Rebirth in the Apocalypse: Third Time's a Charm

Chapter 474 No Longer Hoping

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Apparently, I had slept so soundly that I missed the guys coming to bed and most of them leaving it the next morning. I opened my eyes slowly as the bright sun shone through the white curtains of my room. I could feel the soft breeze gently tease my hair, the perfect temperature of not too hot and not too cold.

"Good morning, Princess," rasped Chen Zi Han from under me. "Did you have a good sleep?"

"Yeah," I moaned as I closed my eyes and snuggled back down onto him. "But that doesn't mean that I want to leave the bed right now."

"No one is making you," he assured me as he gently brushed his fingers through my unbound hair. "That is one of the benefits of this space; everything outside freezes. You can do everything on your own time."

I hummed, practically purring as he continued to play with my hair. "There are some days I wish I could just live here for the rest of my life."

"Then why don't you?" he asked, cocking his head to the side and looking at me.

"Because it feels like the easy way out," I admitted. I loved my space, but I never wanted to become dependent on it. It needed to stay my short-term sanctuary, not my long-term escape.

"What do you mean?" asked Liu Yu Zeng, walking into the room, a tray of food in his hands. I rolled over and sat up as Chen Zi Han propped up the pillows behind me. Placing the tray down in my lap, Liu Yu Zeng went to sit down at the bottom of the bed. 

I looked over the pancakes with maple syrup, crispy bacon, and a glass of orange juice in suspicion. "Where's my coffee?" I asked, glaring at the man. 

"You can have it as soon as you have eaten something," he assured me. "I just think that coffee on an empty stomach isn't good for you."

"Is that what you were talking about last night?" I asked, confused. I had never gotten sick drinking coffee on an empty stomach. Sometimes, it would even replace the need to eat.

"Yup," said Chen Zi Han. "We have all agreed that we haven't been taking as good of care of you as we should be. That changes now."

"I don't understand?" I said around a big bite of pancakes. They definitely weren't as sweet as I would have made them, but they were still tasty.

"And I don't understand why you don't want to rely on your space," shot back Liu Yu Zeng with a smile. "So, an answer for an answer. You go first."

"I think that any life worth living needs to be lived," I said, dipping my bacon into my maple syrup. "If I start to rely on my space because everything in it is easy, am I really living? Or am I just repeating the same day over and over again until I go crazy?"

"You want conflict?" asked Wang Chao, and he and Liu Wei walked in with coffees for everyone, including myself. 

"I want conflict," I agreed with a nod. "I am not saying that I want my life to be in danger every day like it was in my last life, but I want to know that I can face obstacles and overcome them."

I shoved the bacon into my mouth as Liu Wei handed me my cup of coffee. I turned it around and chuckled at the mug he chose. On it was a red jar, and in the jar, it said, "Canning is my Jam". Well, he wasn't wrong. I do love canning. I just really miss my mason jars…

I took a sip and thought about what I wanted to say. "I want to be able to look back on my deathbed and smile at the memories I made and the things that I accomplished. I don't want to look back and realize that there was nothing really to remember. Does that make sense?"

"It does," said Wang Chao reassuringly. "And it is a smart way of thinking. Most wouldn't want conflict in their life. They would choose to just live forever in their space, never leaving."

I smiled and took another sip of coffee. As I brought down my mug, Chen Zi Han cleared his throat. Turning to look at him, I saw that he had a forkful of pancakes ready to feed me. "Not just coffee anymore, remember?"

"Okay," I nodded my head and took the offering of food. "But I gave you my answer; now, you give me yours."

"We are worried," said Liu Wei as he adjusted his glasses. "The assassin would have been beneficial to keep around just as a live-in doctor, but without him, we don't know how you are doing, health-wise."

"If he was still around, I would have already been dead from a mushroom allergy," I retorted with a roll of my eyes. I wasn't missing him at all, but I would admit that he had his uses. 

"And we are worried now because you are going into a Reaver encampment where you will be pushed mentally and physically. We don't want something to happen to you," added Wang Chao, looking at me seriously.

I wasn't so dumb as to not realize that they were concerned that I was pregnant; it had been a few months since my last period. But I was also realistic to know that in the last few months, I have been training harder, losing a lot of weight, and stressed beyond all belief. 

I closed my eyes and took another sip of coffee, reminding myself that no matter how much I might wish otherwise, it was always best to be realistic instead of getting your hopes up only to have them dashed a few weeks later. 

That had happened to me a lot in the first year of the cabin. Every month, I would wait and pray, only to have my hopes dashed. I figured that it was because I was sleeping with the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse that I couldn't get pregnant.

After twelve months of high hopes and crashes, I was no longer going to hope for anything. 

I would save the healer and then go back to my cabin. When I wanted adventure, I could always walk down the hill and kill a few humans. 

But otherwise… I would stop hoping.

I knew that Wang Chao could hear my thoughts, but the smart man that he was, didn't comment.

"Now that both of our questions have been answered, onto the latest issue. Who the Hell is Gong Hao Zhi's wife, and why is she looking for me?"

-----

We popped back into the fight club without anyone being any the wiser about our disappearing act. If I had been a bit more of an extrovert, I might have lost my mind. But the idea that I could go days away from everyone only to come back to no one even noticing I was gone was the best feeling ever.

"We should be ready to open on time in 30 minutes," said Mao Jing, turning around from the bar and looking at us. Liu Yu Zeng waved his hand in acknowledgment but otherwise said nothing. 

"Is it bad that I have no idea what is going on?" I asked, looking around the place. I mean, I didn't know if there were any fights lined up or if we should be expecting a full crowd or be mostly empty. I didn't even know how to run a place like this.

Good thing I didn't have to. The success or failure of this club was firmly on Mao Jing's shoulders. All I would do was make sure that there was enough food to keep everyone going long after I left.

There was a commotion at the door, and I could hear men yelling. I narrowed my eyes and looked at Liu Yu Zeng and Chen Zi Han. They nodded their heads and stood up, walking around the booth and to the front door where the noise was coming from. 

The noise died down as soon as my two men approached the group of men trying to force their way into the club. Raising an eyebrow, I looked at Wang Chao. Was this the wife? 

He nodded his head and rolled his eyes. "Sorry about that. I thought she would have been smarter."

"She has her eyes on Reaper, Ares, and Murder. How smart could she really be?" scoffed Liu Wei. Lifting up his hand, a waiter scurried over to him. Whispering into the other man's ear, Liu Wei jerked his head to the side, and once again, the waiter rushed away.

"She wants the bikes?" I asked, my head cocked to the side. "Why not just give them to her?"

"An excellent question," smiled an innocent woman as she walked toward me. She was wearing a light blue A-line dress that would not have looked out of place in the 1950s. I would have wondered what she could have been doing in a place like this if it weren't for the 15 men following behind her.