: Separated by Life and Death

Perhaps because they were premature, both of them looked so small, as if they might stop breathing at any moment.

No matter how much my heart ached, there was nothing I could do.

I flew to Zane Vance's side. He and Celia Blanc were sitting on a bench by the sea, a picture so beautiful it was unreal.

"Zane, let's go collect seashells, okay?"

The girl blinked her starry eyes, asking him with childlike innocence.

He ruffled her hair and gently said yes.

It was impossible to imagine that just a moment ago, he had hung up on me with such a cold and decisive tone.

"AH!"

The girl's shriek shattered the harmony of the scene.

"What's wrong?"

He anxiously took her hand, turning it over and over, inspecting it closely, only to find a cut that was almost healed.

"How could you be so careless?"

Though they were words of blame, they were filled with doting affection.

He used to use that tone with me, too, but never again after we got married.

After carefully disinfecting it with iodine, he took out a bandage and meticulously wrapped it for her.

That cut was so small it would have healed on its own if left unbandaged.

The girl looked at him, happy and content, like a scene from a teen drama.

Watching this scene, tears scrambled to escape my eyes, and pain spread from my heart throughout my entire body.

'So a soul can cry, and feel pain, too.'

Mother Vance, having received the hospital's call for family, arrived fashionably late.

"The patient suffered a massive hemorrhage. Resuscitation was unsuccessful. I'm sorry for your loss."

The doctor shook his head and sighed, but Mother Vance looked thrilled.

"Good, she's dead. Finally dead, the unlucky thing."

My Best Friend couldn't take it anymore and slapped Mother Vance hard across the face.

"Nina marrying into a family like yours was a dozen lifetimes of bad luck."

"You dare hit me?"

Mother Vance clutched her cheek, her face a mask of disbelief, before grabbing a handful of my Best Friend's hair.

"You damn girl, you're just as shameless as that little wench! I'll teach you to hit me! I'll teach you!"

The scene descended into chaos. The doctor finally managed to pull the two of them apart.

Knowing what kind of person Mother Vance was, my Best Friend was naturally unwilling to hand the babies over to her.

"Doctor, I'm the family. These are my son's children. Who else would you give them to but me?"

'I thought that no matter what, they were her grandchildren. That even if she despised me, she wouldn't go so far as to mistreat the babies.'

'But I had still underestimated her.'

"Doctor, what about the babies' umbilical cord blood? That stuff is valuable, you know? It can sell for a lot of money."

I furiously tried to block her, standing in front of the babies, but I could only watch as her hand passed right through my body.

It turned out that before I had even given birth, Mother Vance had already told the doctor to save the umbilical cord blood.

After getting the "precious" umbilical cord blood, she happily abandoned the babies and disappeared, who knows where.

My Best Friend sat by my bedside, crying as she called Zane Vance again and again, but the call never went through.

'How could the call possibly go through? He's with Celia Blanc, happily collecting seashells right now.'

I followed Mother Vance, wanting to make her go back to the hospital to see the babies.

But no matter how hoarsely I screamed, she couldn't hear a thing.

She sold the babies' umbilical cord blood for a full $15,000. The moment she got the money, she found the nearest mahjong parlor and started playing.

An immense feeling of powerlessness washed over me.

Zane Vance finally remembered me and gave Mother Vance a call.

"Where is Nina Sterling? She's not picking up her phone or answering her texts."

"Oh, her? She just gave birth, so she's in a foul mood. She's mad you didn't come back to be with her for the delivery, so she's intentionally ignoring you. Son, you can't fall for this woman's tricks."

There was a clear note of anger in Zane Vance's voice.

: Wicked Mother Vance

"Mom, you need to set her straight at home. She's gotten more and more demanding since she got pregnant."

That got Mother Vance all fired up.

"You have no idea. After giving birth, she thinks she's hot stuff, ordering me around to do this and that. One minute it's laundry, the next it's fetching her tea and water. Your own mother… I've become her personal maid."

Getting swept up in her own performance, she even managed to squeeze out a few tears, her voice thick with a sob.

"She smashed every pot and pan in the house, and that's not even the worst of it! She's forcing me to make clothes for the baby. At my age, how can my old eyes even see well enough for that? Waaah…"

Zane Vance's anger completely flared up.

"Mom, you've suffered. Don't enable her. I'll give her a piece of my mind when I get back."

This Zane Vance was a world apart from the brilliant, noble-hearted young man I remembered.

Before, he could never bear to say a single harsh word to me.

When he took me home to meet his parents, his mother threw a fit the moment she found out I was an orphan, absolutely refusing to approve of our relationship.

He pulled me into his arms, his voice resolute.

"She's marrying me, not you. I'm going to marry her no matter how much you disapprove."

After a huge fight with his mother, he turned right around and came to comfort me.

"Nina, my mom is just… unrefined. She's used to being unreasonable. I will marry you, I promise. Don't pay her any mind."

'Now, it seems he's long forgotten all that. In his heart, I'm the unreasonable one.'

Our past vows, eternal as the mountains and seas, now seemed like a colossal joke.

'Zane Vance, my only wish is that we never meet again in the next life.'

Because they were premature, my babies were supposed to be in incubators. But the cost was too high, and Mother Vance would never dream of paying for their hospital stay.

She raised a stink and forced the doctors to discharge them, signing the papers against medical advice.

She brought the babies home.

But she didn't care for the babies at all. All she cared about was mahjong.

The tiny babies, though not yet fully developed, could still feel discomfort, and so they cried.

The babies wailed and wailed, and when their cries annoyed her, she just shut them in the farthest room and went back to organizing her mahjong game.

Even the other players couldn't stand it.

"The babies are crying so hard. Aren't you going to do anything?"

"Do what? I didn't give birth to them. Whoever did is responsible. If you want to blame someone, blame them for having such a heartless mother."

I had no idea when she had last fed them. The two babies, exhausted from crying, even started gnawing on their own hands.

Their diapers hadn't been changed in a long time and were overflowing with filth.

Their cheeks grew flushed, showing the faint signs of a fever.

My heart ached beyond measure.

These were the babies I had carried for eight months, the babies I had risked my life to birth. They were my treasures, so precious I was afraid they'd shatter if I held them too tightly or melt if I kept them too close.

And now Mother Vance was treating them like a burden, tormenting them like this!

Watching their faces grow redder and their breathing weaker, I was frantic, about to break down completely!

'My babies, don't sleep! Look at Mama!' I desperately reached out to hold them, but my transparent hand passed right through their bodies.

A wave of helplessness washed over me, like a great mountain pressing down, crushing the air from my lungs.

'Save my children! Won't someone please save my children!'

I was frantic. A soul cannot cry, but at that moment, I felt as if I had cried myself dry.

I fell to my knees, clasping my hands together. I kowtowed to the heavens, one bow after another, piously begging the gods to perform a miracle and save my children.

But no one heard my prayers. The babies' cries grew louder and louder, a sharp sword piercing my heart and leaving it in tatters.

Finally! The babies' desperate, life-or-death wails finally alerted a neighbor.