"Perhaps you should devour something ...... devour, absorb ...... "
"Bored? You should not have emotions ...... virus invasion ...... "
"He is about to collapse ...... "
Jiang Yan woke up with a start, sweat covering his forehead.
Sunlight filtered through the sheer curtains, spilling across the floor. Scarlet rose petals were scattered over the pure white carpet before the bed.
He had another nightmare.
Recently, he had been having nightmares almost every day. Although the contents were different each time, they all seemed to be connected to the same thing.
Yet whenever Jiang Yan woke and tried to grasp the fleeting threads of his dreams, he could remember nothing. Only the gray data panel in his mind reminded him that his world had become abnormal.
However, the usually delicate and timid little prince was eerily calm and strong about it, which even Jiang Yan himself found strange.
According to what he knew of himself, he should have thrown himself into the arms of his giant fiancé the first time he had a nightmare, crying and seeking comfort. Then, with his lover by his side, he would have turned to his elder sister, the great Elven Queen, for help, and finally accepted the purification of the Mother Tree, surrounded by the soothing presence of family and friends.
In reality, he had done none of this.
For the first time, Jiang Yan felt he might not truly understand himself.
He took deep breaths to calm his racing heart. The obedient black hair on his forehead was damp with sweat, and his crystal blue eyes were misty like glass candy.
Instinctively, he reached to his side, but the spot where his fiancé should have been lying, large as a small mountain, was empty. Only then did he notice the sound of running water coming from the bathroom.
Jiang Yan subconsciously wanted to call out his fiancé’s name, to ask for an embrace as usual, but stopped a second later.
He hesitated, then sat up and leaned against the headboard, quietly watching the sunlight spill across the windowsill while listening to the sound of water from the bathroom.
In truth, the abnormalities in his world were not limited to his forgotten nightmares or the strange panel in his mind.
It began when his new human friend Jian Hou approached him in shock, asking how it was possible that Jiang Yan had been on Yu Xiu’s bed one moment, appeared in the academy grove rejecting Cao Youfeng’s confession the next, and then, less than ten minutes later, returned to Yu Xiu’s side holding a completed wedding invitation.
"Is this some kind of special elven magic? Teleportation? I thought elves could only fly!" Jian Hou had stared at him with wide eyes.
Jiang Yan fell silent. Because that entire afternoon, he had been with his lover and had never left his side.
After that, as the wedding day drew near, such events happened more and more often. People claimed to see him in different places at the same time, even though he had never left the library or Yu Xiu’s castle. Strangely, no one seemed to find this odd except his human friends.
"A duplicate body."
Three days ago, Jiang Yan and his human friends gathered in the library to discuss this strange phenomenon.
Although Jiang Yan had never actually seen another version of himself, the situation was far too bizarre. He once suspected that it might be because of the evil god’s bloodline within him, that perhaps the sleeping, terrifying deity was about to awaken. But when he sought the Mother Tree’s help, that possibility was denied.
Although the sleeping evil god was indeed showing signs of awakening, those other "Jiang Yans" appearing everywhere had nothing to do with it.
Because of this, Jiang Yan had tried to seek help from his academy teachers, his sister, and his fiancé. Strangely, they all seemed unable to hear his words or see his confusion, as if this matter did not exist in their world at all.
Fortunately, his three human friends were different. They were just as puzzled as he was.
"Dual existence is an urban legend in the human world. It means that there is another person who looks exactly like you. Strictly speaking, they are not a person, but more like your shadow," Cao Youfeng explained.
When Jiang Yan said he had never rejected Cao Youfeng’s confession, Cao Youfeng’s eyes briefly lit up. But Jian Hou quickly extinguished his hope by saying Jiang Yan had been with Yu Xiu the entire afternoon.
Even so, Cao Youfeng was still willing to help. It was not because of some foolish chivalry, but because Jiang Yan’s abnormality had affected them too. That same mysterious gray-and-white panel had quietly appeared in their minds.
"Everyone has their own duplicate. You live in different spaces and, in theory, should never meet in this lifetime," Cao Youfeng continued.
"In human legends, it is said that when someone’s duplicate appears near them, it means they are being replaced by their duplicate. When someone sees their duplicate with their own eyes, it means they are about to die."
Then, Cao Youfeng tried to comfort Jiang Yan. "Fortunately, you have not seen yours yet."
Jiang Yan blinked and said, "I have."
"What?!"
Cao Youfeng, Tao Shi, and Jian Hou all exclaimed together.
"And they were not just one of me," Jiang Yan hesitated. "There were many."
Many.
As if the Creator, after making Jiang Yan, loved him so much that He copied and pasted him many times over. Or perhaps Jiang Yan himself was the one copied from someone else.
His human friends were shocked and began frantically searching human texts for answers.
Although those other "Jiang Yans" caused him some trouble, such as agreeing to things on his behalf and making him accidentally break promises, they had not caused any real harm. Still, the world was clearly not normal, and no one knew what might happen next.
In truth, what Jiang Yan had not told his human friends was that it was not only he who was abnormal, but also his husband.
The sound of running water from the bathroom pulled Jiang Yan back from his thoughts. He got out of bed barefoot, stepped onto the soft white carpet, and carefully approached the bathroom. Everything in a giant’s room was enormous.
To make things easier for his elven fiancée, the giant had thoughtfully replaced all the door handles with ones suited to his smaller size, even though Jiang Yan had repeatedly said that he could simply fly.
Jiang Yan pushed the bathroom door open slightly and peeked through the crack. Amid the rolling white steam, black tentacles were twisting behind the frosted glass screen.
Yes, tentacles.
There were indeed races on the continent that had tentacles, such as certain kin of the merfolk like squids or octopuses. When they came ashore and intermarried with other races, their children sometimes inherited tentacles.
But no matter what, as the pure-blooded crown prince of the giants, Yu Xiu should not have had tentacles. Especially black ones, impure and filthy.
Jiang Yan took a deep breath, his blue eyes darkening, and silently returned to bed. For the first time, he felt that Yu Xiu’s habit of replacing door handles had not been pointless. At least now his wings would not make any sound that might alert him.
Lying back on the bed, Jiang Yan stared blankly at the ceiling. Reason told him that he should tell someone, or at least ask his human friends for help. But he did not.
No one knew better than he, who had once been tainted by an evil god, what black tentacles represented. So, after only a brief hesitation, he chose to protect his fiancé without hesitation.
What bothered Jiang Yan even more, however, was Yu Xiu’s concealment. Yu Xiu clearly knew about his tentacles and knew that it was not normal. Otherwise, he would not have hidden it so carefully every time Jiang Yan tried to bring it up.
Jiang Yan wanted to talk to Yu Xiu honestly about it, but he never found the chance. Yu Xiu seemed to sense that Jiang Yan knew something and deliberately avoided the subject.
They were lovers, and after marriage, husbands. The most important things for lovers were loyalty and honesty. Yu Xiu was clearly not honest with him. Yu Xiu was always like this.
At that thought, Jiang Yan froze. Why did he think that Yu Xiu was always like this? Since they started dating, Yu Xiu had never hidden anything from him, except for this. But recently, Jiang Yan often felt that Yu Xiu had always had these flaws, as if they had been married for many years already.
Just then, Yu Xiu came out of the bathroom wrapped in a bath towel. Sunlight glimmered on the droplets running down his perfect muscles and disappearing into his abdomen, a sight that made one’s mouth go dry.
The moment he saw his lover half-sitting on the bed, he pounced like a large dog, pulled him into his arms, inhaled his scent like a cat, kissed him hard on the face, shared a long and lingering kiss, then flipped over so the little elf lay completely on top of him.
He rubbed his chin against the elf’s soft hair, absentmindedly teasing the transparent wings that looked like sugar paper, and asked gently,
"Want your husband to carry you for a bath?"
Jiang Yan shook his head. He turned over, lying on top of Yu Xiu, quietly gazing into his eyes. The deep green eyes were like a swamp in the heart of a forest, hiding dark and dangerous undercurrents.
Reason told Jiang Yan that if he kept digging deeper, his current world would probably be destroyed. He would likely lose his peaceful life, his kind and loyal friends, his loving mentors, and his affectionate lover.
He should remain silent, immersed in this world of sunlight and flowers, until he fell asleep forever in his lover’s arms and returned to the embrace of the Mother Tree.
But....
Jiang Yan decided to shatter it all himself. He needed the truth, just as he demanded honesty from Yu Xiu.
He needed to know what the gray-and-white panel in his mind was, why his three human friends remained unchanged as if bound by some unseen force, what those countless "selves" appearing endlessly were, and who his husband truly was.
Jiang Yan took a deep breath. He looked into his lover’s eyes and slowly said ......