“System, are you fucking sick?”
**[System Warm Reminder: Task triggers are based on plot logic, not the System’s subjective will :)]**
“Plot logic? Asking me to kill my own mother, you call that plot logic?”
**[System Warm Reminder: You may choose to refuse the task. However, refusing will trigger the ‘Filial-Justice Dilemma’ negative status, reducing Assistance Points by 10 every day. Based on your current 185 Assistance Points, if Si’s Mother survives for more than eighteen days, your Assistance Points will reach zero.]**
“I’ll fucking Mie your mother’s Mie-ing arm!”
Luo Tiantian’s face turned ashen as he gritted his teeth.
If his Assistance Points reached zero, he would have no money for medical treatment. Without money for treatment, he really only had three months left to live.
These rewards… 200 Assistance Points and 500 Game Coins. Combined, they were already worth 70,000…
All he needed to do was… kill Baosi’s mother.
In the game.
She was just a game character…
When his grandfather passed away, Luo Tiantian had stayed by the bedside, clutching that withered hand and watching as he slowly closed his eyes. When his maternal grandfather passed away, Luo Tiantian hadn’t been able to see him one last time. By the time he reached the hospital, the man was already in the operating room, and they couldn’t save him.
He had sent away the two people he loved most in his life, and now he was truly all alone.
The affection from Si’s Mother might be fake—merely memories provided by the system—but Luo Tiantian truly yearned for a mother to love him like that.
“Imperial Consort?”
Xiao Tao’s voice came from above him.
Luo Tiantian looked up.
Xiao Tao was crouching in front of him, her eyes red, and she had already dropped to her knees.
“Imperial Consort, what is wrong? Please do not frighten Xiao Tao…”
Luo Tiantian looked at her delicate face. This little palace maid truly liked him, was obsessed with him, and was willing to do anything for him. If he spoke the word and told Xiao Tao to kill someone, she would certainly do it.
“Xiao Tao.”
“This servant is here.”
“If one day… I mean if, someone asked you to do something very, very bad, would you do it?”
The look in Xiao Tao’s eyes was a gaze of almost fanatical devotion.
“There is nothing the Imperial Consort asks Xiao Tao to do that is bad. Whatever the Imperial Consort commands, Xiao Tao will do.”
Luo Tiantian looked at her.
But he wasn’t asking Xiao Tao. He was asking himself.
***
Su Wenjun took a sip of cold water in the lounge.
The family of the patient who had died during the emergency surgery eventually signed the letter of understanding and didn’t continue to cause a scene. After checking on a few more patients and performing a minor procedure, she finally had a moment of free time to leave.
Su Xiao was in the restroom, so Su Wenjun waited for her in the lounge. Afterward, they would go to have dinner with Tiantian.
Her phone lit up. It was a system notification from Huaxia Shenyu.
**[Your hidden task ‘The Mother’s Choice’ has been updated]**
**[Current stage: Moment of Choice]**
**[Task Requirement: You have realized that your existence has become the greatest weakness of your daughter, Baosi. The currents of the harem are surging; the Wangfei and others have already moved against you. If you live, they will continuously use you to harm her. Only your disappearance can truly sever this tether.]**
**[Please make a choice within three days:]**
**[Option One: Self-termination. Exchange your death for your daughter’s peace. Upon completion, you will receive the ‘Mother’s Heart’ title, 300 Game Coins, and unlock all information regarding the special item ‘Old Sachet’.]**
**[Option Two: Continue to survive. You will remain your daughter’s weakness, and more conspiracies will be aimed at you in the future. The task will automatically fail, and the subsequent plot direction will be unknown.]**
Su Wenjun stared at the screen and thought. She wasn’t thinking about the task itself, but rather the events that had unfolded today.
When the emergency surgery failed and the family member grabbed her by the collar, she hadn’t actually been that scared. Having been in this profession for over twenty years, what kind of scene hadn’t she witnessed? She had experienced family members far more aggressive than that.
What she feared was something else.
She feared Xiao Xiao seeing her in such a pathetic state. She feared her daughter would think she was useless. She feared the last bit of her image in her daughter’s heart would shatter.
But Xiao Xiao had rushed forward. Her daughter had stood in front of her.
“You fucking let her go!!”
Although she was over forty, she still found those words deeply moving.
Having been a doctor for over twenty years, Su Wenjun had seen too much life and death, and too many family dynamics. There were children who fought over inheritances, parents who gave up on treatment to save money, and cases like today, where a daughter rushed forward to protect her mother.
She just never imagined that such a thing would happen to her. Because her relationship with Xiao Xiao had always been the deepest wound in her heart. She thought that wound would never heal.
But after today’s incident, her relationship with Xiao Xiao had actually begun to improve…
Of course, if Tiantian hadn’t brought Xiao Xiao here, and if he hadn’t said those things to her… her relationship with Xiao Xiao would definitely not have changed. That child was helping them, mother and daughter, in his own way.
Even though he was a pitiful soul himself—only twenty years old, in love with a terminally ill boyfriend, enduring neural intrusion in the game for his boyfriend’s sake, and even dealing with the boyfriend’s lingering ex-girlfriend…
“Auntie, we all understand that you are hurting. But this wasn’t the doctor’s fault.”
“Auntie Su is also someone’s mother. She also has a daughter waiting for her to come home.”
When that child crouched in front of that hysterical woman, the words he spoke were more effective than any comfort.
Su Wenjun reached out and wiped the corner of her eye. It was wet. She hadn’t cried in a long time.
“Tiantian…”
She softly whispered the name, knowing how sensible and kind the child was.
Su Wenjun picked up her phone and read the task again.
**[Option One: Self-termination. Exchange your death for your daughter’s peace.]**
Self-termination. Committing suicide in the game.
By letting Si’s Mother die, Baosi would have no weakness, and those who wanted to harm her would have no leverage. It was just a game character; Su Wenjun knew that.
However, she still remembered the light in Tiantian’s eyes when he saw Si’s Mother in the woodshed that day. That was real. It wasn’t acting or a system setting; it was that child finding a tiny bit of warmth within the game.
If Si’s Mother died… would Tiantian be sad?
He probably would. Even if he knew it was fake, he would still be sad. Because the emotions that child invested in the game were real.
Just like today in the hallway, when she hugged Tiantian, the child had stiffened for a moment. Then, he had slowly relaxed, burying his face in her shoulder. At that moment, Su Wenjun knew that this child hadn’t been hugged by anyone for a long, long time.
Far too long. So long that he was no longer used to being embraced, yet he craved it so desperately.
“That child…” Su Wenjun sighed.
She planned to have a proper talk with Luo Tiantian during dinner tonight, especially about the matter regarding his boyfriend.
In fact, the 300,000 in medical fees was only a preliminary estimate; more would certainly be needed later. Luo Tiantian was still young, only twenty—did he really love that boyfriend enough to sacrifice everything? There was no need to throw everything away for a youthful…
Wait??
Su Wenjun’s train of thought suddenly took a turn.
‘That’s not right. Since Tiantian has a boyfriend, why wouldn’t he be used to being hugged?’