Esper X Family – Chapter 699 – Digging Up Old Grievances

The livestream came to a successful end.

Fu Qiqi had managed to hold out until the very end, despite the enormous risk to her reputation.

Truly a cause for celebration.

As for Lou Weiwei, she had appeared completely at ease throughout the entire process, clearly no longer bothered by it.

Upon reflection, this made perfect sense.

From the very beginning, the Dayun Truck had been like a robotic human, lacking any strong sense of self-awareness and willing to accept just about anything to achieve his goals.

Merely appearing as Lou Weiwei was a trivial price to pay.

If it could make up for the fatherly love Ye Yao had been missing, then Lou Wei was entirely willing to bear that cost.

Besides, Ye Yao was already mature for her age and didn’t need any extra guidance.

Add to that her overwhelming personal strength, and she certainly didn’t need a sense of security from her father.

In the end, the only thing Lou Wei could do was enrich the joys of Ye Yao’s daily life.

And the price he had to pay along the way was, to him, utterly insignificant.

Although it was a bit tough on Fu Qi, he was Ye Yao’s uncle after all, and there was nothing wrong with spoiling his niece.

It wasn’t like they were committing any crimes. As long as it didn’t cause any negative repercussions, Lou Wei was confident that Fu Qi could accept it.

This was what it meant to have an open mind!

“It’s finally over.”

Fu Qiqi collapsed onto the sofa, completely letting go. It had been a long time since she had felt such pressure.

The last time her pressure levels had been this high was when Ye Ge had been putting the pressure on her.

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Fu Qiqi always felt that taking part in this kind of show was worse than spending three days and three nights elbowing Vengeful Spirits to death.

Although the distance between her and the masses had shrunk, and she hadn’t left an aloof impression… what was the price?

“Little Yao, can I change back now?”

“Nope, we haven’t taken a commemorative photo yet! This is the first live stream event featuring the little streamer and two legendary magical girls together, we definitely need a proper memento.”

With that, Ye Yao sat herself right between the two of them, looking every bit like a little fan.

“Don’t pull such a long face, come on, smile! This is the last time… mhm, the last time. I’ll never put Uncle through this again.”

Fu Qiqi let out a light sigh, her expression one of resignation.

Since Ye Yao had resorted to an acting cute tactic that was practically cheating, what uncle could possibly resist his niece’s pleading?

Especially when that niece was someone you could practically raise as a daughter.

The little one had gained overwhelming power but had never used it to force anyone into anything. That alone was more than enough to be gratifying.

“Alright, I hope this really is the last time. Otherwise, your uncle might actually face an ill-fated old age.”

“How could that ever happen? With me around, even if Uncle wants to sit on the golden toilet ¹ Warhammer’s Emperor of Mankind is only kept alive through his golden throne. , I can make it happen. There’s no such thing as ‘old age’ for you.”

Ye Yao flashed a harmless, innocent smile, as if she hadn’t just said something deeply unsettling.

Fu Qiqi: “???”

She didn’t dare breathe. She hoped that it was just her imagination.

With a click, Ye Yao finished taking a selfie of the three of them.

As a moderately well-known little streamer, this kind of event deserved a behind-the-scenes post to make her fans green with envy.

Ye Yao quickly slapped a cute little fat bird emoji over her own face, captioned it “The pinnacle of this little streamer’s life”, and posted it straight to her account feed.

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Within moments, the likes shot past ten thousand.

“Awesome, if the streamer won’t show her face, what are we even watching?”

“That little fat bird is getting in the way, daring to possess the streamer’s body. I think it wants to go solo.”

“Wait, is this a scheme to sow discord?”

“Isn’t that photo edit a bit too much, Streamer?”

“Upstairs, what do you know? This is called the beauty of subtlety!”

“Gotta say, Crimson Wheel and Void Heaven are absolute top-tier beauties~”

“Bro, you’re really hungry. But same, honestly.”

“Thanks, we love big mamas like this.”

Ye Yao was utterly satisfied after posting.

This is what life is all about.

Not only did she get to slack off, but there was also endless fun and a brilliantly bright future ahead.

“Father, Uncle, look! You’re so popular! Everyone must be so jealous!”

Like a little angel eager to share her joy, Ye Yao nearly shoved her phone screen right into Lou Weiwei and Fu Qiqi’s faces.

Fu Qiqi glanced at the screen briefly, the corner of her mouth twitching slightly.

“They’re jealous alright, but definitely not of you.”

Although Crimson Wheel and Void Heaven were also world-class in popularity, compared to Ye Yao, they were worlds apart.

The difference between world-class and world-class was too great ² It’s that one cultivation trope where some people can be much, much stronger than others at the same cultivation level. .

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Lou Weiwei glanced at it briefly, then looked away.

“I can’t keep up with the times. I still don’t understand why people call us ‘mama’. Even if our appearance is female, our apparent age shouldn’t be mature enough for that.”

After the live stream ended, it was back to ordinary family conversation.

The family bond that Ye Yao cherished so much hadn’t grown distant after her ascension to godhood. It remained relaxed and perfectly balanced.

“It’s okay. Honestly, sometimes I feel like calling Lou Weiwei and Fu Qiqi ‘mama’ too.”

The white-haired girl spoke with conviction.

“Think about it. Cute appearance, overwhelming power, a personality that naturally shields the weak like children behind them, always stepping up in times of crisis… Doesn’t that have a certain maternal greatness to it?”

And most importantly, there were loli mamas ³ It all started with one line from Char that was memed everywhere… (see chapter 13’s note for details). At some point the memed got deconstructed to treating lolis that act maternally as moms. Recently, the term became popular again in Chinese internet because of a certain Cure Arcana Shadow who apparently exudes maternal charm… . That was the real key.

“R-Really?” Fu Qiqi began to doubt her own life.

“Really really! Trust me on this! Have I ever lied to you?”

Ye Yao patted her chest with absolute certainty, as if she had completely forgotten the web of deceptions she had woven early on.

And that sentence clearly stirred up some unpleasant memories for Fu Qiqi.

It wouldn’t have mattered whether she brought up those long buried things.

But since they had managed to carve out some rare relaxation time, and the atmosphere was so carefree, with family members talking without reservation, Fu Qiqi felt compelled to dig up old grievances.

“Now that you mention it… Thinking back, Little Yao, you’ve tricked us quite a few times. Back then, I don’t know how many people couldn’t sleep at night.”

There was not a trace of reproach in the voice of one of history’s legendary stress-bearers. It was more like rueful sighing and resignation.

Ye Yao blinked.

Facing it head-on without flinching!

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“What could I do? I was terrified at first. Facing people like Father and Uncle, isn’t it only natural to be a little stressed?”

“Especially Father. You nearly scared me to tears back then. That was just me fighting to survive.”

Ye Yao smoothly deflected a chunk of the blame onto Lou Weiwei.

The orange-red-haired girl looked slightly awkward, clearly not wanting to admit that her former self had been a bit like a robot.

Fu Qiqi nodded thoughtfully.

“Come to think of it, when you were first adopted, it seemed like you already knew most of the situation. We schemed and schemed, but never expected you to have a mind-reading ability that wasn’t affected by mental power levels.”

That was probably the biggest variable in the entire adoption plan.

Coupled with Ye Yao’s unusually mature inner self, the Countermeasures Bureau had been thoroughly played by a massive information gap.

“Back when you first met Lou Wei, what exactly did you find out?”

Ye Yao fell into thought, trying to recall.

“Hmm… The Strongest Esper of the Current Era, capable of single-handedly destroying nations… He was extremely wary, coming to investigate a potential world-ending threat in me, and if I showed any abnormality, he’d suppress me with force immediately.”

That was about the gist of it.

Fu Qiqi: “…”

Alright. That was indeed a little frightening.

Author Note

Gwah, now that things have come to this, let’s eat first.

Text: Secretly retreat