CHAPTER 158: A DANGEROUS GAMBLE!

A distressed look appeared on Mother Qi’s face. She wiped her tears before comforting her daughter. With a gentle expression, she whispered, "Jianyi, we want you to be happy and protect you from any harm. When I first heard you muttering that man’s name in your sleep, I was shocked and distressed. When I thought you could finally heal from your pain, another pain came to torture you."

She caressed Qi Jianyi’s head, and her words lingered in the air for a moment.

"Your father almost went crazy and wanted to look for that guy. We wanted to ask you back then, but when you woke up, you looked fine. We thought that you didn’t remember your dreams, so we let it go. But I’ve seen for the past seven years that your mind is always lost in thought. It was like your body is here, but your mind isn’t." Mother Qi’s eyes trembled, and fear flashed by for a moment before disappearing.

"I’ve always had this fear. The fear of you suddenly disappearing." Qi Jianyi could hear the tremble in her mother’s voice as she tightened her hug.

"But I also realised that we cannot stop you from finding your happiness just because we want you to be by our side. When the time comes, we have to let you go..." Qi Jianyi felt something was wrong with her mother’s words and tone. She broke away from the hug and looked at her mother with a confused gaze.

Mother Qi smiled, but there was a trace of reluctance in it. She rubbed Qi Jianyi’s cheeks before continuing.

"You said you did not regret leaving that world and have accepted your fate with Song Chengfeng, that you were not meant to be together. But Jianyi, have you truly accepted your fate? It’s been seven years, and you’ve only fallen deeper into the sinkhole that slowly suffocates you. What’s the use of leaving that world if you aren’t living in this one either?" Mother Qi confronted her. She questioned her daughter with a serious expression.

Qi Jianyi opened her mouth but didn’t know what to say. She knew that her mother already had her answers, and no matter what she said, it would only be a lie in her mother’s ears.

"You left the filming industry, your writing career, and said you wanted to focus on business. But tell me the truth—did you truly leave that writing career because of the backlash back then? Or because writing would remind you of him?" Mother Qi looked at her with a questioning gaze.

"Or did you choose to do business because you wanted to keep yourself busy so you wouldn’t think of him, didn’t you?" she pressed. Her voice was solemn but full of certainty.

Qi Jianyi turned her head away, directing her gaze elsewhere. Her eyes cast down, dimmed at the thoughts of her reason for doing business. Seeing her guilty reaction, Mother Qi sighed.

"Jianyi, your father and I—we will always be here for you. But don’t clip your wings and break your happiness for us. If being with him made you happy, then go and chase it. You have lived with us, and we are your past and your present. But that doesn’t mean that we will be your future too."

"Mom, how could you say that?" Qi Jianyi gasped in disbelief. She looked at her mother in horror, not understanding why her mother would say things like leaving them.

"Then, do you want to live like this—alone and lifeless—forever? I am fine if you have no thoughts of marriage and want to be single forever. Because your father and I will support you and take care of you until your old age. But if the reason why you don’t want to get married or even meet new people is because of him, I cannot support that." Mother Qi’s voice was stern.

Qi Jianyi was rendered speechless by her mother’s words. What could she possibly say? That she would forget Song Chengfeng and simply move on with her life?

But could she truly do that—forget Song Chengfeng?

Qi Jianyi knew that the love between her and Song Chengfeng was never the kind of sweeping romance people often imagined. It wasn’t something born out of a fleeting moment or a few days of magical connection that blossomed into an everlasting love.

Theirs was something slower—gentle, unhurried, and unexpected.

It began as curiosity, but gradually transformed into something unforgettable. Her feelings had grown slowly, like the first bud of a flower pushing through the soil to bloom.

If Song Chengfeng’s feelings for her were like a delicate thread, subtly drawing him closer without him even realizing why he kept seeking her out...

Then Qi Jianyi’s love was more like a flower that hesitated to bloom. She had felt drawn to his care, his attentiveness, his love, his quiet affection—but she refused to admit it to herself for a long time.

Yet once she finally did, that flower bloomed with brilliance. And now, tragically, it was beginning to wilt with each passing day.

Because even though Qi Jianyi knew that Song Chengfeng’s love would never stop flowing toward her, like water meant to nourish that flower. Unfortunately, she could no longer receive it.

"I can’t choose him over you," Qi Jianyi whispered after a long pause, her voice barely audible. She looked at her mother with a pained expression.

"Just think of him as a fleeting love—something that came into my life, taught me a few lessons, and left. I’ll move on. I’ll forget him." She lied through her teeth, her eyes glistening as they fought to hide the truth. But

Mother Qi wasn’t someone who could be easily deceived. She let out a sharp snort and turned away from her daughter. Closing her eyes, she exhaled a long, heavy breath.

"Asking you to choose him doesn’t mean I’m asking you to abandon us," Mother Qi said, her tone calm but thoughtful.

Qi Jianyi tilted her head slightly, a puzzled look crossing her face. "What do you mean, Mom?" Turning back to meet her daughter’s gaze, Mother Qi finally spoke words that had never once crossed Qi Jianyi’s mind.

"You said the reason you suddenly woke up in that world seven years ago was because both you and the other Qi Jianyi wished to be ’born’ under different circumstances, didn’t you?" she asked, her voice firm, laced with the weight of knowing. Qi Jianyi lowered her head, guilt rising like a tide.

"Did you make that wish or not, Jianyi?" Mother Qi pressed, her eyes fixed on her daughter’s downcast face.

Knowing her mother wouldn’t stop until she had an answer, Qi Jianyi could only nod, quietly admitting the truth. She quickly opened her mouth to defend herself.

"It was just a passing thought, Mom! A silly wish—I never meant it," she said quickly, trying to sound casual, as if she carried no guilt over wishing to be born into a wealthy family.

Seeing the guilt written all over Qi Jianyi’s face, Mother Qi let out a soft laugh and shook her head. "Why do you feel so guilty for making a wish like that? Neither your father nor I blame you. When life gets hard, it’s natural to long for things beyond our reach. I, too, once made a few unreasonable wishes to God. Thankfully, none of them were granted."

She gently patted the back of Qi Jianyi’s hands, her voice soft and comforting. "We’re human, Jianyi. Sometimes we ask God for things that sound absurd—not because we truly want them, but because we need a way to release the emotions we can’t bear to carry."

Qi Jianyi’s panicked expression softened at her mother’s reassurance. But soon, confusion began to cloud her face again. "Why are you bringing this up all of a sudden?" she asked, her brows knitting together.

"You once told me that you and the other Qi Jianyi swapped bodies because your wishes aligned. And before you woke up in this world again, she told you her wish to become ’you’ hadn’t changed," Mother Qi explained, pausing briefly to let her daughter absorb the meaning behind her words.

Qi Jianyi, though still bewildered, began to sense where the conversation was heading. She stayed silent, allowing her mother to continue.

"If her wish still stands, then there’s a small chance that you could return to that world," Mother Qi said gently. Qi Jianyi’s face twisted in disagreement, her lips parting to object.

"If both of you can come to some kind of understanding, it might be possible for you to switch lives again. You could live there—with him—and still come visit us now and then." The more her mother spoke, the more stunned Qi Jianyi became. She stared at her mother in disbelief, horrified by the suggestion.

"Mom, how could you be so sure that I can swap lives with her again? And even if I could, how do you know it’s something we can just do whenever we want? That’s a dangerous gamble," she said firmly, frowning as she dismissed her mother’s idea outright.