Chapter 235

Chapter 235

The more Jian Fan acted like this, the more uneasy Qin Nan became.

“How did you even think of that?” Qin Nan asked.

Jian Fan looked helpless. “Your quest deadline.”

Qin Nan cautiously asked, “There’s no other evidence, right?”

Jian Fan nodded. “Not at present.”

Qin Nan breathed a sigh of relief. “Good. A quest deadline doesn’t necessarily mean it’s the deadline for solving the world. You must be overthinking it this time.” Besides, none of the worlds they had encountered before had imposed such a time limit, had they?

Jian Fan saw what Qin Nan was thinking.

He could not be bothered to remind him that he had once encountered a world with exactly that kind of deadline.

How long ago had that been?

His own total had also been above seven thousand Points. Several others had accumulated high totals as well, so they entered an exceptionally brutal world. Almost the entire group was wiped out. In the end, only he and Xia Zeqin survived.

And…

Remembering the past made Jian Fan’s mood turn heavy again.

“What’s wrong?” Qin Nan asked worriedly when Jian Fan’s emotions suddenly shifted.

Jian Fan came back to himself and shook his head.

“You’re acting strange,” Qin Nan muttered.

Jian Fan tugged at the corner of his mouth, unwilling to say more.

The surrounding NPCs continued their conversations. Now that Jian Fan had fallen silent, he listened in–and unexpectedly heard something useful.

“Have you heard? The Prince of the Flower World is searching for his missing fiancée.”

“The Flower Prince’s fiancée? Which Little Princess of the Flower World is she?” someone asked curiously.

“She’s not from the Flower World. She’s a young girl who came from no one knows where.”

“The people of the Flower World are so tiny. How could an outsider marry the Prince?” The others sounded exceedingly surprised.

The noblewoman who raised the subject smiled and shook her head. “She’s a thumb-sized girl who supposedly appeared out of nowhere. She and the Flower Prince quickly fell in love, and they had already set a wedding date. But then she suddenly vanished. The Flower Prince is nearly frantic searching for her.”

“Vanished suddenly… Could the Flower Prince have been deceived?” someone speculated.

The noblewoman shook her head. “Who knows? But I heard a rumor that the Flower Prince would bring people from the Flower World to today’s ball. No one’s seen them yet, though, so perhaps the rumor was false.”

Jian Fan raised an eyebrow.

Thumbelina. Mu Xin’s story.

Qin Nan had heard it too.

He searched his memory of Thumbelina and suddenly slapped his forehead. “I remember now. We overlooked something.”

Jian Fan looked at him.

“Thumbelina isn’t supposed to have wings,” Qin Nan said.

Jian Fan paused.

Because they were all fairy-tale characters, it had never occurred to him to consider whether their appearances precisely matched those in the stories.

Mu Xin was now the size of a thumb, so they had instinctively identified her as Thumbelina.

Mu Xin had not denied it at the time either.

Thumbelina’s defining feature was being a thumb-sized girl born from a flower. She possessed no other special ability. Her story was an adventure in which she could not fly and had to rely on others, until she finally arrived in the Flower World and met the Prince.

Then the wings on Mu Xin’s back…

Jian Fan glanced toward the women speaking nearby.

Mu Xin could only have acquired those wings after meeting the Prince. Yet her present story did not seem to fall within the original tale. In the fairy tale, Thumbelina married the Prince; there was no missing fiancée, nor did Thumbelina ever grow wings.
Jian Fan looked at Qin Nan.

Qin Nan met his gaze and was briefly confused. It took him a moment to understand.

He immediately made an okay sign at Jian Fan, then approached the three noblewomen.

“Honored ladies, forgive my interruption. I overheard you discussing the Prince of the Flower World, and I’m curious what sort of story lies between him and his fiancée,” Qin Nan said.

All three women turned toward him.

They exchanged glances, regarding Qin Nan with some wariness.

“My apologies, but we don’t know the details either,” one replied.

Qin Nan smiled. “I wonder whether any of you have noticed a thumb-sized girl here at the ball. I originally assumed she came from the Flower World, but I couldn’t help overhearing that its people have yet to arrive. In that case, this girl…”

Qin Nan let the implication hang.

The three women’s interest was immediately aroused.

“Is that true? There’s really a thumb-sized girl at this ball?”

Mu Xin was extraordinarily small. Although she had been moving around the ballroom for a long time, many people had not noticed her at all.

Qin Nan nodded. “Yes, madam. Others besides me should have seen her too.”

“Then she truly might be the Flower Prince’s fiancée.”

“Will the Flower Prince come to the ball today?”

“Why did his fiancée disappear and appear here? What story is behind it?”

All three women radiated intense curiosity.

Qin Nan smoothly joined their gossip. “I’d certainly like to know what happened between the Prince and the girl. Of course, we still can’t be sure she’s truly the Flower Prince’s fiancée.”

The noblewoman who knew the rumor immediately asked, “Does the girl have wings?”

Qin Nan had already formed a theory. Her question confirmed it.

He nodded. “She does. They’re truly beautiful. When she flies, she looks like a flower fairy.”

The noblewoman clapped her hands. “Then it’s her. She must be the Flower Prince’s fiancée.”

“Why are you so certain, madam? Do you know the story behind it?” Qin Nan asked with feigned curiosity.

The noblewoman smiled. “Because those wings were the Flower Prince’s token of love to his fiancée.”

Well, well.

So there was even a token of love.

The noblewoman continued.

“The girl was far too small. A single stride for us took her ages to cross. She couldn’t even travel from one flower to another under her own power. Whenever she wished to go anywhere, she had to rely on someone else.”

“Seeing how much this troubled her, the Prince gave her a pair of wings. With them, she could fly wherever she wished. Who could have imagined that three days after receiving the wings, the girl would disappear?”

My, my.

Qin Nan had many thoughts upon hearing this.

Had she swindled his affection and his equipment?

Was it really all right to distort a fairy tale this badly?