Volume 7 The Inverted Man Chapter 48 Miracles Can Only Last a Moment
If Jasmin had been rather enjoying all the glances the men were casting at her before, now she was left with nothing but worry and fear.
She picked up her pace again, as if she were being chased by the Forsaks.
Finally, Jasmin dashed into the apartment and got away from the men before they could get close enough.
Whew …… The young girl patted her chest and secretly decided to go out at night less often in the future.
It was then that she cognized that there was a downside to over-the-top beauty.
After calming down a bit, Jasmin went up the dimly lit staircase to the third floor, returned to the outside of her house, and unlocked the door with the key she carried with her.
She cautiously approached her parents’ bed and once again examined their faces by the light of the moon.
Compared to when she had left the house not long ago, her father and mother’s faces had become quite rosy, with much less gray hair and wrinkles, and their snoring was almost non-existent.
They had truly regained their health …… Jasmin could hardly contain her smile, extremely visibly relieved.
Sensing movement, her mother’s eyelids twitched and slowly opened.
Jasmin held her breath and collected her smile, ready to surprise her mother.
Her mother half sat up and looked over, her expression suddenly becoming extremely frightened.
”Who are you?” The woman asked in a shrill voice and pushed her husband up beside her with all her might.
Who am I? Jasmin was a little dumbfounded by the question, and for a moment she didn’t know how to answer this simple question.
At that moment, her father also woke up and looked at the beautiful young woman in front of him with confusion and alarm.
”Get out! Or I’ll call the police up!” Jasmin’s mother left her sleeping bed and copied the candlestick that lay beside her, using it as a weapon.
”Thieves are not welcome.” Jasmin’s father was fairly polite with his eviction order.
He knew to try not to push too hard when confronting a burglar, or he could easily make the other man choose an extreme response.
If he didn’t have a wife and children, he wasn’t too afraid to fight the burglars, but now, he had an entire family on his shoulders.
Jasmin finally came back to his senses and hurriedly spoke:
”Dad, mom, I’m ……”
Before she could finish her sentence, she was greeted by her mother splitting her head and shoving her, and was pressed by her father’s shoulder, getting all the way out of the room.
As for what she said, no one cared in such a situation.
Clang!
The door of her own room closed before her eyes, which left Jasmin bewildered and helpless.
She wanted to tap on the door, to prove her identity with the key she carried with her, but just then she heard her mother at the opposite window, saying to the policeman patrolling below:
”There’s a thief here, a thief!”
Thief …… Dad and mom don’t recognize me …… Will they think I’ve plotted against them …… Will the police believe “Automatic Wishing Machine “Will …… Jasmin’s heart tightened, and she subconsciously decided to leave the apartment first, avoiding the police, and then wait for dawn to explain to her father and mother one by one, and use the common memories to make them believe.
Stomp, she buried her head, in the sound out of the neighbors surrounded by, along the stairs fast step down, rushed out of the apartment.
Running all the way to a nearby alley, avoiding the police coming down the street, Jasmin gasped and stopped, tears sliding uncontrollably down her face and towards the ground.
Suddenly, a hand reached out and covered her mouth, dragging her to a secluded part of the alley.
”How much money? How much do I give ……” A drunken, slurred voice rang in Jasmin’s ears, seemingly treating her like a streetwalker and unable to resist her temptation.
Jasmin struggled, frightened and desperate.
Just when she felt she was about to collapse, the drunk’s hands loosened.
”Miss, are you okay?” A raspy male voice followed.
Jasmin quickly stepped away from the area where the drunkard was before turning around to see a police officer in a black and white checkered uniform.
”He, he wants ……,” Jasmin said and burst into tears.
The policeman gave her a pitying look and said:
”We’ll take him to the magistrates’ court, but, young lady, you’ll need to come back to the police station with me and take a statement.”
Jasmin, who was in a state of extreme fear and extreme overwhelm, subconsciously nodded.
It didn’t take long for her to sit down in the statement room of the nearby police station, across from the policeman and his colleague from earlier.
”That means he never asked you if you were a streetwalker, and you never made any hint of soliciting customers?” The policeman weighed his words.
He was worried that speaking too bluntly would hurt the beautiful young woman in front of him.
Jasmin held her coffee cup and sipped down as she said:
”Well, I just got to that alley.”
”Okay, that’s as far as it goes. Ms. Jasmin, can you tell us where your home is? We’ll send someone to take you back.” The other policeman asked curtly.
Thinking of her parents’ reaction and that disgusting gaze, Jasmin couldn’t help but shiver and said as if on the verge of tears:
”I have a conflict with my parents, I can’t return home for a while, maybe you guys can send me to the nearest hotel ……”
At this point, she remembered that she only had a few pence left on her, so she couldn’t afford to stay in a nice hotel, and that kind of cheap hotel was almost as dangerous for her.
The first policeman was baffled for a moment and said:
”Fine.”
The policeman hesitated several times on the way to take Jasmin to the nearest hotel before finally speaking:
”If, I mean if, you’re ready to be a stand-up girl, you can just come to me, no need, no need to work so hard ……”
Hearing those words, Jasmin felt like her spirit was about to break, similar to how she felt when she first saw that face after being burned by the fire.
It made her feel extremely insecure, and she fell silent without replying.
Luckily, the policeman didn’t force himself on her and drove her all the way to the door of the nearest hotel.
”No, I’ll get in myself.” Jasmin rebuffed the offer to walk her to her room.
Waiting for the policeman to leave, and not really checking in for her stay, she walked out of the hotel at a brisk pace.
She wanted to go to the town square, to the “automatic wishing machine”, to cancel her last wish.
Such beauty was horrible!
After a few steps, Jasmin removed the scarf that was draped around her shoulders and wrapped layer after layer around her face, just as she had done the first time out tonight.
By then, her face still bore the marks of the flame burns, and her missing nose and badly damaged lips made her look like a demon.
After arriving at the town square in the trolley bus, she entered the street once more and saw the brass-colored “automatic wishing machine”.
Jasmin’s heart settled a little, and she quickened her pace to the machine.
She was at a loss as to what to do with her last wish.
”Your first wish is a free try and doesn’t count towards the three wishes, so you have one more to go.” At that moment, Jasmin heard the voice of that Mr. Merlin Hermes.
She twisted her head to look, only to see the magician wearing a tall bowler hat calmly looking at himself across the street, by the gas streetlight, under the dim glow.
”Okay, okay.” Jasmin busily took out 1 copper penny and put it into the “automatic wishing machine”.
”I wish for my last wish to be canceled.” She mumbled with her eyes closed as she gripped the wrench and turned it.
”Duh.”
Once again, she heard the slightly dull tapping sound.
Upon opening her eyes, Jasmin rushed to the store next to her, stopping in front of the glass window and removing layer upon layer of the scarf wrapped around her face.
She saw herself again, the not-so-pretty teenage girl.
Jasmin instantly relaxed and instinctively looked back at the “Automatic Wishing Machine”, only to find that it had disappeared, along with Mr. Merlin Hermes.
”Praise the Goddess, and thank you Mr. Hermes.” Jasmin sincerely nodded four times clockwise on her chest.
She then took the last of the copper pennies and boarded the trackless public carriage home.
No one gave up their seat to her on this journey.
As her figure disappeared down the street, Klein reappeared, holding an ancient patterned silver mirror in his hand.
”Great master, why don’t you end with ‘Too much greed only turns good things bad’ or ‘Wishes always come with a price’? That would make the whole thing seem more philosophical and rise to the level of a fable.” On the surface of the mirror, a single silver word jumped out.
Klein laughed and said:
”The biggest problem was that I couldn’t fulfill her desire to become very, very, very beautiful in the normal way, and the ‘lie’ could only be adjusted to a certain extent.
”Therefore, I had to ‘graft’ one of the effects of a seal originating from a magical girl onto her body, which resulted in her acquiring amazing beauty while also coming with a terrifying ability to charm the men around her, making them irresistible.”
That seal belonged to “Judgment” Hugh, a relic of the demoness Sherman.
–Because of Hugh’s negligence in preserving it, Sherman’s extraordinary characteristics and the box that contained it fused together, becoming a seal with an astonishingly negative effect, which caused Hugh’s younger brother to look at that box in the wrong way.
In order to solve this problem, Hugh made a wish to Mr. “Fool” and asked K to seal this item.
After saying that casually, Klein looked at the “Magic Mirror”:
”Arodes, are you comforting me?”
”No, the main problem is still that she’s too greedy, if she just wanted to become beautiful without so many ‘very’ attached, the result would be quite good.” On the surface of the mirror, silver words flew up.
”Also, that falls within the realm of ‘lies’ that can be adjusted.” Klein nodded and said to Aroldus, “It’s true that the adjustments made by ‘Lies’ to her appearance can be cured permanently, but it’s always a certain difference from the original muscle, skin and bone structure, and after a decade or so, when she gradually shows signs of aging, the difference between the adjusted and unadjusted parts of her face will slowly intensify, and the face will look rather odd and stiff, unless she actually becomes ‘faceless’ and can correct the problem from time to time.”
At that, Klein chuckled and shook his head:
”Lies are just lies after all.”
Then, as he traveled towards the other end of the street, he continued:
”Moreover, even if she really becomes beautiful, whether she will live a better life in the future is also an unknown, admittedly, beauty can give her access to many resources and allow her to marry a ‘prince’, but the probability is that her own cultivation, character, and level of knowledge won’t be able to sustain that kind of life for too long.
”Well, don’t rule out the possibility that she’s good at learning and can enrich herself from various experiences and eventually manage a good life, but that’s another story.
”Oh, miracles can only last a moment, destiny is always long.”
During the conversation with “Magic Mirror” Arodes, Klein’s figure gradually disappeared at the end of the street.
His understanding of “Miracle Worker” had deepened one more layer.
……
After returning to his apartment building, Jasmin didn’t try to open the door, and it took him a lot of courage to reach out and knock on the door.
With a creak, the door opened and her mother appeared.
”Oh, you’re finally home.” Her mother sighed in relief, then asked in unusual horror, “You, your face?”
Jasmin squeezed out a smile:
”Cured, by a gentleman who specializes in miracles.”
Mr. “Automatic Wish Machine.”
Just as her mother and father suspected that their daughter was under the influence of the devil, several police officers in black and white checkered uniforms came up the stairs and approached.
The leader was a lady with light blue eyes and a quieting smile.
”Ms. Jasmin, we have something we would like to ask you.” The lady spoke politely.