But gradually, I couldn't smile anymore.
The edges of the dream began to collapse.
The time the ghost messenger had given me was running out.
I touched Pei Zhou's face.
“Husband.”
He tightened his grip on my hand.
“I'm here.”
“You're not allowed to come looking for me.”
The light in Pei Zhou's eyes slowly faded.
“Why?”
“Because I don't want to see you.”
He stared at me.
“That's a lie.”
“……”
This man was already on the verge of dying, yet he was still so impossible to fool.
I could only glare at him fiercely.
“Either way, you're not allowed to die.”
“You promised me you'd live well.”
“But the person who hurt me has already been punished.”
Pei Zhou lowered his head.
“I don't have anything else left to do.”
“Who says you don't?”
I continued counting on my fingers.
“Yuan Bao is old. You have to take care of it.”
“You're not allowed to change the name of my island.”
“My clothes, photos, and jewelry—don't throw away a single thing.”
“Every year on the anniversary of my death, you still have to burn the latest models for me.”
I paused.
“Most importantly—”
“You still haven't finished the lifetime you owe me.”
Pei Zhou's eyelashes trembled violently.
I lifted his face.
“Pei Zhou.”
“Dying with me doesn't count as loving me.”
“Living well in my place does.”
His eyes reddened, and he couldn't say a word.
The dream was collapsing faster and faster.
Our bodies were also beginning to turn transparent.
I rose onto my toes and kissed him one last time.
“You have to eat on time.”
“Drink less and don't smoke.”
“And don't touch those sleeping pills or that gun again.”
“Wait until you're an old man who has lost all his teeth.”
“Then I'll consider whether I want to see you.”
Pei Zhou held me tightly.
“How long?”
“I don't know.”
“Suìsuì.”
“Mm?”
“In our next life, will you still marry me?”
I deliberately thought about it for a long time.
Only when the tension in his eyes had become almost impossible to hide did I gently nod.
“I'll see how you behave.”
The dream shattered completely.
When he woke, Pei Zhou was still sitting beside the bed.
The pills were still in his palm.
He stared at them for a long time.
Finally, he threw all of them into the toilet.
The gun was also locked inside the safe.
Outside the window, the sky gradually brightened.
Yuan Bao crouched outside the door and meowed at him.
Pei Zhou bent down and picked it up.
“She came.”
Yuan Bao licked his hand.
Pei Zhou smiled with reddened eyes.
“She was still just as fussy.”
“Even after dying, she still wanted to boss me around.”
Lin Wantang was sentenced to life imprisonment for intentional homicide.
The device and all the data left behind by the system were completely destroyed.
From then on, there was nothing left that could erase my existence.
Pei Zhou never married again.
He moved all my belongings back into our bridal chamber.
He also restored every photo that had been damaged by the system.
Every year on the anniversary of my death, he took his private jet abroad and bought the latest handbags from that season.
Then he burned them for me on the island.
The first year, he burned a hundred handbags.
He almost set half the island on fire.
When I received the handbags in the underworld, the ghosts around me lined up for three whole blocks just to watch the spectacle.
The ghost messenger was so furious that he punished me by making me copy the fire-safety rules eight hundred times.
I couldn't stop laughing as I copied them.
Later, I found a job in the underworld.
I helped newly arrived spirits choose clothes and coordinate their jewelry.
I didn't earn much.
But at least I was no longer useless.
Pei Zhou lived for a very long time.
Long enough for Yuan Bao to leave him.
Long enough for his hair to turn completely white.
Long enough for the hands that had held me countless times to grow old and become covered in wrinkles.
At eighty-seven, he lay on our wedding bed.
The two wedding rings were still hanging against his chest.
Before closing his eyes, he looked at my photograph and asked softly,
“Suìsuì.”
“Did I behave well?”
That day, the Ghost Gate opened.
An old man with completely white hair stepped through.
He stood at the entrance to the Road to the Underworld, nervous just like he had been the first time he met me.
I wore my prettiest dress and carried the latest handbag he'd burned for me that year, deliberately putting on a stern expression.
“Mr. Pei.”
“You're late.”
He looked at me for a long time.
His eyes gradually reddened.
The next second, he ran toward me.
With every step he took, his white hair grew darker.
His aged face gradually returned to the way it had looked in his youth.
Finally, he stopped in front of me.
Still the same tall, straight Pei Zhou with the cold, striking features I remembered.
He opened his arms toward me.
“Mrs. Pei.”
“Could I trouble you to save your husband first this time?”
I couldn't help laughing.
Then I threw myself into his arms.
“Sure.”
“Since you didn't behave too badly.”
“I'll raise you for another lifetime.”
He lowered his head and kissed me.
Along the Road to the Underworld, the red spider lilies bloomed across the earth.
I had finally waited for him.
And this time—
we still had another long, long lifetime ahead of us.
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