Lena tried to fight the tears from streaming, her shoulders from trembling. It was futile. The emotions flowed nonstop for a few minutes until she fell asleep.

Unbeknownst to her, that would be the very last time that she would see her mother alive.

When Lena woke up again, it was from the sound of her growling stomach gnawing inside her. She opened her eyes and listened as the torrential sound of rain echoed inside the walls of the house. Walking out of her bed, Lena realized that the pain in ribs was now gone. Her body felt a little lighter, better.

Turning towards her right, Lena realized that the rain started leaking inside the walls. It was peeling away the brown wallpaper which was the only thing that gave this room any color— its dull and lonely color. A sigh escaped her lips as she walked towards the clothing cabinet next to the leaking walls. Moving it should prevent the water from soaking their clothes.

After a few tries, Lena finally moved the cabinet a few inches away from the walls. She stood straight, shaking her head at the mess in front of her. The fact that the body found this familiar disturbed her. How could Lena and her mother continue to live in this unsanitary place?

The thought of her mother made her frown. Hou Yingying said that she would prepare soup for dinner. Maybe she just didn't bother to wake her up when she saw that she was asleep? Walking out of her room, Lena instantly froze at the sight of Hou Yingying sprawled on the floor. A sad suspicion rose inside her when she spotted the same black blood pooling around her mother.

"Mother?" this time, the words came out unhindered. "Mother?" She nudged Hou Yingying's arms. Lena immediately used all the strength that she could muster to carry her mother towards the only bed in their room.

She tried to feel for Hou Yingying's pulse. There was none. Slowly, the sad suspicion turned into a reality. Lena fought the urge to bawl. Torrents of heavy emotions washed through her as she watched her pale mother lay on the bed, unmoving. Why was she even crying?

This was not her mother. She shouldn't feel anything at all.

She sobbed. Memories of Lena Hou and her mother having fun played in her mind like a broken record. The woman who lovingly raised her was now gone, together with the soul of the original Lena Hou.

'Isn't this a happy occasion?'

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She was finally together with her daughter, the daughter who died from protecting her not too long ago. However, this fact was not enough to stop the tears from spilling down her cheeks. The salty drops of liquid streamed down her face as her chin trembled.

She could feel a raw emotion inside her— its rawness reverberated inside Lena's soul, reminding her of her own pain in the past. Why couldn't she just stop crying?

Lena didn't know how long she had sat next to her mother. With the rain hammering their roof, Lena stared at her mother silently. Her tears had long stopped falling, but the wound inside her heart didn't stop bleeding. She blinked, her lashes heavy with tears.

Biting her lips, Lena decided to get a blanket to cover Hou Yingying's body. As heartbreaking as it may seem, she needed to find a way to bury her. Rummaging through Lena Hou's memories, she immediately discovered that burying someone required money, something that she and her mother didn't have.

After a few pauses, Lena decided to check the thing that they called a Citizen card. If her memory served her right, this was the only currency that was used in this time. No more copper, no more silver or gold, just a card made of a certain element that was able to prevent people from arranging the material inside it.

She turned towards the cabinet and started rummaging through their damp clothes.

'There it was,' another sigh escaped her lips. Sitting at the bottom of the cabinet was a small pouch made of cloth. Hou Yingying and Lena used this pouch to store their Citizen cards— something that they rarely used due to lack of funds.

The orange cards caught her attention. From Lena's memories, these should be the lowest type of cards that could store the least amount of credits. She eyed their digitally scanned images on the cards next to a certain code that should contain something that would identify them as the owner of these cards.

She held the cards closer to her body. The realization that Lena Hou did not really know much about anything in this world was just sad. Lena Hou grew up away from the city. In fact, she had never gone to the city her whole life. She stayed in this place working odd jobs for people who couldn't even read or write properly.

Lena Hou was lucky that her mother taught her these things when she was a child. Remembering the current language, Lena realized that this was not the same language that she spoke. Certain words were there, but someone who knew the language two thousand years ago would never be able to talk to someone from this era. However, because of the body's memories, she easily understood and was able to speak it.

Once again, sadness wrapped Lena's heart. The thought of her mother teaching her reading and writing despite living in these conditions sent something warm inside her. Her eyes lingered on Hou Yingying's body as she wondered if the woman had any regrets before she died. Did she regret not aborting Lena Hou? Did she regret this kind of life?

Frowning, Lena turned her attention towards the cards. Not many people in this place had access to these cards. In fact, they used barter as their main way to provide for themselves as they had no way to pay without the cards. Food was traded for services that involved cleaning and washing clothes, while clothes were sometimes bartered for animals caught by hunters.

Both of these things were experienced by the mother and daughter as they struggled to provide for each other.