Chapter 2
1521words
I returned here, ostensibly to pack my belongings and say goodbye to my mother.
I walked through the long corridor lined with holographic portraits of generations of Vance family members, each face in those images wearing serious expressions, their gazes carrying a digitally optimized, cold sense of superiority. I headed toward the wing where my mother Sophia resided, where the lighting was always a bit softer.
Her living room door was slightly ajar, and from within came low, desperately suppressed yet still audible sobbing. The sound was like tiny needles piercing my heart.
I pushed the door open.
Mother Sophia was curled up on the sofa lined with soft velvet, like a wounded bird. She was once a talented neural cartographer who could depict the most complex and intricate neural pathways with artistic and beautiful images. But now, those hands that once captured subtle bioelectric signals and created astonishing works were weakly covering her pale cheeks.
"Mom," I called softly, closing the door to shut out the outside world.
Sophia jerked her head up, her eyes brimming with tears. She looked at me as if I were a lifeline, yet also as if I were another piece of evidence breaking her heart. Due to her emotional distress, her body began to tremble slightly beyond her control—one of the early uncontrollable physiological symptoms of "Heartblight."
"Elara, you're back? Did he… did he really let you go?" Sophia's voice carried an undisguisable tremor, every word soaked in pain.
I walked over, not rushing impulsively into her arms crying like in my previous life, seeking illusory comfort. I just silently picked up the temperature-controlled pot on the coffee table, poured a cup of warm water, and then took out a small, withered blue flower that emitted a faint fragrance from an exquisite crystal jar beside it, placing it into the cup.
This was "Tranquil Flower," a plant that helped slightly with emotional stability, something mother often used when she experienced high work pressure in the past.
"Have some water, Mom, I added some Tranquil Flower." I handed the cup to her, keeping my voice as steady as possible, even sounding somewhat distant.
Sophia took the cup but didn't drink. She just looked at me with her reddened eyes full of tears: "Why? Elara, tell me why? You clearly knew… knew that woman…" Her voice choked, unable to continue, "Leila Croft! And her children! They are the future your father really wants!"
"I know." I answered calmly, sitting down on the sofa beside her, maintaining some distance.
"You know? You know and still…" Sophia became more agitated, water from the cup splashed out, wetting her nightgown, "He's not sending you abroad to study, he's sending you away! To make room for his real family! Don't you understand?"
"I know." I repeated, my tone without any fluctuation, almost cruel.
Sophia was stunned, as if seeing her daughter truly for the first time. In her imagination, her daughter should have been grieved, angry, crying together with her and cursing the unfairness of fate—not this calm to the point of cruelty, as if discussing someone else's affairs.
"Then why did you sign it?" Sophia's voice was hoarse, filled with disbelief and deep hurt. "Do you… do you blame me? Blame me for being useless, for failing to keep this family together, for failing to keep your father's heart, for not even being able to maintain my own health…"
"I don't blame you, Mom," I interrupted her, my voice dropping low but carrying an undeniable strength. I reached out and gently held her cold, trembling hand. "Quite the contrary."
I paused, searching for appropriate words that wouldn't reveal my secret of rebirth yet could give her a faint hope: "I'm just choosing a path that can truly protect you. Staying by your side, we can't change anything. We would both just waste away here. By leaving, I can gain… the power and opportunity to change everything."
Sophia looked at me blankly, clearly unable to comprehend my words that were beyond my age and frighteningly calm. "Power? You're just a child, what power do you need? Mom only wants you to be safe and happy."
"Safe? Happy?" I almost couldn't control myself from laughing coldly, but I held it back firmly, "Mom, in this family, under this surname, without power, there's no such thing as safety or happiness. There's only being chosen, being arranged, and ultimately being ruthlessly abandoned."
I moved a little closer, lowered my voice, and looked intensely into her tear-filled eyes: "Trust me just once, will you? Just this once. Wait for me to return. I will take back everything that belongs to us. And, I swear, I will find a way to cure your illness."
Heartblight was considered almost incurable, making my promise sound like delirious mumbling in desperation. But perhaps it was the unprecedented, almost obsessive determination and strength in my eyes that moved her, or perhaps she was already desperate enough to grasp at any straw. Sophia stared at me blankly, tears flowing more heavily in silence, but finally nodded very slowly and slightly.
That night, I lay in my familiar bed, yet could hardly close my eyes.
In the early hours before dawn, I could no longer stay in bed, and quietly got up to go downstairs.
My mother was still there, curled up on the sofa, hugging a cushion, gazing vacantly at that false warmth, like an abandoned, battery-depleted delicate doll forsaken by the whole world.
My nose stung with emotion. I picked up a soft thin blanket folded nearby, walked over, and gently covered her with it.
Sophia seemed startled, trembling suddenly, and lifted her head slightly. Seeing it was me, a faint light flashed in her eyes, then quickly dimmed again, leaving only deep exhaustion and sorrow.
"You're still awake?" Her voice was terribly hoarse, like rough sandpaper scraping against wood.
"I'm organizing my school application materials, some documents are urgent." I shifted my gaze, telling a clumsy lie.
Sophia nodded, neither questioning further nor exposing the truth. Mother and daughter fell into a suffocating, sad silence.
After a long, long time, so long that I thought she would not speak again, she finally mumbled, as if talking to herself, yet also like making a final, feeble accusation against this unfair world: "It's not that I didn't try… Elara, I really gave it my all to hold on… but he never… from the very beginning… never intended to let me win…"
At that moment, immense sadness and anger nearly overwhelmed me. I desperately wanted to hug her tightly, to tell her that I would never let anyone hurt her again in this lifetime, to tell her that I knew what would happen in the future, to tell her to just hold on a little longer.
But scenes from my past life flashed sharply before me—mother bound to a hospital bed with restraints after her failed suicide attempt, her eyes completely extinguished, and the endless despair brought by my own cheap, non-refundable return ticket.
Being soft-hearted is the greatest cruelty—both to mother and to myself. Temporary tenderness would only drag us back into the abyss.
I hardened my heart, stood up straight, and forced my voice to sound calm, even indifferent.
"Get some rest, Mom," I said, "It's late. You need sleep."
After saying this, I turned around and walked up the stairs step by step, without looking back. I could clearly feel that gaze from behind—filled with confusion, pain, and a trace of completely shattered hope—following my back until I disappeared around the corner of the staircase.
Back in my room, I locked the door and slid down against the cold door panel. I finally allowed myself to take a deep breath, only to inhale a mouthful of bitterness.
No, I can't stop. I don't have time to grieve.
I opened my Personal Terminal, the cold light of the screen illuminating my wet but determined face. I bypassed my family network's main authorization (I knew my father would soon revoke it), using a backdoor access I had set up as a child that had gone unnoticed, and began frantically searching for any traces related to "Omega Genesis" company that hadn't been reported by mainstream media, checking the Vance Group's recent non-public investment bulletins.
Time ticked away slowly. Just when I was about to give up, in an extremely inconspicuous appendix of a report about sponsoring an ecological research project on some remote planet in the group's internal database, I saw a vague mention of "Omega Genesis" as the core technology provider, along with a project code whose budget had been drastically reduced, almost hidden—
P.O. 177.
Prometheus' Child? 177?
My heart skipped a beat, a shiver of premonition ran down my spine.
This might be the only, tiny clue.
But it was enough.
I burned this code deep into my mind.
This was my starting point.
