Chapter 495: From This Day Forth, I Grant You Royal Power

In the dining room, on the walnut-colored long table, silver platters held cooked king crab, bright red as if blushing, or perhaps in anger. The candle flames flickered gently, and from the corner of the dining room, the radio played a song, “Our Farewell.”

“I can hear you say my name~♪

I can almost see your smile~♪

Feel the warmth of your embrace~♪

……”

The music echoed in her ears.

Lu Yibei glanced at the radio in the corner, then at the woman sitting across from her, frowning, “Hey, can you turn off the music?”

You really don’t need to go out of your way to please me… Lu Yibei thought.

Wang Meili stared at Lu Yibei in surprise, “Isn’t this the insert song used in Love and Magic Girls? I thought you’d like it.”

“……” Lu Yibei opened her mouth as if to speak, but finally just sighed silently, “Then do you know when this song appears? It’s when Bai Xiaohua finds her childhood friend’s corpse in the enemy’s lab.”

“Oh.” Wang Meili replied with dimmed eyes, got up to turn off the radio, then sat back down and smiled at Lu Yibei, “Shall we eat then?”

“Mm.” Lu Yibei nodded expressionlessly, silently picking up a crab leg and the seafood scissors at hand.

Time slipped by quietly. The two of them ate the absurdly large king crab in silence. For a while, the only sounds in the dining room were the soft crack of crab shells and the clink of utensils.

Both of them knew what was about to happen, yet neither brought it up.

Though they sat close, separated only by a table, it felt as if an invisible wall stood between them, keeping them far, far apart.

Lu Yibei hadn’t expected that her first candlelit dinner in this life would be with her own mother, and that there would be so little interaction–quieter even than two strangers sharing a table.

After a long while, she finally couldn’t stand the strange atmosphere anymore. She put down the seafood scissors, looked up at the woman across from her, who was eating heartily.

“Actually, I don’t know what makes a good father. After all, I’ve never been one myself. But I think my old man was at least a very responsible father.”

Wang Meili looked up, smiling sweetly, “Right? I think I have good taste, too.”

After she spoke, seeing Lu Yibei didn’t respond, she fell silent again. After a moment, Lu Yibei continued.

“For a single father, raising a child is really hard. He bathed his son alone, fed him, played both father and mother. He always went out alone, but got used to taking a little kid everywhere. He dug out the old family recipe book abandoned in a corner and started learning to cook from scratch…”

Lu Yibei had once thought that if she ever saw Wang Meili again, she would be agitated, furious. But now, her heart was surprisingly calm.

“He clumsily learned to be a not-so-bad father, worked hard to let me grow up like a child from a normal family. Though many things other kids learned directly from their mothers, I had to stumble and fall to figure out. But I didn’t let him down–I more or less grew into what he hoped for.”

You never took part in any of this, just copied it once over… Lu Yibei added silently in her heart.

As she entered this little house, the fog that had shrouded her memories finally lifted completely, and her memories of her old man became clear again.

It was only then that Lu Yibei suddenly realized that everything in this special space truly was a projection of Hua City. Even the things she experienced with her mother were just carefully decorated copies of her past with her father.

She even realized that this core lady might only be a projection, carrying the real Wang Meili’s memories and feelings.

“The first time I realized I was different from others was in elementary school, during a parent-child event. My guardians were two grown men. After that, even though the teachers and classmates never said anything, their looks toward me became strange.”

“But back then, I only vaguely felt I was a bit different, without really understanding it. Not until the third year of middle school, on Mother’s Day, when the school organized a movie screening…”

“It was an old film, the name… sorry, it’s been too long, I’ve forgotten. Anyway, it was pretty boring. The movie was almost ninety minutes, and I couldn’t even pay attention for ten.”

“I don’t know if the movie was really touching, or if the sad atmosphere just made everyone follow along. When the climax came, almost everyone in the auditorium had red eyes–except me…”

At this point, the scene from that day in the school auditorium flashed through Lu Yibei’s mind.

In the dimly lit auditorium, she stared at the big screen, faint sobs echoing in her ears. She felt none of the emotion her classmates did.

She watched the same movie as everyone else, but couldn’t understand why such an ordinary art film would make her classmates cry so hard.

As if she were an outsider.

“……” Wang Meili was silent for a long time, looking into Lu Yibei’s eyes, and spoke softly, “I’m sorry.”

Lu Yibei shook her head, “You have nothing to be sorry for. You brought me into this world, and I’m already grateful for that. I just want to tell you, stop imitating Dad, there’s no need.”

I just wanted to feel it once, the first and last time, the true warmth of a mother… Lu Yibei seemed to say this to Wang Meili in silence.

Wang Meili vaguely sensed Lu Yibei’s feelings, but only gently shook her head.

She wanted to respond to Lu Yibei, but she wasn’t born a mother either; this was her first time being a mother, and she didn’t know how to bring warmth to Lu Yibei at a moment like this.

“No… that’s not what I’m apologizing for,” Wang Meili said calmly.

Then what is it? Lu Yibei opened her mouth, wanting to say something, but her vision suddenly blurred, the scene before her eyes rippling like a reflection scattered in water.

A numbness rose from her abdomen, spreading rapidly through her body like an electric shock.

Immediately after, a powerful drowsiness surged into her brain, like an invisible giant hand pulling her consciousness away.

“You put something in the food…”

Lu Yibei suddenly realized something, lifted her head to look at Wang Meili, watching as the woman’s figure in her vision gradually distorted, as if it could be blown away by the wind at any moment.

Damn it, her own mother drugged her kid’s food? How could you do that?!

Lu Yibei thought, desperately mobilizing all her psychic energy to resist the sleepiness devouring her consciousness, raising her hand, trying to grasp that figure.

Wang Meili gently pressed down Lu Yibei’s hand, calmly saying, “Don’t waste your strength, my child. I added [Tears of Brahma] to the food, a very potent sleeping Alchemical potion, something I learned from an Indian guy…”

Watching her own mother disappear before her eyes, even if it was just a projection, was still too cruel for her. Wang Meili thought.

“Sleep, my child. When you wake up…” This was the last thing Lu Yibei heard Wang Meili say to her; whatever else Wang Meili said after that, she could no longer make out.

She widened her eyes, gathering all her psychic energy into them.

Light flickered in her eyes like molten lava, a few crystalline drops slid down her cheeks, whether from the impending separation from Wang Meili or the intense burning pain in her eyes.

Finally, just before her consciousness faded into silence, her vision cleared for a brief moment. She stared fixedly at the woman across the table for three seconds, imprinting her figure into her mind.

“Thud—-!”

Lu Yibei fell asleep, her body slumping onto the dining table with a soft sound.

Seeing this, Wang Meili stood up and walked over, gently caressing Lu Yibei’s face, then, as if in farewell, leaned down to brush aside her hair and kissed her on the forehead.

It felt like an eternity had passed, yet also just an instant, before Wang Meili’s lips left Lu Yibei’s forehead.

She straightened up, a flash of resolve in her eyes, then closed them, parted her lips, and began to softly chant a power description.

Born as a deity, speaking its own name, praising with black ink, singing the <Jiushou>… Wherever the sun and moon shine, wherever wind and rain reach, all must obey.

——–

Just as Wang Meili was softly chanting the power description, “Lu Yibei’s” body suddenly trembled imperceptibly.

Then…

She slowly opened her eyes a crack, her gaze deep as she glanced at Wang Meili, then closed them again, a faint smile flickering at the corner of her mouth.

I saw her! How wonderful… “she” thought.

——–

Accompanied by the soft chanting, countless tiny cracking sounds rang out from her body, her fair skin splintering with jagged cracks like shattered glass.

Brilliant, dazzling light burst forth from the cracks in her skin, radiating in all directions. Everything in sight trembled, countless tiny vibrations overlapping to become a deep, earth-shaking rumble.

Countless splendid bubbles appeared around her body.

Floodwaters ravaged as people fled in terror, years of migration and hardship, an old man blowing into a Clay flute, ancient and solemn palaces rising from the hands of craftsmen, farmers working from sunrise to sunset according to the seasons, amid cheers, an ancient emperor sat upon his throne…

Scenes of a distant era outlined in flowing light, overlapping and converging on Wang Meili, forming a brilliant, dazzling crown.

“From this day forth, I grant you royal power, your life is short, but your glory is endless.”

She spoke softly, gently placing the crown on Lu Yibei’s head and letting go.

In an instant, everything around shattered into sparkling fragments, converging into rivers of flowing light, pouring into Lu Yibei’s body and engulfing her figure.

And so, the fusion began.