Chapter 265
Chapter 265
“The Stepmother Queen realized that the Prince intended to kill Snow White. More importantly, she realized there was nothing she could do to stop him.”
“So the Stepmother Queen sent Snow White away?” Mu Xin guessed.
The Flower Prince nodded.
“Then… the Poisoned Apple?” Mu Xin asked tentatively.
“The Stepmother Queen was also the one who had Snow White eat it.” The Flower Prince looked at Mu Xin with a smile. “The Seven Dwarfs were sent by the Stepmother Queen to protect Snow White.”
“The Poisoned Apple wasn’t actually poisonous. It was merely a drug that induced a coma,” the Flower Prince explained. “It could keep Snow White unconscious for a very long time, but waking her up wasn’t difficult. All she needed was a little water. Of course, it’s hard for an unconscious person to drink water on their own, so…”
Mu Xin felt that she now understood exactly where the story was going.
The Stepmother Queen had been afraid that the Prince would harm Snow White, so she had deliberately sent Snow White away and dispatched the Seven Dwarfs to protect her.
This was essentially adding a touch of real-world logic to the fairy tale.
After all, outside of fairy tales, no one would sympathize with an intruder who suddenly broke into their home, much less let Snow White stay with them. But if the seven of them had been sent by the Stepmother Queen to protect Snow White from the start, then everything made sense.
The same went for the later scene in which the Stepmother Queen fed Snow White the Poisoned Apple.
Since the Seven Dwarfs worked for the Stepmother Queen, and Snow White shared a close relationship with her, the Stepmother Queen could easily reach Snow White’s hiding place and arrange to meet her without the Seven Dwarfs present. Snow White would also have no reason to be wary of an apple offered by the Stepmother Queen.
Even the True Love’s Kiss that followed now had an explanation.
The Prince had supposedly awakened Snow White with a kiss, but in reality, he had simply transferred some water into her mouth with his own.
However…
Another question occurred to Mu Xin.
“Why did the Prince wake Snow White with a kiss?” Mu Xin asked.
The Flower Prince looked surprised. “Why do you still think the Prince was the one who woke Snow White?”
Mu Xin: “???”
Could the answer be…?
“It was the Stepmother Queen,” the Flower Prince said. “She was the only person in the world who knew how to wake Snow White.”
Of course!
Mu Xin had gotten the answer she wanted.
As for why the Stepmother Queen had chosen to wake Snow White with a kiss, or what happened afterward, Mu Xin wasn’t especially interested. They had drawn so many different roles that it would be impossible to investigate every single person’s backstory. Knowing the key details was enough.
Then another thought flashed through her mind.
Feigning surprise, Mu Xin exclaimed, “Oh my god, so that’s what really happened.” She then asked, “Then… does the Prince know about the Mermaid, the Sea Princess?”
Since the Flower Prince knew Snow White’s story, perhaps he knew the Sea Princess’s story as well.
The Flower Prince didn’t react as if there were anything strange about the question. Playing along with Mu Xin, he asked, “What do you want to know? I don’t actually know that much about the Sea Princess.”
“How much do you know?” Mu Xin asked expectantly.
The Flower Prince thought for a moment before saying, “The Sea Princess didn’t actually turn into sea foam.”
Mu Xin: “???”
Holy shit.
The Flower Prince was practically a walking guidebook to the plot.
“How is that possible?” Naturally, Mu Xin made sure to look shocked.
The Flower Prince smiled. “The Sea Princess wouldn’t turn into sea foam that easily. Do you really think she would die just because she failed to marry the person she loved? Turning into sea foam is merely how her kind leave the land and transform from humans back into mermaids.”
Mu Xin blinked.
“Is there anything else?” she asked.
The Flower Prince shook his head. “I’m not too sure about that. After the Sea Princess left, the man she loved only mourned her for a day before setting off to travel the world with his bride. They still haven’t returned. However…” The Flower Prince furrowed his brow. “I heard that the Sea Princess has appeared again. It’s truly shocking. Why would she obtain a new pair of legs and come back here? Surely she still hasn’t given up?”
At this point, Mu Xin more or less understood where the story was heading.
The Sea Princess’s tale had been expanded as well, though differently from Snow White’s. The first part of the story remained the same, making this feel more like a sequel.
The Sea Princess had not died. Instead, after some time had passed, she appeared in human form once more.
After all, dying just because a romance didn’t work out was far too wasteful of fish.
So what exactly was Qin Weiyi’s task?
Mu Xin couldn’t figure it out.
Seeing her frowning in deep thought, the Flower Prince laughed. “Why are you thinking so hard about this?”
“I’m curious, that’s all.” Mu Xin came back to her senses and smiled at him.
Then her eyes darted thoughtfully as she continued fishing for information. “Do you know any other interesting stories? I’d like to hear them.”
Of course, it would be even better if those stories happened to contain the information she wanted.
Since Mu Xin seemed to enjoy such tales, the Flower Prince searched through his mental repertoire and asked, “Would you like to hear the story of Cinderella?”
Cinderella?
Wasn’t that Lin Junruo’s task?
Mu Xin immediately nodded, staring at the Flower Prince as though he were the Buddha of the World of Universal Light.
She had never met such a wonderful NPC!
“Cinderella was actually a princess all along,” the Flower Prince said.
Mu Xin: “???”
All right. Yet another fairy tale that had been rewritten beyond recognition.
“Cinderella didn’t know who she really was, but her biological parents had been searching for her all this time. They were gravely ill and didn’t have long to live. Cinderella was their only child, so they wanted to find her and have her inherit their throne. They sought help from neighboring kingdoms, and a Prince from one of those kingdoms saw his opportunity.” The Flower Prince spoke calmly, as though none of this was worth making a fuss over.
From that brief explanation alone, Mu Xin quickly pieced together where the rest of the story was going.
The Prince who married Cinderella had not fallen in love with her at first sight at all. He had planned the whole thing from the beginning, carefully laying the groundwork one step at a time.
He had found Cinderella long ago.
He knew that once Cinderella was taken home, she would become an empress. By then, his status would no longer be worthy of hers. And so, he staged an elaborate show.
That show became the story of Cinderella as everyone knew it.
Why did everything Cinderella wore turn back to normal after midnight, while the Glass Slipper in the Prince’s possession remained unchanged?
Because it had never been the one Cinderella left behind. The Prince had commissioned a Glass Slipper in her exact size specifically for her.
And that wasn’t all.
Cinderella’s shoe size wasn’t uniquely rare, either. There were bound to be others with the same size. So why had none of the women before her been able to wear the slipper?
“Because there were Glass Slippers in many different sizes. None of those women were ever given the one in their actual size, so of course none of them fit. Only Cinderella received the right one,” the Flower Prince explained.
Tsk.
Behind every beautiful story, there might be someone harboring ulterior motives.