Eleven raised her eyebrows as she instantly had a cold look on her face.
“Why the question?” Su Man callously asked.
Eleven remained silent as she did not know whether to tell Su Man the truth. Whilst she remained guarded against Su Ruhua, she understood Su Man’s character and knew there would not be any problems.
It was just…
“Are they twins?” Eleven asked. While the answer had already leapt out, she was still clinging onto the very slim chance they happened to be identical.
How could she accept such a relationship – where her master was related to Mo Ye by blood? Who would she direct her hatred at?
“Yes,” Su Man’s gaze turned dark as he plainly replied. “Her other sister is called Su Ruyu.”
Ruyu…
Eleven smiled bitterly as the answer seemed largely set. While she did not know The Old Witch’s actual name, she heard The Blue Wolf call her name, Xiaoyu, before. Her head was starting to ache.
How could it be?
Ye Wei and Eleven only saw The Old Witch’s actual face once or twice, but those few times had left an extremely deep impression on them as she had an extremely eminent look that stole thunder. The Old Witch would typically wear an ugly mask that seemed to resemble a half-burnt face. When the children first reached the island, they would find her extremely terrifying and have nightmares of her in the middle of the night.
When Ye Wei and Eleven first began, they were no exception and felt that she was utterly ugly. The children did not know what name to call her by, and they would occasionally hear The Blue Wolf call her Xiaoyu. Young Ye Wei was extremely rebellious, and she often provoked The Old Witch into anger. There was once they were spanked by The Old Witch for not meeting training targets when The Blue Wolf was calling her Xiaoyu, hence Ye Wei – with arms akimbo – shouted, ‘All that jade in her name doesn’t matter. She’s really that damn old witch.’
The nickname of “The Old Witch” hence spread like wildfire and the children equated her with an old witch.
She was a stern teacher, and Eleven – in her ten-over years on the island, never even saw The Old Witch coldly smile once. The Old Witch gave people the impression of her being an extremely cold and deathly person whose wrists were extremely strong. The training base, also known as “Devil’s Island”, was borne out of the impression she gave people.
Eleven and Ye Wei, since young, were often beaten by her irregardless of their condition and age. When they had to be spanked, she spared no expenses and did not preach untiring guidance, empathy or any other values. She punished them until they achieved their targets, and they felt that what they had been through in their younger days was nothing short of brutal.
A few later, the beatings reduced and they however became even more accustomed to it. Eleven and Ye Wei were actually the least beaten as The Old Witch extremely doted on them despite them going against The Old Witch and challenging her with disrespectful words. The Old Witch however favored Ye Wei the most.
Eleven had an immense respect for The Old Witch. The Old Witch and The Blue Wolf were responsible for nurturing countless talents who followed him or left. The talent The Blue Wolf nurtured were not as eminent as those nurtured by The Old Witch.
Ye Wei, Eleven, Chu Li, Bai Ye, Jason, Blackjack, Ross… were under The Old Witch’s wings from young, till their teenage years, until they went on missions and gathered experience to the point they could rise up to the challenge alone.
To Ye Wei and Eleven, while The Old Witch was an old witch in senses of the word, she was even more esteemed than their very parents.
This explained why The Old Witch had nary a reaction when The Blue Wolf betrayed the organization as though nothing was amiss. Her younglings were utterly indignant and swore to pursue him to the ends of the earth.
In their impression, they seemed to be a pair of eccentric lovers as The Blue Wolf seemed to always pursue her but she was indifferent. As The Blue Wolf was in his prime and in extremely good shape, he was virtually flawless. The Old Witch, on the other hand, was ugly, had a weird temper and vicious. There seemed to be a rotation of identities in this game of love as it ought to have been The Old Witch pursuing The Blue Wolf rather than otherwise.
Following The Blue Wolf’s betrayal, they all thought that The Blue Wolf despised her looks.
Eleven saw how she reacted like a woman in love when she stared at the ring on her necklace engrossingly after The Blue Wolf left. As they assumed that The Blue Wolf had given her the ring, they thought she was in love with The Blue Wolf and hence had an agonizing look on her face.
That was why Ye Wei and all hated The Blue Wolf even more and hunted him down.
The Old Witch knew what was going on but did not stop them as though she had nothing to do with it.
Eleven only saw how The Old Witch actually looked like after The Blue Wolf left. There was once Ye Wei and Eleven arranged to go to the hot spring behind the mountain, but ended up hearing agonizing groans there.
They saw an inexplicably beautiful woman clutching her head in pain murmuring softly under the moonlight. Ye Wei and Eleven could not clearly hear her murmurs but only saw what seemed to be her having an immense headache.
Ye Wei then raised the incident to Eleven and felt as though she saw a divine beauty incarnate. While Ye Wei was slightly exaggerating, that was the closest to their thoughts. Eleven was extremely shocked.
They did not know when there was such gorgeous beauty on the island.
Following the shock, Ye Wei and Eleven wanted to go into the water to help her, but she coldly ordered them to stop. Ye Wei and Eleven, especially Ye Wei, was shocked stiff by her order and almost fell headfirst into the hotspring.
“Old Witch? Are you possessed by some goddess?” Ye Wei shot off her mouth as Eleven grabbed her shoulder and hinted to her to stop joking.
The Old Witch, in her immense headache, sunk to the bottom of the spring and the surface of the water became calm.
Ye Wei and Eleven were discussing which side of her was true?
They typically saw a person in their forties to fifties, and what they saw – a woman who was in their twenties at most – left an indelible impression. Ye Wei and Eleven felt they were scammed as it seemed that somebody who was not too much older than them was their master for ten-over years.
It was hence little wonder that everybody’s faces changed as they changed, including The Blue Wolf’s. The Old Witch’s face remained the same throughout time.
When The Old Witch came up from underneath the water, she was calm and her beautiful face was made even more attractive by the hot spring. Her pink lips, dark grape-like eyes and delicate features made her attractive beyond measure.
She walked towards them and quietly wore her clothes. Ye Wei whistled naughtily as she praised her immaculate figure. She gave them a stern glance before Ye Wei kept quiet.
Once she was done wearing her clothes, Ye Wei then scooted over and ran her hands all over her face to figure out if that was her actual face. Ye Wei was the only person amongst them all who dared to run her hands all over her. Anybody else who tried to follow suit would have been knocked dead by her.
She finally confirmed that it was her bona fide face.
The Old Witch left them with a ‘shut up’ before disappearing. Eleven and Ye Wei were utterly lost for words that month.
The second time they saw her actual look was at the same hot spring a year later and under the same situation. She seemed to have some condition that gave her chronic headaches which flared up under a round moon. The image of her clutching her head in pain and roaring was extremely unbearable.
Eleven and Ye Wei did not ask, and she had no intention to reveal her actual look to people for her own reasons. They were also not silly enough to spread word about it, and Ye Wei and Eleven were hence the only ones who actually knew how gorgeous she looked.
Ye Wei was extremely curious and kept her questions to herself for a year. When they saw The Old Witch relapse the second time, it was so demonic to the point she seemed as though she was about to go bad. As the hot spring in a forbidden zone of the island, nobody else could access the place. Nobody hence knew that Ye Wei, Eleven and The Old Witch got into a fight with an expected outcome – The Old Witch sent the two beauties flying into the water. Eleven was however extremely satisfied with the outcome as she gradually calmed down.
“Old Witch, what exactly are you suffering from that you can’t treat yourself using your immense strength in medical skills and toxins?” Ye Wei curiously asked.
“I don’t know,” she clutched her head as she seemed utterly lost. She only knew that she was plagued with this headache for many years, but never why she had a headache. She also did not figure out why.
“Old Witch, why did you disguise yourself to be this ugly despite being this pretty?”
“Instinct.”
“… You are really weird,” Ye Wei was baffled as she touched her face curiously. “Was all time away from the sun the reason for your looks? You don’t look too much older than me. Just how old are you?”
“Forty.”
She seemed to want to talk to somebody this night, and she said much. She answered all that Ye Wei said.
At last, Ye Wei became bold and asked about The Blue Wolf. “Old Witch, we are going to find The Blue Wolf and kill him to vent your anger. How’s that?”
“Whatever!”
“… You’re not stopping us?” Ye Wei asked.
“Whatever!”
Ye Wei was speechless once again.
“Don’t you like him?”
The Old Witch fell silent and seemed somewhat lost and cold. Her non-reply, to Ye Wei and Eleven, seemed like a silent admission. Ye Wei was wise-cracking enough to ask about her when she was tired, but The Old Witch seemed to know better and remained mum.
Ye Wei and Eleven, in their doubts, thought that she did not want to say. But it seemed…
“Don’t you know where she is?” Su Man asked and gently interrupted Eleven’s memories. Eleven came out of her memories and looked at Su Man’s face. Ye Wei and her were blind enough to realize that Su Man and The Old Witch had some facial similarities, not to mention their tempers.
“Eleven, there are some things that happened in the Su family that I am not exactly certain about, but I am certain that my Second Sister is key to them. My Eldest Sister has searched for her for twenty years. If you know where she is, please tell me,” Su Man flatly replied.
Eleven pondered and eventually shook her head. “I know where she is, but I will not say a word.”
“Eldest sister said that she tried finding her for many years but to no avail. While she could be dead, eldest sister will be extremely elated to know that she’s still alive. Why didn’t you say anything earlier?”
“I’m sorry,” Eleven plainly replied. “She had warned us not to reveal any information about her.”
Su Man had a steely gaze that seemed displeased and somewhat frustrated. He eventually became calm. Since Su Ruhua had left, he would not be able to actively contact her unless she took the initiative to contact him.
He ought to let nature take its course.
Since she was alive, any ghosts of the past would eventually be dispelled.
“How is she related to you?”
“Please do not ask, and I will not say it either,” Eleven immediately interrupted Su Man’s words and got up to return to her cabin. Eleven, who had confirmed that The Old Witch and Su Ruhua were siblings, had extremely mixed feelings.
Wasn’t it the biggest of jokes that the Mo brothers were the nephews of The Old Witch? Why the f*** would The Top Terrorist Organization be duking it out with The Mafia then?
How should she vent all that hatred in her?
Four days later, Su Man’s ship returned to Riyadh. Once they were on shore, Cheng Anya saw Third Young Master Ye’s svelte figure standing there as he waited for her. As he had not seen her for a long time, his thoughts for her grew. Ye Chen, disregarding the people around him, hugged her and kissed her hard on her lips as he vented out his worry and thoughts about her through his kiss.
Cheng Anya then remembered that Su Man, Jason, Bai Ye and all were present and struggled to break free. Third Young Master Ye instead held her tightly in place and only let go of her after he had his fill from kissing her. Cheng Anya was blushing.
Jason, like a flame, appeared right before Eleven as he stared at her. “Eleven, who the f*** messed you up this badly? Who the f*** man? I’m gonna freaking murder him!” Jason suddenly flew into a rage.
As the firecracker lit up, he wanted to grab Eleven but was afraid of touching her lest he broke her up if he used too much force.
As Eleven saw familiar faces, she seemed distant and shook her head. “I’m fine.”
She sounded as cold as her previous self as an anger burnt between Jason’s eyes. Cheng Anya was afraid that he would make mincemeat of the people around him.
“Was it Mo Ye?”
“Jason, I’m a little tired,” Eleven said. Jason immediately led her to a luxurious camper van as Bai Ye solemnly opened the door for her. The entourage returned to Su Man’s residence in three vehicles.
As Third Young Master Ye was only fetching Cheng Anya, the young couple remained by the beach after everybody else had left. Third Young Master Ye gently touched her abdomen. “When we bade farewell before, we did not quite see anything. Seems like our little chap has grown quite a bit.”
Cheng Anya nodded. “Su Man said that it’s in the pink of health.”
“That’s great,” Third Young Master Ye simply wanted to hug Cheng Anya and not let go of her as he really missed her. Cheng Anya smiled and tapped his shoulders. “Good child, now you miss me eh?”
“What’s wrong with missing you? You should cry if I don’t want you anymore,” Third Young Master Ye said arrogantly. Cheng Anya wanted to clobber him with her fists.