Gold Heart, Warm Soul

27| Dead ends

The prophecy book was nothing special. There were a lot of blank pages in it and most of the words were in an ancient language I could not understand. It was brought to the temple to be inspected and the Lou family had already check all the records to find where the book originated, however, there were no leads. The book didn't have a record on who the author was. It was a week after the incident, that the book was burned to ashes in the midst of returning the book to me. No one knew how the book caught fire. It was a mystery. The priests said it could be a warning of sort. The priestess had already confirmed the curse affecting me and had proceeded to give me protection charms to keep me away from harm. All the families had a meeting to stop the curse and started their research on how to recreate the jade that stored the old King's spirit energy. They were running against time as they said it had already been weeks since the jade was destroyed by Xia Lin, however Titus believes that Xia Lin probably worked for someone to destroy the Jade. Now we had to find the perpetrator. I have a sneaking suspicion that the jade was a fake. What would Xia Lin gained by destroying the Jade? There were many loopholes in Xia Lin's actions. What was her ulterior motive. Something did not sit right with me.

I lying on heated futon wasting time and napping. Everyone was in the meeting room and discussing on their next move. Even though I was dragged into the mess, I don't feel the need to do much. I had lost my motivation. The curse was still progressing and I would have still died after 5 years. In my past life, the Jade wasn't destroyed since Xia Lin stayed with Titus, so I couldn't have had the misfortune. Everything was a puzzle with missing pieces. Recently, I gained back the fuzzy memory of the incident in high school. I was backstabbed by friend A and became an outcast. Somehow, I found out evidence for the incident and I was cleared from all misunderstanding. At that time, I have lost all trust in all my friends, realising that they stuck up to me because I was from an influential family. I became even cautious when associating with people and trying to figure out people's ulterior motive in approaching me. Then, I lost all my sociability. The weird thing was that the evidence was just suddenly sent to my house address in the mail. Someone must have helped me, but who? I have a gut feeling it might have been Ethan. He's really good at finding these things. If he didn't decide to pursue the Zhang Family Business, he could be a talented lawyer.

"Hey, what are you doing here," Ethan asked me. "Hmmm, sleeping," I lazily mumbled. "You're not sleeping. I can hear you talking," he said teasingly. "I'm sleepwalking."
"Really, you can answer my questions while you're sleeping?"
"Yeah I have super powers."
"Alright. Alright. Get up. Let's eat lunch."
"I'm not hungry," I mumbled adamantly with my eyes still closed. I could feel my arm being tugged and in a second I felt my hold body flipped over like a sack over Ethan's shoulder. The shock filled my body and I didn't have a chance to screamed.
"That's rude, Ethan! You're supposed to treat girls with care," I argue while my head is still spinning from the sudden movement and my eyes fixated on Ethan's bum.
"Then stop be a lazy cat!" Ethan vocalised while slapping my butt.
"Hey!!!" I shouted with surprise. "I thought you were a gentleman."
"You can share," he shrugged his shoulders and could feel myself sliding down and losing friction. Ethan hoist me up to keep me from falling. I could tell we were going to kitchen from the way he trudged the floor.

As I was placed carefully on a chair, I noticed the dining table already had dishes out. I was given a plate and instinctively I started piling food onto it. Ethan smiled at me and shook his head, seeing how I react so quickly with food. "We found a way to store the King's SP. (AN: SP= spirit energy) Thankfully the priest had recorded some of the text from the prophecy book. It doesn't have to be a physical object. It could be passed onto humans, more specifically god-blessed human beings." "By god-blessed, you mean like the priest and priestess." "Yes. And it can be passed to another, if anyone died. A ritual has to be done. Once the SP is stabilised the curse can slowly start to residue and balance can go back," Ethan stated enthusiastically. "Hmm~" I continued munching on food. "Why are you acting like that?" Ethan arc his eyebrow questioningly. Even that look on him made him look handsome. I shook my head to get rid of my thoughts. "Like what?" I innocently said.
"Like you don't care." He places his chopsticks on the table. "Do you believe in reincarnation?" "Hu- What?" The topic change must have bewildered Ethan. I snickered lightly. Even I can't get my head around reincarnating. My past life might have all just been a dream while I was in coma, but it doesn't makes sense since I remember it so realistically and I could even feel it in my soul that all I experience was very real. "Maybe. Since SP exists in our world," Ethan finally responded to me. "What if I told you I was reincarnated?"
"I'd believe you."
"Why"
"Because I know you."
"But that doesn't justify it."
"Maybe because I'm bias, but I love you. So I'd believe you if you told me anything bizarre," Ethan said truthfully and I could tell it was sincere. Without my control, my cheeks decided to heat up. I averted my eyes and silence overwhelmed us.
"You don't have to reply me yet," he softly said. I nodded my head and just like that I told Ethan about my past life. I told him about the obsession I had with Titus. I told him about my downfall. Or how I was hospitalised and became outcasted from everyone. How I've never seen him throughout my past life, like he disappeared from the Earth. And how I died. It was a long story.

"Alright.... I believe you," Ethan told me after my long speech. It must have been overwhelming to be told so much. I told only Ethan and not even my family. It was annoyingly comforting how I trust him so easily.
"I have a theory," he cautiously suggested.
"About my past life?"
"Yes. I don't think that life was yours or more specially it's not really reincarnation."
"What do you mean?" I was confused.
"Did you ever realised why you woke up back in coma instead of restarting your life. Reincarnation is like a restart button. You would have to restart your life back to when your were born as baby. But you started back up from your coma. Not as a baby but an adult."
"Yeah I did think that it was weird. Why wasn't I reborn instead, but I restarted from after the coma," I agreed with Ethan as I understood where he was coming from. Besides he was more of a psychological expert than I am.
"I think while you were in coma, you went to another dimension. More accurately, something like an alternate dimension. Of course some events were similar. Technically you were the same person," Ethan explained slowly.
"You mean my soul went to another my body from another dimension."
"Yes. Have you ever wondered why you were so obsess with Titus. From what I know about you, you didn't have an obsessive infatuation with Titus. Yes you have some feelings, but it's more like looking up to a person? Almost like you idolised my brother, but not romantic feelings."
As I thought more about it, what Ethan said was true. When did I have an obsessive nature towards Titus. Even when I was in high school, I treated him just like my brother. I did look up to him, but I never developed romantic feelings. Also in my past life, some things were different. Like how I've never had contact with Felicia at all. How I was so sociable even after the incident in high school, as if I didn't go through the incident at all. It was like some events didn't occur at all. That must be why it took some time for me to remember the high school incident in this life.