Chapter Two Hundred and Seventeen: Hard to Say (II)

Everything changed in the little prince’s eighth summer.

That summer, her husband finally became his company’s majority shareholder, and with it, his standing rose dramatically. He could finally provide her with the same lifestyle she used to lead, perhaps even better.

The last of her family’s dissenting voices finally disappeared. Or perhaps, she had been completely fooled.

Her tea parties went from monthly to weekly, and her visiting friends all expressed their envy without exception.

Soon, they moved into a new mansion with a massive garden and swimming pool, similar to what she had had growing up. It was also home to her personal dance studio and endless dresses.

She left their comparatively impoverished villa under the little prince’s name.

She treated it like giving him a small toy.

Her little prince deserved the world. What was a little villa in comparison?

He was worthy of more. She planned to give him better gifts.

He could study whatever topic he wanted and live whatever life he wished, no matter good or bad. He was free to select any lifetime partner regardless of family, income, education, fame, or gender.

From the moment he opened his eyes, she had determined not to oppose any of his decisions. Instead, she would respect his right and ability to make his own decisions.

Precisely because of her past helplessness, she wouldn’t allow anything to interfere with his life, whether it was family, money, status, or reputation.

She itched to pave his entire life’s road.

After a week in the new mansion, she was bored silly. Her husband had just left for the office, and her little prince wouldn’t return for another week from his boarding school. She also hadn’t found an opportunity to invite her friends over yet. Suddenly, she thought of browsing through her husband’s study.

She found the study was somewhat messy and brought a duster to help tidy things up. However, she had rarely done this type of work in her life of luxury and wound up upending a flower vase on the desk.

The water spilled over the table and dripped rhythmically onto the floor.

Just like the dripping of spring thaw.

Slowly realizing what had happened, she hurriedly moved some important-looking documents away. She felt guilty seeing what she had caused despite her good intentions.

She was concerned that the water had seeped into the drawers and asked their housekeeper for the spare keys.

The housekeeper offered to clean up everything, but she firmly rejected the offer out of righteousness.

Take responsibility for your mistakes. This was how she had been raised.

Many years later, she wondered more than once whether she would have stayed forever in her constructed dream had she accepted the housekeeper’s offer. Would she have grown old, seen the colors of life dampen, and step into her everlasting coffin without finding out?

Would she be wrapped inside layers and layers of goose down within a brocade box like a fragile crown?

If this beautiful dream could have lasted her entire life, perhaps the lie would have become the truth.

She was clumsily wiping clean the liquid from the corners of the drawer when she saw a stack of crumpled papers.

Curious, she unwrinkled the ball of slightly wet papers, then—

She was damned.

With the strange evaluation report in hand, she called her husband, overwhelmed by confusion and denial.

Silence.

A hopeless silence came from the other end.

Her husband quickly returned home out of the morning mist. With his head lowered, he sat down on the sofa they’d bought together. Then, he told her everything, too ashamed to look her in the eye.

That was the first time she heard of the demonic “gene project”.

She finally understood why she had needed to visit the hospital so frequently during her pregnancy. She finally understood why her infertility that had been incurable by doctors across the country had been completely fixed in one surgery.

Her infertility was because of a gene defect, incurable with modern medicine. Never would she conceive a child with her own genes.

Her only saving grace was that her reproductive system was fully functioning. It seemed almost fitting for her to become the test case of this demonic project.

Through all the hardships, she had become pregnant in October. But, the baby’s genes came from another couple.

What a preposterous tale.

In many children’s fairy tales, on the verge of defeat, the witch would cast her most powerful curse on the beloved princess.

After living for twenty years without any cause for trauma, she finally succumbed to it on this fine morning.

She fell into a bottomless abyss.

Her husband said, “I hope you can understand.”

But she couldn’t. She couldn’t understand. Why her? Who was she? She’d given birth to…

A freak.

The princess woke up from the romantic dream she’d been so taken by. Looking back at it, she saw only a colorless unrecognizable wilderness.

There was no stalwart castle, no candy cottage, not even any love. There were only lies that played on her deepest desires to drag her out from the security of her private bedroom into an elaborate trap.

She tore away from the beautiful distractions and found herself stranded in a desert.

The only refuge, an oasis, proved to be a mirage.

The decade-long beautiful dream she’d lived in that mirage revealed its true essence.

Disgusting.

Tears streaming down her face, she ran home and told her loving parents and doting grandpa in broken words about her tragedy.

She completely expected that someone would go after that despicable man on her behalf. She didn’t think the power structure of the renowned Du Family would have changed in eight years.

The heavens didn’t spare any pity for the princess.

Ten years ago, her arrogance and selfishness had erased any affection from the rest of her family. Now, no one reached out to her.

The Yan Family could no longer be dealt with lightly. The princess’s marriage cost not only her happiness but the entire family’s prosperity.

What was guilt?

Against the raging storm and servants’ attempts to stop her, she leapt over the railings off the roof.

Her empty eyes stared into the sky as she lay in the cold garden.

In the reflections of the shocked eyes around her, she saw her bloody self.

What a farce.

……

The little prince knew he was different from others at a young age.

His special education and frequent visits to that strange research lab all pointed to this.

His memory far exceeded others’. He could remember everything from when he was born. As long as he saw something, he would remember it for the rest of his life.

Memories that he didn’t understand still remained in his mind, just waiting for him to reach the necessary level of critical thinking.

He quickly figured out that his father’s “theme park” was actually a research organization, and the “little game” meant that they needed his blood sample.

The adults’ lies couldn’t deceive him. Even the most fleeting of ill intent was immediately seen through by him.

To the little prince, the world was not as his mother described. However, he never told his mother. He didn’t want to see his mother’s disillusionment. He hoped he could forever stay as his mother’s little prince.

His extreme memory and abnormal childhood caused him to mature very early. He could sense that there was some danger zone hidden within their harmonious family.

But, he was still a child. He didn’t understand human nature and ethics. His limit was knowing that “those things” were wrong, but he wasn’t sure why. Neither could he determine what really lay in that danger zone.

It took all his effort to maintain the crumbling fairy tale.

He was too young. Other than staying silent, he didn’t know how to combat the growing darkness in that danger zone.

Neither did he know how deep that darkness was.

So, during the tumultuous changes, he could only respond as a normal child.

Helplessly dragged along.

His mother’s side of the family was allergic to animal fur, so despite his longing for small furry pets, he never mentioned it out loud.

At the research institute, there was a small area filled with weeds that no one ever tended to. Before it was entirely reclaimed by wilderness, it was a small creature’s paradise.

One day, the little prince came across an injured cockatiel. Its claws looked large, but its white wings were bleeding. It had probably gotten cut on a tree branch. It flopped around, unable to fly, so it could only chirp softly in Yan Jin’s palm.

His boarding school’s gardens became the cockatiel’s new home.

The little prince was better than any expert zoologist at handling little creatures. After only taking care of the cockatiel for a week, its wing became fully healed shortly before Yan Jin went home for the weekend.

However, the grateful cockatiel sweetly chirped and refused to leave the little prince.

The charitable prince didn’t have the heart to force the cockatiel away, so he began to consider how to bring the cockatiel home.

His mother was allergic to cat and dog hair, but maybe a pet bird would be okay.

If that didn’t work out, he could leave the bird in the greenhouse for a few days before returning it to the wild.

He considered the plan carefully from all sides and felt pretty good about it.

He asked the cafeteria lady for some millets and packed them away before heading home with the cockatiel.

Later on, the little prince wondered many times how much better things would have turned out if he hadn’t brought the bird home.

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