Dreaming Nun froze for a moment when she heard my question, then shook her head before nodding again.
This confused me. Did she recognize the ghost or not?
Dreaming Nun was badly hurt, continuously coughing up mouthfuls of blood. Antonio said she had internal injuries and needed rest - she had hit the Buddha statue too hard when she crashed into it earlier.
Not only that, Dreaming Nun complained of a terrible headache, as if the world was spinning, so I had no choice but to let her rest.
The four of us hid behind the Buddha statue for over an hour. Antonio and I took the opportunity to doze off, waking up just after 4:00 a.m., with two hours until daylight.
"Mr. Roger, if we can't solve this mystery, why don't we just burn down the entire nunnery?" Antonio asked with a ruthless expression.
"No, we're close to the truth - very close," I said, looking at the sleeping Dreaming Nun.
"Could you fetch some water?" I suddenly asked Antonio.
Antonio froze, then asked if I was thirsty.
I shook my head. I wanted to get water to wash Dreaming Nun's face.
Antonio gave a bitter laugh. "At a time like this, you want to risk going out just to wash her face?" He suggested we wait until daylight, especially since Dreaming Nun was asleep now.
"That's exactly why - because she's asleep. Antonio, if you won't go, I will! This might be the key to solving the mystery."
Antonio refused to let me go. "It's too dangerous out there - better I go. If you encounter those nuns, you might not escape unharmed."
With that, Antonio immediately ran out, his figure disappearing into the night's darkness.
I felt uneasy after Antonio left, but half an hour later he returned with a basin of water and a towel. He said he'd been lucky to find a bathhouse.
I quickly wet the towel and carefully cleaned Dreaming Nun's face. After several minutes, all the ash and dirt had been wiped away.
When we saw Dreaming Nun's real face, we were both stunned. Her face was strikingly similar to the human skin in the coffin. After all these years wandering below the mountain and then in the mental hospital, her appearance had naturally declined somewhat, but it couldn't diminish her beauty.
"Mr. Roger... did you suspect this all along?" Antonio asked.
I nodded. "If I'm right, Dreaming Nun is who they call KONGQING."
Antonio is a little confused and says did Dreaming Nun lie to us?
I said no, what she said should be true, only she didn't know she was KONGQING, and used someone else's point of view to tell what happened in the nunnery back then, and also, just now, that female ghost is the former abbess of the nunnery, that is, KONGQING's elder sister, and I don't know what the reason is, and some people have used her death to cover up the fact that KONGQING is still alive. I don't know what the reason is.
Perhaps this former abbess of the nunnery is still being killed for reasons unknown, but definitely because of KONGQING.
It's something that definitely has nothing to do with Arturo's family, but there's someone else involved, two factions in all, one side trying to kill KONGQING, the other desperately trying to save her, even to the point of getting other people killed for her sake.
Antonio was stunned, he did not expect this matter to be so complicated, this nunnery is more brain burning than a palace fight.
Just then Stein woke up, he seemed much better and waved his hand saying he was thirsty and wanted water.
We didn't have any water to drink, so we had to give him two gulps of Dreaming Nun's face wash, and after he drank it down, he said it tasted weird, but it woke him up quite a bit, and Antonio laughed badly and helped him put the new sticky rice on.
Stein can already talk normally and can even stand up and move his body, and those two bloody holes have scabbed over, so it shouldn't be too much of a problem.
That's when he stood up and saw Dreaming Nun, and suddenly the man was fixed, his pupils dilated, his expression tense, and he thought that the human skin from the coffin earlier had found its way to him.
I told him not to be afraid, this is Dreaming Nun, or KONGQING.
Stein was a little surprised, but again, it seemed like he expected it.
Now that we know that Dreaming Nun is KONGQING, everything can be solved by waking her up, but it's like she has amnesia, she keeps thinking that her identity is Dreaming Nun.
Coincidentally, Dreaming Nun had just managed to wake up at this time, and she rubbed her chest as if she had recovered a bit from her injuries, though she still looked slightly pale.
"You guys looking at me like that? What does it mean?" Dreaming Nun felt uncomfortable when she saw us staring at her in unison, and that too when she had just woken up.
At this point I wasn't going to hide it from her and decided to tell her who she was, I'm sure there were many more twists and turns that had happened to her. "Dreaming Nun, you are KONGQING, can you believe it?" I said as I crouched down and locked eyes with her.
Dreaming Nun froze for a moment at that, then poofed out a laugh as she asked me if she wasn't still dreaming, was she?
"Do you remember what that shell of human skin in the coffin looked like?" I asked.
Dreaming Nun nodded and said of course she remembered - that was what her senior sister KONGQING looked like.
I said, "Yes, that's definitely KONGQING's appearance, it can't be wrong. But..." I told her not to get excited as I showed her my phone.
I turned on my phone's camera function and positioned it in front of Dreaming Nun.
Dreaming Nun looked at her reflection on the screen and instantly froze. Her face pressed close to it was nearly identical to that human skin shell - if not exactly the same.
"Is this my face? I can't even remember the last time I looked in a mirror," Dreaming Nun said in surprise as she stroked her face with one hand.
"Why... do I look exactly like Master KONGQING?" Dreaming Nun couldn't comprehend or even believe what she was seeing.
"Listen, you are KONGQING. This resemblance isn't the only proof. That female ghost earlier was your elder sister - the former abbess of this nunnery. She said she couldn't see KONGQING, and just now she couldn't see you either. You are KONGQING. Don't you remember?" I said while desperately shaking her shoulders.
"No! I'm Dreaming Nun! I'm not KONGQING, I'm not!" Dreaming Nun struggled violently before covering her head.
This was clearly escapism on her part. It was as if she was deliberately forgetting her true identity. But why?
"You must be KONGQING. You have to remember, or all the nuns in this nunnery will die. You must remember you're KONGQING to save the nunnery and save your senior sister," I insisted.
Dreaming Nun's expression froze as she listened, as if my words had finally reached her.
"Do I... have to be KONGQING to save everyone? To save the nunnery? To save them all?" Dreaming Nun muttered to herself.
"Yes! Think hard!" I urged.
"Ah... my head! It hurts! Why does it hurt so much!" Dreaming Nun began pounding her head desperately.
She seemed to be engaged in an internal battle, wrestling with herself until she was so exhausted her eyes rolled back and she passed out again.
I quickly pinched her philtrum and thankfully woke her again. The first words she spoke upon opening her eyes were: "I remember... I remember everything now..."