Chapter 385: Chapter 385
The story of ’reincarnation’ that I read involved wandering ghosts inhabiting the bodies of the dead to live again. After some thought, I realized my circumstances were different. I didn’t take over a dead person to live; I was born. For a long time, I agonized over this issue. Eventually, I came to accept it, thinking that having the chance to live again, and in a healthy body at that, was wonderful.
Mom was a very gentle person. It feels wrong to occupy her son’s body, and I feel tremendously guilty. I want to be extra kind to her as compensation, so I only ever smile at her. Life was leisurely until one day, I woke up and saw a very familiar face that almost made me scream.
I dreamt of that face at midnight. It was my son. Seeing someone so similar to my son takes me by surprise, especially since this person resembles him so much, like an enlarged version of my son. From his resolute face, I can vaguely see the teenager he once was and those clear eyes, sparking a crazy speculation in my mind that I subconsciously deny.
As I reminisced about my son’s antics, the middle-aged man suddenly split into a grin, looking utterly foolish. It hurt my eyes to look at him—such a brainless visage, certainly not my son. Even if they share the same name and appearance, I still can’t accept this person as my son. My son wasn’t this foolish.
Therefore, I never call him ’Daddy’ nor do I address him as father. In case he truly is my son, that would be too much of a loss for me, and I couldn’t reconcile that with myself. As for mother, I never call her ’Mom’ because the word holds a special meaning for me. I refer to her as ’mother’. My brothers tease me for being too formal, suggesting that when you grow up, you should follow the times and call her ’Lord’.
After I learned to walk, I stumbled through the house, discovering that it wasn’t the Military District Mansion where I once lived, nor the Mo Mansion on Hidden Dragon Mountain. I breathed a sigh of relief and started to soften my attitude towards him. More importantly, I haven’t seen Mei Lan since my rebirth. If he was healthy, as my filial son would have made sure of, he would have surely lived with Mei Lan. But since the moment I opened my eyes till now, I have never seen her.
In fact, I didn’t really want to see Mei Lan. I wouldn’t know how to face her; it’s better not to meet at all. At the age of seven, my mother and her man took me back to the old house. Seeing the familiar Mo Family Ancestral Hall was like a bolt from the blue. The reality I refused to believe was right in front of me—this person is my son.
In the ancestral hall, my Grandpa was worshipped, the first patriarch of the Ji Family. Seeing his black-and-white photo, I suddenly felt a twinge in my nose, as if I could remember Grandpa teaching me hand in hand. Time has passed, and unexpectedly, I’m back at the Ji Family. Below Grandpa’s photo are my parents. My memories of them have faded, but seeing their photos brought back the sound of Daddy and Mom speaking to me softly and the worried look on Mom’s face. Below my parents is my own photo frame; the photo is of me when I was quite young, probably in my twenties.
My son asked me to kneel down and introduced everyone above. When he pointed to my photo and asked me to call myself ’Grandpa’, I honestly felt damned. Staring at the photo, my son thought I was being absent-minded again and slapped me. I turned and glared at him.
In my past life, my son would never have dared to do this. He respected and admired me. Whenever he would act up, all I had to do was look at him quietly and he’d behave. Unlike now, where he tends to lecture me at the drop of a hat, claiming boys need to be raised tough, spouting nonsense I’ve never heard before. ɪꜰ ʏᴏᴜ ᴡᴀɴᴛ ᴛᴏ ʀᴇᴀᴅ ᴍᴏʀᴇ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀs, ᴘʟᴇᴀsᴇ ᴠɪsɪᴛ nοvelfire.net
I am worried. In the years since I passed away, I wonder if my son has gone astray.
Next to my photo frame in the ancestral hall, there’s no photo frame for Mei Lan, yet she’s nowhere to be found at home. It seems like everyone avoids the topic.
What happened at home after my departure? Whether Mei Lan is alive or not, I have no clue. If she’s dead, what did she do that prevents her from being included in the Ji Family’s Ancestral Hall? It unsettles me not knowing.
Gleaning from what I’ve overheard from my brothers, I learned the gist of it. Two years after my death, Mei Lan disappeared, and my son went mad searching for her. It wasn’t just Mei Lan; several other girls went missing too. Later, they were found in a room in He Xu Palace, their corpses intact, lying hand in hand with a male corpse beside them...
My heart aches for my son. He lost his father, which is me, and then his mother. Honestly, it upsets me to hear this, but only momentarily; Mei Lan, in my memory, was a gentle yet strong woman and a wonderful mother. I don’t know why she would do such a thing, or perhaps she had her reasons.