Chapter 157

From the moment the bright moon's tail rolled up to Bailixiangxun, the memory fragments began to change rapidly.

Yu Tu witnessed the grand wedding, the turmoil of transformation, the hand in hand in crisis, the firm refusal in the face of temptation... As the saying goes, "It is easy to share adversity, but difficult to share wealth." Jiaoyue and Baili Xiangxun, a couple who seemed to be an unmatched match in the eyes of outsiders, have gone through ups and downs together and walked hand in hand for another twelve years.

On Baili Xiangxun's 40th birthday, Jiaoyue suddenly called him to the room mysteriously. The candles in the room were as bright as daylight. A white egg was lying in the piled quilts on the wide bed.

At the age of 40, Baili Xiangxun has become more mature. He looked at the bright moon with a loving look but also a puzzled look: "What is this? A big white egg?"

Jiaoyue slapped him unhappily and said, "I gave birth to this, your child!"

Jiaoyue has been feeling unwell for some time, and Baili Xiangxun is extremely anxious. However, since Jiaoyue is a mermaid, they dare not just find a powerful doctor to see her, for fear that someone will notice the difference between her and humans.

Jiaoyue thought that nothing was wrong. Apart from feeling a little nauseous occasionally, there were no other changes. She even gained weight. As a couple who were both very successful in the outside world, neither of them thought about pregnancy.

The union of mermaids and humans was unprecedented in history. Neither Jiaoyue nor Baili Xiangxun had ever considered that they would have a child of their own.

Jiaoyue suddenly turned back to her original form last night. She laid an egg smoothly without going through any pain. If she hadn't sensed the blood connection with the egg, she wouldn't have discovered that she was pregnant.

Jiaoyue said it simply and lightly, but Baili Xiangxun's first reaction was not surprise. Instead, he pulled Jiaoyue to look at her from head to toe, blaming himself: "It's all my fault. I should have paid more attention to it some time ago. Yueyue, are you feeling uncomfortable somewhere?"

Even though mermaids are not human and have surprisingly good physiques, how can pregnancy and childbirth not be hard?

In the end, it was Jiaoyue who took the lead in interrupting Baili Xiangxun's repeated questioning, which was expected to develop into a long speech: "Don't ask me, I'm really fine. I don't feel anything when I lay an egg!"

Now the couple faced a more serious problem—their child was an egg the size of a grapefruit.

Ordinary eggs can be hatched by poultry, but eggs laid by the union of humans and mermaids...

"Do we need to put it in water to hatch it? Will the baby drown?" Baili Xiangxun frowned, thinking that this matter was more troublesome than dealing with the old foxes in the Chamber of Commerce. "Are there any requirements for the water temperature?"

"Don't ask me, I don't know either." Jiaoyue stared at the big white egg in the quilt and counted on her fingers, "Cold water, warm water, hot water, hen, duck, goose - how about trying them all?"

Baili Xiangxun: "This is our cub, not a piece of fabric dyed for trial and error."

"Let's try it. Mermaids have very strong vitality." Jiaoyue poked the big white egg in the middle of the quilt. Suddenly, she was stunned. "I think I remember how to hatch eggs."

Mermaids did have some heritage, but they were fragmented and she was too impatient to look through them.

"If either the parent carries the egg on their body and it is exposed to body temperature, it will hatch in a hundred days."

Jiaoyue picked up the big white egg from the quilt and shook it: "Make a small backpack and we take turns carrying it on our backs?"

Baili Xiangxun timidly snatched the egg from Jiaoyue's hand and sighed: "Forget it, I'll hatch it myself."

In the subsequent memory fragments, Baili Xiangxun incubated the eggs diligently for a hundred days. During the incubation period, he always paid attention to Jiaoyue's condition, not allowing her to work hard or get tired, for fear that laying the eggs this time would have an impact on her body.

When the eggs hatched, Jiaoyue was radiant and even more beautiful, but Baili Xiangxun looked thinner due to tiredness.

Inside the egg that hatched was a human-looking baby boy. The new parents curiously touched his little hands while the other carefully pinched his little feet.

"Baili, the cub's hands are so small and soft, it's a pity that he doesn't have mermaid blood."

If the child hatched from the egg has mermaid blood, it will be born with a fish tail in the lower body.

"The man is innocent, but he is guilty of possessing a jade." Baili Xiangxun said, "This is not necessarily a bad thing."

"That's right." Thinking about the fact that she still had to hide her merman identity, Jiaoyue immediately agreed. "Although he didn't inherit the blood of a merman, he will definitely live longer than ordinary people in the future."

Even though she had become a mother, Jiaoyue's temperament remained unchanged. She grabbed Baili Xiangxun by the collar and kissed him on the lips. After more than ten years, Baili Xiangxun had become very successful. When he was kissed, only his ears would turn red, and the redness rarely spread to his face.

"I saw you flipping through a book a few days ago." Jiaoyue said with a smile, "Tell me, which one did you choose from the more than 80 names?"

Jiaoyue has always been impatient with these things.

"How about the word '誠'?" Baili Xiangxun discussed with her, "It comes from 'Sincerity is the beginning and end of things. Without sincerity, there is nothing. Therefore, a gentleman values ​​sincerity.'"

Jiaoyue didn't quite understand what he said, but she could sense Baili Xiangxun's expectation and importance: "Okay, from now on, I'll call you Baili Cheng."

"It's not Baili Cheng." To her surprise," Baili Xiangxun said, "it's Jiao Cheng."

"Forgot?" Baili Xiangxun said with a smile, "Twelve years ago, when I married you, the child should have your last name."

"The rules of the human world are so troublesome." Jiaoyue said, "No matter whose surname he takes, he is still your child, right? If you like, you can give him your surname."

Whether she was called Jiao Cheng or Bai Li Cheng, Jiao Yue didn't care at all. Even though she had lived in the human world for more than twenty years, she was still different from humans in essence.

"You don't care, but I do." After twelve years of marriage, Baili Xiangxun knew what Jiaoyue was thinking. "One cannot be greedy and want both."

It is always a long process to go from being the overlord of the ocean to being a land merchant. The couple became increasingly busy. When the child was hatched, he was a tiny ball, thinner than any other baby. They did not dare to take him around, but only found a trustworthy family in the small fishing village that had changed a lot since then to entrust him to care for him.

Di Changqing took a few steps to the side to avoid the sudden quicksand on the ground, and commented: "If you don't teach your child well when he is young, it will be difficult to change his temperament once it is set."

Di Changqing's words came true.

When Jiaocheng was six years old, Jiaoyue and Baili Xiangxun finally sorted out the huge family business and had some spare time. After the couple returned home, the more careful Baili Xiangxun discovered something wrong—there seemed to be something wrong with their child's values.

Because it was the fruit of their love, Jiaoyue and Baili Xiangxun were extremely fond of Baili Cheng, but this fondness was by no means spoiling him. In addition to providing him with a good life, they also paid strict attention to his education. Although the little Baili Cheng was a little naughty, he was generally a good child who was sensible and understanding.

It was just that they returned home suddenly without notifying anyone when they found something wrong. When Jiaoyue and Baili Xiangxun entered the house, they found their children throwing a tantrum, with people kneeling on the ground around them, and everyone was silent. The child who was well-behaved and sensible in front of them, but occasionally naughty, was yelling that he wanted to beat or kill people, and he kept whipping the people kneeling in front of him with a whip.

As the business empire built by Jiaoyue and Baili Xiangxun grew bigger, more and more people wanted to please them. Their love was stronger than gold. Jiaoyue was straightforward and principled, while Baili Xiangxun was smooth. Those who wanted to please them only tried to curry favor with their only son.

Except for his parents, no one dared to tell him what to do. The little child grew up with everyone treating him like a star. Everyone obeyed him and tried to please him. No one dared to criticize him. As a result, the older he got, the more arrogant and domineering he became.

In the memory fragments, Baili Xiangxun, who had always been gentle and stable, was rarely angry. He ignored Baili Cheng's chaos and fired all the people hired to take care of Baili Cheng. Then he carefully selected and hired a group of new people in order to correct his distorted personality.

Worried that the person he had carefully selected was still not suitable, Baili Xiangxun discussed with Jiaoyue that he should stay at home as much as possible in the next few years to adjust Baili Cheng's personality, and it would be Jiaoyue who would have to work hard outside.

This incident is extremely clear in the fragments of memory, and what followed was like a cross-scene, so fast that it was difficult to see clearly, but they were all things related to the family business, until... a gray memory slowly unfolded.

In this memory fragment, everything is in mourning, and the magnificent mansion is filled with blinding white. The bright moon in the memory fragment is straightforward, strong, steady, and domineering. She has never been so fierce before.

Baili Xiangxun died when Baili Cheng was eight years old.

After reading so many memories in the fragments of memory, Yu Tu saw Jiaoyue cry for the first time. Tears slid down from the corners of the mermaid's eyes, flowed down her jaw, and when they fell to the ground, they turned into pearls and scattered everywhere.

When the mermaid was extremely sad, her tears turned into pearls.

Baili Xiangxun died, and the coffin built for him was parked outside the door. Jiaoyue, who arrived a step late, held Baili Xiangxun's cold hand and cried bitterly.

The person in this world who loved her most sincerely and unreservedly would never open his eyes to look at her again, would never laugh with her again, would never put clothes on her again, would never stand behind her forever again. As long as she turned around, he would always be there.

Yu Tu frowned: "Something's wrong."

In the fragments of Jiaoyue's memory, Baili Xiangxun looked lively and did not seem to be suffering from any disease. Swallow the mermaid pearl and sign a marriage contract with the mermaid. As long as you do not harbor any ill will towards the mermaid, the mermaid pearl will continue to nourish your body, making you less likely to suffer from disasters and diseases, and live a peaceful life until old age.

Although what they see are Jiaoyue's memories, because the memories are materialized, they are presented from a third-party perspective. Therefore, what they can see is not the memory "filtered" by Jiaoyue's subjective consciousness, but what actually happened in the past.

Baili Xiangxun's love for Jiaoyue is sincere and passionate, and seems flawless.

"Senior, you are very perceptive." Perhaps the confusion in his expression gave it away. Di Changqing kicked away a crab that quietly crawled over with its claws extended. He stared at the sad memory with interest and said, "You will know when you read on."

This sad memory did not end here. The closed door opened a crack, a child slipped in, and then quickly closed the door.

Jiaoyue had stopped crying, but there were many pearls scattered on the ground. The child who came in was wearing mourning clothes. He walked over slowly, hugged Jiaoyue, and said in a small and soft voice: "Mom, I'm scared."

Jiaoyue's eyes turned red again, but this time, she didn't shed tears. She just hugged her child tightly, as if she wanted to embed him into her body and protect him forever.

The child in mourning had his head on her shoulders, his face was sad, his eyelids were red and swollen, and it looked like he had been crying for a long time. But when he stared at the pearls scattered on the ground, his expression was inexplicably gloomy.

Less than a month after Baili Xiangxun's funeral, Jiaocheng suddenly fell ill. Many doctors were consulted, but no one knew the reason. Jiaocheng's health deteriorated rapidly, and his face became paler day by day. He lay on the bed with his eyes closed. His beautiful peach blossom eyes looked a little scary on his thin face.

"Mom." When Jiaoyue came to visit him again, Jiaocheng stretched out his languid wrist from under the quilt and grabbed her arm, "Am I going to die..."

He murmured, "I want to live, mother."

No mother would remain indifferent to her own child's prayers. Jiaoyue held Baili Xiangxun's relics and sat by the window where she could see the sea for the entire night.

The next morning, Jiaoyue personally brought him a bowl of medicine, a new bowl of medicine.