# Chapter 1286: The Truth of the Wedding
"My father brought my mother back to Liu Yun City and married her two years later. Although my father never knew my mother's true origins, his feelings for her never had even a trace of impurity or reservation."
"In the third year of their marriage, they had me. In the fourth year, they had Yuanba. In the seventh year... my mother's profound force and memories suddenly recovered overnight."
"Then she left. She abandoned my father, abandoned me and Yuanba. She left very resolutely, completely severing her marital ties with my father, and didn't take a single thing. She told my father, told us, to forget her forever, and never to go looking for her..."
Even as he spoke, Yun Che could still feel Xia Qingyue's sorrow. He sighed softly and said, "Qingyue, she wasn't being heartless or cruel. She had no choice but to leave. Otherwise, once her aura was detected, it would bring immense disaster upon all of you."
The woman he loved with all his heart, the one he had announced to the world would soon be his Divine Empress, had lost her memory and become another man's wife, bearing him two children... No man could face such an outcome calmly. The more he loved Yue Wugou, the more he would go mad. And he was Yue Shen Di.
The consequence of him finding out would almost certainly be the death of Xia Hongyi, Xia Qingyue, and Xia Yuanba.
So she had to leave, and she could never return.
"I know." Xia Qingyue said softly. "Beyond that, there was also the love... and guilt she felt for my father."
Yun Che: "..."
"My mother said that the seven years she spent with my father were the most at ease and happiest years of her life. My father loved her, and she truly loved my father as well. During those years, she never once wanted to recover her lost memories. In fact, she even feared it... afraid that the awakened memories would shatter her happiness and peace. But... when all her memories returned in an instant, everything was turned upside down."
"..." Just listening, Yun Che felt a suffocating weight pressing down on him.
Yue Shen Di loved Yue Wugou. He took no more concubines for her sake. He built the Divine Empress Hall for her. He named her "Yue Wugou." He was going to make her the Divine Empress of the Moon God. He announced it to the world. He severed all ties with the Star God Realm for her...
Xia Hongyi also deeply loved Yue Wugou. During those seven years when she had lost her power and memories—the weakest and most helpless period of her life—Xia Hongyi was the one who accompanied her through it. She married him as his wife and bore him two children...
Yue Wugou was undoubtedly fortunate to have two men who loved her dearly. But when the memories were unveiled, that fortune turned into a heart-devouring cruelty.
She had to make a choice.
Choosing Xia Hongyi would mean betraying Yue Wuyai for eternity and bring immense disaster to Xia Hongyi and her two children.
Leaving Xia Hongyi meant she would never again see her husband and children...
It was indeed a choice of ultimate cruelty.
And toward Yue Wuyai, she felt she had no right to choose again. Only guilt and sin remained.
"After she left us back then, my mother actually didn't return to the divine realm right away. Instead... she found a quiet place and tried to end her own life. Because she felt her existence would only bring disaster to our family, and as for my adoptive father... she no longer had the face to see him."
Yun Che: "..."
She had done nothing wrong, yet she had become the greatest sinner... Yun Che sighed deeply in his heart.
"But in the end, she gave up on ending her own life and returned to the Yue Shen Realm. Because she wanted to see my adoptive father one last time... or perhaps she wanted to die by his hands."
"And even if she hadn't tried to end her own life, even if my adoptive father didn't kill her, she didn't have much time left."
Yun Che was startled: "You mean, your mother..."
Xia Qingyue closed her eyes slightly, not letting Yun Che see the pain in her gaze: "When she was severely injured back then and lost all her profound force, her life force withered a little more every year. During those seven years, she gave birth to me and Yuanba, and in doing so, she also took away almost all of the Stainless Divine Qi within her. Her sudden recovery of profound force and memory was actually a kind of... final radiance before death."
"..." Yun Che stared blankly, unable to speak.
Everyone in Liu Yun City knew that Xia Qingyue's mother had always been frail. When Xia Hongyi mentioned her back then, he had said she was very weak, to the point where even walking was difficult in severe cases. She had a difficult labor when giving birth to Xia Qingyue, and even Xia Qingyue herself was born ice-cold and barely breathing. Had Xiao Ying not done everything he could to save her, she might have died the moment she was born.
And that was exactly why Xia Qingyue had been betrothed to Xiao Che since birth.
Including the end—when Yue Wugou left, the reason Xia Hongyi gave to the outside world was that she had died of a severe illness... No one had ever doubted it.
"My mother originally returned to the Yue Shen Realm in secret, but for some reason, she was discovered by others, and they fanned the flames, causing great damage to my adoptive father's reputation. My mother thought my adoptive father would resent her even more, maybe even kill her with his own hands, but..."
She took a light breath and said: "He told my mother, 'Wugou Wuyai'—"Stainless and Boundless"—was the vow of his lifetime. It wasn't because she had a Stainless Divine Body, nor because she was no longer 'pure.' The fact that she could return at all was already a tremendous blessing from the heavens."
Yun Che: "..."
"That wasn't just some hypocritical empty words." Xia Qingyue spoke softly: "After my mother returned to the Yue Shen Realm, everyone, including those within the Yue Shen Realm itself, thought she had been imprisoned by my adoptive father, living in darkness under his wrath every day, perhaps even tortured to death. But the truth is that all these years, she had her own little world. There were many maids who specifically accompanied and cared for her. My adoptive father visited her almost every day. Every so often, he would use his own power to extend her life. Even the most top-grade pills of the Yue Shen Realm were used on my mother without any hesitation."
"Without this, my mother would have long since passed from this world, and I would never have had the chance to see her again."
Yun Che was deeply shocked.
His impression of Yue Shen Di was completely transformed in that moment.
Everyone, even Yun Che who had only arrived in Eastern Divine Region not long ago, knew about the "Yue Wugou" incident back then and the tremendous humiliation it brought upon Yue Shen Di. It was even called the greatest scandal in the history of the Yue Shen Realm.
No matter how strong a man's tolerance was, it would be absolutely difficult to endure such humiliation, let alone the emperor of a king realm. The fact that he would unleash all his fury and resentment upon Yue Wugou seemed entirely reasonable to everyone... even though they knew it wasn't Yue Wugou's fault.
But Yue Shen Di... treated Yue Wugou exactly the same as before when she returned.
Yun Che asked himself: if it were him, could he do the same?
"After my mother left, my father fell ill several times a year. He would secretly shed tears and sit facing my mother's portrait for an entire day at a time. So I swore from a young age that one day, I would find my mother, so that my father would no longer have to cry, and our family could be reunited... I devoted myself to the profound way with this goal in mind."
"Finally, in the Yue Shen Realm, I found my mother, but I also had to face my adoptive father. I once scolded him, loathed him, resented him, even hated him. All because of him, my father and mother had to be separated, and our family could never reunite. But later, I slowly learned everything from my mother's words. I saw with my own eyes how meticulously he cared for my mother, and I could no longer bring myself to hate him."
"Even calling him 'adoptive father'... I do so willingly."
Yue Shen Di had saved her life, saved Yue Wugou's life, and used his own dignity to let Yue Wugou spend the rest of her days truly in "stainless purity." How could she hate him? How could she possibly hate him?
"Yue Shen Di... I mean, your adoptive father... does he know about Tian Xuan Continent and Uncle Xia?" Yun Che probed.
"No." Xia Qingyue said: "My mother refuses to mention it. My adoptive father only asked once and never asked again."
They would never allow Yue Shen Di to know about Xia Hongyi. And when she returned to Tian Xuan Continent in the future, she would also never mention Yue Shen Di to her father... Perhaps letting Xia Hongyi live forever in his longing for Yue Wugou was the least cruel outcome.
"Then your mother... is she well now?" Yun Che asked again.
"..." Xia Qingyue shook her head slightly and said nothing.
Yun Che felt a sharp pain in his heart. The sudden recovery of profound force and memory back then had already been a radiance before death. Yet now, she had held on for over twenty more years. If it weren't for the boundless resources of the Yue Shen Realm and Yue Shen Di's unreserved generosity, in any other place, Yue Wugou might not have been able to survive until now.
But it seemed Yue Wugou had truly reached the end of her strength. Even Yue Shen Di could no longer turn the tide.
Yue Wuyai—the realm king of the Yue Shen Realm, one of the Four God Emperors of the Eastern Domain, a man standing at the very peak of the Chaos—was so infatuated, so tragic... even humble in his love for a woman.
In the end, a God Emperor was also a man of flesh and blood, with a heart.
"Then... this wedding ceremony... is it to fulfill your mother's final wish?"
"...In the end, it wasn't me who completed the wedding ritual with my adoptive father, but my mother..." Yun Che was finally beginning to understand what Xia Qingyue had meant by that.
She had given Xia Hongyi seven years. She had given him a son and a daughter. At the end of her life, she wanted to give herself to Yue Wuyai...
Unexpectedly, Xia Qingyue shook her head.
"Do you know why my adoptive father specifically had me show my face before the wedding ceremony?" Xia Qingyue asked.
Yun Che was slightly stunned.
Whether in the divine realm or the lower realms, no matter the level of the wedding ceremony, the bride would always have her face covered the entire time—either with a large red veil or with curtains of jade beads—and it would only be removed by the groom after entering the bridal chamber.
At the very least, of his three formal weddings, except for the one with Xiao Yaohou where he was the "groom entering the bride's family," the other two had been exactly like that.
(Cai Zhi: ???)
But Xia Qingyue appeared in public before the wedding ceremony even began.
At the time, Yue Shen Di had been provoked by Xing Shen Di's words and had Xia Qingyue come out to meet everyone... Thinking back on it now, it seemed to be a deliberate move taken in stride.
"It was intentional?" Yun Che asked.
"Yes. It was to make everyone remember my aura, especially my Glazed Qi. And that was supposed to be my only appearance. After the wedding ceremony began, I would use the 'Star-Shift Moon-Change' technique to temporarily shift my aura onto my mother, and then my mother and my adoptive father would complete the wedding ritual."
Yue Shen Di had personally gone to Dun Yue Immortal Palace to remind Xia Qingyue to "prepare," which meant he wanted her to be ready for the "Star-Shift Moon-Change."
Yun Che was filled with a myriad of emotions. No matter how much Yue Shen Di himself wished for it, he couldn't publicly remarry Yue Wugou... because he was still the realm king of the Yue Shen Realm.
He could only helplessly resort to this deceptive method to fulfill Yue Wugou's final wish... and perhaps his own greatest wish as well.
At the same time, because Xia Qingyue possessed the "Glazed Heart," it could also wash away the humiliation Yue Shen Di had suffered, and simultaneously announce to the world that the Yue Shen Realm would henceforth be blessed by the Heavenly Dao.
The humiliation Yue Shen Di suffered was because of Yue Wugou. As Yue Wugou's daughter, Xia Qingyue must have been more than willing.
But then why had she shaken her head earlier? And why had she said before that this wedding ceremony was not only for the world to see, but even more so for the Yue Shen Realm to see?
"At the same time, because of my 'Glazed Heart,' it can wash away the humiliation my adoptive father suffered, and also allow my mother to release her greatest burden." Xia Qingyue softly spoke what Yun Che was thinking, but then she said something that astonished him: "But these are not the full extent of this wedding ceremony."
"The other important purpose is to allow me... to legitimately... succeed to the throne of Yue Shen Di."
Yes, the tangled story of Yue Wugou and this tangled wedding ceremony of the Yue Shen Realm—all of it, ultimately, was for this (￣￣)~* The strongest thigh for the pretty boy Yun Che is about to appear...
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