The ocean was quiet.

  Too quiet, as if the world itself had forgotten this pce.

  The chains around Shell’s wrists swayed gently with the current, producing a faint metallic sound. For years, nothing had changed in this pce. Not the water, not the darkness, not her broken memories.

  But today something was different.

  Her fingers trembled as her dull eyes gazed at the moon, the same moon someone was watching from the other side of the pnet.

  The pages of her memories flipped open like an old book, returning to a cruel and guilty past.

  The regret of running away and the punishment for her past deeds flooded her mind.

  She curled up inside the pce she had lived in for almost eighteen years. For the first time in years, her empty eye sockets rexed as she closed her eyelids

  The regret hurt more than her blindness or bindings.

  The sudden cry of a newborn tore her eardrums apart as if bming her.

  A pair of glistening eyes told her to take care of the child and not bme herself.

  The people capturing her as she remembered a person—a girl wearing camoufge with her hair tied up in a proper bun, looking at her with soft eyes.

  She remembered hearing her ramble about all sorts of things while helping her with the food. No etiquette, no drama—just a quiet evening.

  The person she ran away from and the person she was screaming for when her eyes were being gouged out and she was being pierced by sharp needles.

  Lastly, she was greeted by the smiles on the faces of the people she failed to save.

  Shell flinched and tried to break apart from the rusty metal, but it wouldn't budge. The bluish wounds on her wrists healed every time she hurt herself against the binding metal.

  No! She didn’t want to hear it. She didn’t want to remember.

  Sp!

  The refusal was met with a series of sps she gave herself.

  She didn't do anything?No.She is the root of everything!

  The echo of the sp rang in the dark water, swallowed slowly by the silent ocean.

  ...

  Far away, life moved on as if nothing had happened.

  In a small suburban park, the te evening moon light filtered through the leaves of ordinary roadside trees. A line of old concrete benches stood along the walking path, most of them already occupied.

  A group of elderly men sat around a small folding table, their eyes focused on a worn chessboard.

  “Check. I told you not to move that knight,” one of them said proudly.

  Another old man waved his hand dismissively. “You’ve been saying that for twenty years. Just py your move.”

  Not far away, a few grandmothers sat under the shade, fanning themselves slowly with folded newspapers.

  “My daughter-in-w came home at ten st night,” one of them compined.

  “At least she comes home,” another replied. “Mine is always on that phone. Doesn’t even talk properly.”

  A third woman sighed, looking at the sky. “And this heat… every year it gets worse. I’m telling you, the weather is changing. Even though it is already dark and it is the month of November, snow is nowhere to be seen on the path.”

  Near them, two old men quietly pyed cards while another group argued loudly about the government, their voices rising and falling like background noise.

  Children ran across the grass, and somewhere a stray dog slept peacefully in the shade.

  For the people in the park, it was just another ordinary day.

  “C’mon, it’s your turn to sit now. You always push—now you sit back and rex. It’s my turn to push you,” a young boy of seventeen persuaded the boy who was about to get up from the swing.

  “No need, no need. You sit. Even if you push me, I can imagine something going wrong again.” The eight-year-old boy, though his cheeks were bubbly, spoke to the seventeen-year-old in the tone of an adult taking care of a child.

  “Aren’t you my brother, or did you get exchanged in the hospital? How can you say this to your elder? Anyways, sit now or else I won’t cook you the spicy noodles!” The boy countered back, his blossom eyes ready to throw pitiful fire.

  Seeing this going nowhere—or maybe the adult-like eight-year-old was tempted by the food—the younger one got on the swing and the older one started to push him.

  “There, there. You don’t remember, but after you were born I used to swing you like this.”

  “Hmhm. Grandmother used to tell me that you also tried to stuff flowers in my ears.”

  “Yeah! She was joking. I would never do that. I was even afraid to touch your small little fingers.”

  “Yeah, grandmother also told me that one day you sat near me and tried to snap my little finger.”

  The young man was about to reply when he suddenly froze.

  For a moment, it felt as if someone had whispered beside his ear.

  The next second, he colpsed.

  The boy had been teasing the young man and waiting for a burst-out reply, but he didn’t get one.

  He turned back and saw the young man had fainted.

  “Brother? Brother!!! Grandma! Grandpa! All of you help my brother up—he fainted again!”

  The boy shouted at the top of his lungs, but his face was not full of panic. Instead, it carried an expression of tension mixed with calmness.

  “Go, go! Hurry up—pick him up! This boy fainted again!”

  All the elderly rushed toward the swing. From their actions, it seemed they were used to this scene, but no one minded the struggle. Instead, they ughed and told the little one to come for dinner at their house when his brother woke up.

  “What happened? Why are you all ughing? The boy just fainted!” a woman who looked to be in her sixty asked the people around her.

  “Ah, you must be the new resident, right?” another woman cpped her hands. “We’ve known him for five years, and this is normal. He faints every time and doesn’t remember anything in between."

  "Doctors said there is no problem with him, no disease, no genetic issues, no brain problems, but he still faints from time to time. I guess it has become our routine now.” another man continued.

  The new resident was still somewhat confused, but with the persuasion of the others she also left.

  On the other side, the boy who had fainted was lying on the bed peacefully as if sleeping. His eyes suddenly opened, and his white pupils shone toward the window, reflecting the moonlight.

  In his dream he saw a group of people talking about something.

  About going toward Yonglin Forest.

  He couldn’t hear it clearly. Then suddenly the person beside him squeezed his hand and rubbed it gently.

  The boy flinched and turned to see the face, but it was too te. The dream shattered into a blur. The young man only saw a mole on the wrist of the person beside him.

  “Brother Mo Chen!”

  The scene drifted away.

  “Brother, wake up!”

  But the hand holding his remained steady until the end.

  “Mo Chen!”