Chapter 2

Early the next morning, when I walked downstairs, Chloe's car was already waiting at the curb.

The back window rolled down, revealing Julian sitting inside. His eyes were puffy and red, a crumpled tissue clutched in his hand.

Chloe leaned over from the driver's seat.

"Ethan, I heard someone reported you. Did you sleep okay last night?"

I opened the front passenger door. "Fine."

Julian sniffled softly from the back, his voice hoarse.

"Ethan, don't be nervous. I'm sure the re-exam will go fine."

I clicked my seatbelt into place and didn't look back. "Yeah."

Two blocks in, Chloe glanced sideways at me several times, hesitating to speak.

Her fingers drummed softly on the steering wheel, her breathing noticeably heavier than usual.

In the back seat, Julian buried his face into the tissue, his shoulders trembling faintly.

Chloe caught a glimpse of him in the mirror.

The memory of Julian breaking down in tears the night before churned violently in her mind.

He had sobbed about how much this exam meant, about his father's medical bills and his mother working odd jobs, how this was his only shot at climbing out of poverty.

Then he had bitten his lip, wiped his tears, and hurriedly insisted that he didn't mean anything bad—he was just terrified of failing.

She had frozen on the spot.

After a long silence, she had finally nodded.

Once Julian left, she sat in front of her laptop staring at the screen for an eternity before opening the complaint portal, typing out Ethan Vance's name letter by letter.

Snapping out of her thoughts, she pulled a water bottle from the door console and held it out to me.

It was the exact same brand, the exact same packaging as the one from the day before.

"Ethan, drink some water. You have to fast for the re-exam too. Clear your throat."

I looked down at the bottle.

In my previous life, she had handed it to me just like this, gently urging me to finish it, and I had drained the entire bottle.

After that, I failed the vision check, got rejected by the academy, watched my body deteriorate day by day, and finally died alone in a rundown apartment.

I looked up into her eyes.

"Chloe."

Her shoulders flinched slightly.

"Do you really want me to drink this?" I looked right into her eyes.

The car fell dead silent. Even Julian's muffled sniffling in the back stopped for a second.

Her fingers tightened around the plastic bottle, making a faint crunching sound.

She parted her lips, her eyes wavering, her gaze darting toward the rearview mirror.

In the mirror, Julian looked back at her with wet, pathetic, tear-stained eyes, full of silent pleading.

She pushed the bottle a fraction closer to me.

"Drink it, Ethan. I'd never hurt you."

Right then, I felt something shatter completely inside my chest.

It wasn't heartbreak. It was a clean, absolute severance.

Like a string that had been pulled taut across two lifetimes, finally snapping into total silence.

I took the bottle, twisted off the cap, tilted my head back, and held the rim just above my lips.

Tilting my wrist slightly, I let the cold water run down my chin into the inner lining of my jacket collar. The thick fabric absorbed every drop without showing anything on the outside.

The water was freezing cold. As it trickled down my neck to my chest, it carried a chilling chill, just like the cold ground on the day I was buried.

I lowered the bottle and wiped my mouth with the back of my hand.

"All gone."

From here on out, we were strangers.

Chloe's shoulders slumped in relief, then tensed up again.

In the back, Julian lowered the tissue, staring intently at the bottle in my hand.

We arrived at the medical center.

This time, I was led into a private examination room where three senior examiners sat in a row, a full stack of test plates laid out before them.

"Ethan Vance, please take a seat. The re-test follows the same procedure as yesterday. Call out the numbers as you see them."

The first plate was flipped. I called out the number.

The second, the third, the fourth... They went through every single plate from start to finish, repeatedly pulling out the most difficult ones.

"A butterfly. Twelve."

"A bull. The silhouette of a bull."

"Number eight, over a red-spotted background."

The three examiners exchanged a look, and the one in the middle spent several moments jotting notes on the evaluation form.

"Ethan, your color vision is completely normal. The results are fully consistent with yesterday. There is no defect whatsoever."

I placed the half-full water bottle on their desk.

"Thank you, doctors. I have one more question."

The lead examiner looked up at me.

"Someone submitted an official complaint accusing me of cheating on my color vision test, which forced me to come back for this re-check. The results prove I am entirely clean."

My voice was calm and steady, every word ringing clear:

"I want to know who filed that complaint against me."