Chapter 175 is a truly satisfying read, a genuinely enjoyable read! ...
It all felt like a dream. I met Bernard, and then he disappeared. Was he really here? What power brought him here? If he can come here, can I go back anytime?
Thinking of this, I scrambled out of the basement, afraid that if I was even a second later, I might be swept back into another world.
I was terrified. I'm just an ordinary girl, completely unable to adapt to this strange and unpredictable world. The people and events there constantly challenged my resolve, and it took a tremendous amount of effort for me to barely gain a foothold there.
They all think I want to be the Queen of the Westerlands. No, I just want to survive and go home.
The weather is getting warmer, and I have completed my phase assessment and successfully submitted several papers.
Perhaps because I was completely relaxed, I dreamt of another world again. I dreamt of snow-covered landscapes, bright sunshine, and many people and events.
Upon waking, I called the upscale nursing home again to schedule a meeting with Mrs. Dole. Since I couldn't escape it, I might as well face it bravely. This time, I went alone.
“Mrs. Dole, may I see your diary?” I knelt down beside her wheelchair.
“Diary? What diary?” Her aged face scrunched up. “These days people watch TV all day, why would they keep a diary?”
Did you keep a diary when you were young?
"When I was young? Of course I wrote." She suddenly laughed. "My handwriting was excellent when I was young."
"May I take a look?"
Her eyes lit up suddenly, as if she remembered something. She immediately lifted the pillow on the bed next to her, picked up a worn hardcover diary, and said, "Look how well I write. Nowadays, all people can do is type on a computer."
“That’s right,” I nodded in agreement. “Not many young people like to write these days.”
She turned the pages shakily, "Look, this is my handwriting, I write so well."
Can I take a closer look?
"Can."
"Can I take it back and make a copy?"
"Can."
"I'll pay you back next time." I was overjoyed.
"No rush, just write well, and let me see your handwriting next time." She smiled, clearly enjoying communicating with people about writing.
"good."
I spent the whole night reading this diary. The diary is quite thick, the entries are a bit messy, and it's written in English, so it took me some time to translate it.
Most of the content wasn't about the alternate world, but rather Mrs. Dorle's daily life, spanning her elementary, middle, and high school years, ending in university. Perhaps university kept her too busy, or perhaps her mindset changed, and she no longer had the leisure to write in her diary.
I searched and searched and finally found a few places that described otherworldly settings. They were written in a rather scattered manner, but pieced together, they look like this:
"Today, I heard my grandfather tell me his father's story. He started from scratch in the big city, first working in a clothing factory, then running his own clothing business, then opening a small shop, and then meeting his mother. His mother was a rich heiress, of average appearance but arrogant and with a somewhat eccentric temper, which is why she was still unmarried in her thirties. But his father had a knack for dealing with women, and he won her over in just one month. I don't know if it's true or not, but that's what my grandfather said."
“Grandpa only got halfway through the last story before his cough came back. It took him more than two months to recover. Now he’s asking me to tell him a story again. Grandpa said that after his father and mother got married, his father’s business became more and more prosperous. His clothing store grew bigger and bigger, and eventually it became a chain store. He made a lot of money, which is why we have a villa to live in now.”
"I don't have many memories of my great-grandfather, who was my grandfather's father. I think I saw him a few times when I was a child, but the memories are very vague. I do have some memories of my great-grandmother, though. She was very old, almost a hundred years old when I was in elementary school, but she dressed very elegantly every day and wore light makeup. She always wore high heels when she went out, even though my grandfather tried his best to persuade her not to wear them to avoid falling. She insisted on wearing them, saying that my great-grandfather had told her that she should always dress presentably when going out. By then, my great-grandfather had passed away many years ago, but my great-grandmother always said that he hadn't died, but had just gone to another world. Oh well, what difference does that make from being dead?"
"Grandma also loved writing in her diary. I once caught her writing in it; she had just finished and was about to put the diary away. I wanted to read it, but she stopped me, saying it was a secret. When Grandma passed away, Grandpa wanted to burn her diary with her. On the last night of the vigil, I couldn't resist opening it and reading it. There were many unbelievable things inside. For example, she said that Grandpa had come back to see her and encouraged her to live well even if she was alone. He also said that if she met a good man, she should remarry and not be alone, as it was too lonely."
"She asked the old man if he had remarried over there. The old man was silent for a while and then answered yes. She started crying and cursed him for being a scoundrel. The old man said she could remarry, and she said she had met several men, but none of them could compare to him. The old man sighed and then suddenly disappeared. I read this passage several times and guessed that it might have been the old woman's dream."
Having read this far, I'm now certain that the old man is the one who wrote the mysterious book of the Western Frontier. He came to the modern world by chance, married and had children, and later returned to start a new life, leaving his wife and children in the modern world with only deep longing.
"There's something else I was too embarrassed to write in my diary before. My grandmother mentioned in her diary that no other man could compare to my grandfather. She said that my grandfather's skills in bed were truly exceptional. She was such a proud young lady back then, but he slept with her and she wanted to sleep with him again after sleeping with him once. She wanted to possess this poor boy, so she ignored her parents' objections and forced herself to be with him. Later, she got pregnant and married him while pregnant."
"After the old man married her, he became richer and richer, and he had several women outside, supporting them at great expense. When she found out, she made a huge scene, but she couldn't bear to divorce him. Because she had also slept with several men outside, but none of them could compare to my old man. They both knew about each other's affairs, but divorce was impossible."
I paused for a moment, and when I saw this, I wondered... is this the kind of marriage that's popular among the modern rich? Each going their own way? But it didn't seem like it, because the diary also said: "Grandma said she could never get a divorce because there are too few men like Grandpa. I found that strange. How could there be too few? Aren't there plenty of men like that among the rich?"
I then read the old lady's diary. She wrote that the old lady had put all her assets in her name, including her bank deposits—basically everything related to money. The old lady said that if they divorced, he would have nothing. The old lady was very moved, saying that no wealthy man would dare to transfer all his assets to her name like the old lady had; it was absolutely impossible.
"My grandfather told me that after my great-grandfather died, my great-grandmother's health deteriorated significantly, and she became increasingly delusional. She often said that my great-grandfather would come back to see her in the middle of the night, sometimes in her dreams, sometimes in her room, and they could chat for most of the night. My great-grandfather kept urging my great-grandmother to remarry, saying that he was doing very well in another world, that he had become a king, and that he had several wives, each of whom was obedient to him. He advised my great-grandmother to enjoy life while she could."
"Grandma said she was too old and not as youthful as she used to be, so how could she be happy? Grandpa just sighed and said that he was a young man over there, and that he had really made a profit, living two lifetimes in one. When Grandma told Grandpa about this, he just thought that Grandma's fantasy was acting up again."
The diary entries about the alternate world are basically as described above. They're quite simple, roughly piecing together a story of a man's triumphant rise in another world. He starts from scratch, marries a wealthy heiress, keeps a mistress, remains devoted to his wife, who is equally loyal, and eventually dies of old age. He then returns to the alternate world, this time in his prime, and uses the knowledge he gained in the modern world—he may have been royalty in his previous life and was very intelligent—combined with his modern skills, he becomes incredibly powerful, seizes the throne, and reaches the pinnacle of life.
This is a truly satisfying read, a genuinely satisfying read! I sighed, wondering why I wasn't so lucky.
Another question arises: how did that old man come to the modern world? And how did he become young again after returning to the other world? The second question can perhaps be explained by the different flow of time, but what about the first question? Perhaps the first question holds the secret to my travels back and forth between the other worlds.
I returned to the nursing home with my diary. I knelt beside Mrs. Dole's wheelchair and showed her the few pages of English I had practiced.
Wearing her reading glasses, she examined the handwriting with a magnifying glass and smiled with satisfaction. "Your handwriting is quite good, but why did you show it to me?"
Then I remembered that she had lost her mind. She frowned as she looked at the diary I handed her, "What do I need this for? Take it away, take it away."
“This is your diary,” I said.
“I never keep a diary,” she said forcefully, “take it away.”
"This really is your diary."
She spat at me twice, "Who would write this kind of bullshit diary! You think I'm as free as you guys? I'm busy from morning till night."
I was stunned. Two nurses happened to pass by and, seeing her angry face, quickly ushered me out. "I'm sorry, Mrs. Dorle is in a bad mood today. Please come back another day."
I placed the diary on her bed and prepared to leave, but she grabbed it, threw it at me, and yelled, "This isn't my diary!"
I picked it up, covered in dust, and a nurse took me to the entrance of the nursing home, comforting me, "That's how it is with elderly people with dementia. They get angry for no reason. It's not just you; we caregivers often get spat on too."
“I shouldn’t have made her angry,” I sighed. “She said it wasn’t hers, and I shouldn’t have insisted it was.”
“You didn’t say anything,” the nurse said with a smile. “Six months ago, her grandson came to visit her, but he didn’t say a word. She spat at him and sent him flying out the door.”
"grandson?"
"Yes, she used to have a daughter who died during childbirth due to amniotic fluid embolism, but her son survived and is now 28 years old."
A thought suddenly struck me: Could this grandson know something?
I met with the castle maid and Dalene and told them about the diary. They were both very surprised.
The castle maid was envious of the old man's carefree life, saying, "This is the life every man dreams of."
Daisy looked disdainful. I recalled Daisy's past love triangle with Mamboya's father and mother. She was sensitive and embarrassed about the idea that a man's "deep affection" for his wife was just a fling with other women.
That day was just a fleeting encounter. Everyone was busy, and the events of that otherworldly past seemed no longer important.
Some time later, I called the nursing home to arrange a meeting with Mrs. Dole, but to my surprise, the nurse said on the phone, "Mrs. Dole passed away a few days ago, didn't you know?"
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Author's Note: Sorry to keep you all waiting, muah~~
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