Free Web NovelChapter 210: Chapter 210: Vanished
After Tang Yuanxiao and Yu Le left, Su Li sat alone in her chair with her eyes closed for a long time.
It wasn’t until a nurse, worried about her condition, woke her that Su Li mustered the energy to stand up.
She wanted to smile and thank the nurse, but her face was so swollen that even smiling was difficult.
’My hand is aching and swollen, a prickly, numb pain,’ Su Li thought mockingly, her face expressionless.
’Having a high pain tolerance is a virtue, I guess. After a while, you just get used to the pain.’
She pulled herself together, went outside the hospital to buy some fruit, and visited the decorator’s room to apologize again. Then, under the family’s complex gazes of resentment, sympathy, and pity, she left the hospital.
As dusk fell, no one noticed Su Li’s disheveled state.
Su Li had to stop and rest twice on her way, walking intermittently before finally getting home.
She had no energy to eat, nor the strength to wash her face or feet. She just collapsed onto the bed, unwilling to move an inch.
’Her whole world had been turned upside down overnight. This was probably what that felt like.’
Yet, Su Li didn’t feel the slightest bit surprised.
Because the one who caused all this was Mrs. Tang. As for what kind of person Mrs. Tang was, Su Li had seen it with perfect clarity in her past life.
She wouldn’t even be surprised if Mrs. Tang killed someone.
’That’s just who Mrs. Tang is.’
Su Li’s heart was frighteningly calm. She even thought with cold composure.
’I skipped class this afternoon. Skipping class right after the semester started will look bad. I just hope the slap mark on my face fades by tomorrow morning so I can go to class.’
It was a nice thought, but unfortunately, it didn’t come to pass.
Su Li got sick.
She, who hadn’t been sick once since her rebirth, had fallen ill.
She started running a fever in the middle of the night.
When the fever woke her, Su Li was drenched in sweat.
Su Li knew she was sick with a fever. She knew she should take medicine, drink water, and cool down. She knew all of that, but she had no strength.
She didn’t even have the strength to get out of bed.
Su Li spent the rest of the night in a daze, unsure if she was unconscious or asleep. She only became fully lucid when the next day’s sunlight streamed into her home.
Her sweat had soaked her clothes, dried, and soaked them again. Su Li’s head ached, her hand ached, her face ached—her whole body was in pain.
Su Li forced herself to get up.
When she looked in the mirror, she took one glance and didn’t want to look a second time.
After a night had passed, the swelling had gone down a bit, but the slap mark was even more obvious. The color had changed from purple to a dark, bruised blue-black.
Su Li grabbed a scarf to cover her face, wrote a leave request note, and dragged herself to school to ask for time off.
After getting her leave approved, Su Li bought some medicine and went back home.
She forced herself to drink water, eat some congee, and take the medicine. Only after that did Su Li feel at ease enough to lie down again.
After lying down for half the day, the medicine probably started to take effect, and Su Li drifted off into a groggy sleep.
She slept until evening, only waking up to the ringing of the phone.
Her head still ached, but her body felt much lighter.
Su Li felt her own forehead and figured it was just a low-grade fever now.
"It’s already six o’clock..." Su Li glanced at the time and got out of bed to answer the phone.
"Hello." freёwebnovel.com
"Su Li, it’s me." Tang Yuanxiao’s tense voice came through the receiver.
"What’s wrong?" Su Li asked after a pause.
"How... how are you?" Tang Yuanxiao sounded hesitant, as if holding something back.
Su Li frowned. "I’m fine. If you have something to say, just say it."
"I..." Tang Yuanxiao gritted his teeth. "I wanted to ask if my mom went to find you."
"Came to find me?" Su Li let out a breath and glanced at her door. "I don’t know."
’She didn’t come to my home, but I don’t know if Mrs. Tang went to the school.’
"You haven’t seen her, right?" Tang Yuanxiao confirmed.
"Right, I haven’t." Su Li exhaled. "Did she disappear again? Did she run off to ’catch me in the act’ again?"
Su Li’s voice grew more and more strained.
’How many more tricks did Mrs. Tang have up her sleeve?’
’She didn’t know if Mrs. Tang had already gone to the school and caused a huge scene.’
"Su Li, I’m sorry. I... I shouldn’t have called you, but I’m really worried."
Tang Yuanxiao’s voice was even more strained than Su Li’s.
"My mom... she’s missing. I don’t know if she went to find you or went somewhere else."
It took a moment for Su Li to find her voice. "Missing?"
’What does he mean, missing?’
"Yes. I’ve searched the entire area and couldn’t find her. Yu Le helped me look at your school in the Imperial City, but he couldn’t find her either..."
Su Li was speechless.
Tang Yuanxiao was at a loss for words too, but he had to force himself to speak.
"Su Li, if she came to find you, or if you see her, please let me know. I’m desperate right now. I’m afraid she might get a foolish idea and try to... end her life again."
Su Li sensitively caught the word "again."
"What do you mean, ’end her life again’?" she asked, cutting Tang Yuanxiao off.
Tang Yuanxiao froze for a second. "We argued a bit yesterday, and she... she tried to hang herself in the middle of the night. She was just rescued... I didn’t expect that she would again..."
Tang Yuanxiao never expected Mrs. Tang would do something like that.
After Mrs. Tang kicked him out of the room last night, he didn’t dare to sleep. He just sat outside her door, keeping watch for half the night.
In the morning, Mrs. Tang emerged looking haggard. Aside from the horrific ligature marks on her neck, her face showed no other signs of anything unusual.
She went to Aunt Chang’s house to pick up Little Tang Mo, her face full of loving affection as she kissed and hugged him.
"Grandma was wrong last night. I scared you, Momo. Grandma won’t do that again. Grandma loves you so much..."
She cooed at Little Tang Mo, took him for breakfast, and then walked him to school.
When she returned, she told Tang Yuanxiao she was tired and wanted to sleep.
Although Tang Yuanxiao could tell she was still angry, she seemed to have calmed down, which made him breathe a sigh of relief.
He couldn’t skip work, so after saying a few comforting words to Mrs. Tang, he left for his job.
He was still worried, so he came back at ten o’clock to check on her. Mrs. Tang was still asleep, so Tang Yuanxiao went back to work.
He had also asked a neighbor, the wife of a soldier, to help keep an eye on Mrs. Tang.
Unexpectedly, when he came back at noon, Mrs. Tang was gone.
At first, Tang Yuanxiao thought she had gone to pick up Little Tang Mo, but when Little Tang Mo came home, Mrs. Tang was nowhere to be seen.
Tang Yuanxiao’s heart sank.
An hour later, it was confirmed: Mrs. Tang was missing.
Tang Yuanxiao, Yu Le, and everyone else who could help searched for her. They turned every possible place inside out, but there was no sign of Mrs. Tang.
That afternoon, Tang Yuanxiao searched the entire town but still couldn’t find Mrs. Tang. ƒrēewebnoѵёl.cσm
Fearing Mrs. Tang might have gone to bother Su Li again, Yu Le rushed to Huaguo Communication University in the Imperial City and did a quick search there as well.
Nothing. She wasn’t seen in town or in the Imperial City.
Just like that, Mrs. Tang had vanished.
After the crying, the tantrums, and the attempted hanging, Mrs. Tang had pulled a disappearing act.
Su Li listened to Tang Yuanxiao’s words and remained silent for a long while.
"Is it possible she went back home?" Su Li asked, taking a deep breath as she heard the anxiety in Tang Yuanxiao’s voice.
Tang Yuanxiao paused. "Probably not. Her luggage is still here. She didn’t take anything."
But his tone held a note of uncertainty.
"The train from the Imperial City back home leaves in the afternoon, so there aren’t any more running at this time, but..."
Su Li finished his sentence for him, "I’ll go to the train station and check for you."
"Su Li... thank you," Tang Yuanxiao said with difficulty.
Su Li’s lips twitched into a semblance of a smile. "Don’t thank me. I don’t want anything to... happen to her either."
’In her last life, Mrs. Tang had cried herself blind and died of depression after Little Tang Mo was lost.’
’If something really happened to Mrs. Tang, Tang Yuanxiao would probably spend this life in misery too.’
Su Li hung up the phone, took a deep breath, and mocked herself, "Su Li, oh, Su Li. You might as well just call yourself a Mary Sue."
Mocking herself was one thing, but twenty minutes later, Su Li still dragged her not-yet-healed body out the door.
She knew Tang Yuanxiao’s personality. If he hadn’t been desperate, he wouldn’t have called her at a time like this.
