Diary of exchange

Chapter 6

The Uncontrollable Vortex

Lin Wan began frantically poring over sources.

She didn't dare search in the school computer lab, so she waited for the weekend, slipping away to the city library far from home. There, on a public terminal, her fingers trembled as she typed in keywords: "fate swap," "curse," "antique diary," "mark." Most of the results were just novel tropes or far-fetched ghost stories, each one chilling her heart a little more.

She even snuck off to that flea market one time, but the stall was empty—the rocking chair and the gaunt old man had vanished, as if they'd never existed. When she asked the vendors nearby, they just waved her off impatiently, saying the old guy had been muttering nonsense and who knew where he'd wandered off to.

The last lead had snapped.

Despair washed over her like a tide, enveloping her completely. She felt trapped in a transparent glass bottle, able to see the world outside but unable to touch it, forced to watch helplessly as the oxygen inside dwindled bit by bit.

And the "exchange" showed no sign of pausing for her fear—instead, it accelerated, as if some switch had been flipped.

She found herself getting picky about food. The braised pork her mother made, which she'd always loved, now tasted greasy to her. But the elegant, artfully plated Japanese bento Su Xiao often brought? Those somehow sparked an inexplicable appetite.

Her handwriting started to incorporate Su Xiao's deliberately practiced flourishes in certain strokes, without her even realizing it.

Worse still, during one break between classes, Wang Rui bumped into her on purpose, knocking the books from her hands and scattering them across the floor. In the old Lin Wan, she would have simply crouched down and picked them up in silence. But in that moment, a sharp, sudden surge of fury rushed to her head, and she nearly blurted out, "Are you blind?"

The words caught in her throat, laced with Su Xiao's brand of biting sarcasm and entitlement, startling even her. She clamped her lips shut tight, swallowing the alien impulse by force, then crouched down—her fingers trembling violently from the aftershock.

She was being assimilated. Not just gaining abilities, but her personality and emotions were eroding away too.

Things seemed to be spiraling worse for Su Xiao as well.

Her grades fluctuated wildly—brilliant one day, plummeting to the middle of the pack the next. For someone who prized her image above all, this instability frayed her nerves to the breaking point. Cracks were showing even with her clique of girlfriends; whispers circulated about how her "temper had gotten so weird," how she was "moody as hell." Lin Wan had witnessed it firsthand once: Su Xiao exploding over some trivial matter at Wang Rui, then forcing a smile and an apology. But that flash of viciousness had left everyone around her stunned.

Lin Wan knew those were her own long-suppressed negative emotions, funneling through this bizarre link straight into Su Xiao.

They were like two connected vessels, their bases forcibly joined by that diary, with the water levels—or rather, their "fates" and "selves"—pouring wildly, uncontrollably into each other, blending in a frenzy.

She had to do something!

She couldn't just keep waiting passively like this!

The thought grew louder and more insistent. On a Friday evening, driven by an impulse bordering on self-destruction, Lin Wan pulled open the drawer where the diary was locked away once more.

The deep brown journal lay there quietly, as if asleep—or perhaps waiting.

She lifted it out and set it on the desk. The lamplight traced its rough edges.

She stared at it, her chest heaving. Fear warred with a broken, reckless anger inside her.

If stopping its use would only make the exchange spiral out of control, if the cost was already inevitable... why not just harness it? If Su Xiao had made her suffer, then let Su Xiao taste something even deeper!

A dark, venomous thought bubbled up like gas from a swamp, popping one after another.

Didn't she want friends? Didn't she bask in the glow of constant adoration?

Then let her lose it all!

A glint of ruthlessness flashed in Lin Wan's eyes. She snatched up a pen and, with a vicious thrill of release, scrawled furiously across the diary's page:

Let Su Xiao be betrayed by everyone close to her! Let her taste the bitterness of total isolation!

The nib tore into the paper with a rasping hiss, like a serpent flicking its tongue.

When she finished, she collapsed into the chair, utterly spent, gasping for air as her heart hammered with a toxic mix of exhilaration and dread.

She lifted her left hand and rolled up her sleeve.

The bluish-black mark reacted almost the instant her pen left the page. It surged upward with visible speed, as if injected with life, darkening to the density of ink; faint wisps of ominous black vapor even seeped from its edges. It had crept right up to her elbow!

A searing pain, like flames licking her skin, erupted from the mark—sharper and more intense than ever before!

Lin Wan curled into herself, cold sweat beading instantly on her forehead.

This wish had exacted a toll far beyond any previous one!

But amid the agony, a twisted, shadowy satisfaction took root in her core.

She'd done it. No longer just a passive victim. She wielded power now, even if it sprang from the abyss.

Back at school the next day, Lin Wan kept a deliberate eye on Su Xiao.

The storm hit faster than she'd imagined.

During morning break, Su Xiao and Wang Rui clashed over where to go for the weekend. In the past, Wang Rui would have backed down. But this time, she jutted her chin out, refusing to yield an inch.

"Su Xiao, can you stop being so self-centered all the time? Everything always has to revolve around what you want!"

The words ignited all the pent-up irritation and unease Su Xiao had been nursing lately. She shoved Wang Rui hard, her voice shrill and piercing: "What did you say? Say that again!"

"I said you're self-centered!" Wang Rui fired back, her face flushing with the heat of the moment—and with so many classmates watching, there was no graceful exit. "Who do you think you are, anyway? Some princess everyone has to cater to?"

"You—!" Su Xiao trembled with rage, her hand rearing back to strike, only to be yanked down by another girl nearby.

"Xiaoxiao, come on, drop it..."

"Wang Rui, just cool it!"

Chaos erupted.

Su Xiao met Wang Rui's furious, unfamiliar glare, then scanned the faces around her—stunned stares, hushed murmurs, indifferent shrugs—and a terror unlike any she'd known seized her. The world of adoration and orbit she'd always relied on was crumbling right before her eyes.

She wrenched free from the girl holding her, eyes reddened, shot Wang Rui one last venomous look, and stormed out of the classroom.

Lin Wan watched from her seat across the room, taking it all in from afar.

She should have felt triumph, right? Her wish had come true. Su Xiao was losing the friends she cherished most.

But as she watched Su Xiao's crumbling silhouette flee, that face twisted with fury, grievance, and raw disbelief, no spark of satisfaction stirred in Lin Wan.

Only a cold, leaden weight settled in her chest, squeezing the breath from her lungs.

She glanced down at the bluish-black mark on her arm, now past her elbow joint and still throbbing faintly.

She'd gotten what she wanted.

But she'd paid a steeper price than ever.

She stood on the edge of an accelerating vortex, shoving herself deeper into the dark with her own hands. And at the other end, Su Xiao was being dragged down just as mercilessly.

This exchange was no longer mere revenge.

It had become a mad waltz with no victors—only mutual ruin.