Clumsy Beast, Keep Your Paws Off Chapter 814: A Mother’s Greatest Fear

"Your eldest daughter," he continued relentlessly, "will disappear into the stream of fate. You will tear apart the heavens looking for her, but you will never find her."

"...And your other daughter will be tormented by the love of her life...chasing it, reaching for it, but never truly obtaining it."

"Stop talking nonsense!" Su Qinglan’s eyes turned blood-red with fury. She took a fierce step forward, her aura violently erupting into the air.

The surrounding ground cracked, and the wind whipped wildly through the trees. "I will be here! I will protect them! No one plays with the lives of my daughters!"

In an instant, Su Qinglan closed the distance and clamped her hand tightly around the old man’s thin, fragile neck!

"Tell me what happens to them!" her voice shook with raw anger and desperation. "Tell me! What happens to Yueyue?! What happens to my daughters?!"

The old man didn’t struggle. He didn’t raise his hands to push her away. Instead, his dark, cloudy pupils suddenly rolled backwards, turning entirely, milky white!

Su Qinglan’s heart trembled violently. That gaze! It was the mark of absolute future-sight!

"I have seen..." the old man rasped, his voice echoing with a strange, reverberating double tone that sounded like it came from another realm entirely.

"...countless roads. Countless endings. Countless graves. And yours... is not the most tragic. But it is approaching."

Then, just as abruptly as it had happened, his eyes snapped back to normal. The old man blinked innocently, looking down at her hand clamped around his throat.

"Why are you holding my neck?" he asked, tilting his head.

Su Qinglan’s expression cracked in utter disbelief. "You..."

The old man calmly adjusted his dusty collar. "Did I say something strange?"

Su Qinglan stared at him, her blood running cold. He was acting! He clearly knew exactly what he had just revealed, yet he was playing completely dumb!

Slowly, she released his neck, her gaze turning lethal. "Old man... it seems you are quite eager to die."

The old man looked at her for a few silent seconds before letting out a soft, peaceful laugh.

"Yes. I have always been eager to die. But death... is a coward."

He turned his face towards the distant horizon.

"Every time I invite it, it turns its face away. So I have lived. Year after year. Century after century. Waiting for the one thing even the heavens refuse to give me."

He looked back at Su Qinglan, his eyes seeming bottomless.

"Perhaps that is why I recognise wandering souls when I see them. You and I... we are not so different. Except you still have something to lose."

He slowly turned away, taking a step down the dirt path.

Tap.

Tap.

"Protect them while you still can," his raspy voice floated back on the wind.

"Because fate... does not knock twice."

Tap. Tap. Tap.

His frail figure slowly faded into the dense trees. Su Qinglan remained standing alone in the quiet grove, her hands ice-cold and her mind in complete, terrifying chaos.

When Su Qinglan finally returned to the house, everyone immediately noticed that something was terribly wrong.

She walked back slowly. Her steps were steady, but her face was completely pale.

The lively woman who had left only a short while ago seemed to have turned into a frost-bitten plant. Her shoulders were slightly lowered, her eyes had lost their usual vibrant brightness, and even the faint, warm smile that usually rested on her lips was gone.

The moment she stepped into the courtyard, all of her beast husbands looked toward her.

Hu Yan was the first to react. He immediately stood up from the wooden bench, his ears twitching in alarm. "What happened?"

Rong Ye’s brows furrowed deeply, his violet eyes darkening, while An Mo’s gaze became razor-sharp.

Even the eight cubs, who had been loudly playing and wrestling nearby, instantly fell quiet when they saw their mother’s hollow expression.

Su Qinglan stopped in the center of the courtyard. She looked at all of them.

For a brief moment, she desperately wanted to tell them everything. She wanted to tell them about the old man, about the chilling words he had spoken, about her past life, about her daughters, and about the terrible, dark futures he had predicted for them.

But the words stuck in her throat like sharp glass. She couldn’t say them. She couldn’t bear to ruin their peace.

She simply forced a faint smile. "I’m fine."

Rong Ye immediately knew she was lying. He took a step forward, his voice tense. "You don’t look fine at all, Lanlan."

Su Qinglan avoided his piercing eyes, looking down at the dirt. "I’m just tired."

Hu Yan walked closer, his tall frame looming protectively. "Did that old man do something to you?"

Her heart trembled violently inside her chest, but she shook her head. "No."

"Then what happened?"

"Nothing." She forced another smile, but that smile was so weak and fragile that it hurt to look at. "I’m just going to sleep for a bit."

Before anyone could stop her, Su Qinglan turned around and hurried into the main house, heading straight for her bedroom.

"Qinglan!" An Mo called out.

She didn’t stop.

"Lanlan, wait!" Rong Ye tried again.

She kept walking, her head lowered.

"Female..." Shi Feng’s voice echoed behind her.

Still, she gave no response. She stepped into the room, grabbed the heavy wooden door, and pulled it shut.

Bang.

A second later, they heard the distinct click of the internal lock turning.

Everyone froze in the courtyard. The entire house became dead silent.

Hu Yan stared at the closed door in utter disbelief before turning his panicked gaze toward the others. "What happened to her?"

No one answered, because none of them knew.

They had seen Su Qinglan furious. They had seen her frightened. They had seen her exhausted after a long journey or a heavy battle. But they had never seen her like this. She looked as though someone had stripped away the light inside her soul.