The curtain lifted: the message was from Yekase herself.

The number was masked like a face behind gauze, but the origin doesn’t lie. Her own phone pinged Jiang Bailu at ten thirty during the big break.

She’d asked Bailu to come warn her, and left a self-tag like a pinned badge: [doctor].

Peel the edit history, like bark off time.

First edit time…

[September 2, 10:58 PM.]

Second day of school— the day she visited the swim club, a memory beading like dew.

She had no memory of writing such a text; a prickle of dread first, then logic saying it was fine.

That night? She wandered a nearby park alone, sat on a bench, watched city lights spill down the mountain like a river, did nothing, then went home.

Good. At least the night’s search site stood like a flag in mist.

Back in class, Ling Yi bragged she’d memorized the meanings of the first five runes, a cat showing trophies, and spooked Yekase. Only then did she wonder what that stranger wanted.

“Oh, she probably had the wrong person. We talked like mismatched keys and locks, and she left.”

No need to drag them into Yekase’s riddle, like pulling chicks into a storm. Realistically, they couldn’t help.

Anyway, stash the phone and unroll the scroll, like old silk breathing…

“Wait… why is there another one?”

In Drafts— another message, half-built like a bridge over fog.

[to: Father]

[August 27, 2012,]

[one minute before 3 p.m.,]

[you were with us.]

...?

... …

…?!?!

[Father]—?!

Her father was in their hometown, a regular white-collar, like a desk plant under fluorescent lights.

At that time, no way he stood beside her in Twin Towers City. No reason, no route— wings don’t sprout from stone; this wasn’t mere memory erasure.

And it says “us.” At 3 p.m. on August 27, she’d likely just rolled from bed to brush her teeth, a lone toothbrush in a glass.

Send… and see?

Her thumb trembled like a wind-tossed leaf and tapped send.

[Send failed. Recipient number is out of service.]

…ah.

A fifty-something elite office worker forgetting to top up, like a wallet left in rain— sure.

Normal, my foot! Why’s it out of service! Is that why it didn’t send! Dad, what are you doing!

“Yekase?”

“Just a sec!”

The text wouldn’t go, and his state was a fogged window. What now? Her chest tightened like string on a bow.

She wasn’t a demon. Even if she’d run off and skipped New Year’s fireworks, she wasn’t heartless enough to watch her over-fifty dad play disappearance, like shadows swapping masks.

Maybe she had to— after a long drought— call home and draw water from that well.

Gulp.

She swallowed; nerves rose like chill mist around reeds.

“You two keep going… I’ll make a quick call.”

Seeing her solemn face like a closed fan, the sisters stayed quiet and traded a glance.

Lunch break still had time. She returned to the Tech Corner and perched like a sparrow.

She typed the number. Her thumb hovered, unwilling to dive, like a hawk over dark water.

Home… is it still the one she knows, a roof against rain?

Parents… still the pair she knows, two lamps in the night?

“Tss… hoo…”

She drew a long breath and pressed the call, like diving into a cold lake.

After a short busy tone, a familiar voice threaded through the speaker, thin but recognizable, like silk tugged through a ring.

“Hello?”

Her hand froze mid-lift, iced like winter bark.

“Uh… it’s Yekase, right? Mom, did you delete my contacts?”

“Yekase?”

That echo stalled her heartbeat for a beat. Her body plunged into an ice pit, and her eyes skittered like startled fish, landing on a shelf: Why Penguins’ Feet Don’t Freeze.

“Ah? Eh?…”

“Miss, you dialed wrong, right? This is the Liu household. Auntie has only one daughter, named Liu RuoYuan.”

“I didn’t—”

…Right! Her surname Ye— wasn’t that hers? Are both memory and name counterfeit, like paper seals pasted over a door?

Her pupils quaked like an earthquake under glass.

V3? Is this the Danganronpa V3 set, a stage with black curtains? Was she force-fed a name and role, tossed into a sealed lab to fend like a rat?

“Then… I’ve got to have a mom, right?!”

“Then go find your mother.”

“You are my mom!”

“Little girl…”

The voice paused, a reed bending in wind.

“Your voice is lovely, but you can’t pretend someone’s mother to scam living expenses, like picking pockets in daylight.”

“I’m not, I didn’t— my allowance’s fine!— Wait, why am I being treated like a scammer?!”

Huh? Huh?

Is this the price for too many lies, smoke eating its own tail? In the end, did she fool even herself and lie her mother away, like a bridge burned behind her?

Yekase felt her defenses crack, a faultline through bone. Not the guilt she never felt when lying, not the anger when lied to— a primal fear gnawing the marrow, her self teetering like a cliff edge.

“Anyway, be a good person from now on. Goodbye.”

Beeep—

The call cut, clean as a blade through rain.

Yekase stood dumbfounded, mute as stone.

How did things… twist like this, a river suddenly changing course?

In one noon’s span, she lost father and mother, two stars doused. Not gone— they refused to know her, like doors bolted from inside.

“Yekase…”

Ling Yi edged to her side, footsteps careful as on frost.

“I, heard… a little.”

Yekase looked at her with a face she couldn’t manage, features adrift like leaves on water.

“Even if family doesn’t want you… don’t be afraid. If I talk to my folks, they’ll take you in, like opening a warm kitchen.”

“Uh?… Ah?”

Eh? So it’s already this bad, like a boat drifting from shore?

“I’m serious! Yaya will welcome you too.” Ling Yi wrapped her tight, arms like a blanket. “You make little inventions, right? If money’s not tight, hope’s bigger! Even living alone isn’t impossible, like a room with your own light…”

“Mm…”

She still couldn’t grasp the sky of it, but Ling Yi’s goodwill sank warm, like tea into cold hands.

She lifted her arms and hugged back. At the corridor’s edge, they held tight, two reeds in wind.

“Ling Yi, I need to tell you something. It’ll sound absurd, like birds singing at midnight, but please believe me.”

“Mm-hm?”

“The world we’re in was likely altered by someone, a chessboard rearranged by hidden hands.”

“?”

“Memory versus fact. Memory versus memory— I’ve seen too many collisions, like waves breaking on cliffs. Chance and illusion won’t cover it. When Occam’s razor fails, only deduction remains.”

“Deduction…?”

“Rule out the impossible, and what’s left is truth, a stone in the stream.”

Her voice steadied, a pond settling after wind.

Ling Yi half-understood, a joke blooming like a flower and then folding. But the will in Yekase’s tone shone like steel; she chose to believe.

“Changed… what parts? Maybe we aren’t high schoolers. Maybe we aren’t Ling Yi and Yekase, names like masks.”

“That’s possible.”

“Uh, wow…”

“Hard to believe?”

“To believe that takes courage, like stepping into night. But I trust the Yekase who stood up to the Sinister Organization won’t lack it.”

Ling Yi leaned to her ear, breath like a warm ember:

“What a coincidence. When it comes to courage, I don’t lack much either.”

…

“Ha…”

Yekase’s mouth found a curve, laughter like bells.

“Hahahaha! Alright. Let’s begin— today, we find every suspicious clue in the school, like lanterns in fog.”

They let go and high-fived, a crack like a spark.

“Alright! I’ll take the Technology Building and Activity Hall. You hit the field and gym. If we find anything, we’ll meet at the little observatory…”

“No need— just ping me. I have an off-campus site to check first, a stone I must turn.”

“Skipping class?”

“I’ll be back before dismissal. It’s my first day in the Bird Study Club, after all.”

She chose Bird Study Club and handed in the form, a choice weighed like scales. Not love— just pros and cons. A boring choice; she never expected much fun from clubs.

“Then go get ’em.”

Yekase waved, slipped downstairs in the tail end of lunch, like a fish slipping current.

Past the gate, her goal was clear— the walking-park she’d wandered two nights ago, a path like a memory thread.

Maybe something happened there, ink dropped in water.

If it isn’t wholly erased, even spider-silk traces can be a true step forward, a foot on solid rock.

“…I’m in.”

Two simple words, tinged with nostalgia like old incense under rafters.

She smiled and pulled out her phone to check the route, pixels like fireflies…

“—Uh? Twenty kilometers away?!”

How did her past self “take a walk” that far, like legs sprouting wheels?!

“Oh! Memory deletion… right… another erased clue…” A bead of cold sweat slid down her brow like rain; she propped herself up on that flimsy excuse.

Looks like she had to ride. Thankfully, the city’s veins run fast like rivers; transfers came quick.

An hour later, she hopped off the bus and stepped into the free civic park, leaves murmuring overhead.

Several times, roadside police asked why a student was strolling on a Thursday, eyes like lanterns. She bluffed through, no harm. Yet, though she lied as usual, noon had left a grit of guilt under her eyelid, a feeling new as first frost.

No good, Yekase. You can’t fight like this. Put on your shameless mask, iron skin against rain—

“This should be it.”

She finally stopped.

A shaded jogging path stretched ahead, trees thick on both sides, pulsing with life like green arteries.

Beside it, a steep slope climbed. From below, only the rail showed like a spine. Cars and motorbikes slid past inside the rail, their hum like bees. Hard to tell if that upper side still counted as park.

On September 2, she drifted here, aimless as a leaf— or so the surviving memory paints it.

Then, something happened, a scene plucked away like a page torn— already erased from her mind.

And from September 3 on, the world shifted, like a compass needle forced east.