Chapter 65: Greed

White Night stood where she was, her soul-form trembling slightly, and her eyes heating up for reasons she couldn’t name.

Those pasts she couldn’t remember, and the thousand-year obsession carved into White Peace’s very bone and blood, wrapped around her like a rising tide, tightening her throat until she couldn’t speak a single word.

White Peace gently raised her hand, her fingertips brushing away the tears that had unconsciously fallen from the corner of White Night’s eye; her voice was as gentle as a campfire that had never gone out on a snowy night.

“A long time ago, so long that I can’t even remember which world it was.”

“There was a little beggar, filthy and so hungry she was nothing but a pile of bones, huddled in the snow of a mass grave, waiting to die.”

Her voice was flat, as if telling someone else’s story, but her fingertips curled slightly, hiding a trace of an imperceptible tremor.

“Back then, I wasn’t like this. I had no power, no name, nothing at all; my heart held only greed. Greed for a bite of food, greed for a place to shelter from the rain, greed for someone to actually look me in the eye.”

“Everyone walked around me. Some kicked me, some cursed me, but most simply acted as if I didn’t exist at all.”

She paused, and when she spoke again, her voice was saturated with an inseparable tenderness.

“Then one day, a young girl came along.”

“She was different from everyone else. She had just crawled out of a pile of corpses and was covered in blood herself. Even after I bit her, she knelt down and looked me seriously in the eyes.”

“She didn’t think I was dirty, she didn’t think I smelled, she gave me food, gave me clothes for the cold, and gave me the first real sense of being alive in my life.”

“She said one sentence.”

White Peace looked up, gazing deeply at White Night.

In those pure black pupils, the tides accumulated over five thousand years surged, finally settling steadily before her at this moment.

“She said, ‘You are alive too, just like me.'”

The moment White Night heard those words, something deep within her soul-form completely woke up.

It wasn’t a specific memory, but a resonance etched into her soul that caused her spirit body to light up spontaneously, like that fire in the snowy night that had burned for a thousand years without ever being extinguished.

“That girl was named White Night.”

As White Peace’s voice fell, White Night’s soul-form shuddered violently.

It felt as if an invisible hand had suddenly gripped the depths of her soul, making even her breath hitch for an instant.

“She gave me a name: White Peace. She protected me every day, brought me food, found me places to stay, taught me to speak, taught me to read, and taught me how to survive in a chaotic world.” White Peace’s voice grew even softer.

“From her, for the first time, I learned what it meant to be cared for, what it meant to have a home.”

“Later, she left. Not the town—she died. To protect me, she died at the hands of the ‘Eerie’.”

“The day she died, I held the coat she left behind. I wanted to cry, but no tears would come. Back then, I had just transformed into an Eerie; I didn’t understand what crying was. I only knew that a place in my heart had become empty, shattered, and could never be filled again.”

“From that day on, I had only one thought—I must see her again. I had to find her, no matter what she reincarnated into, no matter which world she was in, I had to find her.”

She stopped for a very long time, so long that Su Shuang’er and Mu Yingying held their breath, leaving only the soft sigh of the wind passing through the cliff walls at the bottom of the valley.

“Actually, I’m not fifty-eight years old. I’ve lived for five thousand eight hundred years.”

White Night froze completely.

Su Shuang’er’s hand holding the spear loosened for a moment—not because she had lowered her guard, but because her fingertips lost their strength, stunned by that number.

Mu Yingying’s mouth dropped open into an ‘O’ shape, unable to close for a long while.

The joke she had made earlier about “love rivals” could no longer be uttered. Looking at the two people in the center of the blood pool, she felt a suffocating weight in her chest—an obsession of five thousand eight hundred years was too heavy, so heavy it made it hard to breathe.

“In those five thousand eight hundred years, I went from a remnant soul of pure obsession to what I am now.” White Peace’s tone remained calm, as if speaking of a most mundane matter.

“I traveled through many worlds and experienced countless cycles of reincarnation. I saw White Night die and live, live and die; each time, she changed her appearance, changed her name, and changed her world.”

“But no matter how she changed, one thing in her soul would never change.”

She looked at White Night, her gaze burning like fire.

“I can recognize it.”

“You are White Night. In this life, your name is White Night. In the last life, you had another name, and the one before that, yet another. But you have always been her.”

Listening to these words, White Night’s mind went blank.

She still didn’t remember those past lives—not the snow of the mass grave, nor the fire in the ruined temple, nor how she had once risked her life to protect that little beggar.

But she couldn’t dismiss these words as a fabricated story.

Because the person saying them had lived for five thousand eight hundred years, crossed countless worlds, and set up this entire scheme in the Hundred Flowers Valley just to find her and see her one more time.

“I tried many times to create a physical body for myself.”

White Peace looked down at her hands.

“Turning the void into reality—you probably haven’t heard of this. It means turning an ethereal Eerie body into a tangible, physical body that can touch you.”

“But I failed every time. The bodies I created couldn’t withstand my obsession and power; they decayed too quickly, turning from a child to an adult, then to an old woman in just a few days, before completely collapsing.”

“When you met me on the road, that’s what I looked like—my physical body was aging rapidly after a failed attempt to turn void into reality. When I said I was fifty-eight, it wasn’t my age; it was how long that body lasted—only fifty-eight days from formation to total decay.”

Only then did White Night fully understand.

That toothless, staggering old lady on the road wasn’t a woman in her sixties; she was just another futile attempt among countless failures.

“This Hundred Flowers Valley was the solution I came up with,” White Peace said.

“I’ve tried this method countless times in other worlds: using flowers to absorb the essence of living things to grow a Seven-Colored Flower strong enough. By consuming it, I can finally stabilize this physical body and stand before you properly.”

“I’ve set up this scheme many times. In different worlds, at different times. In some worlds, the flowers wouldn’t even grow; in some, they grew but weren’t of high enough quality; in others, the Seven-Colored Flower was finally ready, but I couldn’t find my White Night.”

A slight ripple finally entered her voice, like a thousand-year-old calm lake finally stirred by a stone.

“I am the incarnation of Greed, and I grew this valley of flowers by feeding on the greed of the world. But they don’t know that the only greed I’ve ever had in this life has only ever been you, White Night.”

“If I can’t find my White Night, turning void into reality can never truly succeed.”

“Even if it did, without finding you, none of it would have any meaning.”

She looked up at White Night, her pure black pupils reflecting only the faint light of the spirit body.

“This time, the flower is ready.”

“And you are here too.”

“That’s why I said you chose me after all. Every time I leave the choice to White Night, you always choose to let me live.”

She tilted her head slightly, a smile of relief in her voice, like dust that had drifted for thousands of years finally settling on the ground.

“Five thousand eight hundred years, and it has never changed.”

White Night remained silent for a long time.

She didn’t know what to say.

She didn’t remember those past events; she only knew she was White Night, a remnant soul attached to a bicycle.

But every word from the girl before her, the weight of those five thousand eight hundred years, fell heavily on her heart, making it impossible to treat this as a lie.

“I may not remember those things.”

White Night finally spoke, her voice very soft and carrying a hint of an almost unnoticeable sob.

White Peace looked at her, waiting quietly, without any rush or disappointment.

It was as if she had known White Night would say this, and had been waiting for these words for five thousand years.

“But if everything you said is true, then you… have waited far too long.”

White Night leaned forward half a step and gently held her hand. “Peace, I will try to remember slowly, okay?”

White Peace didn’t answer immediately.

After a few seconds, she smiled.

The corners of her mouth curved up slightly, as gentle as that piece of warm roasted meat White Night had handed her on that snowy night.

“Okay.”

Her voice was as light as the wind, yet every word carried the weight of a mountain as it struck White Night’s heart.

“I’ve already found you. I’ve waited five thousand eight hundred years; how could I not agree to wait for you to remember everything about us?”

“Compared to never seeing you again, this is nothing at all.”

At that moment, White Night’s soul-form brightened again.

Like a campfire blown by the wind, it flared up a bit stronger.

Su Shuang’er and Mu Yingying stood at the edge of the blood pool, listening the entire time without interrupting.

Su Shuang’er’s face showed no expression, but her hand instinctively reached out toward White Night before silently pulling back.

The spear in her grip had become hot, but in the end, it only turned into a sigh that was almost inaudible.

Mu Yingying looked at Su Shuang’er, then at the two in the center of the pool. She opened her mouth but ultimately said nothing.

No one would have guessed that the toothless old lady who claimed to be fifty-eight on the road—who had chased White Night for candy and been teased for “looking energetic”—was actually a being who had lived for five thousand eight hundred years and crossed countless worlds just to see one person again.

Looking at her vibrant face, White Night couldn’t help but ask, “Is it okay that your hair is completely white now?”

White Peace reached out to pinch her own cheek, not caring about her white hair.

“Don’t worry, this age is just right. If I’m too young, it’s inconvenient to do things and I can’t protect you; if I’m too old, I won’t look good, and you might not like me anymore.”

Having said that, she turned to look at Su Shuang’er and Mu Yingying by the blood pool, tilting her chin up with an air of complete confidence.

“From now on, you can just call me Auntie. Pretty Girl Auntie.”

Mu Yingying: “…Huh?”

“I’ve lived five thousand eight hundred years. Calling me Auntie is quite reasonable, isn’t it?” She raised an eyebrow.

“And since I’m so beautiful, calling me a ‘Pretty Girl’ is also quite reasonable. Together, ‘Pretty Girl Auntie’—perfect.”

Mu Yingying turned to look at White Night with a blank expression.

White Night looked at the girl who was deeply affectionate one moment and a prankster the next, not knowing how to respond.

Su Shuang’er stared at this “Pretty Girl Auntie” expressionlessly for three seconds.

She silently looked away.

She didn’t say a word.

Only her grip on the spear tightened once more.

Mu Yingying sighed inwardly.

Well, great. Another love rival.

But this person’s kindness toward White Night was real; she had traded five thousand years of life for the chance to stand by White Night’s side.

Mu Yingying didn’t even know where to start if she wanted to compete.

She could only think to herself secretly: it seems she would have to work even harder to deepen her bond with White Night.