No language could describe the bizarre scene before him.
There was no way anyone could see her with normal vision but Xia Lei could see her with his X-ray vision. If one were to argue that ghosts exist, then how could one explain how Xia Lei had never seen a ghost in two years of using his X-ray vision but was seeing Princess Yongmei right now?
But if ghosts didn’t exist, then what was she doing before him?
In that instant, Xia Lei felt like his imagination had expanded to its very maximum but was still not enough. The truth behind Princess Yongmei’s existence aside, he didn’t even dare believe it was real!
The air seemed to freeze and stop moving. Light from the lamps shone and the shadow beneath Xia Lei’s feet did not waver.
Xia Lei looked at Princess Yongmei and Princess Yongmei looked back at him. Their gazes seem to cross two different dimensions to meet, to mingle.
After a longer period of looking, Xia Lei begun to feel like Princess Yongmei’s body was real.
“I remember your face.” Princess Yongmei’s voice came clearly from her pink lips.
This line again. She’d said this line the most.
Her words jolted Xia Lei back to his senses. He looked at the camera on the wall out of the corner of his eye, then turned and headed for the door.
Xia Lei looked back once he was out the door. He was still using his X-ray vision and he saw Princess Yongmei follow. Xia Lei thought she would come floating over like those ghosts in movies but she did not. She walked on the floor with her legs in an elegant and mesmerising way.
Princess Yongmei quickly came to the glass door. The door had shut automatically behind Xia Lei and she looked like she was going to hit it. Xia Lei felt an impulse to reach out and open the door for her but the impulse flashed past and he did not act on it.
And in that instant, Princess Yongmei went soundlessly through the glass door to appear before Xia Lei again.
“I’ve waited for you for so long…”
Xia Lei resisted the urge to speak to her and turned to walk to the room he had occupied the last time he was here.
Princess Yongmei followed, as elegant and mesmerising as ever. She seemed neither shy nor ashamed about her body.
Meanwhile, in a secret office in the military base, Ling Han and a few elderly gentlemen watched a wall of monitors closely. One of those monitors showed Xia Lei walking slowly, as if his steps were heavy with thoughts.
It was not just this scene. All of Xia Lei’s time in the laboratory had been recorded too and nothing was left out.
“Why did he leave?” An elderly gentleman broke the silence in the office.
“Don’t know,” said another elderly gentleman, “But he was acting a little strange in the research laboratory. He looked at those two pieces of alloy and the bronze book, then looked about… Did he discover something?”
“What can he discover? There’s nothing in the research area. If there were something then we would have discovered it too.”
“Could he have gone mad?”
“Maybe something really did go wrong with him. His movements are a little strange. Weren’t the initial signs of madness in those scientists looking about and talking to themselves?”
“Let’s not make any conclusions yet and keep watching,” said Ling Han.
“What should we do if he really has gone mad?” said the elderly gentleman who had spoken first.
Ling Han wrinkled his brows. “If he’s gone mad then who’s still going to come study that mysterious alloy and that unsolvable bronze book? Give him some time. We need to put some trust in him.”
“It’s not that I don’t trust him. First, he’s not an archaeologist and second, he is not a material science expert. Mr Ling, I don’t know why you suggested having Xia Lei to take over the research work of the mysterious alloy but from what I see this will be a fruitless endeavour,” said one.
“True. He is an amateur. What is he using in his research?” said another.
Ling Han did not seem bothered. “Because the people who have interacted with the mysterious alloy have either died or gone mad. By ‘interact’, I mean ‘touched with bare hands’. Shi Boren does not count. I’ve asked him and he said that Xia Lei had handed it to him wrapped in cloth. He only opened the cloth to look inside and handed it to Scholar Wang right after he returned. But Xia Lei was the first person to excavate that piece of alloy. Who knows how many times he’s touched it but he’s completely fine.”
“What are you trying to say, Mr Ling?” asked someone.
Ling Han spoke evenly, “Our experts have exhausted all methods and instruments but are no closer to finding out what the mysterious alloy is made of, nor achieved any result. Perhaps we should look at this problem from another angle. Not all the questions on this Earth can be answered with scientific knowledge. Besides, our scientific knowledge is not as great as we’d imagined. There is still no definitive answer for the origin of the universe, or even us, human beings. You are all scholars of the Academy of Sciences so you may not approve of what I’m saying but you cannot deny this truth.”
So these elderly gentlemen were scientific scholars!
The scholars looked at each other and they all fell silent.
It was true - if scientific knowledge and instruments were of any use then they would already have had some result with the resources they had here, but there was none. What was worse was that precious talent had lost lives and gone mad, and the cause could not be found!
Ling Han’s gaze swept over the scholars and he said, “Scholars, I am putting my life in danger by presiding over this matter so I have my own opinions, of course. And you have to know that I had Xia Lei come here with the aim of protecting you all. I know you want to unravel the secrets of the bronze book and the mysterious alloy but you know what the result is if you come into contact with that alloy.”
“Never mind.” An elderly scientist sighed. “We trust you, Mr Ling. Let’s give that Xia Lei some time.”
A faint smile appeared in the corners of Ling Han’s lips. It was no easy task to persuade these elderly scientists.
On the monitor just then, Xia Lei opened the door to a room and walked in. He was lost from sight when the door closed behind him.
“Are there no cameras in the room?” asked an elderly scientist.
Ling Han shook his head. “No cameras. It is a private room so how can we install cameras?”
“What did he go in there for?” asked someone.
No one could answer that.
Ling Han took out his mobile phone to call Long Bing but he stopped after taking it out. He knew that Xia Lei had not allowed Long Bing to enter the research area, so Xia Lei would know that he was being watched if Long Bing went in to see what he was doing.
It would be a disaster if Xia Lei was angered and washed his hands off this.
Xia Lei used his left eye to do a quick sweep of the room and he relaxed only after he confirmed that there were no cameras or listening devices. He turned just in time to see Princess Yongmei pass through the door and enter the room.
The light in the room was a little better and Princess Yongmei looked more real. It looked like the flesh on her was warm.
Princess Yongmei stopped in her tracks before Xia Lei, leaving just 30 centimetres between them.
Xia Lei could not feel Princess Yongmei’s breathing even though they were so close.
She did not say anything this time but just looked at Xia Lei.
“Who are you?” asked Xia Lei probingly; he kept his voice low.
“I remember your face.” Princess Yongmei spoke, but it was the same line.
Xia Lei frowned. “So what if you remember? I’m asking who you are.”
“I’ve waited for you for so very long…”
Xia Lei paused. This incongruous answer was not what he wanted. He had thought hard about how to lure Princess Yongmei over to figure out what she was, and he’d even hoped to gain some information on the alloy and bronze book from her but it now looked like she was only capable of saying these two lines. She was like a broken record!
Xia Lei tried another question after some thought. “Where are your clothes?”
“I remember your face.”
“There’s a fly on your butt.”
“I’ve waited for you for so very long…”
“I am your father, Emperor Yongle.”
“I remember your face.”
Xia Lei was speechless.
There was no sense in asking any further questions in this situation.
Xia Lei was then struck by a thought. He immediately reached out to grab Princess Yongmei’s arm. She did not dodge but his hand grabbed empty air. He stared blankly at the closed fist in Princess Yongmei’s arm, and felt like he was in a dream.
He did not manage to grab anything but the fist that was in her arm felt especially cold. He was able to bear it for the first few seconds but he quickly could not and he hurriedly withdrew his hand.
“This… Could she be a type of ability?” Xia Lei was gobsmacked.
Princess Yongmei flickered, then suddenly disappeared into thin air.
Xia Lei looked about for her but could not see her.
‘It looks like I’ll have to gather all the components before I can solve the mysteries of the alloy and bronze book. I wonder where they’ve sent this expert group?’ Xia Lei’s head was full of guesses.
A voice suddenly came from the speaker system outside the room door. “Mr Xia, please come up to the surface.”
Xia Lei’s train of thought was interrupted. He replayed the voice he had heard in his head and quickly thought of a person.
Ling Han. What was he doing here?