Who Is She, Really?

"You're officially a student at Moye Military Academy now. However you look at it, without me, you'd still be scraping by on some backwater border planet." Xu Chengbi tapped his fingers on the desk. "You're smart enough to see how much I can help you. Life in the Imperial Military is a far cry from being a cadet."

"Get to the point. What do you want from me?" Xu Lingqu wasn't in the mood for his games.

Xu Chengbi paused mid-tap, then looked up and fixed her with a viper's stare. "The way you are now, I can't tell you just yet. Once you've thought things through, we'll talk again. But you won't get a third chance."

If a second conversation went as poorly as this one, he would simply make her disappear. The potential rewards were worth a second shot, but Xu Lingqu wasn't who he'd expected—too clever, too stubborn, impossible to control. Letting her run free would be like raising a tiger.

Xu Lingqu stood. She knew exactly what was running through his mind. She had no intention of giving him a second chance to ensnare her.

She turned and walked out of the highest-ranking officer's office in the military base.

She had a rough idea of what he wanted her identity for—nothing more than the power struggle between the pro-war and pro-peace factions within the Imperial Military. Her status was a sensitive one: the daughter of a fallen Imperial soldier. But what exactly Xu Chengbi planned to do with her, or which direction he leaned—that was still murky.

Gina was again assigned to escort her back. They left the base in silence, and only once they were seated in Gina's vehicle did she speak up.

"Miss Lingqu, I can only tell you two things, and they're the only things I know." This was a place she'd personally confirmed as completely safe, so she felt comfortable addressing Xu Lingqu directly. "I helped Admiral Xu process a document."

Gina's expression remained grim. "I altered the autopsy report from when Lady Liu Linghui died. I removed the record that she was carrying a two-month-old fetus at the time of death. Back then, the autopsy reports of the soldiers and their families who died in that batch were backlogged in the Military Department due to compensation disputes, and never sent to the imperial medical system for verification. That report was the only hole in his lie, and I've already taken care of it."

Those words hit Xu Lingqu like a thunderbolt. She turned sharply to look at Gina. "Are you sure?"

"I'm sure." Gina didn't know what had been said between Xu Chengbi and Xu Lingqu, but she was certain it involved questions about her origins. "The second thing is that the letter Liu Zhi wrote to him was real. In Imperial Year 83, the year I chose to work for Admiral Xu, he finished writing that letter and then left. Admiral Xu did instruct the border officers to keep providing you with enough relief money to survive—and yes, just enough to keep you alive is all they needed."

That confirmed it: Xu Chengbi intended to cement her identity as the daughter of his deceased subordinate and use that identity for his own ends. That was why he'd had Gina cover up the truth. Who Xu Lingqu actually was mattered little to him; only the identity mattered.

For Xu Lingqu herself, a far bigger mystery loomed.

So who was she, really? Why had Liu Zhi, a man with no blood relation, chosen to raise her? Why would he lie to the admiral when he sensed his time was running out? Did he know that the ring she wore was the long-missing Liu Ming? And where did her special constitution come from?

Could it be that the original owner was actually the Galaxy Admiral's daughter? But the timeline didn't add up. The Galaxy Admiral had vanished five years into the Interstellar Empire, and it was now Imperial Year 95—Xu Lingqu was only eighteen.

A granddaughter, then? But the Galaxy Admiral had never had any scandals, and even if he had descendants, why would they hide their identity? Why hand Xu Lingqu to a frail old man to raise?

Xu Lingqu twirled the ring on her finger, waiting for the storm of questions to settle in her mind. Finally, she spoke to Gina, her voice serious: "Thank you."

Without Gina's information, Xu Lingqu might have been taken in by Xu Chengbi's story—after all, she'd never imagined a man like him could tell a lie in every single sentence.

The vehicle came to a stop at the gates of Moye Military Academy. Before stepping out, Xu Lingqu turned to Gina. "My promise still stands. Forever."

Under someone like Xu Chengbi's watchful eye, telling her all this must have carried enormous risk. So far, Gina had been the one offering help; it was only right to acknowledge that.

Gina watched her stride into Moye Military Academy, her tall, straight figure growing distant. To this day, she had never once regretted throwing in her lot with Xu Lingqu. Especially now—after seeing such a dramatic transformation in just one trial period—Gina felt even more certain of her choice.

Back in the dormitory, Liu Ming materialized in his puppy form and immediately complained, "That Admiral Xu is way too sneaky..."

Before he could grumble about Xu Chengbi for a full half hour, Xu Lingqu cut in: "Your memories stop at the day Yin He was going to kill himself?"

"Yeah. After that, I was sealed in the ring's space, and my main body was nowhere to be found. I couldn't appear again until you awakened your psychic power," Liu Ming said obediently.

"Did the Galaxy Admiral have a family? A daughter or son?" Xu Lingqu pressed.

"Huh? That guy? No way! He was always off fighting with Caesar Ulysses back then. How would he have a family? Me and that Caesar guy barely count as half," he said, making a complex human-like expression on his dog face—a mix of shock, disdain, and nostalgia.

If he said that, then the Galaxy Admiral's descendants were out of the question. But—

"The Caesar Ulysses you mentioned—that's the founder of the Empire, the founding emperor, right?" She'd only seen that name once, when she first arrived in the interstellar era and searched for basic knowledge. The Ulysses family was the imperial house; no one could share that name entirely.

"Yeah, that's him. I didn't like him much back then. Don't know why, but being near him always made me uneasy. Oh, and Chi Ren—that's Caesar's mech—felt the same way. But what could we do? Caesar was his master. Good thing my master was Yin He—oh wait, no, that guy went off to die. Now you're my master! By the way, that redhead who came to see you that day gave me the same feeling. You didn't go and make friends with a Ulysses, did you?" Liu Ming suddenly recalled the redhead with a touch of lingering disdain.

Xu Lingqu had already suspected Jin's identity, but she hadn't expected Liu Ming to confirm it completely.

A prince paying a personal visit to Moye must have had some purpose. But so far, Xu Lingqu felt no discomfort around Jin, so she could tentatively keep him within her circle of acquaintances.

She stood up and headed to the bathroom. There was a smell in Xu Chengbi's office that lingered on her clothes and made her uncomfortable, so she decided to wash up.

Passing the sink, Xu Lingqu stopped in front of the mirror.

She wasn't in the habit of looking at herself. In the apocalypse, she practically never did. In her pre-apocalypse life as a normal person, she'd occasionally glance, but not often. Since arriving in the interstellar era, apart from being forced to sit in front of a vanity at first, she'd rarely paid attention to her own reflection.

The young woman in the mirror was no longer the sickly, fragile creature she'd been at first. Her very demeanor had shifted so dramatically that she looked like a different person.

Her dark eyes were sharp, her nose straight and high. When she looked down at someone, there was an indescribable harshness to it, tinged with a hint of mockery.

In a flash, Xu Lingqu felt the girl in the mirror bore a three or four out of ten resemblance to who she herself had been back on Earth, before the apocalypse, living an ordinary life.