The Ghost Insists on Giving Me a Beautiful and Powerful Wife! - Chapter 30.2

Nan He often wanted to have a fight with her, to make it clear that she was a spirit, and a spirit much older than her, not her child. She didn’t have to discipline her like a three-year-old baby. But it was only a thought; the child was like a teacher in a school, with first-rate lecturing skills. The older she got, the better her eloquence became, and Nan He couldn’t talk her down.

Unfortunately, her life was not as good as her mouth; she didn’t live longer than Gou Nanchun.

Gou Nanchun at least lived to fifty; she lost her life in her early forties.

The fortune-teller said her extreme intelligence had led to an early demise, and that living past forty was only due to Nan He’s spiritual blood protection.

She really did copy Gou Nanchun, learning everything perfectly.

Her dying entrustment of the child was a similar scenario, perhaps even more so.

The child was still in swaddling clothes when she passed away. She hadn’t thought to name the child, but she did know Nan He resented her husband, so she divorced him before dying.

Nan He, having been disciplined for decades, suddenly became rebellious.

She deliberately named the child exactly the same as her grandmother, and then coaxed the little Gou Nanchun to call her “Grandma Xiao He.”

Nan He felt that if the grandmothers knew, they couldn’t blame her. After all, they both left so early, leaving her alone. That meant she could do whatever she pleased.

A child in swaddling clothes couldn’t discipline or command the Family Guardian Spirit to be obedient.

Gou Nanchun’s granddaughter was quite different from both Gou Nanchun and her mother. Perhaps it was because she grew up with the rebellious Nan He that she developed a non-conformist personality, disliking the occult and only loving to play. Fortunately, maybe due to good inherited genes, her mind was excellent. At a young age, she managed to revive the grain store that Nan He had run to the brink of collapse.

Strangely, despite her love for play, her body was the healthiest of all.

She was free of illness and disaster from childhood. The only shortcoming was her apparent lack of interest in marriage. Suitors came in wave after wave, but she showed no sign of accepting.

Nan He was already averse to marriage. Since the little Gou Nanchun had no intention, Nan He pretended to be blind as well.

Feigning blindness led to the reality that the Gou family bloodline might truly end. She struggled for a long time before making a choice against her own feelings.

She decided to let the little Gou Nanchun get married.

Nan He found Gou Nanchun in the lotus pond. She was wearing a hat made of lotus leaves, barefoot, with her trousers rolled up, wading through the mud to dig for lotus roots.

Fine mud spots dotted her snow-white skin, and her clean face was also coated with some dried mud.

The silt was unstable, and it was easy to get stuck.

Nan He watched her staggering and struggling in the mud and feared she might fall and get a mouthful of mud. She quickly floated over, grabbing her shoulder to pull her out of the mud. Just as she touched her shoulder, her arm was grabbed by Gou Nanchun’s hands, which were covered in mud.

“Grandma Xiao He, don’t fly around wildly. If the servants in the mansion see you, they’ll think you’re a demon.”

Seeing her anxiously looking left and right, Nan He couldn’t help but feel she had done something wrong.

She released her spiritual power, and Gou Nanchun easily pulled her into the mud.

The hem of her skirt was dampened and smeared with mud, instantly becoming much heavier. It was truly difficult to move without spiritual power. So, Gou Nanchun led her through the mud, pulling her up a bit when she sank a foot, and saying as they walked, “Grandma Xiao He, let’s have a competition to see who catches more eels. The one who catches more gets to eat more!”

“Are you catching eels?”

“Yes.” She casually pushed aside two lotus root stems, her head lowered, appearing very serious as she searched for the traces of eels hidden in the mud.

Nan He followed her forward for a while.

She suddenly turned her head and smiled at Nan He: “Grandma Xiao He still has time to catch up to me, after all, I haven’t caught a single one yet.”

She looked quite proud in her playful manner.

“How about we go up first? I have something to tell you.”

“Is it very important?”

“Yes.”

Gou Nanchun unapologetically refused: “Then I don’t want to!”

“Then… then saying it here is fine too.”

“I won’t listen!”

Gou Nanchun raised her hands to cover her ears. The mud and water on her hands smeared her ear tips, wetting her dark hair strands.

She didn’t mind the dirt and kept her hands over her ears.

Nan He was afraid the muddy water would flow into her ears: “Put your hands down.”

“Then Grandma Xiao He must first take back what she said about having something important to tell me.”

At nearly forty years old, she still retained a childlike innocence. Though fine lines had begun to creep around her eyes, her heart was still like a child’s.

Nan He was always helpless with the Gou family women. She couldn’t dictate Gou Nanchun’s decisions, couldn’t stop her daughter’s penchant for lecturing, and couldn’t change the little Gou Nanchun’s childishness.

More than a hundred years had passed since Nan He’s birth, and she had grown somewhat.

Moreover, no one had lived longer with the person in front of her than she had. She pulled Gou Nanchun’s hands down: “You… Achun, do you know what I want to say?”

“How would I know? I…”

She was about to banter further, but Nan He cut off her chance to speak: “You should get married, or the Gou family bloodline will end.”

The little Gou Nanchun’s smile slightly stiffened. She averted her gaze and shrugged indifferently: “I’m not an emperor, and I don’t have an empire to inherit. So what if the line dies out?”

“Achun.” Nan He was a little anxious: “Your family has the grain store, and you have me…”

Her voice trailed off, her confidence waning: “What will I do when you die later?”

The little Gou Nanchun’s face completely changed. She dramatically stepped back a few paces, looking at Nan He with profound grief: “Grandma Xiao He, are you cursing me?”

“I’m not, I didn’t… I just…”

She wanted to explain, but didn’t know what else to say.

It seemed like everything was her fault, yet she was clearly thinking for the Gou family: “Your grandmother didn’t want to get married either, but she did for the sake of the Gou family…”

Nan He tried to persuade Gou Nanchun, but before she finished, the little Gou Nanchun grabbed her wrist, squeezing tightly: “Grandma Xiao He, are you trying to say I’m selfish?”

Nan He was pulled forward, her upper body almost touching her chest: “I’m not…”

The little Gou Nanchun removed the lotus leaf from her head, letting her entire face meet the sunlight.

The scorching light brought a smile back to her face. It was bright and uninhibited, yet it didn’t reach her eyes: “Grandma, you always think about what Grandmother wanted. Why don’t you ask what I want?”

“You… what do you want?”

“I want…” The little Gou Nanchun turned around, leading her toward the flat ground: “I want not to get married. Don’t worry, Grandma, I’ll arrange everything. I’ll sell the grain store before I die. I’ll leave half the money for you and distribute the other half to the poor. The Gou ancestors were all good people who helped the world and saved others, so doing this counts as inheriting their aspirations. Hmm… If Grandma Xiao He is afraid of being lonely, I will reincarnate. When I reincarnate, you come and find me. You’ll definitely recognize my soul’s aura, Grandma. Then I’ll continue to play with you, take you traveling, take…”

Her voice abruptly stopped, sinking slightly, and becoming softer and softer: “If it’s reincarnation… Grandma Xiao He probably wants to find Grandmother more.”

Nan He couldn’t quite hear her and couldn’t help but ask: “What did you say?”

The little Gou Nanchun didn’t answer. She simply asked: “Grandma Xiao He, which do you think is more important: getting married, or my happiness?”

Nan He had only one answer.

Even trying to persuade the little Gou Nanchun was against her own heart.

“Happiness is more important.”

“If I get married, I won’t be happy.”

“How could that be?” Nan He earnestly recalled: “Your grandmother and your mother were both very happy when they got married. Your grandmother was a liar, but your mother certainly didn’t lie. You…”

The little Gou Nanchun led her away from the mud. She rubbed Nan He’s face with her not-so-clean hands, a mix of mischief and subtle revenge.

She remained silent. Nan He tried hard to discern something from her face but could see nothing.

Nan He had no choice but to grab her wrist, preventing her from further messing up her face: “You still haven’t answered me.”

“Because you’re only happy when you marry someone you love. I don’t love any man right now, but I really love you, Grandma. How about you marry me, Grandma Xiao He?”

She was always smiling, still in a slightly flippant manner.

Nan He found it difficult to distinguish which of her words were true and which were false. She could only answer every sentence seriously: “Your grandmother said women and women cannot get married.”

“Is Grandmother always right?”

The little Gou Nanchun’s expression darkened, devoid of any smile.

Nan He had never seen her like this and was slightly startled for a moment.

The little Gou Nanchun noticed this, and a smile instantly reappeared on her face. She affectionately pleaded with Nan He: “Grandma Xiao He, Grandmother wasn’t a sage; she couldn’t be right about everything. I don’t care, I won’t get married, and don’t rush me. Otherwise, I will be very sad, and then I will weep until my eyes are washed out, and then I will die…”

“Don’t…” Nan He was somewhat afraid. She had already bid farewell to too many people. Now, even the thought terrified her: “Don’t die.”

They reached a silent agreement.

Nan He no longer urged her to marry, and the little Gou Nanchun diligently looked after her health, doing her best to live.

Of course, occasional arguments still arose. For instance, when people on the street looked at them with increasingly strange looks, and Nan He wanted the little Gou Nanchun to treat her as her niece and stop calling her “Grandma Xiao He,” the fifty-something-year-old Nan He would stomp her foot, put her hands on her hips, and argue: “No! You’re so much older than me, I will call you Grandma. Don’t you dare pretend to be my niece! My Gou family line has ended, I have no niece!”

Nan He was a little confused: “Achun, don’t you find it strange to keep calling me Grandma?”

“Of course not. Who else would have such a young and beautiful grandma?”

“But your grandmother said… people outside would find it strange.”

Nan He’s hair already had white streaks, but her temperament hadn’t changed much. She would cling to her, pinching her face one moment, her waist the next, fully expressing her dissatisfaction: “Grandma Xiao He, you are my Guardian Spirit, not theirs. Why do you care so much about what they think? You only need to care about what I think!”

This was completely different from the answer she had once heard. However, Gou Nanchun and the little Gou Nanchun were fundamentally two different people.

The only thing they had in common was that they were human, and humans all had short lives.

The little Gou Nanchun was true to her word. She had tried hard to prolong her life, but she was aging, and her body was telling her it was time to leave.

A hundred years of life was longer than her mother and grandmother combined.

But for a spirit, it was still too short.

“You must not! You must not die!” Nan He had never known she could be so forceful. She continuously fed the decaying body with her spiritual blood, ignoring that she was choking and that her face was completely pallid: “Achun, you must not die! You’re still young, you won’t die!”

“Xiao He… Grandma… cough, cough…”

Her fair and tender skin had long turned into dry, woody texture, full of wrinkles when touched, with no smooth spots.

She was indeed no longer young.

“Was… was Grandmother really that good? cough, cough… You’re definitely going to say yes. You’re always like this… cough… always talking about Grandmother. You… go find her.”

She truly couldn’t live anymore; even speaking was difficult.

She struggled to reach up, her lips pressed tightly against Nan He’s ear, making sure she could hear her faint voice.

“Nanchun… go find Gou Nanchun. Be happy… You said happiness was important. I… I want you to be happy.”

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