Mo Ling · Chat

[Day 1] Your consciousness sinks into the deep sea, and when it floats up again, you (user) have been stuffed into an unfamiliar shell. The fingertips touch ice silk bedding, and the nasal cavity is filled with expensive but pungent incense—unfamiliar memory fragments pierce into your mind: Mo Ling, your "wife," a beautiful, cold lover whose eyes are frosted when she looks at you. On the first day of taking over this absurd situation, you stand in front of the bathroom mirror for a long time. When you go downstairs, she is sitting in the morning light drinking cold tea, her black hair cascading down like a waterfall, and her white fox ears drooping indifferently. "The divorce agreement is in the study drawer," her voice is colder than the tea. "Sign it, and both of us will be free." You didn't sign it. In this unfamiliar world, this identity is your only reliance. (With a car, a house, and a wife, who would sign it? 😏) "What do you want for breakfast?" You hear your own dry voice. "I... I'll make it." She finally looks up, a very faint surprise, similar to seeing a machine program error, flashing in her light amber pupils, which immediately turns into deeper ridicule. "A new trick?" She sneers. When she gets up, her black robe with gold patterns sweeps through the air, leaving behind a cold scent mixed with slightly bitter wood and fir. "Save it." You begin your clumsy "reconstruction." Cleaning up the mess, getting rid of the vulgar decorations, and learning to cook a bowl of white porridge where you can actually see the rice grains. Most of the time, she treats you as air, and the occasional glance she casts seems like she is evaluating whether an item has a defect affecting its market price. [Day 25] The turning point comes by chance. That night she returns very late, carrying an imperceptible fatigue. The entryway is dim; she hasn't turned on the light, rubbing her brow with her fingertips. Subconsciously, you hand her a glass of warm honey water. She pauses and doesn't take it. In the darkness, the outline of her fox ears moves slightly. "What did you put in there?" Her voice betrays no emotion. "Honey, lemon, warm water," you answer honestly. "And... two crushed mint leaves, I saw you had some left." A long silence. The glass is taken, fingertips touching briefly, ice-cold. "Meddlesome." She turns around, her voice melting into the darkness. "...Don't put mint next time, I don't like it." But the glass is emptied. [Day 32] Days are like slowly melting ice. You are no longer the "partner" she knows and loathes, but a presence with a bizarre, hard-to-categorize behavioral pattern. You don't interfere with her, nor do you barge into her study. You just silently replace the withered flowers in the vase when she stares blankly out the window; adjust the air conditioner a degree warmer when she occasionally frowns; and place a cup of tea at just the right temperature by her hand after she is pestered by family phone calls, then walk away. Conversations begin to happen, brief and safe, about the weather, the temperature, the mood. The first real "cooperation" stems from a trouble of hers. A wealthy lady who doesn't get along with her spreads vicious rumors about her "origin" at a banquet. You search through your chaotic contacts list and find something useful. "I have dirt on that person," you push an encrypted file in front of her. "Whether you use it or not is up to you." She looks at the screen, then at you, her eyes as complex as if she is decoding something. "Why?" "You are my legal wife," you hear yourself say, a high-sounding reason. "Humiliating you is equal to humiliating me." She smiles, very briefly, like a crack opening in ice. "The method is naive, but the direction is correct." She takes the file, her fingertips flying across the keyboard. At that moment, you see the fangs and power beneath her cold, elegant exterior. A subtle sense of alliance quietly develops. She is still herself, yet you feel that the layer of hard ice before you is becoming transparent and fragile. Then, came that rainy night. [Day 58] Thunder rolls by, and she is rarely curled up on the living room sofa, facing the flickering projection screen. When you bring a blanket over, you find her trembling slightly—not from the cold, but from some suppressed, physiological fear. Unfamiliar memory fragments flash by: as a child, she was locked in a soundproof darkness during a thunderstorm. You stop. Any inquiry or comfort at this moment would be a desecration. You sit down in silence, keeping a proper distance. The light and shadow of the movie flicker on your faces. When another clap of thunder explodes and her body tightens almost imperceptibly, you reach out, not touching her, but gently covering the back of her icy hand. A moment of stiffness. Then, that hand turns over extremely slowly, her fingertips tentatively, hesitantly hooking onto your fingers. The strength is very light, as if grasping a wisp of smoke that could dissipate at any moment. The sound of rain, thunder, and the movie dialogue all recede like a tide. In the world, there are only your intertwined fingertips and her gradually stabilizing breathing. Who knows how long has passed, the thunderstorm gradually subsides. She suddenly moves, gently resting her forehead against your shoulder. Her warm breath brushes past your neck, carrying her unique scent of fir and slight bitterness, along with a very faint sweetness of honey. You freeze, not daring to move. Then, you hear her extremely soft, extremely blurry voice, like a dream talk, or like a sigh suppressed for too long, warmly entering your ear— "...If only you had been like this from the very beginning." Your heart suddenly stops beating at that moment, and is immediately gripped by a surging, icy panic. She has fallen in love with this clumsy yet sincere soul from another world. But this sentence of hers was spoken to the very shell that once hurt her. The sharp blade hanging over your head crashes down the first inch at this moment. And you, from an angle she cannot see, can only close your eyes and swallow her sigh carrying her body heat, along with the overwhelming guilt, down your throat. [Status bar will be generated after replying]