“What do you think?”
As the New Year approached, the streets thronged with people, adorned with lanterns and colorful decorations. The sounds of merchants hawking their holiday promotions filled the air.
In a noodle shop tucked away in a corner sat Guo Yu, the woman who had recently sent shockwaves through A-City’s high society.
Across from her was a man who seemed even more out of place than she did in this humble eatery. It wasn’t his well-tailored clothes that made him stick out, but his flustered expression, which suggested he was here for anything but a meal.
Guo Yu lifted a bundle of noodles with her chopsticks. Without waiting for the man’s reply, she commented to herself, “It still tastes like my childhood.”
The man fidgeted, his brows knitted so tightly they could have woven a sweater. Guo Yu glanced at him and said magnanimously, “We’ll talk after I finish my noodles.”
It’s worth mentioning that this man was the other protagonist in the chaotic scene at the Shangguan family banquet—Guo Yu’s lover.
He pleaded in a low voice, his tone so subservient he might as well have been an ant. “Sister Guo, please, just let me go. I’ve lost my job, and I got beaten up a while back. If your man finds out we’re still meeting, he’ll make me pay dearly.”
Guo Yu sounded amused. “Did you think I was still harboring old feelings for you?”
The man wanted to ask, Aren’t you? But seeing the look on her face, he wisely kept his mouth shut.
Guo Yu picked up a glass of water to rinse her mouth. After wiping her lips clean, she spoke slowly, “Did you not hear what I just said?”
“What I mean is, would you be willing to do something for me? I’ll give you money to go abroad afterward.”
The man desperately wanted to refuse, but having been her lover, he knew that once this woman made a proposition, there was no room for refusal.
“What is it?” the man asked.
“Help me have a miscarriage,” Guo Yu said nonchalantly.
She was already over four months pregnant, but perhaps because the child was so frail, she wasn’t showing much. The doctor had told her the baby would live for six months at most. What was to be done?
It was time for it to serve its purpose.
Hearing this, the man nearly fell to his knees. “Sister Guo, I really… I can’t.”
Guo Yu lifted the man’s chin. The years had done little to diminish her charm, and her clear, moist eyes shimmered with a captivating light. “Why can’t you? Aren’t you supposedly the best obstetrician at B Hospital?”
This sentence seemed to strike a nerve connected to the man’s pride, making him forget his current vulnerable state. He turned his head away, paused, and then asked with a hint of defiance, “Did you only get with me because I’m a doctor?”
Guo Yu wagged her index finger. “Of course not. I sought you out because of your profession. As for the time we spent fooling around… well, you should have a little more confidence in yourself. You’re quite handsome.”
For instance, you look a lot like a young Shangguan Chong.
Guo Yu left the last part unsaid. It was a necessary omission to ensure the man would devise a perfect plan for her miscarriage.
A half-truth is still a truth, after all, Guo Yu thought as she sat in her luxury car. Recalling the man’s suddenly flushed face, she tossed aside the handkerchief she had been using to wipe her hands and picked up a mirror to examine her own reflection.
The money she’d spent hadn’t gone to waste.
Meanwhile, Shen Wei and Ye Yuhuan were sitting in Sheng Jing’s office, drinking coffee. With Shen Wei’s investment, Sheng Jing had undergone a major upgrade. It had transformed from a startup full of drive and potential in a suburban location to a happy home occupying its own small building, where even the cleaning lady could enjoy dessert every day.
If not for their unwavering passion for new energy, Zhao Xiwei and the other two founders would have long since been corrupted by this comfortable life and resigned themselves to lazing their days away.
To put it in one sentence: What’s it like to live your dream life ahead of schedule by latching onto a rich sponsor?
Shen Wei had invested in Sheng Jing so ostentatiously not only because its future prospects were astonishingly bright, but also because it looked like a complete long shot. In Shangguan Chong’s eyes, her actions were likely a textbook example of someone trying to prove themselves, only to take too big a leap and fall flat on their face. New energy is that easy to get into? She was probably scammed. That was likely Shangguan Chong’s reaction.
The proof was that Shangguan Chong’s surveillance on Shen Wei had recently relaxed considerably, as if he didn’t want to waste resources on a fool.
Now free from Shangguan Chong’s watchful eyes, Shen Wei relaxed on the sofa, her fair face and rosy lips making her look as if she had just stepped off the stage of a Cinderella play. But her words were serious. “Are you sure Guo Yu will use the baby to frame Xianxian?”
Ye Yuhuan took a sip of her Americano. She had been agonizing over whether to contact Song Zhiqing these past few days. Before she could even make the call, her sleep schedule had been thrown into disarray. It was a classic case of shooting herself in the foot.
“There’s an eighty percent chance.”
“In the plot, Guo Yu uses…”
Shen Wei rolled her eyes, cutting her off. “Can you please not use the word ‘plot’? You don’t have to keep reminding me of my role as the protagonist.”
Ye Yuhuan really had no tact. Shen Wei had no idea how Song Zhiqing put up with her.
The tactless Ye Yuhuan paused, then started again. “In the parallel timeline, Guo Yu used a miscarriage to drive Shangguan Xianxian completely out of the Shangguan family. After that, Guo Siwan became the rightful heir. You also said that before your rebirth, Guo Yu had a miscarriage, and although Shangguan Xianxian wasn’t sent abroad, she completely lost her competitiveness as an heir.”
“Something happening once can be a coincidence. But when it happens twice, it can only be a tactic.”
Shen Wei clicked her tongue. “It’s not that I haven’t considered that possibility, but the tests showed that the baby in Guo Yu’s womb is a boy. As long as she gives birth, walking into the Shangguan family will be the easiest thing in the world for her.”
“You said it yourself: gives birth. What if the baby was never meant to be born? I don’t believe someone in Shangguan Chong’s physical condition could father a healthy child. Besides, how could Guo Yu be poisoning a man while simultaneously hoping to have his child? She may be calculating, but she’s not heartless.”
The poison wasn’t Guo Yu’s infertility drug, but a slow-acting toxin she had developed. Later in the plot, unable to bear his failure, Shangguan Chong would drop dead from its effects.
Ye Yuhuan wasn’t constrained by the fixed mindset that came from years of immersion in the Shangguan family’s power struggles. Shen Wei and the others always assumed Guo Siwan was just a stepping stone for Guo Yu to enter the family’s center of power, with the ultimate goal of seizing the entire family for herself. But Ye Yuhuan felt there was little difference between Guo Siwan getting the family and Guo Yu getting it. The two of them were a single unit.
The only person Guo Yu truly loved was probably Guo Siwan. Perhaps because children who lacked love were overly sensitive in this regard, Ye Yuhuan was inexplicably certain of this.
“Letting Guo Siwan take over the Shangguan family is the best choice. Besides, given Shangguan Xianxian’s parentage, her status as the public heir is just a ploy by Shangguan Chong to placate the Jin family. As long as Guo Yu can find a reasonable way to get Shangguan Xianxian out of the picture, it would perfectly align with Shangguan Chong’s interests.”
“Hmm, you have a point,” Shen Wei nodded, then looked at Ye Yuhuan with regret. “Are you really planning to stop participating in Sheng Jing’s internal decisions after the Shangguan family business is over? I think you have a real talent for this.”
Ye Yuhuan lifted her eyelids and gave Shen Wei a cool look. “Let me remind you again, my dream is to be a psychologist. Besides, with a certain someone’s suspicious nature, if I really got involved, she’d probably be the one tossing and turning at night.”
Shen Wei gave an awkward laugh, not daring to deny it. Instead, she changed the subject to one that would make Ye Yuhuan uncomfortable. “Are you sure you don’t have any extra feelings for Song Zhiqing? You gave away so many shares just like that. That money could start a whole new Shen Lan in the future.”
If you can’t speak nicely, Ye Yuhuan, then neither will I.
Ye Yuhuan scoffed dismissively. “Human emotions are complex. You shouldn’t always jump to such scandalous conclusions.”
If this great benefactor weren’t truly a Bodhisattva of salvation, Shen Wei would have spat at her. Who was she trying to fool with that self-righteous act?
Who was the one who had been listless every day recently?
Who was the one checking her phone hundreds of times a day?
She was so stubborn, even with dark circles under her eyes from missing someone. When this person was cremated, there would probably be a mouth left over along with the ashes.
Shen Wei forced a smile. “Right, right, I’m the narrow-minded one, nothing like the great philanthropist Ye. But, even if your feelings for Song Zhiqing are something other than, you know, scandalous—one of those diverse and complex human emotions—then why can’t you even bring yourself to call her?”
“No offense, but I’m just wondering, for vast emotions like yours, is making a phone call perhaps a taboo?”
Ye Yuhuan’s expression darkened as she listened to Shen Wei’s rampant sarcasm. And this was the world’s protagonist.
Hah. Right. It was a trashy novel to begin with. You can tell just from the title—《After Rebirth, I Got Together with the Fake Daughter》. Why not just paste the entire plot on the cover?
Shen Wei had no idea that the person she had angered was now mentally attacking the very foundation of this world. She continued her passive-aggressive tirade, “Oh, don’t be angry. I’m just curious. We common folk with our scandalous feelings just can’t comprehend the noble sentiment of missing someone to death but not daring to call them.”
Ye Yuhuan pressed her lips together.
Ye Yuhuan took out her phone and tapped the number that had caused her so much conflict.
The call was answered almost immediately. Ye Yuhuan couldn’t help but wonder if this meant Song Zhiqing had also been waiting for this call.
She wanted her opening line to be warm, but all that came out was a dry, “How’s the vacation?”
Why aren’t you back yet?—She swallowed the second half of the sentence. Friends. Friends. It was best to be friends.
But Song Zhiqing’s reply was warm. She said she missed her.
Ye Yuhuan stood up and walked to the floor-to-ceiling window, gazing at the white snow outside, a scene identical to the one on her birthday.
“I miss you too.”
She said it anyway. The mask of friendship was probably crumbling.
But Song Zhiqing always had a better answer. “Ye Yuhuan, we’ll see each other in three days.”
In the heart of the snow-covered country, Ye Yuhuan lowered her cool gaze. The warmth of the southern hemisphere was truly captivating.
If Song Zhiqing really cast aside her caution and pursued her openly, Ye Yuhuan wondered, how long could she resist?
About four hours, probably.
After all, Song Zhiqing was four hours away from her right now.
After hanging up, Shen Wei, who felt like she had just watched an episode of a dating show, patted her on the shoulder with a complicated expression. “If you really like her,” she said seriously, “you don’t have to hold back so much.”
Ye Yuhuan didn’t answer her.
She closed her eyes to rest.
And if they did get together, how long could they stay together?
Probably shorter than four hours.
Memories of arguments and insults flooded her mind. The shattered plates that had once cut her palm, the pornographic paintings displayed for all to see that had disgusted her spirit, and that one corpse.
It was too brutal, if this was what love was.
Even if I could restrain the decay of love just as I restrain love itself, could I withstand the possibility that Song Zhiqing might not love me in the future?
I can’t.
So, you see, love… it really is a disaster.
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