Mother-in-Law Refuses to Regress! (7 Chapters Left to Complete) - Chapter 35
It was while Larisa stood beneath the wall of the house where she used to live with her mother, chatting amiably with Siod about old times.
“Hey, you again?”
“Oh, Auntie Linda!”
Larisa brightened and ran over. Before Siod could stop her, she buried herself in Linda’s apron and popped her head out to greet her.
“Seeing you again just a week after our last meeting!”
“You really are…”
Persistent, aren’t you? Though Larisa hadn’t meant it that way, Linda assumed she’d come looking for her. After a brief hesitation, she sighed and spoke.
“Want to come inside for a bit?”
“Yes!”
Siod quietly followed behind like a mere attendant. Perhaps because their attire was simpler than before, Auntie Linda—unlike last time—seated Larisa at the dining table and served her tea.
“As I said yesterday… I don’t really know much. But I figured you’d come back, so I’ll tell you everything I do know.”
Gulp.
Siod barely suppressed a smile at the sound of Larisa swallowing hard.
“At first—it seemed your mother planned to hide away with you for the first few months after giving birth. She said she had somewhere to return to. That someone would come looking for her…”
‘Could that person be Father?’
Seeing Larisa’s hopeful gaze, Auntie Linda spoke with pity in her eyes.
“But as days passed, no one came—not even your father, let alone any family. Marina seemed to give up more and more. But yes, that necklace.”
“Huh? This one?”
“Yes. She insisted she could never sell it.”
‘So it really is from someone precious, then?’
Larisa was curious about the identity of the person in the portrait inside the locket.
“When I suggested selling it, she said people trying to kill Marina would find her first if she sold that.”
‘People trying to kill Mother?’
Larisa’s eyes widened in shock.
“Could you tell me more, please?”
Siod pulled his chair closer and sat right beside her. As his face drew near, silvery eyes glinted from beneath his hood. Unlike earlier, Linda now felt this man’s presence growing increasingly overwhelming.
With a dazed expression, Linda continued.
“Marina said she fled because people were after her life. And it was indeed because of the child. But Marina said she never wanted a child of that man’s. Because of the child, her whole life…”
“Enough.”
Siod scooped up Larisa, whose face had gone pale. He’d used magic to hear an honest, unfiltered account—but hadn’t anticipated this side effect. Holding her tightly, he whispered into her ear.
“Larisa. You heard nothing.”
“But…”
“Just sleep for a while.”
After erasing Larisa’s memory and putting her to sleep with magic, Siod sighed as he looked at Linda, whose expression remained hazy.
“Keep talking.”
What Linda shared was a familiar tale—the story of a woman whose life was ruined by a highborn man, forced to flee with nothing, abandoning everything just to survive, after receiving threats from his wife for carrying an unwanted child.
She never revealed exactly who that highborn man was. But Siod had his suspicions. He laid the sleeping Larisa gently onto her bed and quietly opened the locket to examine the portrait.
“Empress…”
It was unmistakably the Empress’s face. Imperial maids were usually chosen from among the Empress’s own relatives, so it made sense that a maid would possess a childhood portrait of the Empress—it was likely meant simply as a study aid before entering the palace.
That explained why she couldn’t sell it. Selling a portrait of the Empress would bring the Empress’s blade before the Emperor’s protection ever arrived.
If Marina truly was the Empress’s relative and a prospective maid, it was no wonder her family abandoned her—they’d all likely aligned themselves with the Empress. That left only the Emperor as the family Larisa could possibly seek out.
*
“What do you think?”
Guinevere, having heard the entire story from Siod, answered without hesitation.
“No.”
“No to what?”
“We can’t let them take Larisa into the palace. Pretend you don’t know.”
She couldn’t just hand over Larisa—whom she’d brought back under a mage’s oath to Marina—to anyone, not even the Emperor.
“But what if Larisa’s real father is the Emperor?”
Guinevere paused briefly, then replied casually.
“It’s not confirmed yet, is it?”
“Shall I investigate, then?”
“…”
“I can do it without getting caught. Done things like this for about a thousand years. What do you say?”
“What’s the price?”
“One date with me?”
“Fine.”
But even if Larisa truly was the Emperor’s daughter, Guinevere had no intention of giving her up.
Letting Larisa enter the palace would inevitably drag her into pointless political squabbles—and that wasn’t the happy life Marina had wanted for her.
If Siod’s suspicion was correct, why hadn’t Marina said anything in advance? Probably because she hadn’t wanted Larisa registered into the imperial family either.
Besides, even if a fatherless girl like Larisa were acknowledged as the Emperor’s daughter, her life wouldn’t be easy. It was suspicious, too, that despite the Emperor’s notorious womanizing, he’d never fathered any illegitimate children until now.
‘Could it be that even in my previous life…? No.’
In her previous life, hadn’t Guinevere herself arranged for Larisa to be adopted into a noble household? Since that family wasn’t deeply involved in central politics, the Empress wouldn’t have seen them as a threat.
That probably wasn’t why Larisa had been poisoned. Larisa had faced death three separate times under similar circumstances—and each time, there was only one common thread:
When she started dating William and received his marriage proposal.
‘It’s probably a love rivalry, after all.’
*
“You got a house?”
“Yeah.”
Larisa held out the deed. William took it, carefully checked the price and ownership details, handed it back, and thought to himself,
‘I should’ve bought it for her.’
Watching Larisa’s delighted face, William silently regretted it.
“Why would a mere tutor buy something like this for you?”
“No idea. Said it was just a gift.”
Truthfully, Larisa was puzzled too. But gazing into William’s suspicious, storm-gray eyes, she had a guess.
“There’s no such thing as ‘just a gift.’ Everyone has ulterior motives.”
“Ulterior motives…?”
“A professor at the Academy coming all the way here as a private tutor for a talentless seven-year-old? That’s suspicious right there.”
“Mother brought him herself.”
“Exactly! Which makes it even more suspicious. Could he have ulterior motives toward Mother?”
Larisa smiled faintly.
‘You’re only figuring that out now? Silly Willi.’
Just from how casually Mr. Siod treated Guinevere—and those sweet, affectionate glances—it should’ve been obvious.
Hiding her thoughts cleverly, Larisa blinked innocently. Though William resembled his mother too much, those mysterious silver-gray eyes were unmistakably inherited from his teacher.
Yet no one ever mentioned it—how odd.
“Did you know? Teacher’s really rich.”
“Richer than Mother?”
“Well… and apparently super powerful, too.”
“More powerful than Mother?”
Her standards were impossibly high. Poor Mr. Siod.
“But Teacher’s a good person.”
“Why all the praise all of a sudden?”
“Praise is good! Why are you angry, Willi?”
“Huh?”
Am I angry? William briefly reflected.
‘Could this be… jealousy?’
He quickly shook his head.
“I’m just worried you trust people too easily! That’s all.”
“Oh, honestly, Willi—you always treat me like a baby. I’m seven!”
Larisa spoke as if being seven were something extraordinary, making William chuckle softly. To be fair, anyone would’ve found it hard not to laugh.
“Why are you laughing? At seven, kids in the back alleys already have their own turf. You can beg on your own without older siblings, you know.”
“Yeah.”
No matter how angelically pretty she looked dressed in fine clothes, traces of that back-alley upbringing always lingered—and William found that utterly endearing.
“Anyway, Teacher’s really nice. He keeps praising you and saying how great it’d be if you married me.”
“What?”
William scowled. The sudden remark felt so random it left him oddly flustered. Seeing his expression, Larisa giggled and asked,
“What? Don’t you want to marry me, Willi-Willi?”
“…”
William realized he needed to answer carefully. What would a normal person say? Larisa probably expected him to say he didn’t want to marry her, right?
“Of course I don’t!”
“Okay.”
Larisa nodded calmly. William clutched his racing heart, agonizing—had he answered well?
“Anyway, so here’s the thing—after we run away, shall we open a shop here?”
“A shop?”
“You said you wanted to help lots of people with alchemy, right? There are many needy folks in the slums. So I’ll give you the house. Let’s open a shop together here.”
‘But isn’t that independence, not running away?’
It didn’t matter. Opening a shop together in the house where he’d lived with his mother—it felt almost like a marriage proposal. William was touched.
“Shall we write a contract?”
“A contract?”
“Teacher says if you know how to write good contracts, you won’t get taken advantage of.”
“Alright.”
Larisa began writing on a blank sheet in delightfully round letters.
“Since I’m giving the house, profits should be split fifty-fifty!”
“Sure.”
Poor innocent William. Larisa smirked inwardly. The contract was now complete—William would do all the work while she sat back and earned money effortlessly.
“Okay, now stamp it and sign!”
“Here?”
William stamped and signed exactly as Larisa instructed. The contract was now binding. Larisa proudly blew gently on the paper to dry the ink.
Ex-husband Wants Reconciliation
One-line summary: Chasing the wife to the crematorium (making an effort to attract someone who has become indifferent), the female lead doesn’t look back, the second male lead takes the position.
Intro:
To repay the kindness of the older generation, Su Mu crossed into a female-dominated world and became a live-in daughter-in-law of the Yan family, single-handedly saving the Yan family from fire and water.
But her husband, Yan Jiyue, the eldest son of the Yan family, treated her with sarcasm and never showed her a good face.
It wasn’t until after Su Mu’s death that this pampered and arrogant young master shed a few fake tears and pretended to want to die for love.
This life’s kindness was enough. If there was a next life, she would definitely kick Yan Jiyue away.
Who knew that the heavens would be so kind as to allow her to be reborn, returning to the time when she had just married into the Yan family.
Su Mu glanced at the Yan eldest son, who still spoke coldly to her, and threw a divorce letter in front of him.
“Let’s divorce!”
***
Yan Jiyue never imagined that he would be reborn. He happily went to find Su Mu, wanting to make up for the mistakes he had made in his ignorant youth.
Wasn’t the reason the heavens allowed him to be reborn to let him reconcile with Su Mu?
But when he pushed open the door to Su Mu’s room, the person lying on the bed was another man.
Su Mu’s personal attendant, Xie Yi.
Yan Jiyue hated him so much that his teeth itched. In front of Su Mu, Xie Yi was a gentle and considerate whisperer of sweet nothings, but in reality, he was vicious-hearted and deliberately sabotaged their husband and wife relationship.
In the previous life, it was he who secretly hid in Su Mu’s coffin and committed suicide, stealing a step ahead of him to be buried with Su Mu.
Yan Jiyue’s eyes were filled with hatred as he cursed, “What kind of thing are you? Your background is lowly, what right do you have to occupy Su Mu?”
Xie Yi looked at the sleeping Su Mu and no longer pretended to be a whisperer of sweet nothings.
He proudly stuck out his belly, “I have the right because my belly is capable of giving the Wife-master a daughter.”
***
Yan Jiyue was consumed with jealousy. He spread rumors that Xie Yi had once been branded with the mark of a “harlot” on his chest.
But on the night Xie Yi cut off the flesh bearing that mark, Su Mu suddenly realized something was amiss.
“How did you know the exact moment I was poisoned? And why did you show up a month early?”
Xie Yi remained silent, blood from his wound soaking through his robes. His sapphire eyes brimmed with anguish – or was it just a flawless act?
Between a once-arrogant husband now seeking redemption, and a gentle soul willing to die for her – who truly held the darkest secrets? And could it be that Su Mu and Yan Jiyue weren’t the only ones given a second chance at life…?
[Reading Guide]
1. True divorce, chasing the wife to the crematorium, the female lead doesn’t look back, the male lead is Xie Yi.
2. The ex-husband did not cheat, he just realized too late and didn’t realize that he liked the female lead.
_____
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