It was only then that he felt fate had finally turned in his favor.
Just a few more days. Once the dregs of the city had been cleaned out, he would propose to Rose.
Some of the senior military officers opposed Rose—a woman of unknown origins staying at the General's Estate.
When they heard Victor intended to marry her, the opposition grew louder.
After all, there was Declan's wife as a cautionary tale.
In such sensitive times, a woman with no verifiable past could easily be accused of espionage.
His voice was ice-cold: "Anyone could be a spy. She couldn't."
Rose was entirely neutral. She came from another world.
Anyone might betray him. Rose alone could not.
He loved her—at first because of absolute trust, because she was like untouched ground, a harbor where he could rest. But later, he discovered he could no longer live without her.
He won his war, convinced the stubborn old guard, and permitted no prejudice against Rose.
Those dissenting voices died before they could travel far—Victor strangled them at birth.
He married the woman he loved, legitimately and rightfully.
Soon he would take his new bride to garrison Nanjing.
But as the old saying went: no one can wrestle fate,
No one can outmatch destiny.
Victor was assassinated on the happiest day of his life.
A single bullet ended his brief existence—even sooner than his originally appointed death.
5.
At the wedding, Owen caught a glimpse of a shadow darting through a dark corner the instant the gunshot rang out.
He was the flower boy at this wedding. He and his sister wore beautiful formal outfits, witnessing the union of the young warlord Victor and their Rose-jiejie.
But everything was destroyed.
Destroyed by one man.
Owen, in his new soft leather shoes, still ran fast. After tearing through two street corners, he slammed into the man.
"Little hero. You caught me."
The man was half-concealed in the shadows at the corner of the street, wearing something between a smirk and a sneer.
So it was him!
Owen remembered their last encounter—at the newly established rehabilitation center, where that smiling tiger of a man had worn the same ambiguous half-smile while probing for the young warlord's whereabouts.
Even then, Owen had felt he recognized that voice from somewhere.
Now, he remembered. That day outside the Paramount, lurking in the shadows, issuing orders in Japanese, dispatching a sniper to the high ground—the mastermind behind it all was none other than Claude Chase, the young master of the Chase family.
This time was no different. He had disguised himself and lurked nearby. With all the elevated positions under Oliver's watch, he handpicked three assassins to infiltrate and strike.
And, against all odds, he succeeded.
It was true what they said—people grew careless when riding high.
Claude Chase mocked Victor. What a joyous occasion a wedding must be, to make a man discard even his instincts for detecting danger.
He watched Victor fall. Watched Rose clutch him desperately.
He felt vindicated. But he also revealed himself.
Owen spotted him and gave chase on pure instinct, forgetting to leave word behind.
After two streets, Claude Chase realized the boy was alone. He regained his composure and turned the tables:
"Little hero. Why did you come alone?"
Owen trembled with fury. He lunged at Claude Chase, ready to tear him apart.
He might be a child, but he had a man's mettle. He knew the young warlord Victor was not a smiling man, but he was a good man through and through.
He never forced the poor to pay taxes. Never stole grain or children from common folk.
He had wiped out the Green Gang bullies who preyed on the defenseless.
Such a good man, brought down by this skulking shadow—killed on his own wedding day.
But Owen, after all, was still only a boy. His thrashing accomplished nothing, and Claude Chase gripped his throat.
In that unwatched, shadowed corner, Owen—whose courage had carried him alone—was chokeholded to death by Claude Chase's black-gloved hands.
A bright young life extinguished. Owen died in his beautiful formal attire.
A day later, as Rose traveled back fifteen years, the timeline reset: Victor died in battle, and Rose vanished without a trace.
Owen jolted awake from a nightmare. He was still at the Renxin Rehabilitation Center, tending to his frail sister.
He had only dozed off for a moment in broad daylight. His throat ached terribly.
Rubbing his perpetually sore neck, he forced himself to memorize every detail from his dream, every note of that voice. Every day he took to the streets, searching.
The Chase family had been expelled from the territory by the young warlord, but Claude Chase had secretly stayed behind. He had been brainwashed during his studies in Japan and returned as a spy.
Years ago, he had introduced another female spy to Declan as a wife. Day and night she whispered in Declan's ear, egging him on to ally with the Green Gang—grow opium, run gambling dens, open brothels.
Claude Chase had also tried to use his own sister to subvert Victor.
That plan failed. Victor became his obstacle. So he schemed to assassinate him.
Once failed, he tried again.
In the revised timeline, the Soviet faction won. Claude Chase threw in with them, then led the Soviets to the Japanese—selling out his own country.
A decade later, Owen finally executed this traitorous spy with his own hands.
At twenty, now named Ouyang Yuan, funded through school by Grace, he took a new name. Grace had hoped he would go far away and never come back.
Instead, he quietly joined the revolution.
He looked at this refined middle-aged man—the one who had so easily killed him in his dream—now scuttling under his own blockade.
Ouyang Yuan smiled as he closed in step by step, subduing him without effort, and sent him to hell with the same chokehold.
Afterward, the New China was founded. Ouyang Yuan led a group of survivors in rebuilding the Ren'ai Welfare Institute.
More and more children were taken in. Dormitories and classrooms expanded, but the ruined church was always preserved.
When Ouyang Yuan was eighty, a pitiful baby girl was left at the gates of Ren'ai.
He didn't know why, but she reminded him of that vanished Rose-jiejie.
He tickled the infant, who had finally stopped crying after drinking her fill of formula. She wore a smile even in sleep.
"Little one," he said, "How about we call you Rose Ouyang?"
6.
Back in 2022, Victor claimed the trust fund he had set up for Rose a century earlier. He used the money to purchase the land where the old warehouse had stood a hundred years before.
And following Rose's off-the-cuff idea from a hundred years ago, he built a mixed-use commercial district.
Victor was highly adaptable and a quick learner.
Not to mention he already spoke multiple languages.
And he had a natural gift for dealing with people.
The commercial district bustled with activity.
After that, Victor shifted his focus to developing boutique hotels. He took Rose on a site visit to a swath of beautiful, untouched land.
Rose, in the grip of pregnancy brain, blurted out: "Isn't this where we went to the hot springs before?"
Victor couldn't understand how she could know about a scenic spot he had discovered on a military march. He pressed her relentlessly for an explanation.
Unable to hide it any longer, Rose confessed everything that had happened during the two months she had disappeared.
They had soaked in hot springs together, boated on Lake Tai, browsed street markets, lived in a little house by the water, and prepared for their wedding in bliss.
Rose wept. She remembered watching him get assassinated on their wedding day, helpless to save him, devastated beyond words.
"I was supposed to die with you, but instead I landed beside the ten-year-old version of you. And then I came home and found you wounded from the explosion. I was afraid that if you knew you had once won, you'd try to go back. Going back is too dangerous. I didn't mean to keep it from you—I just couldn't go through all that again..."
Victor held the weeping Rose and listened to the whole story. Then he chuckled softly: "Rose, I'm not an ungrateful fool. It's just..."
"Just what?" Rose looked up at him. The old resentment had drained from his eyes, leaving only clarity—calm, transparent, like still water.
Victor gazed back at her anxious face, fell silent for a long time, then laughed quietly: "It's just that from now on, we have to reenact every single thing I didn't get to experience. Otherwise, I feel like I've been cheated on—by myself."
Victor got himself a car with faster acceleration, booked smoother private flights. The key point: in this world, he could sleep soundly and settle disputes with reason.
"Rose, you weren't lying. This era is actually quite nice."
Victor was thoroughly satisfied with everything a hundred years in the future. The one shortcoming: their son, An'an, had mysteriously disappeared once.
Thankfully, he turned up in the same spot a while later—more fright than harm.
Victor could not stop thinking about it.
"If An'an crossed over to that era..."
He dared not imagine it. That world was too dangerous. A toddler, alone, facing such danger—it was unthinkable.
He had to eliminate all such risks at their source.
Present-day Victor was a doting father fiercely protective of his son's life. He used safety clips to tether a bodyguard and a nanny—one to each of the boy's hands.
The contraption was so outlandish that Rose forced him to dismantle it.
"If our son goes somewhere dangerous, he needs enough people with him. The problem is, a person only has two hands—one to attach the nanny for daily care, one to attach the bodyguard for security..."
Rose ignored him. Instead, she sewed their contact information and names onto every piece of the child's clothing.
"He has his own path to walk. If you tie him up like this, sure, he'll be safe—but how is he supposed to grow?"
Fine. In addition to being a hovering father, Victor was also an obedient husband. His only option was to carry his son everywhere—in his arms, on his shoulders.
One peaceful year passed. When An'an was three,
He vanished again.
About half an hour later, the closet door swung open from the inside. Out stepped the boy, a piece of candy in his mouth, clutching a black-and-white photograph.
It showed a mustachioed Oliver and Grace. In Grace's arms was a little girl about An'an's size.
With his heart no longer in his throat, Victor picked up the photograph—and couldn't put it down.
He turned slightly away, hiding the mist in his eyes.
"They're safe. They're happy."
7.
Oliver — "My Brother-in-Law"
My brother-in-law died saving me—blown to smithereens by a shoulder-launched shell.
I didn't dare tell Grace.
Telegrams kept arriving, one after another. I could only stammer and deflect.
I spent over a week sick with worry.
Then my brother-in-law showed up again, entirely intact.
It was fucking absurd.
He offered zero explanation for being vaporized and reconstituted. Instead, he fretted over a charred wristband, muttering, "How am I supposed to fix this thing? What if Rose notices?"
Later, he and his Rose disappeared completely.
On their wedding day.
Nobody else remembered.
Only I remembered everything.
I remembered the war we won.
He came back from the dead and became the king of Suzhou and Chesterfield.
He married the woman he loved most, and was about to relocate to Jinling and carve out his own era.
But a single bullet ended it all.
Then his Rose vanished too.
Everyone else's memories stopped at the battle he had provoked himself.
He had been young and impetuous, underprepared, squeezed from three sides, ultimately suffering a crushing defeat.
The Vane family's power fractured into fragments.
Grace was pregnant at the time, and the pregnancy was precarious.
She couldn't tolerate the slightest shock.
I kept the truth from her. Coaxed her, told them they'd gone to France for their honeymoon and wouldn't be back for a while.
That lie lasted nearly two years.
One day, I came home to find a strange child in the house.
He could barely talk.
But the way his mouth curled—that imperious expression—was exactly like my brother-in-law.
I pressed a piece of candy into his hand.
"Who are you?"
He took the candy, smirked again, and climbed into my wardrobe. Disappeared.
I thought—maybe, possibly...
No. I couldn't let myself think it. I went to bed and tried to sleep.
I was losing my mind.
The next year, the child appeared again.
This time, his collar had names embroidered on it.
Victor Vane: followed by 11 digits.
Rose Ouyang: followed by 11 digits.
If someone was playing a prank,
They won.
What were these eleven digits?
Some kind of code?
I gathered the child in my arms. "If you really are Victor's son, call me Uncle."
He smirked and turned his head away.
I produced a fruit candy.
He accepted it and ate it with satisfaction.
Grace walked over, smiling. "What's wrong—who are you talking to?"
The child's head peeked out from my embrace.
Grace gave a start.
"Grace, look—doesn't this child look like Victor?"
All these years, Grace had sensed, deep down, that her little brother was likely gone.
But she held herself together.
She was the strongest woman I had ever known.
Seeing this child at last, she shed tears:
"If only it were really Līfei's child... how wonderful that would be."
I told her what I knew.
The toddler on my lap was evidently short on patience. He jumped down from my knees.
Marched with great ceremony to my wardrobe and opened the door.
I hurriedly pressed a family photo into his hands.
He caught it, fruit candy still tucked in his cheek, and vanished into the closet.
A year later, Grace and I and our daughter Feifei sat waiting.
Every light in the house was on.
Feifei held a slice of cake, rubbing her eyes: "Is cousin really coming?"
Neither of us answered. Without seeing it for yourself, it was impossible to explain.
The wardrobe door opened. A boy in suit and dress shoes leaped out.
Feifei gasped, clapping her hand over her mouth:
"He's real! Cousin is real!"
The kid saw the three of us sitting together next to the wardrobe and paused.
"Waiting for me?"
Such arrogance, at his age. Already insufferable.
Grace stepped forward and hugged him.
He stood at attention and announced his name was An'an. From his pocket, he produced a color photograph and an envelope.
It showed Victor Vane and Rose Ouyang, with An'an.
"My parents are still waiting for me. Gotta go!"
His arrivals were sudden; his departures were whirlwinds.
We pressed the letter we had prepared into his arms.
After that, we never saw him again.
Perhaps he grew up and learned to control it.
It was fine that he stopped coming.
Their world was far better than ours.
— END —