056 Gu Jie’s StoryI forgot myself for a moment.It happened again.Just like with David_69, when I synchronized with his memory and became him, I was slipping into someone else’s life—someone else’s past.I had told myself it wouldn’t happen again.But what was stopping me?......I am Gu Jie.My name’s Gu Jie.I was born mute in a farming village somewhere in the archipelago.My father and mother loved me, despite my deficiency. They would always tell me how I was their greatest fortune. And for that, I loved them.Our village was small, nestled between hills and rivers, where the wind carried the scent of wet earth after the rain. We tilled rice paddies and honored the old traditions. My mother and father worked hard, their hands calloused and strong, but always gentle when they touched me.I never spoke, but I never needed to.I learned to communicate with my hands, my expressions. My mother understood me better than words ever could. My father, despite his roughness, was patient when I struggled to make myself clear. They never made me feel like I was lacking.Even when the village elders told them I was a child marked by fate, a girl born without a voice in a world where words held power, they never saw me as anything but their beloved daughter.We were happy.But happiness never lasts.The storms came first. The rains were relentless, flooding the paddies, drowning the crops. The rivers swelled, swallowing homes.Then came the sickness. A fever swept through the village, sparing no one. It stole away the elderly first, then the weak, then the children. I remember my mother crying over a neighbor’s still body, clutching my hand so tightly it hurt.And just when we thought we had suffered enough—when we had no food, no medicine, no strength left to fight—they came.I remember the hooves, the (...)