Deviant: No Longer Human-Chapter 799: Beating Eveline: The Day a Goddess Learned Fear! (3)

Chapter 799: Beating Eveline: The Day a Goddess Learned Fear! (3)

"Mm?"

Two golden eyelashes lifted.

Her expression stayed the same, calm, indifferent, despite the soft, domestic smile she offered him.

Eveline looked like the kind of woman who would be a strict but gentle wife at home: light golden hair falling in loose waves around her face, a white overcoat draped over smooth shoulders, and a small silver necklace resting against her pale neck.

Her eyes were cold, carved like stone, then filled with a wash of clear ocean blue.

Her lips, rose-red and untouched, completed the picture.

She could blend anywhere.

And still pull every gaze in a room.

Men who saw her always carried the same desire, to tame that soft, indifferent face, that gentleness that wasn’t kindness.

Wang Xiao once felt it too.

For a while, he loved it.

Then it became frustrating.

So he started impregnating her, half out of spite, half out of punishment, until it accidentally resulted in fourteen children.

He wasn’t a man who ever wanted children to begin with.

Each one he had was an accident of emotion, politics, or circumstance, Amelia as compensation, Eleanor as a symbolic heir, Anran during a moment of weakness, Seraphina forced on her for the sake of her spiraling mind, Aurora born out of mutual arrangement.

None of it stemmed from desire.

But this woman...

Looking at her now, soft smile, cold eyes, he remembered Aurora’s warning.

Maybe... maybe...

"...?"

Eveline’s brows faintly drew together.

Something in his stare was different.

Wrong.

He wasn’t annoyed with her, there was no frustration for her to savor, no familiar irritation for her to drink in like wine.

That alone made her uneasy.

His frustration had always been her private victory.

She enjoyed watching him be exasperated with her.

She enjoyed refusing to yield.

But now...

His fingers brushed her lips, slowly.

Gently.

Almost tender.

Eveline’s throat tightened.

What—

What was this?

He held her chin and lifted it, making her look directly at him.

The room went still, the others faded.

Her eyes trembled.

Fear crept up her spine, subtle but real.

Was he going to kiss her?

Here? In front of these women?

Would he strip her, take her right here just to humiliate her?

He had done such things before, it never broke her, but the idea of him doing it in front of these mortal women... she found it unsavoury, almost insulting.

Then she caught herself.

Unsavoury?

Since when did propriety matter to her?

And yet... None of this was enough to make her yield.

Not yet.

Not close.

But for the first time in a long while...

Eveline’s heartbeat stuttered.

"You’ve lived for centuries..." his voice finally slid out low, quiet, almost gentle. "Do you... genuinely mistake survival for wisdom?"

Eveline’s lashes fluttered. She blinked once, slow, composed, and nodded.

He laughed, not loudly.

Just a soft, quiet exhale coated in frost.

"Then answer me something simple."

He leaned in slightly, his shadow falling across her face.

"If a creature bares its teeth every time you reach out... snaps whenever you show it affection... and waits for the first loosened moment to bite-"

His eyes dropped to her lips, then rose again.

"What do you think should be done to something like that?"

Her throat closed.

She’d heard insults before, but this... this wasn’t an insult.

It was a diagnosis.

Before she could form a rebuttal, he continued:

"And not long ago, when the sky was collapsing above you..." His voice sharpened. "Why did you reach up to it? What were you looking for? Escape? Freedom? Relief from me?"

She didn’t answer.

She couldn’t.

Because the truth was uglier than the question.

Wang Xiao slowly, deliberately, caught her chin.

Not gently this time, his grip dug into bone.

Her breath escaped in a strained sound.

"Let me make it easier for you," he murmured. "You want to be treated as an equal. You want the world to believe you stand beside me."

His thumb brushed her jaw, deceptively soft.

"But all you’ve ever done..."

His voice dropped, soft as a knife sliding between ribs.

"...is behave like a beautiful, untrained creature who bites the hand that keeps her alive."

Her eyes widened... She felt the blow before he spoke the words.

"So tell me, Eveline..."

His gaze locked onto hers.

"Are you my equal?"

"Or my bitch?"

A second.

Two.

Then he whispered, dangerously soft:

"Or are you just a disobedient woman too proud to admit she still kneels when I pull her leash?"

The air froze cold.

Eveline’s world tilted. Her lips parted in outrage, shame, something between fury and humiliation...

But before she could speak-

A small hand tugged at Wang Xiao’s wrist.

Both of them turned.

Eirene.

Her tiny fingers held his sleeve, not pleading, not afraid.

Just... there.

Eyes large, ancient, unsettlingly calm.

A six-year-old who looked like she was sculpted from moonlight.

She gazed at Eveline, tilting her head, curious, not cruel.

"Why angry?" Her voice was soft, airy, the kind that made a room instinctively quiet.

Eveline swallowed, hard.

Eirene blinked again, then looked up at Wang Xiao.

"If she bites you," she said simply, "can I have her hands?"

Wang Xiao went silent and raised a brow. "Hands, hm?"

Eirene nodded.

Tiny, innocent, maybe?

Yet, utterly sincere.

"They break easy."

Eveline’s breath trembled, not because of the threat, but because a child had said it without emotion.

And that six-year-old... was her own child.

Her lips curved downward, a smile folding in on itself as a bitter laugh pressed against her throat. She had trained them, trained them to ignore everything except him. It was the only way he’d allow her to raise them at all. If she’d shaped them for herself, he would have taken them away long ago.

So she earned his trust.

So she made them see only him.

So she planted that loyalty deep into their bones.

She had even used it once, nudged them into a conflict to tilt things in her own favor.

She never imagined it would circle back and bite her instead.

Wang Xiao smirked, enjoying the irony.

"Not today," He tapped her nose lightly.

Eirene blinked, disappointed in a soft, almost adorable pout.

"...okay." Then she looked back at Eveline.

Her tone held no malice, just matter-of-fact innocence.

"Don’t make him sad again."

Eveline flinched harder at that than everything Wang Xiao had said.

Was she warning her? How laughable!

She opened her mouth, maybe to apologize, maybe to defend herself, but she never finished.

A sudden pressure hit her neck, and in the next moment-

Everything went black.

Her head slipped cleanly off her shoulders, as if someone had cut through silk.

A quiet gasp, then-

SCREAMS!

Real, human screams from those not used to death.

Eirene only blinked as blood dotted her cheeks, she wiped it with her sleeve like it was dust.

Wang Xiao bent, scooping her up effortlessly.

"Come on, Ei," he said softly.

She wrapped her little arms around his neck, resting her cheek on his shoulder.

"Dad smells pleasant," she whispered.

Wang Xiao’s expression softened, just barely.

Before he could respond, someone rushed in.

"I’ll take her-" Wang Mei’s voice shook, but her hands still moved with purpose. "She shouldn’t be seeing this."

Eirene frowned as she was lifted away, though she didn’t resist.

She only muttered under her breath:

"Don’t wipe my face so hard... it hurts."

Wang Mei froze, half-laughing, half-trembling. Seeing that tiny ivory-skinned face smeared with blood stirred something strange and protective in her chest. She cupped Eirene’s cheek and cleaned it anyway, gentler this time.

"You want to play with me for a bit, Ei? Your dad is... very busy right now." she said softly.

"Um?" Eirene blinked up at her, Mei’s calm grey-blue eyes reflecting half the world in them.

She didn’t resist at all.

"Ah- give her here." Yue approached, remembering how dangerous it was for mortals to hold children like her. "It might not be safe-"

"It’s fine," Wang Mei said, holding Eirene closer. "She won’t hurt me. Right?"

Mei pinched her tiny nose lightly.

Eirene wriggled free and stared up with mild displeasure.

"Don’t touch... Eirene’s face."

She rubbed furiously as if scrubbing away Mei’s scent. 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝙬𝙚𝓫𝒏𝓸𝓿𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝙤𝓶

Mei raised a brow but didn’t argue. She carried the little goddess outside.

Yue watched the retreating pair silently, then glanced at the other two sisters.

Wang Xueying looked like she’d seen a ghost, wide-eyed, bewildered.

Wang Jiarong had gone pale, hands shaking at her sides.

She thought she’d grown used to strange things in this house, she’d told herself that a hundred times. But watching Eveline’s severed head hit the floor... watching those once-alive blue eyes stare blankly at nothing...

Something inside her cracked.

He killed her.

Right there.

In front of a child.

Her stomach twisted.

Wasn’t that girl on Eveline’s lap his daughter?

Then... did that make Eveline his woman?

His partner?

The longer she tried to make sense of it, the more horrifying it became.

And the child, Eirene, had barely reacted. Just a blink, just a small wrinkle of her nose at the blood.

What kind of people are they?

Jiarong’s breath trembled. She didn’t dare make a sound.

Yue’s eyes followed Wang Mei retreating with Eirene in her arms.

Yue still didn’t understand how Wang Mei had managed to look so composed.

Because she hadn’t been.

Mei’s hands were shaking the entire time she held the child, shaking from shock, fear, and the desperate need to get Eirene out of the room before anything worse happened.

But she forced herself to move anyway.

But she refused to let Eirene see that.

Someone had once told her:

If he doesn’t stop you, it means he’s letting you do it.

If he doesn’t want it done, he’ll stop you himself.

So Wang Mei took the chance... and ran with it.

Only when she stepped outside did she quietly exhale.

In her hurry, she didn’t notice until-

Thud!

Something bumped her leg.

"Eh?

She looked down and found a small girl sitting on the ground, with deep watery eyes, holding her head, pouting deeply.

"Everyone’s ignoring me today!"

Zhenxi.

Her eyes immediately narrowed when she saw Eirene in Mei’s arms, jealousy, confusion, and indignation mixing like storm clouds.

Wang Mei blinked. When did she sneak out here?

She lowered Eirene to the ground.

The two girls, same height, same tiny posture, stared at each other.

"Zhenxi, where’s your mother? Didn’t she go for a walk with you and Chen Meili?" Mei asked gently.

"Hmph." Zhenxi pointed down the right side of the road. "She said she had ’some work’ and ran off that way. Should we chase her?"

Wang Mei frowned.

Fu Yuxin never left her child alone.

Something felt wrong, but she forced a smile. "You want to eat some snacks first?"

"?? Are you bribing me?"

Suspicion squinted across Zhenxi’s entire face.

"..."

Mei felt personally attacked.

"What’s... ’bribe’?" Eirene asked quietly, unfamiliar with the word.

Zhenxi shot her a look. "You’re so stupid. Anyone could fool you."

She pressed her palm to her forehead like she suddenly had a migraine.

Wang Mei recovered enough to respond quickly. "If she’s stupid, shouldn’t you teach her so she doesn’t stay that way?"

Zhenxi made a face like that was the most unfair request in the world.

She peeked past Mei’s legs toward the house."...Is Daddy inside?"

"He is," Mei said smoothly, "and he asked me to find someone ’wise’ to teach her. So I came to get you."

Zhenxi blinked. "Me?"

She stared at Eirene again.

Both girls were tiny and serious in their own ways.

After a moment, Zhenxi nodded with grave importance.

"...Makes sense. Daddy can’t have stupid people taking care of him when he gets old. Since it’s Daddy’s order, I’ll accept it."

Mei bit her lip to keep from laughing.

"I can’t go alone," Zhenxi added, grabbing Eirene’s hand. "You follow me."

Wang Mei nodded...

But she didn’t move.

She wanted to see where this was going.

Zhenxi tugged Eirene toward the right side of the road, the same direction Fu Yuxin supposedly ran.

Mei’s eye twitched.

’This girl... is she trying to trick me?’

As she walked, Zhenxi muttered under her breath:

"...My panda and dragon cubs are this way anyway. I have to catch them before they run off."

Mei could only stare.

This child was absolutely trying to follow her mother while pretending it was Father’s mission, and she had even sent her pets ahead to tail her mother discreetly.

Even knowing full well what Zhenxi was up to, Wang Mei still quietly walked behind them equal parts nervous, amused...

and genuinely impressed by her cunning.

She remembered how quiet and helpless this girl had seemed at first... but every day, she was becoming sharper, bolder.

Was she pretending to be helpless only in front of Wang Xiao to gain his favor?

Wang Mei quickly pushed the thought aside.

She had a feeling she did not want to know what methods these little girls used to win his attention.

If she started digging, she’d fall into a rabbit hole she might never climb out of.