Xiao Yu, after hearing his mother’s words, felt he had nowhere left to hide, sobbing miserably, "Mom, it’s not like I wanted to become like this..." He couldn't finish the sentence before dissolving into choked sobs.

His mother immediately pulled him into an embrace, and the two sat down right there on the threshing floor. Xiao Yu rested his head against her shoulder, and she gently stroked the back of his neck. "When you were little, you loved it when I touched you like this; whenever you were sick, you’d cling to me and wouldn't move half a step away."

"Mom, we won't be separated again, ever. I'll take you with me, we'll go back and find Sister, and we'll live together happily as a family," Xiao Yu choked out.

Seeing Xiao Yu tugging at her, urging them back to Xiangcheng, his mother said with tender affection, "My son, your mother has something for you." She unclasped a necklace from around her neck; dangling from it was a locket identical to the one Xiaohui had given him. As her mother was about to open the locket, Xiao Yu snatched it away, clutching it tight in his palm. "I know what’s inside. Sister gave me hers, but I lost it on the way here."

"Heh," his mother offered a faint smile. "You didn't lose it; you tossed it aside because you were heartbroken when you saw your own picture wasn't in it, right?"

Startled by his mother’s words, Xiao Yu froze. It wasn't for any other reason than the fact that she had stated the absolute truth. He realized then that his mother knew far more than he had assumed.

"Mmm, don't look at it," Xiao Yu whispered. "We as a family will be together forever, we won't separate."

Seeing him so distraught, his mother’s heart ached for him. She gently smoothed his soft hair. "When you were little, you barely had any hair. I was always worried you’d go bald before you even grew up. Your father told me I was worrying over nothing, that my hair would thicken up when the time was right. And just as he said, your hair is dark and thick now, and you’re much more handsome than you were as a child."

"Heh..." Hearing his mother say that, Xiao Yu instantly managed a watery smile through his tears.

"Stop crying, you silly child. Open the locket and look, do what Mother says, see what’s inside," his mother said softly.

Although Xiao Yu dreaded seeing his own image missing from the family photo, he found himself unable to refuse his mother’s request. He took the locket and gently used his fingernail to pry the casing open.

Just as he reached the peak of despair, imagining his mother’s reaction to finding him absent from the photograph, he suddenly noticed that the center of the golden locket held, perfectly intact, a complete family portrait: Father, Mother, Sister, and himself—every single one of them accounted for.

"Mom, what is this?" Xiao Yu looked up, about to demand an explanation, only to find that his mother had vanished sometime in the interim. He was left sitting alone on the threshing floor, clutching the locket.

His mother had disappeared too swiftly. Before Xiao Yu could recount years of pent-up longing, she was gone without a trace. This time, an intense, frantic search was inevitable. He scoured every corner of the entire old village, combed through every nook, and then rushed back to the wooden house, turning the courtyard inside out one last time. Finally, he stood in the room that once held the wooden bed and the five-drawer cabinet, staring blankly, asking himself repeatedly: Was all of this real or just a dream? Where did Mother go? Why did she vanish the moment she knew I had become an immortal being? Is my mother truly alive? And if she is, where in the world is she?