Did I Succeed in Redeeming the Villain Today? - Chapter 83

Chapter 83: Lu Ning Saw This Person Holding Her Champagne…

Birds fluttered past the window, scattering sunlight across Mu Qiuyu’s eyelids. The girl’s brow furrowed; though she had slept soundly last night, she was still stirred from her dreams by this play of light.

Mu Qiuyu gazed quietly at the ceiling, her silent eyes reflecting a lingering attachment to the rare, refreshing sleep she had enjoyed. As she wondered why she had woken up so easily, she suddenly noticed the person sleeping beside her had, at some point, rolled toward the corner of the wall.

Lu Ning was deep in a dream. Her brow was tightly knit, as if she were being bound by something. Mu Qiuyu realized immediately that she was having a nightmare. She remembered her mother telling her long ago not to wake someone from a nightmare abruptly, but to soothe them gently until they woke.

This was entirely uncharted territory for Mu Qiuyu. She looked at the distressed Lu Ning, raised her hand awkwardly, and mimicked how her mother used to soothe her—leaning over to pat Lu Ning lightly as she remained trapped in her nightmare.

The sunlight fell on Mu Qiuyu’s profile, highlighting the mixture of hesitation and tenderness in her expression. The waves crashed against the shore with varying speeds, as if lamenting that Lu Ning couldn’t see this sight.

Just as Mu Qiuyu was trying to comfort her, the person in the dream suddenly shouted out in distress: “Tongtong!”

Why “Tongtong”?

Mu Qiuyu froze. In the past, elders—including her mother—had called her “Xiao Tong,” but no one had ever called her “Tongtong.” It was a completely strange and awkward nickname, yet Mu Qiuyu felt an inexplicable sense of familiarity.

With a complex gaze, she asked Lu Ning twice: “Lu Ning, what did you just call me?”

Lu Ning froze at the question. Having just been forcibly kicked out of the Inner World by the system, the details of the room gradually became clear to her eyes. This was the real world. The person in front of her, confused by that cry of “Tongtong,” was the real-world Mu Qiuyu.

The system is too despicable. As soon as Wutong touched upon critical information, it kicked her out without a second thought. It hadn’t even given her a chance to mute herself. Lu Ning was furiously stabbing a voodoo doll of the Main System in her heart, but her logic reminded her: was it time to explain Wutong’s existence to Mu Qiuyu?

However, the last time Wutong had come to the real world, she had provoked Mu Qiuyu. This had left Mu Qiuyu with a very poor impression of this person who used her identity—one could even say she was full of hostility. It was possible that hostility was still smoldering.

Lu Ning felt that explaining Wutong now carried a certain risk. And she couldn’t afford to take risks; Wutong absolutely could not disappear. Among the three of them, only Wutong possessed those memories deleted by the system. Unfortunately, the system wouldn’t allow her to speak of them—she was like an unreadable hard drive.

I’m sorry.

Lu Ning lowered her gaze and swallowed her words. She felt now wasn’t the time to introduce Wutong or to test Mu Qiuyu on Wutong’s behalf. She had more important things to tell Mu Qiuyu.

“Tongtong.”

Lu Ning answered Mu Qiuyu, her eyes fixed on her with sincerity. “That’s what I used to call you.”

“I was just in my inner world, and I remembered some fragments before I was kicked out.”

“It’s the system. It won’t let us remember.”

Hearing this, Mu Qiuyu slowly sat up in bed, looking thoughtful. “The system.”

To be honest, despite dealing with the system across two lifetimes, Mu Qiuyu still hadn’t grasped its logic. Lu Ning’s words made her ponder: “Do you think the ‘color’ of the system is white or black?”

Lu Ning felt that black and white weren’t easy boundaries to define, but as she recalled her experiences, her words leaned toward one side: “The task she gave me was to save you and avoid your previous fate.”

“And during the last punishment, she told me that the purpose of punishment isn’t to make you submit or be obedient. When the punishment before that was wrong, she even sent you a compensation gift package.”

“And there’s more!”

Lu Ning looked up, her eyes bright as she delivered what should be considered good news: “After your previous system betrayed you, it was sent to be destroyed.”

Mu Qiuyu hadn’t expected to hear news of her former partner from someone else. So, was that the story after her death? She had thought the system looked down on humans from a height, and that the betrayal was a pre-arranged plot. It turned out it really was just its disloyalty to her, and the system would ensure traitors received their due punishment.

For a moment, Mu Qiuyu’s gaze became complex—partly pensive, partly relieved. Lu Ning saw it all. She reached out awkwardly and tried to hold Mu Qiuyu’s fingers the way she understood comfort, saying: “There is always someone, or some system, maintaining order.”

Mu Qiuyu felt the winter sunlight outside the window was too blinding—so blinding it made her feel slightly abnormal. Or perhaps she was just crazy. When Lu Ning’s hand pressed against her palm, she felt as if she were wrapped in the softest cloud in the world. Her foul mood, stirred up by memories, dissolved in those hands that weren’t even particularly warm.

Looking at Lu Ning’s hand, Mu Qiuyu knew she liked it. So, regardless of whether she had figured out why her reaction was so abnormal, she decided to enjoy the moment first and continued the topic: “So you think the system might still lean toward the white side?”

“A little bit.” Lu Ning nodded, pointing to herself and then to Mu Qiuyu. “By rights, the system shouldn’t let a host reveal things outside the world’s dimensions, but when I say ‘system’ to you, she doesn’t stop me.”

But saying this, the singular doubt in Lu Ning’s heart grew: “But what is so unspeakable about the fact that we’ve met? Is it just not the right time yet?”

“Could this world be a massive open-world game, and we’ve found an unlocked area?”

The girl’s imagination always veered in wild directions. Mu Qiuyu found it refreshing and nodded along seriously: “It’s very possible.”

Then Mu Qiuyu returned to the main point, asking Lu Ning: “Besides remembering what you called me, what else did you recall?”

“I call you Tongtong, you call me A-Ning…”

As Lu Ning recalled what Wutong had told her, a scene involuntarily flashed through her mind. It looked like high school dismissal; many students in their high school uniforms were walking down a narrow road. The sense of familiarity and the details of the roadside made Lu Ning certain she was one of them. She looked down at her hands; the warm pearl milk tea emitted a familiar fragrance.

“I seem to often buy you milk tea from the shop at our school gate,” Lu Ning said by instinct, searching her memory. But as she spoke, she frowned: “So strange. These are our memories, but I can’t see you in the fragments.”

Hearing this, Mu Qiuyu’s heart skipped a beat. Perhaps she didn’t realize how much she truly cared about Lu Ning, but hearing that Lu Ning couldn’t see her actually made her feel insecure.

“Perhaps it’s been hidden away.”

Mu Qiuyu’s logic became the broom supporting a fairy cake. She looked at the asterisk reward on the task panel, explaining it to Lu Ning and to her own insecurity.

“Too much.” Lu Ning was indignant, flopping back onto the pillow and puffing out her cheeks like a pufferfish. “These are my memories! What right do they have to take them away!”

Seeing Lu Ning like this, Mu Qiuyu played along solemnly: “Once the task is over, we’ll go to the system and sue the one that took your memories.”

Lu Ning’s brain reacted incredibly fast; she tugged at Mu Qiuyu’s hand: “Then will you write the legal entrustment for the appeal for me?”

This person never seemed to let a bad mood linger; she changed faces faster than flipping pages in a book. Mu Qiuyu looked at the smiling Lu Ning and lay back down on the bed with her: “Alright, but before that, promise me one thing.”

Lu Ning looked at the reclining Mu Qiuyu: “What?”

“Stay and sleep with me for a bit longer.”

With that, Mu Qiuyu reached out and pulled Lu Ning into her arms. Perhaps because she had already confessed to being a reborn, full-fledged adult, Mu Qiuyu stopped hiding. Her movement in pulling Lu Ning close was practiced and effortless—not at all like someone who had been an adult for only one day.

Sharing the same bed, Mu Qiuyu’s voice was right against Lu Ning’s ear. The girl’s cool voice was muffled against her neck, clear yet carrying a trace of weary laziness—it was as if Lu Ning were seeing the Mu Qiuyu who first appeared in the original text.

As someone who was completely captivated by Mu Qiuyu from her first appearance, Lu Ning felt she couldn’t take it. Her right ear, exposed to the air, was wrapped in the girl’s breath—warm and moist, like a layer of sticky mist, causing her to shrink back uncontrollably.

But Mu Qiuyu’s behavior was too natural. After she spoke, she simply fell asleep right there. Her cheek was inches away. Sunlight swept across Lu Ning’s vision, carving out Mu Qiuyu’s sleeping face inch by inch. First were her eyes, which looked exceptionally peaceful in relaxation, then her straight nose. A point of light slid down that overly exquisite bridge and landed on her lips.

Lu Ning didn’t know if Mu Qiuyu had really fallen asleep; she only watched her slow breathing, her own cheeks becoming stiflingly hot.

Terrible. What a terrible reality.

Lu Ning’s heart was racing; she felt this couldn’t go on. Suddenly, a puff of white smoke rose from Mu Qiuyu’s embrace. Amidst the swirling mist, the person who was just lying there turned into a kitten.

Lu Ning happily wagged her big tail, pawed around, and snuggled closer to Mu Qiuyu. Now, she could shamelessly lean into Mu Qiuyu’s arms. With that thought, the kitten stretched its head and touched its nose to Mu Qiuyu’s.

“What does this mean?” Mu Qiuyu asked with her eyes closed, her voice coming from beneath Lu Ning’s nose.

Lu Ning squinted, resting her head on Mu Qiuyu’s arm and telling her: “It means the kitten loves you.”

The weather forecast said a cold wave was coming. Cold air rose from the sea, welcoming the arrival of winter. Yet the sun remained bright and warm, shining on the girl and the cat inside the villa. They slept in each other’s arms; even if the bitter winter was coming, they didn’t feel the cold.

Last night, the first snow of the winter fell, cloaking the night in plain white. The cold wind made those traveling outside wrap their coats tight, but in the warm room, a thin dress was slowly being zipped up.

Mu Qiuyu stood before the mirror, looking at herself in her gown. The indigo long dress trimmed her figure into a slender silhouette. This lifetime’s stylist had chosen the same hairstyle as her previous life—fine silver diamonds dotted her hair, understated yet sophisticated. It seemed she was gradually walking back into her past life; the person in the mirror was her adult self. Only this time, she wasn’t alone.

“Dressing up like this really takes away the childishness.”

As she thought this, a voice came from behind her. Mu Jingqin stepped into the mirror’s view, leaning against the doorframe to look at Mu Qiuyu. She was wearing a dress of the same style. However, seemingly intending to highlight Mu Qiuyu, her own style wasn’t as striking, making her look more lazy and casual.

Indeed, the adult Mu Qiuyu of this life didn’t have to grope her way through alone. As the only child of the Mu family, she was being proactively introduced into high society circles by Mu Jingqin, attending the Winter Moon banquet hosted by Mrs. Yue.

“Thank you, Aunt,” Mu Qiuyu said, holding her hem and turning to face Mu Jingqin.

But these words clearly brought dissatisfaction to Mu Jingqin: “That’s why I say you’re a child who can’t be won over.”

“Why always ‘thank you’ this and ‘thank you’ that? It’s as if you don’t want to have anything to do with anyone.”

Hearing this, Mu Qiuyu fell silent. Over the years, she had grown used to keeping her distance from too many people. Now it seemed it wasn’t a good habit. So, she took the initiative: “I will be more mindful in the future.”

“Come here.” Mu Jingqin seemed satisfied with the answer. She gestured to Mu Qiuyu, seemingly holding a box. As Mu Qiuyu walked over slowly, Mu Jingqin silently opened the box. Without showing it to Mu Qiuyu, she directly pinned a brooch onto her chest: “Your mother’s brooch. I borrowed it that year and forgot to return it.”

Mu Qiuyu looked down. It was a swan brooch fully set with diamonds. The white swan always held its neck high, as if its pride would never end.

“But I’m not giving this to you. Remember to return it to me after the banquet, do you hear me?” After pinning it on, Mu Jingqin reminded her.

“I’ll remember.” Mu Qiuyu nodded.

She looked at the swan brooch through the mirror. The indigo dress was like the lake where the white swan resided; it matched her outfit today perfectly. Light hit the girl, casting a faint shadow of her slender form. Mu Jingqin watched Mu Qiuyu admiring herself in the mirror; those lowered eyes suddenly made her daze.

“One swan for you, one for me. One black, one white—the perfect match for us.”

Mu Jingyi’s gentle voice carried laughter as she smiled brightly at Mu Jingqin. Her hair back then was about the same length; the white swan suited her figure, as if she were its incarnation. In that instant, Mu Jingqin’s gaze flickered uncontrollably with panic. She felt as if she were seeing Mu Jingyi in Mu Qiuyu, yet her reason kept reminding her otherwise.

“Fine, I’m going to touch up my makeup. Wait for me in the car once you’re ready.” Mu Jingqin was cold and indifferent; regardless of whether Mu Qiuyu needed anything else, she turned and left.

“Alright.” Mu Qiuyu sensed Mu Jingqin’s emotions, nodded, and watched her leave. Then, she said in her mind: “Are you there?”

“Reporting, I am in position. Mrs. Yue is currently being all lovey-dovey with her husband, preparing to receive guests,” Lu Ning answered, her voice sounding like she was in a spy movie.

In reality, she was just disguised as a banquet server, doing the final detail work. Having finally regained her original appearance, she wanted to be human more often. And she had never been a server at a banquet before; the thought was fresh. High society gatherings were different—brilliantly lit and a completely different kind of bustle.

Lu Ning moved through the crowd with a tray, and in addition to being professional, she overheard plenty of “tea.” However, the tea was all “stinky”—either some gentleman didn’t show up because he got caught cheating and had his face scratched by his wife, or some mistress was about to give birth. In this elegant place, they talked of nothing but boring topics. It truly fit the saying: “Gold and jade on the outside, rot and decay on the inside.”

Lu Ning hid in a corner and took a secret sip of champagne. As she was doing so, the entrance door in the distance was pushed open from the outside. Across the scattered crowd, Lu Ning saw Mu Qiuyu and Mu Jingqin arrive.

Actually, besides the hosts, arrivals didn’t usually attract much attention. But Mu Qiuyu’s beauty was too striking. As she stood at the doorway, the light seemed to fall entirely on her. Her cool expression didn’t need much adornment; she just looked casually across the banquet hall, and in an instant, everyone around her seemed to lose their color.

“Who is that?”

“The Mu family orphan.”

“Didn’t they say she was mentally unstable and died jumping off a building?”

“Where did you hear that? How ridiculous.”

“The girl is quite capable. My daughter says she’s not only first in every subject, but she also won a medal in the Summer Youth Competition.”

“Your daughter is in the same year as her?”

“Yes, both eighteen. It looks like Jingqin brought her out today to introduce her to everyone.”

“She’s pretty. I’m afraid quite a few people will have ideas tonight.”

“What’s the use of having ideas? This girl looks even prouder than Mu Jingqin. Let’s see who can catch the eye of the Mu family.” …

Lu Ning listened to this from the side and couldn’t help but nod. Their Mu Qiuyu was no flower for just anyone to pick. With that thought, Lu Ning prepared to walk over to her flower.

Unexpectedly, as she was walking, a hand reached out in front of her. The champagne she had prepared for Mu Qiuyu was taken away, followed by a gentle and polite: “Thank you.”

It was a fairly pretty face, with long hair pinned up and two exquisite curls at the temples. She was smiling with great breeding at Lu Ning, the server. Because she was a server, the other person didn’t wait for Lu Ning’s answer.

Then Lu Ning saw this person holding her champagne and walking right up to Mu Qiuyu: “Aunt Mu, long time no see.”

Mu Jingqin looked at the girl in front of her, identified her for a few seconds, and then her eyes showed irrepressible surprise: “Xiao Yuan, it’s been a few years. How did you grow up to be so beautiful?”

“They say a girl changes eighteen times as she grows up; I had to become beautiful in front of you, Aunt.” The girl was poised and graceful as she showed herself off to Mu Jingqin. And with that movement, she naturally looked at Mu Qiuyu beside Mu Jingqin and took the initiative to reach out: “Hello, my name is Yuan Yan. My father is the chairman of Zhensheng Pharmaceuticals. I started rotating through the company this January.”

Hearing this introduction, Mu Qiuyu quickly went over the person’s background in her head. The Yuan family was indeed a good partner, but not an essential one to associate with. Etiquette was still necessary in such a setting, so Mu Qiuyu reached out and shook Yuan Yan’s hand: “Hello, Mu Qiuyu.”

Lu Ning was watching this from afar. The sound-capture thread she had left on those ladies earlier fed their discussion back into her ear.

“They’re a match.” “I think so too. Xiao Yuan is a good kid, and pretty. Standing next to Mu Qiuyu, she isn’t overshadowed at all.” “Indeed.”

Hearing these two sentences, Lu Ning whipped her head around to look at those ladies. However, they didn’t notice Lu Ning’s abrupt gaze at all; their eyes were fixed on Mu Qiuyu’s direction. Because of Yuan Yan’s arrival, their gaze had changed from simple admiration to a somewhat matchmaking smile.

“So clever. Girls should be with girls.”

“I think it’s good. Who would have thought?” …

Lu Ning listened to these words flowing into her ears and went crazy. Wait, is your world this open?! Are you just defaulting to Mu Qiuyu’s sexual orientation? And where is this even coming from! How are they a match! Where is this Yuan Yan not being overshadowed by Mu Qiuyu! Open your eyes and look—the three of them standing together, who can compare to Mu Qiuyu! What kind of eyesight is this? Why can she still only see Mu Qiuyu!

Lu Ning was so angry she nearly crushed the tray. Then, a more realistic issue reached her ears.

“The Mu family is old money, but they suffered a setback and need foreign capital support. The Yuan family is an emerging enterprise and happens to need old-money connections.”

“A match made in heaven, truly.”

“That’s why I say, even for family alliances, you have to find one like this.”

Lu Ning grew more irritated the more she heard these captured voices, so she simply cut the thread. Her brow was furrowed, and the words “Family Alliance” were floating everywhere in her head.

This made Lu Ning think of Mu Qiuyu’s ongoing main task. The system only required her to have a “home,” and there were a thousand ways to form a home. Perhaps this method could also be judged as task completion.

Amidst the flickering lights and the clinking of glasses, an emotion called a sense of crisis spread through Lu Ning’s mind. Too many people were eyeing her treasure.

The monotonous sound of running water came from the restroom. In the mirror, Mu Qiuyu lowered her head to carefully rinse the soap from her fingers. She had just made an excuse to let Yuan Yan and Mu Jingqin chat. Although staying away from the center of social interaction was relaxing, for the current Mu Qiuyu, wearing a mask to handle social obligations was still necessary.

Fatigue was hidden beneath her exquisite eye makeup. With that thought, Mu Qiuyu let out a sigh. She unhurriedly turned off the faucet, adjusted the strap on her shoulder, and stepped outside.

Everything seemed to be going smoothly tonight. She just didn’t know why Lu Ning hadn’t contacted her at all. As she was thinking this, Mu Qiuyu was suddenly pulled over by a force.

She instinctively tensed her nerves, and the interface for selecting and redeeming mechanical skeletons in the system mall popped up. But just as she was about to redeem one, she suddenly noticed the way the person was holding her wrist. It was a restrained strength intended not to hurt her, which made her look up at the face standing in the shadows.

Lu Ning’s features appeared blurred yet clear in Mu Qiuyu’s vision. Her true face was sharper than the one Mu Qiuyu had molded back then; she leaned in low, exuding a sense of pressure.

“I have a question to ask you. I know it’s best to wait until the banquet is over, but I can’t wait.”

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