Yaxiu had once wondered what kind of child he might have in the future.
Don't misunderstand—he wasn't the sort of guy who looked at a girl he liked and immediately started daydreaming about names for their kids. In fact, Yaxiu considered his own imagination rather barren. Whenever he saw a girl he fancied, his romantic fantasies basically stopped at places like classrooms, bedrooms, living rooms, beaches, and love hotels... Though even those fantasies rarely cropped up after he started working; "we've got a meeting in a bit" was the ultimate cure for lust.
As the old saying went: overtime can't help you find a lover, but overtime can ensure nobody else has one either.
Yaxiu had first imagined having a child when he was eight years old. Back then, his dad had given him a vicious thrashing with a rattan cane for sneaking in computer games, and he had silently sworn that he would raise a kid who could play games with him in the future.
As he grew older, his expectations for his future child only multiplied: they had to enjoy outdoor sports, know how to date, be able to solve the final problem on the Gaokao math exam, be good-looking, know how to cook, be fluent in a second language, know how to write or draw manga...
Only after entering the workforce, experiencing the harsh beatings of society, and feeling the hardships of life did Yaxiu come to understand his parents' past strictness—while also feeling utterly apologetic toward his future child: *I'm sorry, kid, but I can't find your mommies, boohoo.*
Yet no matter what, the child he had envisioned was definitely never supposed to be like this.
"If you're the one who gets the highest score, Papa, but in the end you have to hand the wish over to Big Sister Annan, do you really—truly—think that's okay?"
Lisi sat cross-legged on the bed, her face full of righteous indignation as she kept her voice low. "I feel it's so unfair to you, Papa!"
"...Rest assured, your papa is utterly useless. The one who gets the highest score will definitely be your Aunt Bojin or Uncle Harvey."
"But it's still unfair!" Lisi rocked her body back and forth, her freshly tied twintails bobbing along. "Think about it, Papa! You, Aunt Bojin, and Uncle Harvey are good companions who've shared life and death! You should share woes and share fortunes! A reward like a God's wish should be shared among the three of you, not given away to that wicked witch Annan who took advantage of your misfortune and enslaved you!"
"You were calling her Big Sister Annan just a second ago."
"That doesn't matter, Papa! What matters is what you think!" Lisi widened her eyes. "Don't tell me you don't want a God's wish? The Omniscient Weaver can grant any wish you have—resurrecting the dead, traveling through time, immortality, or even ascending to godhood—"
"Can I wish for every woman to be required to wear miniskirts and black or white stockings?"
"Blergh."
"Huh?" Yaxiu stared at Lisi, who had stuck out her little tongue looking ready to heave. "What's wrong with you?"
"No—nothing. Lisi probably just isn't used to riding in a car, so my tummy feels a little sick."
"But you've been resting for over an hour..."
"In any case, you want the wish too, right, Papa?" Lisi forcefully steered the conversation back on track. "You can't be willing to just hand the wish over to a wicked witch who deliberately wronged you all, can you?"
"If you're asking whether I want it or not, of course I do," Yaxiu said, propping his chin in his hand. "But I don't think I possess the qualifications—or rather, the breadth of mind—to claim such a wish."
"Why would making a wish need qualifications?"
"Think about it. After finally securing the chance to make a wish to a God, could anyone really care only about themselves and make some selfish wish? The best thing to do would be to make a perfect wish that benefits all living beings while also serving oneself, right? For example, asking the God to bestow new technology that drastically increases productivity, or boosting the lifespan of all citizens—"
"What's wrong with being selfish?!"
Yaxiu stared blankly at Lisi as she roared at him. The white-haired little girl's face was devoid of its usual feigned innocent sweetness, replaced instead by a deep, misanthropic resentment. Yet almost immediately she shrank back, her expression returning to its customary cuteness as though what Yaxiu had just seen was merely an illusion.
She lowered her head and spoke timidly. "Lisi... what Lisi means is, you aren't from this country anyway, Papa, and you don't feel any sense of belonging here. When making a wish, you don't need to consider so much. Wouldn't it be better to just follow the desires of your heart?"
"...Let's have an honest talk, Lisi."
Yaxiu said calmly, "If you want to call me Papa, I don't mind. It's just a title anyway. After all, keeping up this father-daughter façade puts Annan at ease, so we can just treat it like code names between coworkers.
"However, I find it a bit strange. Annan said you lost your memories, and she shouldn't be wrong about that. But this ambitious, discord-sowing attitude of yours isn't something a normal amnesiac child could pull off. Or are you the offspring of some legendary race—so even amnesia can't stop you from being the personification of desire, with filthy blood oozing from every single pore of your body?"
"Does a race like that even exist?"
"Of course. The Capitalists," Yaxiu said, folding his arms. "You didn't lose your memory at all. How did you trick Annan?"
"No, Papa, you're wrong." Lisi tilted her head. "I really did lose my memory. My earliest memory is being captured by those bad guys in black robes. I can't remember anything further back at all."
"Then why are you—"
"But I know what I have to do."
Lisi lifted her chin to look at Yaxiu. "Just like that old witch Annan, I want to use my status as an outsider to become an Echoer. But the difference is that Annan can only rely on you all, whereas I want to become an Echoer myself.
"I have a wish that must be fulfilled," she said with utter seriousness. "I can never, ever surrender it to anyone!"
Yaxiu blinked. "Setting aside whether we can even resist Annan, even if we could, how would you snatch the wish from our hands?"
"That's easy enough." Lisi held up five little fingers. "Papa, me, Aunt Bojin, Uncle Harvey, and Witch Annan. That makes five competitors.
"As long as you unite with the others to resolutely shut out Witch Annan, Papa, the competitors drop to four. And if you're the Echoer who gets the highest hidden score, the final competition will just be between you and me! Once I take care of you, Papa, the wish will be mine!"
Lisi folded down the rest of her fingers, leaving only her middle finger pointed at Yaxiu.
"You're so confident you can defeat me?"
"It's not a matter of confidence, but taking on just you is obviously much simpler than dealing with five people," Lisi stated with absolute conviction. "And don't forget, Papa, you and I still have two Contracts between us!"
"So what? They're two-way anyway."
"That's where you're wrong! Your Contract on me only lasts for 101 days, but my Contract on you has no time limit! If neither of us gets the wish in the end, you'll have to be my servant for life!"
"Hey, hey, how did my status get downgraded from papa to servant?" Yaxiu felt the little brat was getting bolder and bolder. "Besides, this Contract is merely the work of a Two-Winged Sorcerer. There's bound to be a way to dispel it. You can't scare me."
"There is indeed a way to dispel it," Lisi agreed, nodding. "But I have ways to keep you from doing so! If you want to go out, I'll order you to feed me doughnuts. If you want to enter the Void Realm, I'll order you to tell me fairy tales. If you want to study, I'll order you to give me horsey rides! Let's see what you do then! Not only will you be my servant, I'll make sure you never get a wife your whole life!"
"Lisi, you're wicked!"
"Hmph! If you don't want to break your back in the bathroom when you're old and starve to death in utter misery because you can't move, then give it your all to seize that wish... What are you doing?! I'm gonna scream! The Contract says you're not allowed to harm me! Stop it right now!"
"You don't get to order me to stop! Don't forget our Contracts work both ways right now—you can't bind me!" Yaxiu tucked Lisi under his arm and rubbed her white-haired head vigorously. "I really can't harm you, but I can mess you up... Ha! Done!"
Lisi struggled furiously to break free from this evil man. Turning to look in the mirror, she discovered her lovely twintails had been transformed into messy braids sticking straight up into the air, completely ruining her adorable appearance.
She let out a wail and burst into tears. Covering her ears as she backed away, she yelled furiously at Yaxiu, "You are forbidden from leaking the contents of our conversation to anyone else! You are forbidden from disobeying this order! You are forbidden from disobeying my order not to disobey—ugh, so annoying! Anyway, don't you dare leak it, or you'll be in trouble too! Just you wait, Yaxiu! For these 101 days, we'll keep up this father-daughter façade, but once the 101 days are up, I'll show you what true cruelty means!"
*Bang!*
In her haste to rush out, Lisi turned and slammed headfirst into the alloy explosion-proof door. She wobbled on her feet with a series of groans before collapsing unconscious onto the floor.
Yaxiu was dumbfounded by this sequence of events, thinking to himself that this little girl's stupidity had reached at least five percent of what he was capable of as a child.
He walked over and patted her little cheek. "Hey, wake up. The floor is cold, you'll catch a cold. And you need to brush your teeth before bed, or you'll get cavities later."
"She just fainted. Nothing serious."
Yaxiu turned his head to find a young girl in a black-and-white checkered dress lying on her side across his bed. She had glossy, pitch-black hair, and her legs were clad in mismatched stockings—one white, one black. She was gazing at him with an easy, pleasant smile.
However...
"Aren't you supposed to have a miniskirt and black-and-white streaked hair?"
Yaxiu was deeply disappointed. "Why don't you match your character art either?!"
Chapter 196