Ruan Jiaojiao listened to these words, feeling like her chest was churning. She wanted to speak, but her mouth just wouldn’t open. At that moment, she heard another voice, gentle beyond comparison, ringing beside her ear.
"Jiaojiao, Jiaojiao..."
"Come here, what are you doing standing by the ditch, silly girl? What if you fall in?"
"Aren’t you cold? Come to Mommy, let Mommy hold you, okay?"
Ruan Jiaojiao was submerged in the icy water, shivering all over. Instinctively, she reached out, wanting to be lifted up, but she wasn’t. Instead, she saw another little girl, identical to her, being picked up and carried away on the woman’s shoulder.
She grew anxious and wanted to call out for the woman to stop; she was still in the water, she hadn’t gotten up.
But it was then that the little girl in her arms turned to look in her direction, her pitch-black eyes like a void without any edge. Even though she heard nothing, she knew what the other girl was saying.
She was saying: You’re the fake! I am Ruan Jiaojiao!
No, that’s not right! No, that’s not right!
Ruan Jiaojiao shook her head violently. She wasn’t the fake, she wasn’t!
In reality, Ruan Jiaojiao was also shaking her head violently, her hands struggling desperately to grasp at something, but catching nothing, sweating profusely from panic.
"Jiaojiao! Jiaojiao!"
"Grandma! Sister is having a nightmare again; she won’t wake up!" Ruan Jie kneeled on one side, frantic with worry.
Hearing this, the Ruanlin Family matriarch immediately ran out from the kitchen, forgetting even to put down her spatula and tossing it aside, rushing forward to hold Ruan Jiaojiao in her arms.
Xiu Xi, kneeling on the other side, picked up Ruan Jiaojiao’s uninjured hand and bit down hard into it.
But this time it was clearly of no use.
Ruan Jiaojiao was trapped in a nightmare, unable to come out.
She kept crying "No, it’s not," and no one knew what kind of dream she was having.
Even Shu Lang, who was sleeping upstairs, was woken by the disturbance, roused by the sound of Ruan Hao’s running footsteps.
They both rushed downstairs, and seeing Ruan Jiaojiao, who couldn’t be awakened, cradled in the arms of the Ruanlin Family matriarch, Shu Lang was shocked as well and came forward asking, "What’s happened?"
"Sister is having a nightmare again, she never wakes up during them. Biting her hand used to wake her up, but now even that doesn’t work anymore," Ruan Jie said, voice choking with emotion.
He was already terrified out of his wits.
Upon hearing this, Shu Lang was about to pick up Ruan Jiaojiao to take her to the hospital in town, but halfway through reaching out, he suddenly remembered something, his expression turned serious, and he ran upstairs.
When he came back down, he held a small red pouch in his hand.
He fumbled to open the clasp of the pouch and pulled out an amulet. Under everyone’s astonished gaze, he slipped it onto Ruan Jiaojiao’s neck, holding her hands tightly around the amulet.
"This is..." The Ruanlin Family matriarch looked on in shock at the amulet.
"My sister asked me to bring this and put it on Jiaojiao the moment I saw her. I forgot, I forgot," Shu Lang repeated, actually feeling guilty.
He was a researcher and didn’t believe in these feudal superstitions at all.
He thought this amulet was nonsensical, believing it was just his sister expressing her missing her daughter, who she temporarily couldn’t see, and this was the only way to place her longing for the time being.