Chapter 2568: The Resilient Mortal

"James doesn't know."

The Baron shook his head and looked at the flames before him; he seemed to have aged significantly in an instant:

"Mother never told James that the man she was engaged to was also named Cumming, so James knows nothing of this. As for Mother... she probably guessed something before I was born, but because of love, she didn't want to accept reality, so she pretended not to know."

"Mother's early death was likely related to the future slowly aligning with the suspicions she refused to acknowledge. Coupled with the fact that she was later unable to contact Father again, her heart eventually died—it died in anxiety and longing."

"So, in the fifty-year story of our family, among all the participants in this tragedy and comedy, I am the one who understands everything most clearly."

Xia De looked at him with curiosity:

"But I still don't understand what this has to do with you running off to 1809 in your youth to steal your one-year-old wife?"

"Reading Mother's diary and figuring out exactly what happened took the twenty-three-year-old me over half a year. At that time, I was almost going insane; I even wanted to treat that diary and that book as evidence of Mother's madness. After all, Mother really was mentally unstable when she was alive."

He took a deep breath, trying to keep himself from becoming too agitated:

"I read many books and searched through a lot of information during that time, and then I realized one thing: many events that had not yet happened in the future collectively led to me being me at that time. And once some things in the future didn't happen, then I wouldn't exist."

He paused for a moment, then asked Xia De very seriously:

"Do you understand what I mean?"

Xia De nodded gently:

"I understand. Normally, the 【Past】 determines the 【Present】. But because your family's affairs involve time travel, for you, the 【Future】 determines the 【Past】 and the 【Present】."

The Baron exhaled a puff of white air and picked up the teacup the hermits had just given him:

"I never thought about changing the past. The young me at that time was just concerned that I must exist, that what was supposed to happen must happen."

"It took me a long time to sort out everything that happened in the past and future, and coupled with the occasional voices coming from that book—I guess they were voices from other times—this allowed me to further complete the entire experience of our family's three generations, from Mother to my... son. This included the origin of my wife."

"Later, I knew that those were the voices of me in 1850 speaking near that book."

He looked at Xia De:

"The only thing the young me didn't figure out was who James's father actually was; it seems none of the book's successive holders figured it out. But at least I knew the origin of my wife, and I knew that James had to get this book. This was a necessary condition for 'I am me'."

"So, was it really you who gave 'Opening the Forest Gate: Our Animal Partners' to James Cumming?"

"Not gave, just let him discover it. I didn't give him any hints; he discovered the book's function himself, and he was the one who connected with his mother living in the 1800s."

The Baron took another deep breath and looked at Xia De in the snow:

"So the answer is this: I cannot be sure who exactly stole my wife. But if she hadn't become my wife, hadn't become the Baroness, then James wouldn't have been born, then Mother Erika wouldn't have met the James who crossed time, and then I wouldn't have been born."

Xia De and the owl both understood:

"You personally completed this matter just so you would still be you?"

"Yes. Although I wasn't familiar with Creekwood Town and the farm where her real parents lived, I succeeded in taking the child out on my first attempt."

"Although I could determine the address of her real family, I wasn't sure of her foster parents' schedule that day. I had already planned to wait a long time to find an opportunity to send the child out, but on the afternoon I took the child, I met that timber merchant couple in the woods."

With this, everything has come full circle; Xia De can even imagine the expression on the face of the young Cain Kaming, holding his baby in the woods, when he saw the timber merchant riding in a carriage.

And Baron Cumming still had his own thoughts to share:

"I am not a Ringed Shushi like you; I am just an ordinary person. When I took her away, I thought it was fate arranging for our family's three generations. But when I watched her being adopted, I suddenly understood that my very existence proved that it was destined for me to do this."

"Just as I said when I told you the beginning of this story, this fifty-year story is a circle; all beginnings are endings, and all endings are beginnings."

"No, the beginning of everything was Erika obtaining that book. And the end of everything was James Cumming losing that book, thereby severing the connection with Erika."

Xia De corrected him, still carefully savoring the story in his heart.

Compared to the things the Outsider had experienced in the past, the story of the three generations of the Cumming family was more complex. Two time travels—James Cumming making Erika pregnant, and Baron Cumming stealing the infant—together completed this fifty-year cycle.

For the Baron, this was indeed a circle; the fates of three generations wandered endlessly in this cycle. Only someone like Xia De, who was outside the story, had the qualifications to say "beginning" and "end."

And the most bizarre part of this story was that there were no purely bad people in it, yet everyone had done wrong.

The cross-time romance between two young people was immoral, but it was only immoral and despised; after all, they both had their own marriages. Baron Cumming committed the grave error of stealing an infant, but since he existed, this event had to happen; one could even say he actively maintained the stability of time.

Therefore, neither Xia De nor Miss Winslet knew how to evaluate all of this. It was absurd but very logical; taboo, but when you think about it carefully, everything was voluntary.

Snowflakes drifted down from above, and the sound of the round-faced owl on his shoulder shaking its body broke the momentary silence:

"According to what you just said, when you married your wife, you actually knew that she was your... grandmother?"

The Baroness gave birth to James Cumming, and James Cumming traveled through time and had the current Baron with Erika, so this address was correct.

The Baron nodded silently.

"Then when you married her, you knew she would definitely give birth to someone else's child?"

Xia De asked again, trying hard not to let pity appear in his tone. He didn't really want to ask such questions; this was tearing open a wound on the other person, but for the sake of the truth, he had to ask.

And this time, the Baron didn't nod, but said in a somewhat hoarse voice:

"I thought at the time, if James was my biological son, and then my biological son gave birth to me, then this actually didn't matter... but later I met them."

He looked at the hermits:

"They told me some basic common knowledge about time travel. If I were James's father, and James was also my father, then our paternal bloodline would essentially be created out of thin air. This level of paradox is not something an ordinary person can create... so James was born from my wife's affair... she still thinks I don't know about this."

Xia De now envied the owl on his shoulder because she didn't have to care about her expression, but Xia De had to avoid showing more pity:

"I am very sorry to hear this."

The Baron shook his head:

"No need to be sorry, because she also doesn't know that I have illegitimate children outside—two sons and a daughter. I only made up my mind to do this after I knew James couldn't be my son. After all, no matter what, I had to leave behind my own descendants. Although in terms of bloodline, actually, neither James nor I have anything to do with the Cumming family bloodline."

The sorrowful man looked up at the falling snow; even by the campfire, the snow had already dyed his shoulders white:

"And, I didn't want to leave descendants with her either. Her bloodline and my relationship... it's very complicated. I wanted my descendants to get rid of these things."

Xia De even felt some admiration for this ordinary man shivering in the cold. As an ordinary person, Baron Cumming's thoughts, ideas, and initiative were outstanding. He did indeed do wrong, but all of this was truly not his fault.

He completed the time loop without making things difficult for the other parties involved, and he also achieved his own wishes. Even if the Outsider hadn't appeared here, he would have already obtained a result that everyone could be satisfied with by his own hands.

"So you see, sir, you don't need to come and make things difficult for me; everything is over. Even if you want that book, just go back to 1854 and take it. I have finished everything I could do. It's over, it's all over."

The Baron revealed a miserable smile, shook his head, and looked at the flames again.

Xia De heard what he meant:

"So, Erika Cumming is already pregnant?"

"Yes. If they can meet again next time, Mother will tell James about this. So actually, whether they meet or not doesn't matter. My age has reached the end of everything. If you hadn't come looking, I would have found an opportunity to dispose of that book myself."

Xia De stroked the owl again:

"Where exactly did your mother get this book?"

The Baron shook his head:

"It wasn't written in the diary, and I haven't found any clues. But it should have been bought from a bookstore. I investigated this book; it's a very ordinary book of this era, and it's sold in the bookstores in town now."

"Then who exactly is James Cumming's biological father?"

Xia De asked again. This question wasn't actually very important; after all, this person wasn't involved in the fifty-year cycle; he just had an affair with the Baroness. But Xia De was still curious.

The Baron still shook his head:

"If I wanted to investigate, with my status and financial resources, finding some private detectives would certainly be enough to investigate. But I didn't do that."

"Even if I found out, what could I do? I couldn't not love James; after all, we are indeed the closest blood relatives. My wife betrayed me, but she did give birth to James after all, and I also have illegitimate children. So I shouldn't know who it is; if I knew, I would have other thoughts..."

He laughed at himself:

"I have experienced too much in the first half of my life. I understand one thing very well: the less you know, the happier and safer you are. It is because I knew too much that I became what I am now. If I hadn't discovered those relics left by my mother back then, time would actually have completed the loop in other ways... This is also a very dangerous thought; I must not dwell on 'what if' scenarios."

What he said at this moment about "knowing less is safer" was also the consensus of Ringed Shushi, and Xia De understood his thoughts. ===== CHAPTER 2569 =====