Night had just fallen.
A thin mist hung over Liyue Harbor, and the air carried a faint chill.
A gust of wind swept past.
The breeze carried that cold, thin mist along with it, drifting past the Wanwen Bookhouse.
At the tea tables outside the Wanwen Bookhouse.
The novel lovers seated there, reading, had reached the ending of anohana: The Flower We Saw That Day. Tears streamed down their faces, and they cursed even as they wept.
"Old Thief Fang Qiu really isn't human. She actually killed off a girl as sweet as Menma! Waaaah..."
"I knew it! I never should have gotten my hopes up with that old thief Fang Qiu! Redemption and healing? Sure, we got the redemption, but what part of that was healing? Try soul-crushing instead!"
"Does she even have a heart? Old Thief Fang Qiu has no conscience! Menma, I live and die with you!"
"Same here! Uh... hold on, brother, that's going too far. Menma's already passed away. If you die with her, the Wangsheng Funeral Parlor gets one more piece of business."
"Damn it! That old thief Fang Qiu goes too far every single time! Every character she creates makes me feel how beautiful the world is. Kaori. Lingsha. Menma. And the moment I really start believing the world is beautiful, that old thief Fang Qiu brings the knife down, one clean stroke, and tells me the world was never beautiful to begin with..."
"You like Kaori? You do? Slash, dead. You like Lingsha? You do? Slash, dead too... And this time that old thief Fang Qiu doesn't even bother hiding it. Menma, already dead. You like her? You do? Slash, off to the wheel of reincarnation. Did somebody hurt that old thief Fang Qiu once or something?"
"Well well, not a single word about Jack and Jing Tian from The Eternal, huh?"
"Just as I thought. Weathering With You and Your Name were only a brief attack of conscience..."
"Waaaah, my Menma... I have to hold it in, I can't cry. I suspect that old thief Fang Qiu is watching us from somewhere and laughing herself sick."
Under the glow of the lanterns, one novel lover after another cursed into the night.
At that moment, two lovely young women were sitting at one of the tables as well.
"Sister Han Shuang, waaah... Menma's gone."
The ponytailed girl sharing the bench threw herself into the arms of the beautiful woman beside her, wrapping her arms around that slender waist and sobbing her heart out.
Weeping like rain on pear blossoms.
"Sister Qingyao."
The beautiful woman called Han Shuang stroked the ponytailed girl's back, comforting her. But the instant she spoke, a line of clear tears slid down her own cheek.
The two of them clung to each other and cried.
Two lovely young women in each other's arms, weeping like rain on pear blossoms, and easy on the eyes all the same.
Quite a few gazes drifted their way.
Among them, one young man's.
He watched the two girls, full of envy, a sour ache spreading through him.
There had been three people at that table back then, and he had been the one who wanted to strike up a conversation first...
It was only later, after he read Fang Qiu's The Legend of Sword and Fairy 2, that he understood why the surnames Han and Yun were such a coincidence. In The Legend of Sword and Fairy 4, the male lead was named Yun Tianhe and the female lead Han Lingsha.
And they were husband and wife...
He let out a long sigh and looked up at the night sky.
Above Liyue Harbor the thin mist spread wide, and another gust of wind blew through.
The wind gathered up the mist and drifted onward, past the bustling Feiyun Slope, carrying with it the clamor of the slope and the endless voice of the Storyteller on the upper floor of the Heyu Tea House, sweeping off into the distance.
At that same hour, inside a room in the Heyu Tea House.
Outside the window, the breeze brushed past. The candle flame in the room swayed with it, and the pages of the book lying open on the desk stirred and turned forward a few leaves.
Yun Jin sat at the desk by the window, looking down at anohana: The Flower We Saw That Day, its pages nudged forward by the wind. Tears spilled from her eyes, ran down her fair, clean cheeks, and fell onto the paper.
On the page.
Pressed by everyone around him, Jinta "Jintan" Yadomi had confessed to Hayama Meiko with tears pouring down his face, completing his own redemption.
Under the night sky, the two of them walked slowly across the bridge.
"Was what you said just now true?"
"It... it's true."
"Menma likes Jintan too."
"When I say like... I don't just mean the way friends like each other."
"I know. You mean the kind where you want to marry me, right? If Menma had grown up all ordinary like everyone else, could she have become Jintan's bride?"
Jinta "Jintan" Yadomi wanted Hayama Meiko to stay.
But Hayama Meiko still wanted to play with the rest of her friends, and so she refused to stay behind for him.
Reading the exquisitely delicate strokes of Fang Qiu's writing, Yun Jin cried until she could not make a sound.
Her tears fell on the paper and bloomed into wet stains.
Yes.
Menma had loved Jintan so much.
If Menma had been able to grow up ordinary like everyone else, surely she would have ended up with Jintan.
"And then she would have been so happy..."
Yun Jin murmured, turning her eyes to the window.
Beyond it, the thin mist rode the wind into the distance, drifting toward the Wangsheng Funeral Parlor.
The osmanthus tree in front of the Wangsheng Funeral Parlor rustled in the wind. A withered yellow leaf spun once through the air and settled on the ground.
The main hall on the first floor.
Hu Tao sat in a sandalwood chair in the hall, having just finished the final chapter.
A flicker of sorrow crossed her face and vanished, as though it had never been there at all.
She closed the copy of anohana: The Flower We Saw That Day in her hands, nodded with satisfaction, and said, "Not bad, not bad. I'm quite happy with that ending. Hayama Meiko dying in an accident is a pity, of course, but she fulfilled her wish after death. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Birth, aging, sickness, death, all the myriad workings of heaven and earth. The departed have departed, the living go on. What Fang Qiu wrote in that book is exactly the philosophy of my Wangsheng Funeral Parlor. She's a worthy prospective member."
"That's true. The ending is terribly sad, but Hayama Meiko's appearance let Jintan and the others let go of the past and complete their own redemption," the undertaker girl said with a nod.
Her eyes were red, though, brimming with tears, and faint tracks still marked her cheeks.
Her handkerchief was soaked through.
Clearly she had cried more than once while reading.
Pleased by her words, Hu Tao nodded, then turned to look at Old Meng, only to find him staring blankly into space, his face clouded over. "Old Meng, what are you spacing out about?"
"Ah."
Old Meng came back to himself and wiped the corner of his eye. "I just thought of Boss Wolf."
"Boss Wolf?"
Hu Tao raised an eyebrow.
"That's right. Back then Boss Wolf was worried about how Congzi and I were getting along, and that's why she came all the way from Wuwang Hill to Liyue Harbor. It's much the same as this Hayama Meiko of Fang Qiu's, isn't it? She appeared because she was worried about her friends and the person she loved," Old Meng said with a long breath and a sigh.
Hearing that name, Hu Tao narrowed her eyes slightly and said thoughtfully, "Now that you mention it, they really are alike. I told Fang Qiu your story a while back. I never expected her to take it and write a whole novel out of it."
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