The great hall fell silent.
Bibi Dong looked at Qian Chen, slowly pressing her palm against her chest.
Waves of heavy pain throbbed there.
She had once believed that Qian Xunji had taken everything from her.
And so she had stripped Qian Chen of his right to have a mother.
She hated Qian Xunji.
Yet she had visited that hatred upon her own child.
"Why?"
Bibi Dong raised her eyes.
"You knew all of this. Why did you still come to see me?"
"I wanted to ask you in person."
"Ask me whether I regret it?"
"Yes."
Qian Chen looked at her.
"Do you regret it?"
Bibi Dong pressed her fingertips against her chest.
She remembered the child who had been sent away from Spirit Hall.
She remembered how he had clutched her sleeve.
And she remembered prying those tiny fingers loose with her own hands.
She had not looked back then.
Because she hated Qian Xunji.
Because she did not want to see that child who resembled him.
But eighteen years had passed.
That child stood before her.
Behind him, the Snow Empress and the Ice Empress stood ready to protect him.
By his side were Shui Bing'er, Shui Yue'er, and Huo Wu.
He had grown into someone even Spirit Hall had to treat with caution.
He did not need her protection.
Nor did he need her belated compensation.
"I do."
Bibi Dong finally answered.
Once those words fell, she seemed to lose the strength holding her up.
She took half a step back and braced herself against the desk beside her.
Qian Chen looked at her.
Bibi Dong raised her face, her eyes bereft of a pope's authority for the first time.
"I regret sending you away."
"But back then, I..."
She stopped.
She did not want to