CHAPTER 61: CALM DOWN!

Yuanying wiped her eyes furiously.

"She stole everything..."

Her voice was barely audible.

"My place... my family... the love... everything..."

But even as she whispered it, she felt guilty.

Because... Huaijin wasn’t bad.

She wasn’t cruel.

She wasn’t scheming like in those stories Yuanying’s mother read aloud, villainess cousins who bullied the true heiress.

Huaijin was... gentle.

Annoying sometimes, smug at other times, but honest and straightforward.

She didn’t deserve to be hated.

Yuanying buried her face in her arms.

"...Why does it hurt so much then..."

***

While Yuanying trembled upstairs, the elders discussed the festival outcomes.

Inside the study room, the old man, Grandfather Chi, sat with a heavy expression.

He, too, had seen everything today.

The way Huaijin danced with effortless grace. Her calm poise on stage, her innocent, bright smile, and natural charm, even at age six.

And more importantly—

The way his granddaughter had inherited the aura of her mother.

Just like that woman who had appeared mysteriously ten years ago.

A woman so astonishing, so ethereal, so beyond the scope of ordinary understanding... that Grandfather Chi himself had suspected she was not from this world.

But she vanished without a trace after giving birth to Huaijin.

Using all of the Chi family’s power, manpower, and intelligence networks, none of them found a clue to her origins.

Just... gone.

As if she stepped out of thin air and returned to it.

Grandfather Chi’s fingers trembled slightly as he recalled her last words:

"Take care of Yuanfeng for me. And... take care of our daughter."

But he failed to do that, or he didn’t even have the chance. Because Yuanfeng had fought with him bitterly, accusing him of driving the woman away and forcing her into a corner.

And in that heated conflict...

Yuanfeng had left with Huaijin, who was only three years old, cutting off ties for years.

It was only this year that fate brought them back.

The old man sighed deeply.

"Yuanfeng’s daughter... must be protected."

He murmured this to himself. It was not because of inheritance, nor because of pride.

But because he had failed his son, his daughter-in-law. Grandpa Chi may have looked strict and cold-blooded person, but his heart was seen through by his late wife and his youngest son’s wife, too.

He didn’t know when he began to see that girl like his own daughter, perhaps her warm treatment brought warmth to his heart that he thought he had already lost.

So, he was determined not to fail his granddaughter.

*

*

*

Yuanying stared at her mirror.

Her reflection stared back at her.

A pretty girl, a little princess dressed in pastel pink, with her eyes red, cheeks flushed.

"Why..." she asked her reflection, voice trembling, "why can’t I be enough?"

She touched her cheek.

Why couldn’t she be as effortlessly adored as Huaijin? Why did everyone act differently around her cousin? Why did her grandfather smile at Huaijin but only nod at her? Why did Song Jue look at Huaijin with interest instead of at her?

Why was she losing everything?

The answer was one she didn’t want to hear—

Because she was insecure.

Because she felt unsafe.

Because she was a child shoved into an adult’s world, forced to carry expectations she didn’t understand.

Yuanying choked out a sob she stifled with her hand.

She hated this.

She really, truly hated this.

But more than hate... she felt fear.

Fear of being abandoned, like many other children who couldn’t meet expectations, fear of being irrelevant, and being replaced.

Fear that maybe... she was not lovable at all.

The ride home after the festival was peaceful.

Chi Yuanfeng kept glancing at the rearview mirror every two seconds, staring at Huaijin as if she were made of delicate spun sugar that might dissolve if he took his eyes off her.

Meanwhile, Huaijin sat in the back seat with a lollipop in her mouth, her school bag resting on her lap, kicking her legs happily to the rhythm of a children’s song playing in the car.

The contrast could not be more ridiculous.

"Dad, the road’s ahead," she said kindly when he nearly drifted into the wrong lane for the third time.

"Oh—right, right!" He jerked the steering wheel back. "Huaijin, are you tired? Does your leg hurt? Your arm? Are you dizzy? Hungry? Scared? Overwhelmed? Do you need—"

"Dad."

"—a foot massage? A warm bath? A neck pillow? Extra dinner—"

"Dad."

"—or should we go to the hospital just to check—"

"DAD."

Yuanfeng shut up immediately, his mouth snapping closed like someone had hit the off switch.

"...Yes, sweetheart?"

"Please concentrate on the road before you kill us both."

"Ah. Right. Yes. Road."

He swallowed hard and stared at the windshield as if it might suddenly explode.

Huaijin sighed and leaned back, sucking her lollipop. Honestly, she understood why Yuanying felt pressed to death by expectations; having parents like these had to be stressful.

Overprotective parents were both a blessing and a curse.

And her dad was the kind of overprotective who would personally fight the moon if she ever fell and scraped her knee under its light.

Once they returned to their apartment, the evening breeze brushed through the living room curtains. Huaijin dropped her bag on the sofa and stretched.

"Dad, homework," she declared solemnly.

Yuanfeng froze.

"Ah?"

"I have homework. If I don’t finish it now, Teacher Zhang will crush me tomorrow."

Yuanfeng’s eyes widened in horror.

"No! Not Teacher Zhang! That man hates children!"

Huaijin blinked. "...He’s literally employed to teach children."

"That doesn’t mean he likes them!"

"Dad, please calm down."

She patted his arm like comforting a mentally unstable uncle.

Then she marched to the dining table, pulled out her workbook, and started scribbling through the math problems with impressive speed.

It took her half an hour to finish the homework, considering Yuanfeng might faint if he saw her doing all the homework in just ten minutes.

Because honestly? After living as an adult before transmigrating into this world, first-grade homework barely counted as a warm-up.