”

Her fury spilled, ignoring the fragile girl beneath her like waves ignoring a shore.

“W- what are you talking about…”

Panic gnawed. Tang Coco hadn’t expected this after waking. What happened while she was out? Every plan lay in pieces.

“Enough! Stop pretending! Tang Ke!!”

The name detonated. Meng Yuting shouted, tears splashing at the corners of her eyes.

“!!!!”

Tang Coco stared up at her, disbelief cracking like ice. Exposed.

“W- what are you saying… wh- what Tang…”

“Don’t take everyone for fools!”

She tried to explain, but Meng Yuting’s words cut her off like a sword.

“I…”

“At Amusement Island, why did you know our favorite ice cream flavors!”

“I… I heard Xiaoxiao say it…”

“No way! I never told Xiaoxiao that!”

“And how do you explain this! The red-haired you already admitted it. This used to be yours—along with your Anomaly Power!”

Meng Yuting held up the earrings, glint like twin moons—the split-piece Tang Ke had given her.

“She… she was lying!”

Tang Coco’s heart skittered; panic churned like a storm tide.

“Fine. Then tell me this. You know Marilyn, right.”

“Marilyn! How do you know her? Did she…”

She remembered the system’s smug promise to take shape.

“She appeared in front of us two days ago.”

Meng Yuting’s voice went low, like thunder sinking.

“Damn. I forgot her.”

The curse hissed through Tang Coco’s mind like steam.

“She told us… that we had a ‘relationship’ with you.”

“!!!!”

That single line split Tang Coco’s last fragile hope.

“So, can you still spin a reason to deny this?”

Meng Yuting cried, tears running like rain.

“I…”

Words died. She hadn’t expected to be cornered like this.

“Why! Why didn’t you contact us!? Because you left, our team broke apart. Lynx is gone now…”

Her voice broke. The name fell like a fallen banner.

“…”

Tang Coco didn’t answer. She turned her face aside, like a flower shutting against wind.

“So in your heart, we never mattered to you at all…”

Meng Yuting’s hurt drifted out, soft as a wound.

“No!!!”

Tang Coco’s shout tore free. Her heart wasn’t like that.

“I…”

Emotion surged, dammed for too long. It burst like a river in flood. She cried out:

“You think I wanted this!”

“You think I didn’t want to contact you!”

“Looking like this, how was I supposed to face you!!!”

Tears finally fell, bright as beads.

“What, a gender change beat you?”

Meng Yuting shouted, heat flaring.

“I… I’m scared…”

Tang Coco choked; the word trembled like a leaf.

“Scared? Scared of what! That we’d dump you? Abandon you? Is our bond that cheap to you!”

“I… it’s not…”

She shook her head. Everything she’d done felt wrong, like walking in fog.

“Even if you turned into a girl, so what? Does becoming a woman mean you’re no longer Tang Ke?”

“Turn into a woman and you stop loving us?” Her voice splintered like glass rimed with frost.

Tears ran down Meng Yuting’s cheeks like rain off a roof as she kept shouting.

“N-no… it’s not like that…” Tang Coco’s words rustled like dry leaves in a cold wind.

Tang Coco shook her head like a startled sparrow and then yelled, her breath bursting like a thunderclap.

“What do you know!? You didn’t live it—what would you know!?” Her fury cracked the air like lightning through a storm cloud.

“As long as the heart still loves, even if you’re neither human nor ghost, we’ll cross this winter river together!” Meng Yuting’s shout burned like a lantern held high in snow.

“I…” The single word guttered like a candle about to die.

Shame flooded Tang Coco first, heavy as a stone sinking in a well, and then her mind went blank like fog over a field.

She felt she’d truly done wrong, a knot tightened in her chest like rope pulled wet and tight in the rain.

She hadn’t thought of anyone else’s feelings, her remorse blooming like bruises beneath pale skin.

“You really let us down…” Meng Yuting’s words fell like a sheet of frost over new grass.

She stood, wiping tears like rain from a window, and stepped off the bed as if pulling roots from wet earth.

“I’m sorry…” Tang Coco stared up at the ceiling like a white sky and spoke with eyes shimmering like wet glass.

“I won’t forgive you. I’ll settle this debt with you.” Meng Yuting’s voice was a cold blade laid on a ledger.

She said it with her back to Tang Coco, a shut door that wouldn’t open to light.

“But before that, the one you owe isn’t me, it’s Gu Xin… After you left, do you even know how much Gu Xin changed?” Her words flowed like a river cut to a new bend by flood.

She spoke to Tang Coco behind her, then walked to the door like a shadow slipping past dawn, and the room emptied like a lake after wind.

…

Hearing Meng Yuting’s words, Tang Coco strained to sit up; with her hands tied behind her like a cruel knot, she rose like a wounded bird fighting its own cage.

She looked at Gu Xin, who stood to the side like a statue in dusk, eyes shut, head bowed, still as stone with shadows pooling like ink at her feet.

“Xin… Xin’er…” Tang Coco’s voice scraped out like a rusted hinge in a silent hall.

Gu Xin didn’t answer; she walked over in slow, steady steps like drums in the dark and stopped beside her.

Her red-rimmed eyes glowed like damp embers as she looked at Tang Coco, breath trembling like a reed in wind.

“Xin’er…”

Smack!

The slap cracked through the room like a snapped branch, and the sound rolled out to the shadowed corner outside, where Meng Yuting crouched and wept like rain beating a cold wall.