Chapter 624 - 230: Family Reunion
Chapter 624: Chapter 230: Family Reunion
Twenty years!
For over seven thousand days and nights, she hadn’t spent a single one away from the Buddha’s altar. She had knelt and begged the Heavenly Gods and buddhas to let her find her daughter. She had waited a full twenty years, waited until she had one foot in the grave, and finally, she had this result.
Her Suying, her daughter, had returned!
Tears streaming down her face, the old woman reached out to grasp her flesh and blood. Halfway there, she tripped over a raised bluestone slab and nearly fell to the ground.
Xu Shiling and Chen Song were frantic. They rushed forward to catch her, but Xu Su Ying beat everyone to it, throwing herself at the old woman’s feet.
"Mother, Mother! Mother, I’m back. Look at me, Mother. I’m your Suying," she cried.
Xu Su Ying wept loudly. Gone was the ease and poise she had shown while playing a ghost to catch a "thief" in the dead of night.
Panicking like a child who had made a mistake, she threw herself into her mother’s arms, begging for forgiveness over and over. She wasn’t worried about being punished; she only feared that the weathering of time had wrinkled her mother’s face, leaving agonizing scars on her heart, as if she had suffered a death by a thousand cuts.
It was all her fault for being unfilial!
If only she had been a little less hesitant and a little more decisive. If only she had followed those subtle clues to the Capital City earlier, she wouldn’t have made an elderly mother wait in anguish for twenty years.
It was her fault. It was all her fault!
Xu Su Ying bawled, crying so hard in the old woman’s arms that she nearly convulsed.
"Mother, I know I was wrong. I will never leave you again. Mother, hit me, please. It’s all because I was disobedient. I made you suffer. Mother, it’s all my fault, it’s my fault..."
Xu Su Ying cried until she nearly fainted. The old woman held her trembling body, her own tears flowing freely. She hugged Xu Su Ying tightly, as if holding onto a lost and recovered treasure.
It was the heavens’ mercy that gave this mother and daughter a chance to meet again. She was satisfied. Even if she were to die right now, she would die content!
The mother and daughter trembled all over, their wails echoing far into the distance. Not only did Xu Shiling, Chen Song, and the others get red eyes and turn their heads to wipe away tears, but even the other officials and scholars staying at the relay station, as well as the female family members of noble houses, couldn’t help but shed tears alongside them.
"Twenty years. The Xu family searched for twenty years, and they finally found her."
"This is a joyful event, a great joy. We shouldn’t cry; we should smile."
"Pity the old woman. Who knows how she survived all these years? She cried until she went blind. Pity Xu Su Ying too. A proper and privileged lady, as precious as an Emperor’s daughter, yet forced to wander in a foreign land..."
"Let’s not say such depressing things. Everything is fine now, and everything will be fine in the future..."
As they spoke, they couldn’t help but turn away to wipe their own tears. It was clearly someone else’s family reunion, yet they felt deeply moved, as if they had become characters in the play themselves. After all, who didn’t have a little empathy?
The courtyard was too chaotic, and there were too many people. Xu Su Ying didn’t want people treating them like a spectacle. More importantly, the old woman’s body was visibly swaying. Her strength was clearly depleted, and she was about to collapse.
Seeing this, Xu Su Ying wrapped her arms around her mother’s side and said, "Mother, let me help you inside to rest. Please loosen your grip, Mother. I won’t run away. From now on, I will stay right by your side and never leave you again."
The old woman raised an arm to wipe the corners of her eyes, but her other hand still gripped her daughter’s arm tightly. "Are you really not going to leave Mother again?" she asked tremulously.
"I won’t leave you. Wherever you are is my home. I won’t go anywhere from now on. I’ll stay right here with you every day."
The frail old woman probably didn’t even weigh eighty pounds. Half-dragging and half-carrying her, Xu Su Ying brought her inside all by herself, leaving the others who wanted to help with nothing to do.
Once inside, the old woman couldn’t even sit up straight. As if drained of all strength, she leaned to the side and nearly tipped over.
Weeping, Xu Su Ying gently laid her mother down on the bed. She then pulled up a small stool and sat by the bedside. Pressing the old woman’s hand against her own cheek, she spoke intimately to her.
Tears continued to stream from the corners of the old woman’s eyes. Even though Xu Su Ying kept repeating phrases like, "I’m back, I’ll never leave you again," and "Mother, it’s me, Suying," she still couldn’t control her weeping.
Staring at Xu Su Ying through her tears, she gripped her daughter’s hand tightly, laughing and crying at the same time. "Let Mother look at you a little longer. Before, Mother could only see you in her dreams. You unfilial child, you used to hide in the fog, calling out ’Mother’ and then running away. I would get up to chase you, but I could never catch you. You silly girl, you’ve been mischievous since you were little. Even at this age, you were still playing hide-and-seek with Mother..."