"Later, the benefactor fate had sent me was the vile ghost who had once slaughtered my people. He used me until there was nothing left, cracking my marrow and sucking my bones dry. Only then did I learn that everything in fate had long since had its price written in black and white."
I really wanted to eat the bitter melon my elder brother had grown just one more time. As his consciousness blurred, Wei Mulan saw the flames soaring skyward from the Wei Household Immortal Shrine. They seemed to have spotted him too, suddenly stretching their wings toward him. The wings gradually widened, abruptly transforming into the shapes of his parents, his elder brother, and the uncles and aunties from the village. They smiled and reached out to him, their faces free of even the slightest shadow.
Wei Mulan could not help reaching out and gripping their hands tightly. Then his body became light, and his consciousness suddenly sank away. He thought... he had finally gone home.
After drifting for a thousand years, he had finally returned.
"He's dead."
Wen Xu gave a low hum, but inwardly he thought, everything in fate had long since had its price written in black and white? Perhaps. One day, he too might pay the price he needed to pay, just like Wei Mulan.
From very early on, Wen Xu had been uneasy about his excessive good fortune. Too many "good things" had suddenly crowded around him. It did not feel real, and he had not dared to move. He had been terrified that those things secretly bore price tags too steep for him to afford. Yet when he truly saw someone paying the price for past "good fortune," he instead became calm and composed.
Compared to Wei Mulan, who had tortured himself