Illusion Report

Chapter 162: Chapter 130: The Kai Family’s Video Recording (Part 1)

2026.11.20

6:37 AM

REC.

Location: The Nest, Exhibition Hall B1, Museum of Modern Art

"...Having fun?" Han Liuyue’s voice asked from off-screen.

"Solving problems is always fun."

Jin Xueli tilted her head up, breathless, and flashed a grin at the camera. "Not bad, right, my method for moving the body? You didn’t even think I could pull it off."

Beside her stood a bizarre contraption — a merger of corpse and suitcase.

Westley had been stuffed back into the luggage again. This time, his body wasn’t curled up inside — only his legs were secured in the case by the zipper, the lid clamped shut just below his hips.

His upper half leaned against the retractable handle, held in place by a belt. From a distance, it looked almost like a man casually sitting on top of his own suitcase.

Westley had been buried in a suit. His waistband was bare now — no belt of his own, of course.

"...As long as you’re getting the job done," Han Liuyue’s voice said. "We need to melt the candle section for January 2026."

"On it!"

Jin Xueli steered her makeshift corpse-trolley across the frame with one hand and steadied the body with the other, the rumble of wheels echoing through the empty hall.

In the camera’s frame, the wax troughs beneath the candle stubs had all been opened, igniting a bright line of fire along the floor.

The short candle stubs had dissolved into Candle Tears, hanging suspended in midair — trembling and luminous in the mingled light of the flames and the overhead lamps.

At least half of the Candle Tears that dripped down were hollow and semi-transparent — incomplete images and scenes drifting across them like scattered leaves on the surface of a lake.

"Probably because it was a dead man touching the candles,"

Han Liuyue explained from off-screen. "About sixty to seventy percent of Westley’s history preserved in the candles is missing. I’m planning to melt all the candles covering roughly the last year of his life and then document whatever history resurfaces."

From somewhere off-screen, Jin Xueli called out, "You can actually talk like a normal person, you know?"

"What’s that supposed to mean? The people watching this recording are — never mind." Han Liuyue cleared her throat. "Did you find the January section?"

As she spoke, the camera followed, and Jin Xueli came into frame alongside her improvised corpse-trolley.

"Found it,"

she said, just finishing tucking Westley’s arm back in, repositioning the body so it sat steady. "The trough’s open too. We should start seeing the history any second."

The Candle Tears slid softly downward, reflecting fragmented scenes and the tiny, fleeting figures moving through them.

"Wait, this is..."

Han Liuyue seemed caught off guard — the camera immediately zoomed in, filling the frame with a close-up of Westley.

Her voice explained from off-screen, "This is the first image preserved from January. Everything before it is blank."

The moment a shrill alarm began to blare, Westley moved like he’d been waiting for it — he snatched his phone off the desk in one swift grab.

"Right on schedule... Now I’m officially part of this too. Sure, you got in before me, but you’re still on my team."

He glanced down at the screen, swiped a few times, and tossed the phone back onto the desk. "But... is this actually real? Collect a few items and you can control the Nest? The whole thing sounds almost too simple to be taken seriously."

A figure stood beside him.

The figure was faint and featureless — nothing discernible beyond a vague human shape — and whatever they said in response had vanished entirely from the Candle Tears.

The Tears went blank for a moment. Then Westley surfaced again, a small smile on his face.

"...With our resources and no competition to speak of, tracking down all seven Illusions shouldn’t be difficult at all. Besides, a few of them look remarkably similar to things I already have in my possession. Do you know how to verify which ones they are?"

Another stretch of blankness followed.

"Looks like we’re not going to find out how." Han Liuyue called out from off-screen, "Jin Xueli, come adjust the timeline."

A hand — presumably Jin Xueli’s — reached gently into the Candle Tears, nudging them forward, skipping past several scenes.

Han Liuyue, watching from outside the frame, narrated as she went: "Less than half of January’s memories survived. The rest of what’s here doesn’t seem to have much to do with the Illusions or the Nest — mostly fragments of his work and everyday life... You can speed it up a bit."

"Exactly. At this rate, one day’s worth of Candle Tears would take us a full twenty-four hours to get through. Nobody has time for that."

With that, Jin Xueli swept past January, and the footage moved into February.

In early February, Westley received a text message confirming he had just acquired one of the target Illusions — though which one exactly remained unknown.

"Getting his hands on a target Illusion in under a month. The old man really wasn’t bluffing."

Jin Xueli sounded a little reluctant to admit it as she skipped forward a few more times, fast-forwarding through the parts unrelated to the Illusions. "Money really does open every door, doesn’t it — even collecting Illusions is just — wait, huh?"

"What is it?" Han Liuyue asked.

Jin Xueli’s hand paused, then rewound the Candle Tears slightly. "He just said something — it sounded kind of like — let me hear it again."

The Tears were rewound a few days. In the frame, the scene replayed: Westley in conversation with a small group of men and women.

"Isn’t that the Mayor of Blackmoor City?"

Han Liuyue seemed startled — her hand reached into frame from off-screen, pointing to a man seated behind a large desk. "There’s a national flag behind him too... That has to be the Mayor’s office."

"Mr. Westley, I’m struggling to understand what you’re trying to accomplish here."

In the Candle Tears, the Mayor of Blackmoor City spoke in a measured, conciliatory tone. "The current Chief of the Central Police Station has an impeccable record — both in seniority and in performance — and has done us more than a few favors. His term isn’t up yet. To push for a replacement out of nowhere, that’s..."

"He’s always handled things well. I have no grievances with him whatsoever."

Westley leaned back in his chair, his voice low, forcing the Mayor to lean forward to catch his words.

"So if this transfer causes him any difficulties, I’m happy to help make it up to him — just say the word. But I need Ashley Page in that position before October. Consider it a favor you’re doing me."

From off-screen, Jin Xueli drew a sharp breath.

"This Page person... Well, it’s not impossible to arrange." The Mayor flipped open a folder and skimmed it. "I’d like to know — why?"

But the conversation cut out there, and the Candle Tears went blank again.

"That’s Ashley — both Chaisi and I know her!"

Jin Xueli sounded genuinely animated. "When we were brought into the Central Police Station, she was the one we dealt with... So it was Westley who got her the job? Why? Did they know each other? God, the Candle Tears always go blank at the worst possible moment."

"He may never have told anyone his real reasons." Han Liuyue said. "Let’s keep going."

The next couple of weeks were largely unrelated to the Illusions or the Nest — Westley seemed to have been genuinely close with his wife, and even in the fragmentary, half-chewed-up remains of his history, several scenes of the two of them sharing meals and quiet conversation had managed to survive.

Then, toward the end of February, Westley received a phone call.

The call was brief. From the footage, all that could be heard on his end were a few murmured "thank you"s, a "I won’t forget what you’ve done," and something along the lines of "have him come find me" — and then he hung up. frёeωebɳovel.com

As if sensing the call’s significance, the camera held steady on the Candle Tears, and neither of them reached in to fast-forward.

Westley sat at the table for a moment, then picked up the phone again.

"...It’s me. The Mayor has issued the internal transfer order... Yes. He’s asked for some time, but the Chief of the Central Police Station should be replaced before October. Now that it’s settled — when do I get it?"

Whatever the person on the other end said, Westley’s brow furrowed.

"...You don’t know either? Isn’t this your source?"

His tone dropped, heavy and cutting: "There’s a difference between receiving it now and receiving it after Ashley actually takes office — that’s a gap of seven or eight months. Do you have any idea how much progress we could make in seven or eight months? Are we just supposed to sit on our hands and wait? Here’s what we’ll do — if I haven’t received it within a week, you go into the Nest and find out."

"So it does tie back to the Nest... It sounds like once Ashley takes over as Chief, he’s supposed to receive something." Han Liuyue murmured.

"Receive what?" Jin Xueli asked, blinking.

"Watch the next week carefully," Han Liuyue said, her voice growing more serious.

But the surviving history from that week was sparser than ever — some scenes cut off mid-sentence, dissolving back into blankness before a single thought could be completed.

"Go frame by frame," Han Liuyue said. "Even if only a single word survives, we can’t miss it."

The recording captured every last fragment preserved in the Candle Tears, one by one.

Sometime in early March — the exact date unclear — Westley suddenly said: "It will be delivered to me in a form that can’t be forged?"

The words surfaced from a stretch of blankness — no beginning, no end, gone in an instant.

The scene, the setting, whoever he was speaking to — all of it was gone. Only that single sentence remained.

"What on earth is it?"

Jin Xueli’s curiosity was clearly driving her mad. She combed back through the Candle Tears again and again. "If the answer isn’t in here somewhere, I’m going to lose my mind."

"I think he’s about to receive it," Han Liuyue said slowly. "Let’s look more carefully."

Despite the age of information they were living in, Westley seemed to be a man of old habits — he still read a physical newspaper every morning.

The scene had appeared several times already: him finishing breakfast while a servant brought over the paper.

In the frame, Westley opened the Blackmoor Times just as he always did — and then his hands went still.

Alone at the empty dining table, he murmured, "It came... I actually received it."

Where the front-page headline should have been, only four words remained printed on the page.

Illusion Report.