I almost—I almost put on the qipao I hadn’t tried on!
I hurriedly tossed it to the other end of the sofa.
“I just remembered—I already tried this one, ha ha…”
I kept rummaging through the pile of qipaos. A second later, my eyes widened. All the frog closures on this one were still fastened!
That couldn’t be!
I forced myself to calm down. The illusion had to be messing with me again.
I couldn’t let appearances fool me. I tried to remember which ones I’d already tried on.
But no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t remember.
As a fashion blogger, how could I not remember trying on seven qipaos?
It felt as if someone had deliberately blurred my memories…
No, I had to break out of the illusion!
I bit hard into the wound on my tongue, filling my nostrils with the metallic smell of blood.
I closed my eyes, then opened them wide.
The mess of qipaos on the sofa was neat again.
I was holding a plastic bag, with a qipao I’d taken out of it in my hand.
I hurriedly shoved the qipao back into the bag and tossed it onto the sofa.
Thank goodness. I hadn’t let the illusion fool me.
“So these are the two Xiao Yi hasn’t tried on…”
I was done for!
My heart lurched. She knew!
She snatched the qipao from my hand, took another one from the bag, and pressed close to me.
I instinctively backed away, but this time I really did trip over the sofa and tumble onto it.
“Crash!”
My expression changed. My Bluetooth earbuds had fallen to the floor!
Right at her feet!
She picked them up and stared at me.
“Xiao Yi, why are you wearing earbuds?”
I forced a laugh. “I’m wearing earbuds… to listen to music…”
Uneasy, she held the earbuds and tilted her head as she looked around the room.
When she glanced at the desk, the corners of her mouth lifted. “Oh… found it. So this is where Xiao Yi hid her phone.”
She pulled out my phone and unlocked it. The livestream was on the screen!
The livestream title read: Trying On the Qipaos My Sister Gave Me.
After watching it, she suddenly grabbed me as I tried to run.
She held the phone in front of me and said sadly, “Xiao Yi, you’ve been deceived!”
“Huh? Deceived?” I asked, bewildered.
“This streamer is a fraud! She wants to trick you into handing over the qipaos!”
“There’s no point hiding it from you anymore. Xiao Yi, you’re actually my biological younger sister! These seven qipaos weren’t custom-made. They’re our family heirlooms, passed down through generations!”
“You’re my biological sister?” Just those few words were more than I could make sense of, leaving me even more confused.
She nodded and pointed at her face. “Look at us—we look at least fifty percent alike!”
That was true…
Someone in the livestream comments had even said that, looking at our faces, you’d think we were biological sisters.
So I hadn’t been adopted after all.
Then was what she said the truth?
Was Chúc An a fraud?
I had another question. “If they’re family heirlooms, why not keep them stored away instead of making me try them all on?”
She sighed and explained, “These seven qipaos have been passed down for a thousand years. Over time, they developed a spirit of their own! They can pull people into illusions! The heir has to wear all seven to earn the qipaos’ recognition and gain control over the illusions, so they won’t be affected. So when Chúc An contacted you and told you to hand over the qipaos, she was completely scamming you! She wants to steal this precious collection from you!”
[Oh my god, what a horrifying plot twist!]
[Everything has a spirit. If those qipaos really are a thousand years old, maybe the older sister is telling the truth!]
[So the older sister was rushing the streamer into trying on the qipaos so her little sister could inherit them?]
[Can anyone still believe this? It’s all made up. I still trust Master Chúc!]
[Chúc An is mysterious too. Why do you all trust her?]
The comments erupted into an argument. My sister didn’t end the livestream; she put the phone back in my hand.
My mind was a mess, as if two little people were fighting inside my head.
One side told me to trust Chúc An: as long as I didn’t wear the last two, I’d be safe.
The other told me to trust my sister: try on the remaining two and keep our heirlooms from being stolen!
Who should I trust? Which one was telling the truth?
I pushed down my jumble of doubts and asked what I most wanted to know. “If we’re biological sisters, why do I have to be the one to inherit the qipaos? Why can’t you inherit them?”
She answered at once. “Because I’ve been allergic to dust since I was little. Whenever my skin touches the air, I break out in red rashes all over. Xiao Yi, you were lost when you were little, and Mom and Dad felt terribly guilty. By the time I found you, they’d passed away. I’ve taken care of you for years. Doesn’t all that mean more than a few words from some streamer?”
That was true. She’d always taken care of me. If she’d had an ulterior motive, she could have acted long ago.
Why wait until now?
While I was still wavering, Chúc An’s breathless voice came from the phone.
“I’m downstairs at your place. Hurry and throw the qipaos out the window!”
Throw the qipaos out the window?
Could it be just as my sister had said—that Chúc An was only after the qipaos?
My sister had heard her too, and her emotions, just starting to settle, flared up again.
“Don’t give them to her! Xiao Yi, hurry and put one on! Try on the last two qipaos!”
The two of them shouted opposite things, and I was trapped between them, like a thread being pulled apart.
Suddenly, I thought of a way to break the deadlock!
“I still have one I haven’t tried on. Give me the bag, and I’ll put it on right now.”
Hearing that, she hurriedly tore open the plastic bag and took out a qipao.
Suppressing my disgust, I quickly put it on.
If my sister had nothing to do with this, and I pretended this was the last one, she’d surely be happy for me!
When I finished putting it on, her face broke into a full smile.
“I did it! I finally did it!”
“I finally…” Her excitement abruptly stopped, and she turned to stare at me.
“You tricked me?”
Taking advantage of the moment, I’d gathered up the qipaos and rushed to the window.
It wasn’t locked. I pushed it open and leaned halfway out.
When Chúc An saw me, she waved frantically. “Hurry, throw the qipaos down!”
I looked down and saw my sister snarling as she yanked hard at the lower half of my dress.
Her face twisted with rage as she shouted, “Don’t give them to her! Don’t throw them!”
Downstairs, Chúc An urged me too. “Hurry! Give me the qipaos!”
I stood still and asked one more question.
“Sis, if what you say is true and the qipaos are family heirlooms, why are all seven the same size? And why do they all fit my measurements exactly?”
“Chúc An, why did you tell me to throw the qipaos down instead of telling me to jump? You seem awfully concerned about them.”
Chúc An answered first.
“Don’t let the fact that you’re on the second floor fool you—it’s still high enough to get hurt if you jump! If you throw the qipaos down, the corpse woman’s attention will shift, and you’ll be safe! I belong to the occult sect. I don’t care about the qipaos; I just want to deal with these things as soon as possible!”
Chúc An’s explanation made sense.
I looked over at my sister. The rigid expression on her face shifted slightly.
She didn’tShe answered my question: “If I hand the qipaos over to her, we’ll both die!”
After saying that, my sister suddenly giggled. “Now that you’ve figured me out, I’ll stop pretending. That’s right, I do have plans for you. But as long as you obediently put on all seven qipaos, the body-swapping ritual will succeed! After the swap, you’ll become me and I’ll become you. We’ll still be sisters, just as close as ever! But if someone else wears the qipaos, the ritual will fail, and we’ll both die!”
I scoffed. “That’s a nice story. You just want to take my body and my identity! You’ve been planning this ever since you adopted me, haven’t you?”
With her mask torn away, my sister lunged at me and grabbed for me.
I dodged, wrapped the qipaos around my arm, braced myself against the window, and jumped down.
When I landed, my legs wobbled, and I stumbled forward a few steps.
Chúc An caught me just before I fell.
She urgently reached out. “Quick, give me the qipaos. I’ll take care of them!”
I dodged her hand. “Stop her first! I’m still wearing one. At least let me change out of it!”
As we struggled, my sister caught up with us, her eyes bloodshot, as if she’d lost her mind.
“Xiao Yi, you can’t leave… Come here!”
I slipped behind Chúc An.
Chúc An gritted her teeth and somehow produced a talisman, pressing it to my sister’s forehead.
“Let’s go back! To deal with the corpse woman, we need her real name and birth details!”
Chúc An said the immobilizing talisman would only work for five minutes. I hurried her upstairs, unlocked the door, and we went back inside.
Once the front door was shut, Chúc An and I went into my sister’s room.