Chapter 226: Volume Finale: Prisoner of Fate
"She’s blind?"
The frail girl, who called herself Xiaxia, was still looking in Tang Yuan’s direction with her vacant eyes. Her voice was filled with joy. "Grandma says only friends can play together at home... Big Brother, are you a friend?"
Tang Yuan wasn’t too worried anymore. Having already stolen a lot of money, he wasn’t as anxious as he’d been at first. He stopped, and with a hint of curiosity, he engaged with Xiaxia. "Can you... see me?"
"What does ’see’ mean?" Xiaxia asked back, a little confused. "Aren’t you right here, Big Brother?"
After a bit of conversation, Tang Yuan more or less understood.
The girl calling herself Xiaxia had the surname Leng. She was indeed blind, and it wasn’t that she could see him. Rather, in her Perception, there was an aura in front of her, similar to the big brother next door, that even seemed to have a ’glowing’ quality.
"Big Brother, are you a friend?" Xiaxia repeated the question. Tang Yuan didn’t know how to answer. The word "friend" gave him a feeling of instinctive revulsion. ’What rotten luck,’ he thought to himself. ’To think I’d run into a blind little girl who can sense me. Forget it. I’ll just go rob the next house.’
But just as Tang Yuan was about to leave silently without answering, he noticed the little girl was fumbling her way off the bed. Her body swayed, and she was about to fall!
"This kid!"
Instinctively, Tang Yuan immediately underwent Spiritualization and rushed over, then solidified to catch the little girl—his Spirit Body could have caught her too, but because his Spiritual Power activated more slowly that way, Xiaxia might still have gotten scraped.
"Th-thank you, Big Brother."
After Tang Yuan placed her back on the bed, the little girl knew full well she had almost fallen. Her voice turned sorrowful. "Xiaxia always needs Grandma’s help to get out of bed. I’ve tried so many times, but I always fall."
"...Be careful yourself. When your grandma isn’t here, don’t move around recklessly." Tang Yuan didn’t know what else to say, so he replied coldly, "You were lucky this time. If you fall again, I won’t be there to help you."
"Okay... Big Brother, are you leaving?" Sensing Tang Yuan’s intent to depart, Xiaxia’s voice grew dejected. "Wait a moment."
As she spoke, she secretly fumbled under her pillow for a moment before pulling out a White Rabbit creamy candy.
"Big Brother helped Xiaxia, so this is for you!"
Holding out the candy, the little girl’s voice held a trace of reluctance. "This is the candy Xiaxia hid today. Grandma says I can’t eat too much, not even during the New Year, because it’ll rot my teeth. So I was saving it for a time when I don’t have any candy..."
"This..." Tang Yuan didn’t know why he was still here. He took the candy from the girl’s frail little hand.
It had been a long time... a very, very long time since anyone had given him anything.
When was the last time he’d eaten candy?
"Is it good?"
Since Xiaxia couldn’t see, she didn’t know what Tang Yuan was doing. After a moment of silence, Tang Yuan replied in a low voice, "It’s okay... No, it’s delicious!"
For a moment, his stiff face even felt a little flushed. Tang Yuan desperately wanted to give her something in return and then leave quickly, but he had nothing on him except the money he had stolen. Helpless, he could only pat himself down blankly.
But when Xiaxia heard Tang Yuan’s reply, she was overjoyed. "Grandma says only friends give each other gifts. Big Brother helped Xiaxia, and you ate the candy Xiaxia gave you."
"So, are we friends now?"
Hearing this, Tang Yuan finally sensed that something was strange.
’Why is it always ’Grandma says’ this and ’friends’ that... What about this little girl’s parents?’
Tang Yuan asked about it indirectly and received an answer that left him silent.
Xiaxia’s parents had died in a car accident several years ago. Her grandfather had also passed away long ago. Now, her grandmother was raising her all by herself.
On top of that, the little girl was very frail and rarely went outside. She hadn’t gone to kindergarten and didn’t have any friends. She was always at home alone, lying in bed, occasionally listening to her grandmother’s stories and learning some basic things.
Because she rarely had anyone to talk to and didn’t fully understand what the death of her parents truly meant, Xiaxia’s expression was still full of the joy of making a new friend as she told Tang Yuan these things.
But looking at that happy smile, a dark emotion suddenly churned within Tang Yuan’s heart.
’She understands nothing. She’s just a little brat who has nothing...’
’You don’t have parents either, no friends, no family, and you’re even blind...’
’So why... why can you smile so happily? By what right?!’
This dark emotion wasn’t directed at the little girl. It stemmed from the powerlessness he felt over his own aimless life. Tang Yuan felt an endless confusion and rage building up inside his heart.
Suppressing the churning darkness in his mind, Tang Yuan deliberately put on a stern face to scare the little girl. "Xiaxia, Grandma told you not to eat too much candy, but you hid it and deceived your grandma... You’re a bad girl, you know."
"Ooh..." Visibly, Xiaxia’s lips trembled as she reluctantly admitted, "Yes, Xiaxia is a bad girl... Xiaxia often lies to Grandma."
Huh? For a moment, even his darkest thoughts stopped churning. Tang Yuan blinked and asked curiously, "Besides the candy, what else have you lied about?"
And so, he heard the little girl’s somewhat timid voice.
