Chapter 418 - 363: Brianna: A Circuitous Connection

Brianna lay on the ground, arms crossed, her head resting crookedly on them.

She couldn't remember the last time she'd just laid there like this, blankly, doing nothing at all.

She remembered how back in school, she seemed to be endlessly tired during the day. She would always find herself doing just this—crossing her arms on her desk and sneaking in a quick nap—until the teacher walked up to her and cleared their throat loudly.

A gentle breeze would occasionally drift through the half-open classroom window, just as it did now in the Nest. Back then, it rustled her soft, long hair. Now, it rustled the tangled, withered straw on her head, making a dry, scratching sound.

She sat up and looked at her hands.

The patches of skin that had been torn open during her fight with the clerk had dried and flaked off. Underneath, her flesh was still a pale, desiccated brown. It turned out that having skin or not didn't make much of a difference.

She reached up to touch her face, still hesitating.

Brianna looked up at Jacqueline's body in the tree.

'Forget it.' The little mirror was still in Jacqueline's pants pocket. Climbing up to get it just to see her own unrecognizable face... it wasn't worth it.

When she had first "taken off" Jacqueline, she had been terrified. If Jacqueline's body, like Green's, had rapidly gone through the suppressed process of decay, she would have been in big trouble.

But after checking on it several times, Brianna breathed a sigh of relief. She had a theory.

It seemed as long as the brain wasn't catastrophically damaged, a corpse would remain in the state it was in when she first "put it on." 'Right, that makes sense. Otherwise, I wouldn't have been able to live in the human world as Green for two years.'

'In that case, maybe I should thank Chaisi,' Brianna thought with a low, cold laugh.

'He'd better wait for me to thank him personally.'

She glanced up at Jacqueline again and shook her head forcefully.

It had been over two years since she'd died in the Nest, and she had never once seen what "Brianna" looked like now. She definitely wouldn't be happy with what she saw, so why put herself through that pain again?

'Jin Xueli was probably just saying whatever she could to get away at the time. "Good-looking"... how could it possibly be good-looking?'

Brianna lay there blankly for a while longer, like a stray dog on the street with nowhere to go and in no hurry to get anywhere.

'Honestly, I don't even have a clue about the next target Illusion, and I have no idea what's happening back in Blackmoor City...'

Today was November 29th. Jin Xueli had left school and returned to Blackmoor City.

Originally, Brianna had entered the Nest this time to dig up the history Jin Xueli was trying to hide. 'But is that really necessary? All I have to do is put her on, and I'll know everything...'

Either way, this was definitely not the time to be lazing around...

Brianna rolled over and lay leisurely on her side in the grass.

'Maybe the reason I'm just lying here lazily, unwilling to get up and get moving, is because my objective is flawed. I need to seriously rethink this...'

"...Huh?" a soft voice sounded.

Brianna's dead body reacted even before her conscious mind did.

She shot up, propping herself on her arms, and in that instant, she was already braced for a fight. Only then did she realize that she had recognized the owner of the voice the moment she heard it.

But when she got a clear look at the person, Brianna couldn't help but let out a sound of her own. "Huh?... Huh?"

'What's going on?'

'What in the world is going on?'

"Did I scare you?"

Fu Tailan stood on the road, politely keeping a distance of a few steps. The boy seemed a little embarrassed. He gave her a gentle smile and said, "I thought you were... oh, you're already a resident. That's great!"

'Huh? Huh? Huh? Huh?'

Brianna stared at him blankly, a torrent of questions crashing through her mind. 'Why is he acting like he doesn't recognize me?'

'Is Fu Tailan dead? Or did he just have some really bad luck?'

'This has to be a Vulture, right? He has a strong Vulture scent... If that cunning little brat hadn't met with misfortune, how could a Vulture have gotten close to him, let alone taken on his appearance?'

"Miss?" Fu Tailan tilted his head and called out to her again. It seemed he really didn't recognize her.

'Ah, right.'

'Fu Tailan had only ever seen the old Brianna—and not even as a living person, just a photograph. He'd said it himself. He saw Brianna's picture on that driver's license Illusion and realized she was the one inside Green...'

'Which means my appearance really must be worlds apart from what it used to be.'

"Y-You're a Vulture?" Brianna asked, seeking confirmation. 'Now that I think about it, my vocal cords are no longer what they used to be. How could I possibly sound the same as before?'

'So even if this is a Vulture that inherited Fu Tailan's memories, it probably wouldn't recognize my voice as Brianna's.'

"Yes," the Fu Tailan Vulture nodded. "I can now maintain a part of my Vulture self-awareness. I didn't realize we were so famous. Every resident I've passed on the way here recognized me."

'It's less about being famous and more about being a nuisance.' Usually, the moment a resident locked onto a Hunter, the Vultures would already be peeking out from the corners before anything even happened. It was hard *not* to recognize them.

"Where did you turn into this person?" Brianna asked.

Even though she had personally pressed a Vulture onto her dead father's face, she couldn't help but marvel at the sight: it was a perfect replica.

It was painful to see. It was like that last time, and it was the same this time.

The Fu Tailan Vulture named a place that meant nothing to Brianna.

The Fu Tailan Vulture paused, then asked again, "Miss, do you know me?"

The words were on the tip of her tongue, but Brianna swallowed them back down.

Fu Tailan was someone who could never be trusted. Facing a Vulture that had become him, she couldn't let her guard down either. She still had to be wary.

"I've seen you around," she said vaguely, using the nod to let her straw-like hair fall and hide her face. "This Hunter seems pretty well-known. What happened to him?"

As if he himself had been praised, the Fu Tailan Vulture's eyes softened and brightened. "Thank you. I'm actually quite skilled as a Hunter. I'm fine, you don't need to worry about me."

'Who's worried about you? I was asking about Fu Tailan—'

'Right, this damn Vulture thinks it *is* Fu Tailan. I probably won't get a straight answer.'

Even though it was just a Vulture with the same face, Brianna couldn't suppress the black rage welling up inside her. But getting into a fight with a Vulture was completely pointless, so she held back her churning emotions and asked, "What did you want from me?"

"I wanted to ask for directions," the Fu Tailan Vulture said, looking gentle and polite, just as deceptively as Fu Tailan himself. "Or rather, ask about something."

She was about to snap, "I don't know, don't ask me," but Brianna changed her mind. "...What is it?"

"Have you seen any other Vultures around here?" the Fu Tailan Vulture asked.

Brianna glanced at him, then turned her head, her gaze sweeping over the empty road and streets.

'I did see a Vulture in the distance on my way here...'

"Why are you looking for other Vultures?"

He wasn't Fu Tailan himself, after all. Vultures weren't as guarded when facing residents. He thought for a moment and then seemed to answer truthfully, "I've discovered a way to maintain two separate self-consciousnesses at the same time. I want to tell my companions about it."

'So it's just some internal Vulture bullshit. Nothing to do with me.'

Brianna started to lose interest. She gave him directions and also told him when she had seen the other Vulture. She might hate Fu Tailan, but there was no reason to make an enemy of a Vulture for no reason.

"Thank you, miss,"

The Fu Tailan Vulture was clearly pleased before he left, even his signature aloof, hazy expression seemed to lighten. "I thought there was something familiar about you. You're very kind."

'Just get lost already.'

After sending the Fu Tailan Vulture on his way, Brianna lay back down—but this time, she couldn't help but feel restless.

'I feel like... I feel like I shouldn't just let this go.'

'But what do the Vultures have to do with me?'

'The last one, the Vulture that became Westley, was buried along with him at Jacqueline's insistence. It's still in the coffin now, probably long dead.'

But she felt an indescribable unease.

She tossed and turned on the grass like an overstuffed snake. After a while, unable to find a comfortable position, she simply sat up. Just as she did, a series of faint, high-pitched whistles came from the direction the Fu Tailan Vulture had gone. If you weren't listening closely, you would have mistaken it for an angry gust of wind.

'...It wasn't the wind.'

Brianna thought for a moment.

She remembered.

'That must be the call Vultures use to communicate with each other... Outsiders can't easily hear it.'

'It seems the Fu Tailan Vulture found its companion. But why didn't it just call out to the other Vultures itself? Why did it have to ask another resident for directions?'

'Was it because he became Fu Tailan, and his body wouldn't allow it? But Vultures are already pretty human-like, aren't they?'

Brianna knew she couldn't lie still any longer.

She glanced up at Jacqueline in the tree, thinking it might be safer to go as she was—a resident.

There was an alarm under the tree. Jacqueline's body didn't just have an AirTag on it; she had also placed a small defensive Illusion on it. She'd taken precautions, but she couldn't leave it for too long.

Worried about Jacqueline's body, she hesitated, unwilling to go. By the time Brianna finally made up her mind and hurried to the source of the Vultures' whistling, she discovered that the large flock of earthy-yellow Vultures had already begun to disperse, like a sandstorm slowly breaking apart and thinning out.

As for the Fu Tailan Vulture, there wasn't even a shadow of him to be found.

'Did I come all this way for nothing?'

"Hey," she said, grabbing a passing Vulture. "The Vulture that turned into Fu Tailan, where'd he go?"

"It left with a companion. They've been gone for a while." The Vulture looked her up and down. "Are you a human or a resident?"

"...None of your business," Brianna said, shaking its hand off. She ignored it and stared blankly at the Vultures scattering down the road, momentarily at a loss.

'Should I go back?'

She was just about to turn when she suddenly froze.

As she stopped moving, a Vulture in the distance happened to stop as well.

They locked eyes, staring at each other from a distance for several seconds. Just as Brianna's confusion grew, she saw the Vulture start walking toward her.

"You have a very familiar scent..." the Vulture muttered, leaning down and bringing its face close. "Have we met?"

Brianna froze as well.

She wasn't a Vulture, so logically, all Vultures looked more or less the same to her. But this one... it did have a familiar scent...

'No, wait. Hold on—'

"You're the one who turned me into Westley!"

The Vulture slapped its thigh, growing agitated. "You really did a number on me! Whose idea was it to put me in a coffin with that dead Westley guy?"

Brianna was so shocked that if she could have jumped, she would have. "Y-You? But how are you here?"

"Do you have any idea what I went through after that?" The Vulture was clearly full of resentment. "Some girl named Jin Xueli, along with Han Liuyue, dug me up, beat me to a pulp, and then brought me back to the Nest! Seriously! All for the sake of your Westley, just to see his damn history... You really made my life miserable!"