This woman is Hailan.
When she arrived, the door was already unlatched. Hailan can actually see orange streak of lights leaking from the gap so she closed her eyes and pushed the door in.
Inside, she finds an antique shop. Rows of shelves were erected with an old-fashioned square table¹ at the middle. The young girl she has seen earlier in the day was sitting by the table, completely unsurprised to see her arrive. She casually pointed at the chair next to her and motioned for Hailan to sit.
She remembered that the young girl’s name seemed to be Linlang. Hailan sat down, and didn’t speak yet. She sees Linlang staring ahead.
In the middle of the table is a mirror, but it doesn’t seem to reflect anything inside the store; on the other hand, the mirror shows a scene, like a window to a desert where people are bustling.
The jade green roof that is partly hidden with the grains of sand was cordoned off. People in overalls kept coming in and out, walking extremely fast.
Outside the cordon, the crowd is cramped.
“The Dunhuang tomb that shocked the whole nation is still being excavated, and we hope to find the strange secret passage in the nineteenth chamber to find the real coffin of the Dongling Emperor… This will now be rewritten…”
Hailan thought about it and smiled bitterly, “Is this the latest model of TV?”
Linlang froze and let out a low laugh, “This is what a cold joke is like for you people in this time?”
“You’re looking at the wish mirror.” She continued. “It’s a part of the 3-mirrors² of wish³-past⁴-future⁵ mirrors. The wish mirror allows people to see that one thing that their heart desires.”
Hailan was stunned, she tightened her voice and said, “Who on earth are you?”
Linlang didn’t answer the question but instead asked, “According to you, where is the real coffin of the Dongling Emperor?”
In the mirror, a dozen staff members gathered in a circle, talking about something in a low voice, everyone looked grim. Suddenly, a person walked away leaving a gap into the circle, and then bright red coffin hit caught her eye.
Hailan stared at the blood coffin, “Why are you asking me about him? He has nothing to do with me. I came here because Qin Ge—”
“Who said he has nothing to do with you?”
Linlang stretched out her hand and waved, and all the that was shown in bronze mirror were shattered, leaving nothing but emptiness. Hailan was startled.
“Do you know the butterfly effect?”
“Miss Linlang, I don’t understand what you are talking about. I just want to see Qin Ge again.” Hailan interrupted Linlang hastily.
Lin Lang stared at the hand holding her arm for a long time, and finally said softly: “Hailan… butterfly effect.”
Hailan was stunned, breathing sharply, her eyes tilted down. The night is clear and quiet, the end of the lights, where she and Linlang overlap, she saw that there is only one shadow.
For a moment, she didn’t know whether she was shocked or afraid, but her hands could not let the other woman go. She was suddenly pale.
Lin Lang closed her eyes slightly and whispered, “Are you afraid of me?”
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Notes:
[1] 八仙桌 (ba xian zhuo) A Chinese traditional big square table usually dines eight persons (2 on each sides). It actually means the Eight Immortals Table but only because of the number of seats.
[2] if you can remember, this mirror is also used by Xuanji in My Gentle Tyrant as a device, after her modern day death as Zhu Qi, and after the execution arc as Nian Xuanji to see what happened in the past.
[3] 愿 (yuan) as a noun it means wish or desire, but as an adjective it means willingness or sincerity
[4] 溯 (su) or retrospect or the past
[5] 未 (wei) literally means have not happened, so this is basically the mirror of the future
T/N:
Maybe you would notice but starting from this chapter, I am omitting the space between Hailan’s name. I was previously writing it as Hai Lan. Actually, as I was reading the raws again (very carefully this time) I saw that Hailan’s name is actually Qiao Hailan. It was not mentioned in the first volume so I kind of forgot. While it doesn’t have a difference since there is really no spacing in hanzi for names, it actually gives a lot of distinction between the surname and the given name if you translate it to pinyin. Anyway it does not really matter as long as you know which is which. Do not mind my blabbering. But trivia: Hailan’s name means sea-blue or aquamarine. And just to make it clear that Hai is not her family name.
As also, with Linlang– her real name is Nian Linlang because SPOILER: she is (MGT’s) Nian Xuanji’s adopted daughter. So I am leaving her name Linlang as one word. You should also not confuse her with volume 2’s 3rd FL who is Lang Linling, okay? They are two different people living at two different times. I know their names sound the same, but in the raws they look and sound compleeeeetely different. Oh… the translation struggles. Let’s do this!
Kaye's Ugly Translations 
Many thanks
Oh the problem with painting English is so limited
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… auto correct pinying
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