Chapter 38: A Daughter from Another World

“I told you, you’ve clearly fallen for another scheming woman who’s just toying with your feelings, haven’t you?”

“Xiao Li isn’t a scheming woman! She’s just too busy!”

“Ah, yes, yes, yes…”

Qu Linglong and Lin Qianqian bickered noisily nearby, but Hua Xiangrong paid them no mind. She held a bowl of osmanthus wine lees, her gaze fixed intently on the images in her mind.

Her little system, meanwhile, was already in a complete panic.

“Wahhh! I knew this would be exposed sooner or later! What do we do now, Host?!”

“Don’t panic, 099.”

Hua Xiangrong clutched the bowl of wine lees tighter, her small brows unconsciously furrowing. Her voice carried a hint of uncertainty.

“Let’s just wait and see, wait and see…”

It was unclear if she was comforting her system or herself.

The girl who usually championed ‘living in the moment’ now found her heartstrings taut with tension, appearing nervous—even a little anxious about gains and losses—due to her identity being unexpectedly revealed ahead of schedule.

***

On the other side.

“What do you mean, ‘Rongrong grew up with me’? She’s your child; how could she have grown up with me?”

Hua Yan listened to Yun Xueshang’s question, finding it utterly baffling.

“?”

Yun Xueshang paused slightly, looking at her. “But I have never given birth to a child. Is Rongrong… not your daughter?”

“???”

Hua Yan’s confusion deepened, her tone filled with bewilderment.

“How could she be mine? She suddenly appeared at my place over a month ago! She even said you were her mother and that I was a heartless scoundrel, which got me a good beating from Grandmother!”

“But I… truly have never had a child.”

Hua Yan stared at the other woman’s cool, clear face, utterly devoid of any hint of a joke. Her mind instantly buzzed into a chaotic mess.

‘Since she’s not your child, and not mine… where on earth did this child come from?!’

“Wait, Yan’er,” Yun Xueshang suddenly asked, “Could you tell me in detail everything that happened after Rongrong found you?”

“Ah? Oh, it’s like this…”

Hua Yan was momentarily stunned, then proceeded to explain everything in painstaking detail.

“So that’s how it is.”

After listening to the narrative, Yun Xueshang fell silent for a moment, then hesitated slightly. “I do have a guess… but it might sound a little too outlandish.”

“Oh, just tell me already! Don’t keep me in suspense!”

Hua Yan could no longer wait. She was practically dying of anxiety—could Rongrong truly have sprung from a rock?

“Yan’er, I believe Rongrong might… truly be our daughter,” Yun Xueshang said softly, meeting Hua Yan’s anxious gaze.

“What do you mean, ‘truly our daughter’? We clearly haven’t given birth to any…”

“But our bloodline detection spell shouldn’t be wrong, should it?”

Yun Xueshang looked at her, continuing her analysis.

“Even if the spell were mistaken, with your grandmother’s cultivation, there are very few in this world who could deceive her.

How could such an arrogant and powerful expert willingly pretend to be a little girl? Moreover, Rongrong is indeed only at the Qi Refinement stage, and you witnessed her breakthrough with your own eyes.”

“That makes sense… Wait, how do you know my grandmother’s cultivation is so high?”

Hua Yan gradually calmed down, nodding in agreement, but then suddenly detected something amiss.

“Aren’t you the only son of the Hundred Flowers Valley Master? I asked the Saintess of the Joyous Union Sect about your identity back then.”

Yun Xueshang, in turn, was taken aback by the question and looked at her in confusion. “Your grandmother is the old Valley Master; who in the Divine Continent doesn’t know of her profound cultivation?”

“?!”

“You know my identity?! Then why didn’t you expose me when I’ve been calling myself Hua Yan’er all these days?!”

‘You, you’ve probably been enjoying watching me make a fool of myself all this time!’

Hua Yan’s face instantly flushed with shame and indignation.

“I thought you wanted to hide your identity in front of Fellow Daoist Qu and Junior Sister Lin. After all, relations between the orthodox and demonic sects are tense right now; I understand that much.”

As she spoke, the white-haired immortal maiden subtly straightened her non-existent chest, seeming to carry a hint of… pride.

“So, I suppose I should thank you?!”

“No need to thank me, Yan’er, it’s what I should do.” Yun Xueshang’s gaze was sincere.

“Get lost! Don’t call me Yan’er anymore!”

Hua Yan’s cheeks were flushed crimson with anger. “Let’s get to the point! According to your theory, how exactly did Rongrong come to be?”

“Oh…”

The white-haired girl lowered her eyes, continuing, “As I just said, since Rongrong is indeed our daughter, is there a possibility—that she isn’t the daughter of ‘us’ in *this* world?”

“Not of this world… What do you mean?”

Hua Yan looked at her, completely failing to understand.

“Yan’er, you know that the Divine Continent is one world, but beyond it, there are countless other realms,” Yun Xueshang slowly explained.

“Some worlds are small, self-contained, and connected to us either stably or temporarily; those are the so-called ‘secret realms.’ Other worlds are vast, like the Immortal Realm after ascension, which is rumored to be several times larger than the Divine Continent.”

“Tales of strange events from other worlds have existed since ancient times, countless in number. So, have you ever considered that there might be a world extremely similar to the Divine Continent?”

“Are you saying… like what those bald Buddhist cultivators talk about, ‘a thought, a world’? That every choice a living being makes splits off into different realms—that kind of nonsense?”

Hua Yan furrowed her brows, pondering deeply, even forgetting to quibble over the appellation.

“It’s somewhat similar,” Yun Xueshang nodded. “I believe Rongrong might have come from such a world, one similar to ours.

There, too, exist Yun Xueshang and Hua Yan, the Hundred Flowers Valley and the Joyous Union Sect. And in that world, perhaps I truly conceived Rongrong after that competition on the Joyous Union Sect’s Yin-Yang Platform ten years ago, developed affection for you, and gave birth to her.”

“This would also explain why Rongrong, upon first seeing me, familiarly told me not to buy sword manuals from street stalls—a matter that had always puzzled me.

Now, it seems it’s perhaps because she was raised by ‘me’ in that world, and is familiar with ‘my’ temperament and habits.”

“From Rongrong’s description, we can infer that ‘I’ in that world, perhaps due to some event, wanted to take her to find you. However, through some twist of fate, Rongrong might have inadvertently crossed worlds, arriving directly at the Hundred Flowers Valley.”

Hua Yan listened, and though it still felt fantastical, she couldn’t help but find some truth in it.

“Now that you mention it… I remember too. When I asked Rongrong how she came to the Hundred Flowers Valley, she said her vision went ‘snap’ to black, then ‘whoosh’ to bright, and she was here…

I thought at the time that you had knocked her out, brought her to the valley, and then woken her up.”

“I thought, if you were her real mother, how could you treat a child like that? Moreover, Protector Liu also mentioned that when she first saw Rongrong, Rongrong was full of spirit, not at all like someone who had been starving and traveling.”

The more she thought about it, the more reasonable Yun Xueshang’s words seemed. “Also, Rongrong once told me that you taught her that ‘demonic cultivators are pretty much the same as evil cultivators.’ But from my observations these past few days, I’ve always felt you aren’t such an extremist… You don’t actually think that, do you?”

“Naturally not.” Yun Xueshang shook her head frankly, meeting Hua Yan’s inquisitive gaze.

“Then that’s right. It seems Rongrong truly might have instantly crossed worlds and landed in the Hundred Flowers Valley.

As for her view on demonic cultivation… perhaps the ‘you’ of that world, out of love turned to hatred, resented me and taught her that way?”

“Perhaps so.” Yun Xueshang nodded gently.

“So… Rongrong is truly the child of ‘us’ from another world? And by some twist of fate, she arrived before ‘us’ in this world, where she was never born?”

Ultimately, Hua Yan also accepted this conclusion, which could be considered a supernatural legend even in the Divine Continent. Yet, her heart still felt somewhat adrift, lingering with an undeniable sense of disbelief.

“Mm… although it sounds utterly absurd, only this can explain everything clearly,” Yun Xueshang nodded, falling silent for a moment before speaking again. “Yan’er, now that we’ve deduced the truth of this matter, you and I… should temporarily not tell Rongrong, alright?”

“What…”

Hua Yan was startled at first, then understood. “Of course we can’t tell her! She’s still so young; if she were to know that she might never see her real mother again in this life, and that she’s all alone, adrift in this similar yet unfamiliar world… how could she possibly bear it?”

“Indeed. To tell her the truth would be far too cruel.”

Yun Xueshang nodded, remaining silent for a long moment, then her voice dropped slightly. “Yan’er, Rongrong is a good child… I want to help her keep this ‘lie’ going. Even if she is just our daughter from another world…”

“What are you talking about?!”

Hua Yan immediately put her hands on her hips and glared at her. “Who cares if it’s this world or any other world! Yun Xueshang, I don’t care what you think, but Hua Xiangrong—she is my, Hua Yan’s, biological daughter!”

The white-haired maiden watched her indignant expression, first freezing slightly, then her lips curved into a gentle smile, her gaze softening. “Mm, I think so too. I also want to stay with Rongrong… She is also my, Yun Xueshang’s, daughter.”