Alice in the Land of Steam

Chapter 824: Let’s stay together?
"Originally, Gloria's ability was controllable, but since she was cursed, this ability has been completely out of control. It always changes her identity irregularly and disrupts her original life. Moreover, with the change of identity, Gloria's temperament and behavior style will also change. She must find a way to adapt to her new identity and act in accordance with her background, otherwise the curse will become worse."

Bai Ye explained Gloria's curse to Lingge and others in a cold tone, and also answered a question for the young people.

No wonder Gloria's personality reversal is so drastic. When she is a detective in the Seven Stars District, she gives people a weird and mysterious feeling; but when she transforms into the third princess of the Victorian royal family, she naturally shows a noble and elegant demeanor, which makes the audience admire her acting skills.

But those are not actually Gloria's nature, but the changes in character that come with the change of identity. This girl with gray hair and gray eyes is indeed like a fog, always changing and unpredictable.

"So," Ling Ge thought, "I guess it wasn't Miss Gloria's original intention to sneak into the Witch Society to gather intelligence, right?"

"of course."

The cold arc at the corner of Bai Ye's mouth seemed to move upwards with disdain: "I have said it before, she is essentially a weak, slow-witted, and self-deceiving person. Compared to doing such dangerous things, she would probably prefer to shrink in her tortoise shell for the winter. Everything was fine at the beginning. Sometimes she would become the daughter of a noble family, sometimes she would become a small editor in a newspaper, and sometimes she would even be thrown into some strange religious organizations as a believer... But these are all within the acceptable range. For someone like her who goes with the flow, she gritted her teeth and persevered."

"The most dangerous time was with the Witch Society. Can you imagine that, with her weak and incompetent personality, she was thrown into an organization that controlled the long history of human civilization behind the scenes as a core member, and was also exposed to the secrets of the Girl's Kingdom and the Witch Society's plan to change the world. During that time, she suffered from insomnia almost every day, and was anxious. She was either worried about her identity being exposed or worried that the society would suddenly give her some difficult task. She was as stupid as a squirrel worrying about autumn and falling leaves, and had no idea what the most important thing was. If I hadn't reminded her, she might never have thought of taking the initiative, right?"

Bai Ye's comments on Gloria were still so sharp and harsh, as if he had no concept of mercy. Since this was a matter between two personalities, outsiders were not allowed to comment. Ling Ge did not take it to heart and just asked, "So, the person who really wants to cooperate with us is not Miss Gloria, but you?"

"Because the Witch Society will never let Gloria go, and that little fool actually still has an illusion in his heart, thinking that as long as he changes his identity, he can hide himself in the crowd and not be noticed." Bai Ye said coldly: "After her disguise in the Witch Society was exposed, she lived in Lunweiting for a while with several other disguised identities, but the society never stopped searching for her. As long as she stayed in Lunweiting, it was only a matter of time before she was completely exposed. However, even if she escaped, where could she escape to? The entire Western Continent is the sphere of influence of the society, and Gloria's ability has destined her to be unable to cooperate with others. Organizations like the Thirteen Hermits or the True Spirit Sect, let alone whether they are willing to trust Gloria, before that, whether I can trust them is a problem. In comparison, Mr. Lingge and your group, who are recorded in the association's archives, are a more suitable choice, so I made this plan for Gloria, and it happened that she was randomly assigned the identity of a detective, so she had the right reasons and sufficient initiative to do this. As for the failure of the plan later, it was another matter, which was completely accidental."

But she did not come out to refute it.

No one spoke, and everyone silently looked at Lingge. Alice wanted to jump out and make a few remarks, but Saint Xia Liya strangled her fate and she could not move.

"Now you should understand what kind of person Gloria is. People often say that you should not be deceived by the outside and should pay attention to a person's inner self. But for her, not only is her external identity changeable, but even her inner character is so deceptive. I don't refuse to let Gloria stay on this island. Maybe it's something she wants, because in this way she can put the responsibility of fighting against the Witch Society on you. But I think it's necessary to remind you in advance that if you decide to accept Gloria, you have to endure her changes and impermanence, her weakness and slowness, her self-deceiving thoughts, and the troubles she causes you when she changes her identity from time to time. How do you decide?"

Bai Ye's tone seemed matter-of-fact. She didn't think it was an excuse because it was the truth. Not everyone in her position could do as well as she did, especially when fighting against an enemy like the Witch Society.

"By the way," she smiled faintly, "Gloria can hear everything I say now, and I have never intended to compete with her for control of this body, so if she wants to refute, no one can stop her, not even me."

He stared quietly into the girl's frozen gray eyes. The mist in them was no longer hazy and floating, but had formed transparent crystals like glass balls. He tried to see something from these eyes, but it was ultimately futile. Miss Bai Ye seemed to be better at hiding herself than Miss Gloria. If facing Miss Gloria was like facing mist, unpredictable, then facing her was probably like facing the air. Everyone knew it existed, but was there a way to see her, smell her, or even touch her?

"I don't want to think about these questions, but I always think about them unconsciously; and every time I think about them, I feel more and more empty and confused; the soul born from those emptiness and confusion is me—"

"So?" Bai Ye tilted his head, his tone indifferent: "With your keen sense, you can guess the answer even if I don't say it, right, Mr. Ling? What do you think of the relationship between me and Gloria?"

The surroundings were quiet for a moment, but it was soon broken by a sneer. Bai Ye raised his hands and clapped softly. The clapping sound spread far away in the night of Sky Island: "As expected of you, Mr. Ling."

"It seems interesting to keep changing your identity and experience different lives, but when it becomes an uncontrollable curse, it becomes very cruel." Bai Ye's tone was calm, as if he was talking about something that had nothing to do with him: "Every time you change your identity, your personality will change accordingly. Non-existent memories will suddenly invade your mind, making you feel like you have fallen into another world. You can be the most devout believer one second, and completely deny your faith the next, viewing it as the dregs of society. Not everyone can adapt to this drastic change, and they are more likely to be tortured by it and exhausted, with no way to get rid of it, especially weak and timid people like Gloria."

Bai Ye gently stretched out her hand, and a wisp of gray mist lingered between her fingers, looming: "Mist is the most elusive thing in the world. If you want to catch a wisp of mist, you have to make a thousand times the effort. Do you have the courage and confidence to walk with the mist?"

She emphasized the last three words and made a provocative face at Lingge, trying to irritate him.

"Lingge, you are such an idiot." Before the person concerned could respond, Leticia, who was squatting on the carriage, looked at the young man with disdain: "Bai Ye is Gloria's second personality. You can even forget such a simple thing. You are such an idiot!"

"What about you?" The young man suddenly spoke, but he did not answer, but asked: "You have explained all the questions, but there is still one most crucial question that I have not got the answer to: What is the relationship between you and Miss Gloria?"

After she finished speaking, the atmosphere at the scene fell into a strange silence, especially the shepherdess who had just said that Gloria was not weak. Now she had pursed her lips lightly, with a complicated look in her eyes, and no one knew what she was thinking.

However, such ridicule was very low-level and had no lethality. The battle-hardened Ling Ge naturally ignored it and said, "It sounds natural, but a second personality wouldn't appear for no reason, right? Moreover, according to Miss Bai Ye, even when Miss Gloria controlled this body, you could still communicate with her. You both have your own personalities, memories, and cognition of the world, which are not affected by the other personality at all. This sounds incredible, doesn't it?"

"I don't think you are Miss Gloria's alter ego." Linger said calmly, "You are her curse."

"When these contradictory personalities and conflicting memories are mixed together, people often feel like they are in a bizarre dream. Everything they see is not real, and everything they think will become a bubble. What kind of person do they want to be? How do they feel when they look back at their past selves? Which memories in their minds are real experiences, and which are made up? In the end, there is a mystery that humans cannot solve, the greatest paradox in the history of philosophy, that is: where is the boundary between reality and illusion?"

It sounds like Gloria really didn't play any subjective initiative in Bai Ye's plan, and she has been playing the role of going with the flow. The same is true in the game. She has been fighting according to Bai Ye's instructions, and in the end she couldn't bear the pressure and pushed all the responsibility onto another personality. If there was no Bai Ye, could they really win? When everyone thought of this, this question came to their mind. The answer was obvious, but it couldn't be said out loud.

There was only silence.

No one responded, and the applause gradually died down.

The girl with gray hair and gray eyes put one hand behind her back and the other on her abdomen, bent her knees and performed an elegant greeting, as if she had only taken Lingge seriously until this moment and was willing to give him a serious self-introduction: "I am the flower reflected in the mirror, the bell ringing in the upside-down clock tower, the glass fragments pieced together from countless illusory and blurred dreams, and the night that can be seen in the daytime, so you can call me White Night. Nice to meet you, Mr. Lingge."

……

Bai Ye is not Gloria's second personality. Bai Ye is Gloria's curse, or rather, the embodiment of the curse. This is the first time that everyone has encountered such a special situation. "Now that you know, what should we do?" The girl's eyes were full of sarcasm. "Can you accept Gloria as the young queen, but cannot accept me, a soul born from a curse? In this case, you can try to kill me, and then Gloria's curse may disappear. Of course, there is another possibility that Gloria, the little fool, will also die. The probability is 50-50. Do you have the courage to gamble with poison?"

Not to mention Ling Ge, even Saint Xia Liya frowned deeply when she heard this, thinking that this guy's character was too bad, and he was indeed a soul born from a curse. Ling Ge was about to say something, but he saw the gray-haired girl in front of him trembled suddenly, and then the gray haze in her eyes gradually dissipated and turned back to that hazy color.

"I'm sorry!" The girl bent down without hesitation: "Bai Ye seemed to have said a lot of strange things to you. I'm really sorry. Please don't take it to heart."

"Besides," she looked hesitant as she raised her head, "Although she is very mean, she is actually a good person and has never hurt anyone else. Bai Ye has always been protecting me, and the curse has nothing to do with her..."

"So what she said is true?" Ling suddenly interrupted Gloria.

Gloria was speechless for a moment, and after a long while she slowly said, "Indeed, it is true, but it is not Bai Ye's fault, Mr. Ling? We were able to escape the encirclement of the Witch Society just now, wasn't it thanks to her? Just for this matter, can you please not care about her rude words?"

"That's not what I'm asking." Ling Ge shook his head and said, "What I'm asking is, she just said that you are willing to stay, and she has no objection to you staying, is that true?"

"Uh, yes." Gloria didn't understand why he asked this, but she nodded and admitted it. After all, after tonight's incident, she was also exposed to the vision of the Witch Society. She couldn't do it alone, so she had to act with Lingge and the others... Well, she still couldn't do it, but it was better than acting alone.

Maybe just like Alice said, Lingge will gather the seven kingships of order, open the door of the Holy Temple of Heaven, and ask the great goddess of creation to solve all problems?

The girl still has such a beautiful wish in her heart.

"Then stay." Ling said.

"Eh?" Gloria didn't react for a moment and blinked: "What?"

"You and Bai Ye, stay here together." The young man repeated what he had just said, and then turned around to ask the others: "What do you think?"

The young queens naturally welcomed them with raised hands. Nevile shrugged indifferently. Shesta said with a smile, "This will make the hotel more lively." Alice shouted with full energy, "I have no objection!"

Then he lowered his voice and muttered, "It would have been better to do this at the beginning. Why do you have to expose someone's scars before inviting them? I suspect you are doing PUA, Lingge."

Linger glared at her quietly, and when he looked away, his expression had returned to calm: "That's it, everyone has no objection, Miss Gloria, and Miss Bai Ye, you should be able to hear it, in short, you are welcome to join..."

“Gransefa Air Cavalry! Ahhhh, wait, Xiaoxia, don’t, don’t grab your throat! I, I can’t breathe… Save, save me, Shesta…”

"Oh, I don't know how serious Miss Livia's injury is. I'll go back and take a look."

"I should go back and clean the wine utensils, too."

"Then I'll go too... Hey, Sister Rorona, do you want me to help you take this carriage back to the workshop? I'm not sleeping anyway, so staying up late is just for fun. But, this..."

"Alice, that's very noisy. You deserve it."

"Leticia, you should go back to bed. Good children should go to bed early and get up early."

"Good~"

"You can go to class early tomorrow."

“Ugu!?”

Yunjingkong Island is still very lively tonight.

Gloria watched the noisy scene with a smile on her face. She did not find it noisy. On the contrary, she felt a little envious. She silently said in her heart: "Everyone seems to be getting along well. We will also be members of this island in the future. We must get along well with everyone. Bai Ye, stop saying those weird things."

After a moment of silence in my mind, I heard a disdainful snort: "A bunch of idiots."

"Eh……"

"Except that guy."

"what?"

　Give me some meow
　　
　
(End of this chapter)