After Being Reborn, My Ex-Girlfriend Became Obsessed - Chapter 68

Trembling hands gently traced An Yu’s fair face. Lin Duxi’s throat was tight, as if her heart had been ripped open with a knife, bleeding uncontrollably.

“Ah Yu… What did you just say? Can you tell me again?” Lin Duxi’s suppressed emotions could no longer be restrained, and she asked in a hoarse, soft voice.

An Yu’s mind was hazy. Hearing Lin Duxi’s hoarse voice made her chest feel heavy. She struggled to open her eyes and saw Lin Duxi’s reddened, moist eyes, feeling as if a heavy blow had struck her chest.

She reached out and grasped Lin Duxi’s trembling fingers. The cool touch deepened the sadness in her heart. Having drunk, all she wanted was to prevent Lin Duxi from feeling hurt, so she obeyed her earlier request and spoke again.

But the voice, clear in An Yu’s own ears, sounded unusually muffled to Lin Duxi. She stared at An Yu’s thin lips, but even as they moved, everything before her eyes blurred.

A chill ran through Lin Duxi’s body, and the intimate atmosphere in the room dissipated, leaving only a surge of returning emotions. Lin Duxi hugged An Yu, resting her long hair on her shoulder, pressing her forehead against it, quietly sobbing.

“Ah Yu… Ah Yu…”

She didn’t know what to do—how could she keep her An Yu safe from that existence and finally be able to stay with her in peace?

Hearing Lin Duxi’s sobs, An Yu’s heart ached too. The alcohol dulled her nerves, and her sluggish mind hadn’t yet fully processed what had happened when a warning echoed in her mind:

“Warning… Warning… The host has disclosed the existence of the system to an important character in the novel. Punishment will now be administered according to current penalty status.”

“The host disclosed the system’s existence to a novel character twice. Although no substantive effect has occurred, punishment must still be applied.”

The system’s warning echoed chaotically in her mind. Slightly sobered, An Yu noticed Lin Duxi still resting on her shoulder, tears falling onto her pale skin like flames spreading to her heart. She couldn’t help but comfort her softly.

“It’s okay, it’s fine. I’m here, don’t be afraid—I’m right here.”

Lin Duxi shook her head, finally stopping her crying.

At the same time the punishment alert sounded in An Yu’s mind, Lin Duxi slowly fell asleep in her arms.

An Yu closed her eyes, ready to set Lin Duxi down and endure the pain herself, but Lin Duxi clung to her like a vine. Helpless, she had no choice but to sit with her in her arms, waiting for the punishment to begin.

She closed her eyes and waited, but the imagined pain never came. Only Lin Duxi’s warm breath and the faint scent of her hair brushed against her.

Then An Yu remembered—the punishment wouldn’t be an electric shock. She would have to sleep and experience that moment of despair in her dream.

Thinking this, the tension in her heart relaxed slightly. If it had been the usual shock, Lin Duxi would have been heartbroken to see it.

She breathed out gently, lifting the sleeping Lin Duxi and carefully placing her on the bed, opening the bedroom door with her knee. She wiped the sweat from Lin Duxi’s face with a damp towel. Some fragmented memories of her drunken state surfaced, and she instinctively glanced at the hand holding the towel.

A burning sensation spread from her fingertips throughout her body. Her ears tingled pink. Flustered, she hurried to the washroom, scooped up water, and splashed it onto her face to calm the rising warmth.

Looking at her disheveled reflection in the mirror, she slowly recalled the system’s warning and Lin Duxi’s hoarse voice pleading for her to repeat her words. Her breath caught.

Lin Duxi already knew about the system. The system said it had no substantive effect, meaning its protective mechanism prevented her from knowing—but she certainly knew someone was “controlling” her.

An Yu sighed, splashed cold water on herself again to clear her mind, and looked at the sleeping Lin Duxi. Her sleep was restless, and her brow was furrowed.

An Yu went to the living room, prepared some honey water, and placed it on Lin Duxi’s bedside table to ensure she could drink it immediately upon waking, then left.

The more questions she had, the more she wanted to know about the dream punishment, to verify her suspicions.

Lying on her own bed, she didn’t even wash up and fell asleep immediately, exhausted, alcohol still affecting her.

Unfortunately, she had no dreams that night.

Lin Duxi, however, was not so fortunate. Her sleeping mind ached painfully. Her dream consisted of fragmented scenes, each flashing quickly through her consciousness, slipping away before she could capture them.

She only saw herself in the scenes, either alone or talking to others—An Yu never appeared.

Despair and helplessness surged again, breaking through her fragile mental cage. Lin Duxi was enveloped by these negative emotions, adrift in a dark, turbulent sea, unable to find her way, carried forward by the tide.

The last image before waking was in a rainy countryside, a black-and-white photo of An Yu with a slight smile, gazing at her softly. Unable to endure, she cried over the flowers in her arms, unsure if the drops were tears or rain.

Rain poured that night, washing away the summer’s clamor, lightning flashing through the window, illuminating the person sitting up on the bed, startled.

Lin Duxi clenched her fingers, digging into her palms until they turned white.

The scenes from her dream echoed repeatedly in her mind. An Yu’s warmth seemed to fade, leaving only one thought, rippling violently in her heart:

An Yu will die.

It was either a prophetic dream or a forgotten memory.

The rain outside intensified, drumming on the window. Lin Duxi shivered, sweat forming on her back.

She could only glimpse fragments of the dream, and all were incomplete. The only clear image was An Yu’s gentle photo—always gentle, always smiling, always the one who made Lin Duxi’s heart flutter, but never appearing before her.

Her breath caught in her throat. Instinctively, she got out of bed, barefoot, and opened the door to search for An Yu—but the next second, a clap of thunder jolted her fully awake.

How could she tell Ah Yu that she dreamed of her dying? Or warn her not to go somewhere high up? She didn’t know the time or place in the dream. What could she do?

What could she do?

Limp and powerless, she slid down the wall and pressed her head into her knees. Emotions long buried surged, suffocating her.

Realizing something was wrong, she grabbed the medicine from the bedside cabinet with trembling hands. Her elbow hit a cup on the cabinet. She unscrewed the bottle, dumped out a few pills, and swallowed them with the sweet honey water.

The white pill bottle toppled onto the carpet, reflecting the sharp light of lightning.

Her thoughts stabilized. Sitting on the carpet in a mess, she obsessively replayed the dream scenes, then exhaled.

The An Yu in her dream wore summer clothes she had never seen in her wardrobe, meaning it wasn’t the present—there was still time to alter events.

But the dream scenes were too few. Along with the previous camping dream, all she knew were the locations of events and things she wasn’t fully aware of.

The night’s experience was almost unbelievable, yet Lin Duxi calmed herself and transformed back into the high-intelligence persona everyone knew.

There were two possible explanations for the dream scenes: prophetic visions or past memories.

If it was a prophetic dream, she still had time to prevent it. But if it was the second, she remembered that during high school, some classmates read novels with “go back in time to love you” themes. Lin Duxi hadn’t read them, but had overheard. She used to think it was unbelievable, but now the idea seemed to be creeping toward possibility.

If that were the case, how did she survive in the scenarios where An Yu wasn’t present?

Lin Duxi smiled bitterly. If An Yu really… she would never survive.

Due to the scant information in the dream, her speculations couldn’t provide solid proof.

She sharply realized her current change was related to the person An Yu mentioned tonight. And the person behind An Yu seemed not to exist in this world. She couldn’t determine their identity. Initially alarmed, she now had more room for thought.

This person could make An Yu obey them, knowing her schedule, indicating they existed in a higher-dimensional space. Such precautions couldn’t be countered merely by locking doors or closing windows. Lin Duxi was startled by her own realization.

She didn’t believe in ghosts or the supernatural. If such things existed, they would have appeared countless times in her youth when she prayed to the heavens—not now, just as she could finally be with the one she loved.

An Yu’s fingers gripped her phone so tightly the joints turned white. Fear and panic had transformed into madness and hatred. Her dark, obsessive pain surfaced. She had never considered herself a good person, and now she harbored the desire to shred them to pieces.

She would not let what happened in the dream come true.

Ning Xuan’s investigation was swift. The next morning, when An Yu woke up, she saw a message from her, along with a file.

[Fortunately, that person has been in Jiangcheng all along. He’s a lazy man with complicated social connections. Avoid contact with people like him.]

An Yu, still wondering why she hadn’t dreamed of past memories, decided to examine the file first.

The man’s name was Lin Ze, 20 years old, living on the outskirts of Jiangcheng. He dropped out of middle school and had been idle in the city. Recently, he was fired from an electronics factory for inciting others to steal money. He was caught by security while trying to pry open a security door with wire and sent to the police.

After reading the file, An Yu could only conclude that this man was likely unrelated to Lin Duxi’s stalkers or rival’s hired people—just a pure social scum. Yet why was he entangled with Lin Duxi?

An Yu didn’t understand. Seeing the time was near, she closed the file, dressed, and left. Today she had agreed with Shiyu to visit an orphanage for charity.

She sent a message to Lin Duxi in the morning, asking if she wanted to go together, but Lin Duxi was still busy and couldn’t join her.

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