They booked a private room at the hotel. After the dishes were served, they asked the waiter to leave. During the meal, Yu Yi casually asked, “Lin Bai, can’t your stolen terminal be located? Have you tried contacting Xia Xuanxuan?”
Lin Bai shook his head, “The less contact I have with her now, the better. We should no longer have any intersection.”
Yu Yi nodded and stopped asking.
As they ate and chatted, Yu Yi steered the conversation towards time paradoxes.
Lin Bai had previously said that time reversal was absolutely forbidden, that she couldn’t change events that had already occurred in her time-space. But when she had asked Lin Bai to send another executor back a year ago to warn her father, he had said:
“If I really find an executor to complete this mission, it would change many things in this time-space. Setting aside other changes, the biggest change for you would be that you wouldn’t enter the brothel, wouldn’t be desperate enough to want to commit suicide, the system wouldn’t choose you, and I wouldn’t have met you. This means this current commission wouldn’t exist.”
Lin Bai, having drunk some alcohol, was more talkative than usual: “If a person changes the past, some events that were supposed to happen won’t happen, some people who were supposed to meet won’t meet, and vice versa. Some events that weren’t supposed to happen might occur. A simple example: if someone goes back in time and changes their parents’ experiences, causing them to not give birth to him, that person would disappear because they would never be born.”
“
Yu Yi asked in surprise, “Would the person themselves disappear? Just like that? What about the people who knew him? Wouldn’t they find it strange? Or would they just think he went missing?”
Lin Bai shook his head firmly, “No, no. People who knew him wouldn’t remember such a person ever existed. He would completely vanish, not just from the world, but from everyone’s memories, without leaving a trace. Because…”
He paused and continued, “He was never born in the first place. So, if such a change involves people who significantly influence historical development, it could cause major historical changes and serious chain reactions. In the most extreme cases, it could even affect other time-spaces. Although such situations are rare, to prevent these catastrophic chain reactions, the bureau has strictly forbidden such actions. If discovered, it results in lifelong exile.”
Yu Yi pondered for a moment and asked, “If he has disappeared, how can they exile him?”
Lin Bai also thought about it, then slapped the table and laughed loudly, “Right! Isn’t this a huge loophole? Haha, but would there be someone in the world who would do something that makes themselves disappear?”
Yu Yi smiled, “Probably not.”
Meng Qing, supporting his head with his hand and watching them discuss this topic, asked impatiently, “Are we here to eat or to hold an academic conference?”
Lin Bai poured himself another glass of wine.
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Yu Yi took away the wine bottle, advising, “Lin Bai, don’t drink so much.”
Meng Qing also advised, but sarcastically, “Lin Bai, if you get too drunk, you won’t be able to pay the bill. Then who’s treating?”
Lin Bai let out a laugh that wasn’t quite a laugh, murmuring, “If the bureau lifted restrictions and allowed people to change the past, how many would go back to change those events they deeply regret…”
After Yu Yi took away the wine bottle, Lin Bai stopped drinking and took a sobering pill after the meal. The three of them left the hotel and walked to a deserted place, then opened their terminals to return to their rooms.
Yu Yi asked Meng Qing to accompany Lin Bai, saying, “You’ve known Lin Bai longer. He might not say certain things to me, but he would to you.
Meng Qing agreed to this.
After Yu Yi saw him leave, she took out half a bottle of alcohol from the storage cabinet. The white room was the executor’s storage space, where various items and equipment could be stored or retrieved at any time through the terminal. She had just taken the wine bottle from Lin Bai’s side and placed it casually on the ground.
Xia Zhenda was pressed for time and couldn’t find someone to make the mold, so he brought Lin Bai to Xia Xuanxuan’s place of exile. But these were not problems for Yu Yi.
In missions, there are often occasions that require using others’ fingerprints to unlock fingerprint locks, so the bureau has a workshop specifically for making fingerprint molds. Yu Yi entered the workshop, and fortunately, no one was using it at the time. She downloaded a memory package for the fingerprint mold-making process from the terminal, learned it, and followed the steps.
The computer created a 3D model of a finger based on the fingerprints on the wine bottle, then used a 3D printer to print the mold, which would take about an hour.
While waiting for the mold to be made, Yu Yi had the opportunity to use the time effectively. Soon after the mold was printed, she heated and melted the silicone, then poured it into the mold, waiting for it to cool completely.
Half an hour later, she had a transparent silicone finger sleeve.
By putting it on her finger, she could open Lin Bai’s terminal and log into the bureau’s server with his identity.
Yu Yi returned to her room and contacted Meng Qing, learning he was still with Lin Bai. After ending the call, she took out Lin Bai’s personal terminal with the action group leader’s permissions and attached it to her left upper arm.
She looked down at it carefully. All terminals look the same when not turned on. She took a deep breath, then put on the silicone finger sleeve. Since Lin Bai would no longer track this terminal, she could use it with peace of mind. The terminal opened smoothly, but the transmission application had an additional password. Yu Yi remembered the password Meng Qing used to unlock Lin Bai’s storage box and tried it – indeed, it was correct.
Yu Yi chose to return to two years before her current time space, the Lantern Festival. The Hou residence had strict family rules, and she and her sisters were not usually allowed to go out freely, but the Lantern Festival was different. On this day, they could go out to enjoy and guess lantern riddles under their mother’s and nannies’ accompaniment.
She came out of a small alley and walked along the street, walking alone among the joyful and laughing crowd during the festival. She appeared calm, but in reality, her entire body was stiff due to eager anticipation and nervousness, with her heart pounding in her chest.
Soon she arrived near the City God Temple square, where a lively lantern festival was held every year. Yu Yi wore a veil, unafraid of being recognized by acquaintances. She walked slowly among the crowd watching the lanterns, searching for her family’s whereabouts. It was around this time that they would come near the rabbit lantern.
Soon, she truly found them.
Her father looked just like in her memories, hands behind his back, looking leisurely and carefree, walking side by side with her mother. Hong Rui and Hong Zhi walked behind them, talking happily. Hong Min was only six years old at this time, holding Yu Wan’s hand with one hand and pulling Shen Nanny with the other, skipping between them.
Immediately after, she saw herself – her fifteen-year-old self. She affectionately linked arms with Yu Xin and held Yu Yue’s hand, turning to Yu Yue to discuss a riddle.
Yu Yi’s tears burst forth, burning as they flowed down her cheeks. This was the last Lantern Festival she spent with her father and brothers. The next year, shortly after the New Year, the imperial decree for house arrest arrived.
After that, her family was destroyed, separated by life and death, and she never saw them again.
Chapter 153: Difficult to Let Go
