Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations
Father and son held each other and trembled unconsciously for quite a while. Father Wang then weakly asked in a soft voice, “Mom? Mom… are you still there…”
After a long moment, there was still no reply.
His mother had stopped smacking him, but Father Wang unexpectedly felt a sense of loss.
“She probably left…” Old Man Wang gave a long sigh. “Your mother’s spirit comes and goes as it pleases: sometimes it’ll suddenly show up, and sometimes it’ll suddenly disappear. Who knows where it goes…”
“Dad, how long has this been going on for?” Father Wang couldn’t help asking.
“At the end of the seventh day after your mom passed away…”
“It’s been almost twenty years…” Father Wang was astonished.
“That’s right… Your mother has visited me from time to time in the last twenty years.” Old Man Wang smiled wryly. “But she doesn’t go anywhere else, and only haunts this house. Now do you know why I moved in with you? It wasn’t just to avoid the matchmaking interviews arranged by your Aunt Wang…”
Father Wang’s nose stung and he was close to tears. “Don’t say anymore, dad, I understand how you feel…”
Being henpecked was a trait of the men in the Wang family…
Actually, in the Wang family’s small villa, Father Wang was also pretty scared of Mother Wang…
The two men huddled together like two stalks of grass crying in a storm and bending pitifully in the wind.
Mother Wang: “Then… shall we get Ling Ling to check for us?”
“We can’t do that… What ghost hunter would catch their own grandmother?”
“So what should we do now?”
“Since mom wants to stay here, then let her… besides, I’m sure she isn’t some vengeful spirit or other.” Father Wang said, “Those two slaps just now were pretty strong! Just like when I was being naughty back then. It hurts the most in the first second after the slap, and a red handprint is left on the cheek. It won’t leave a scar, and will fade very quickly. The most important is how long the slap can last for: your cheek will feel like it’s burning slightly, which can last up to forty-eight hours at the most.”
Old Man Wang and Mother Wang: “…”
Father Wang said a little nostalgically, “No one in the world is better than mom at slapping.” (At that moment, Father Wang didn’t know that Wang Ling had already inherited from his grandmother that which had skipped a generation…)
After learning why Old Man Wang was afraid of the matchmaking interviews, Father Wang stopped asking questions about the matter that night.
Mainly because he didn’t dare to…
God knew if his deceased mother was watching him from a corner. What if he opened a cupboard to find her squatting inside like Toshio in The Grudge ? How scary would that be?
Old Man Wang went to bed early that night. Weary from a long day of travel, and coupled with Aunt Wang harassing him about the matchmaking interviews, he was already overwhelmed. The sea village was peaceful enough at night and public security here was excellent: guards from the village committee patrolled the village every night. The crime rate was practically zero, and the number of criminal cases that had happened in the sea village in the last few decades could be counted on one hand…
Mother Wang got the bed ready and started to do her skincare. This was something she had grown fond of after becoming a housewife. When she was still a writer before, she hadn’t paid much attention to her skin. Now that she was no longer writing and had bailed on her readers, she had more time to take care of herself.
Mother Wang squirted some skincare lotion onto her palm and spread it evenly before gently patting her face. “What do you think we should do about dad’s matter?”
“What else can we do? We can probably forget about the matchmaking. With mom coming by now and then, dad will definitely spend his last years single.” Father Wang smiled bitterly as he scrolled distractedly through the news on his phone. He was glad that he had finished a stockpile of chapters before coming back here; with all these pesky things cropping up in his hometown, he really wouldn’t have been able to type even a single word.
After taking a look at local news, Father Wang put the phone down absent-mindedly.
He thought hard about Old Man Wang’s matter: the main problem now was figuring out how to deal with this once and for all. After putting an end to the matchmaking for his dad, Father Wang as his son still had to think of a way to make Aunt Wang herself give up on the idea of matchmaking for Old Man Wang.
“Hey… should we…” Just then, Mother Wang picked up a banana from the table and peeled it.
Father Wang was frightened by Mother Wang’s behavior. “We shouldn’t… Aunt Wang might be a little nosy, but we can’t kill her. Skinning her or whatnot would be too cruel!”
Mother Wang’s face was a little red. “What are you thinking… You know exactly what I mean…”
Father Wang: “You want to…”
Mother Wang: “Ling Ling is all grown up now and can take care of himself. How about… we have another child…”
Father Wang shook his head. “No! Absolutely not!”
Father Wang really was a little scared.
They had one child, and Earth was almost destroyed…
If they had a second one, wouldn’t the universe explode…
“You did say before that Ling Ling’s inability to control himself has a lot to do with his emotions. He’s always been too tense; if we can give him a brother or a sister, he might be a little more carefree in the future. Wouldn’t that be good?”
Mother Wang smiled, and her expression gradually turned cold as she gazed at Father Wang. “Or are you saying… you don’t want to have a baby with me? You want to have a baby with someone else?”
Father Wang raised his hands ┗( ́?∧?`)┛ . “Your Majesty, you got me wrong…”
He did want… but he didn’t dare!
“Then that’s fine.”
Mother Wang chuckled. “If I do get pregnant, Aunt Wang’s attention will most likely be diverted; she just wants us to have more people in our Wang family.”
Father Wang smiled. “What are you thinking… It’s not that easy to get pregnant… Ling Ling wasn’t conceived right off the bat back then!”
“If once isn’t enough, we just need to try a few more times.”
“…”
“Why are you spacing out? Why don’t you get to work?”
“You want to do it tonight… ?? Dad is resting, and the soundproofing here isn’t great!” Father Wang was taken aback.
“If we’re looking for excitement, we should go all the way.”
“You’re so frisky…”
…
At the same time, at the Altar of Water in the Palace of Mirrors, Wang Ling, who was approaching the altar, suddenly shuddered.
An odd and indescribable feeling welled up in his heart.
He looked up at the sky as if he was pondering something.
“What’s wrong?” Wang Ming looked at Wang Ling.
Wang Ling asked quietly, “What is it like to be a brother?”
