"My head is spinning..."
Xu Qinghuan woke up amidst a jolt.
Her head was spinning uncontrollably.
Her legs were moving forward unconsciously; the jolting came from the uneven road.
"Father... Brother, where are you..."
After a moment, Xu Qinghuan's vision gradually came into focus.
"Brother?"
On one side, her eldest and second brothers had their heads lowered, gripping the hilts of the swords at their waists, as if ready to draw them at any moment.
On the other side was a deep, bottomless river.
Xu Qinghuan called out a few more times but received no response at all, which she found strange.
Just as she was about to raise her hand to pat her eldest brother to see if he was alright...
Clank...
Chains clattered. Xu Qinghuan looked blankly at her own hands.
Pitch-black, ice-cold shackles tightly bound her fair, slender wrists.
"What is this?"
"Hiss!"
Before Xu Qinghuan could understand the situation, a strong force pulled through the chains, nearly dragging her to the ground.
"What are you doing?!"
Xu Qinghuan frowned and looked toward the source of the chains, only to see a pair of eyes reflecting a figure she was incredibly familiar with.
That figure was just as broad and reassuring as the one that had shielded her in the night.
However, at this moment, the figure sent a chilling shiver through her entire body.
"Brother, Father..."
"Stop playing around, this isn't funny."
"I'm going to get mad!"
Xu Qinghuan threw a bit of a temper.
No one answered her.
"I'm not walking anymore!"
"What exactly are you trying to do?!"
Xu Qinghuan stood her ground to protest, originally thinking it would be useless.
Unexpectedly.
Her eldest and second brothers beside her, along with Xu Youde in front of her, stopped abruptly.
"Let's go home, this really isn't fun..."
Xu Qinghuan forced a smile; all of this was making her scalp tingle with fear.
"Home?"
In front of her, Xu Youde did not turn around.
"Which home?"
Xu Qinghuan froze.
"Our... our home in Taoyuan, Jiangning!"
"That is not your home."
Her eldest brother spoke up.
"How could that be? Don't you recognize me? I am Xu Qinghuan, your sister, his daughter!"
Xu Qinghuan grew anxious.
"My daughter? Their sister?"
Xu Youde's voice was somewhat gloomy and cold.
"You are not her!"
This was a venomous tone Xu Youde had never used before.
"You are a monster! You killed my biological daughter, and you vainly hope to replace her!"
"Don't even think about it!"
"I, I!"
Xu Qinghuan opened her mouth, but her second brother didn't give her a chance, shoving her violently into the river.
Gurgle, gurgle...
"Help..."
Xu Qinghuan fell into the water. Through the surface, she saw Xu Youde and her two brothers looking back with cold eyes.
Her two brothers looked as if they were terrified she wouldn't die, their swords drawn and ready to deliver the final blow.
Xu Qinghuan wanted to call for help, but... it seemed she really wasn't his daughter, nor their sister.
Thinking of this, Xu Qinghuan felt utterly helpless.
"Would it be better if I just left?"
Xu Qinghuan gradually sank beneath the surface, unable to tell if the wetness on her face was river water or tears.
Her body grew colder, and her consciousness began to plunge into darkness.
However, just as Xu Qinghuan was about to give up...
The hand she had reached out toward the three members of the Xu family was suddenly grasped by another gentle yet strong hand.
Confused, Xu Qinghuan used her last ounce of strength to look toward the other side of the water.
She didn't know if she was hallucinating or what.
The river water was like a mirror, and on the other side of that mirror emerged a face identical to hers.
That was...
Her?
She was holding her own hand?
No, that was...
That was!?
For the first time, a look of absolute shock appeared in Xu Qinghuan's eyes!
The pulling force from the hand increased!
She broke free from the deadly river water.
She entered the mirror of hope.
As their figures swapped across that parallel plane!
The world turned upside down!
The river flowed backward!
The mirror flipped over!
"Wake up!"
"Ah!!!"
A sharp scream was forcefully squeezed from the depths of her throat.
Xu Qinghuan suddenly sat bolt upright.
Before her eyes was a dim bed canopy embroidered with a pattern of a hundred sons and a thousand grandsons, which looked somewhat sinister in the candlelight.
She gasped heavily for air.
Cold sweat rolled down her forehead, soaking her silk undergarments and sticking uncomfortably to her back. The icy sensation made it hard for her to distinguish between dream and reality.
The air smelled of soothing incense mixed with the bitter scent of herbal medicine.
Bang!
Right at that moment, the bedroom door was violently thrown open from the outside.
The carved wooden doors slammed heavily against the wall with a loud crash, shaking dust down from the ceiling beams.
A figure rushed in, bringing with him the cold wind from outside.
"Who is it?!"
"Which blind fool dares to touch my daughter?!"
"I'll chop him to pieces!!"
The newcomer was holding an unsheathed short sword.
He had not even put his shoes on properly; one foot was half-slipping out of a shoe, while the other was completely bare on the floor.
His hair was a mess, and his official hat had long been tossed who knows where.
It was Xu Youde.
That same wealthiest man in Jiangning, who usually greeted everyone with a polite smile and was so shrewd that even his strands of hair seemed hollow.
Yet right now, he looked like a madman.
His face was covered in stubble, dark circles hung heavily under his eyes, and his eyeballs were completely bloodshot. It was obvious he hadn't slept for days.
He stood firmly at the doorway, waving his sword wildly a couple of times as his reddened eyes vigilantly scanned the corners of the room.
Under the bed, behind the cabinet, next to the folding screen...
Only when he confirmed that there was no one else in the room besides his daughter on the bed—no assassins, no killers.
Xu Youde's entire body went limp. His knees gave out, and he nearly collapsed onto the floor.
But he quickly steadied himself and scrambled toward the bed in a panic.
"Huan'er?"
"Did you have a nightmare? Was it a nightmare?"
"Don't be afraid, don't be afraid. Father is here. Father is right here guarding you."
He rushed to the bedside, instinctively reaching out to hug and comfort his daughter.
But halfway there, his hands froze.
He looked down at himself.
Having stood guard outside the door for the past few days, he reeked of smoke and sweat, and carried the chill from outside.
His daughter had just woken up and her body was weak; he shouldn't shock her system.
He awkwardly pulled his hands back, clumsily rubbing them hard against his silk robe.
He continued to mutter incoherently:
"It's alright, it's alright. I've prayed to all the gods. Even if the King of Hell came, I'd stuff him with red envelopes and send him packing..."
"Don't be afraid. Father has nailed all the doors and windows shut; not even a fly can get in..."
Xu Qinghuan stared blankly at the messy old man in front of her.
Was this the corrupt official Xu Youde, who wielded immense power in Jiangning City and made countless people grind their teeth in hatred?
Was this the ruthless character who, by the broken bridge, coldly ordered the slaughter of hundreds of people until none were left?
At this very moment, he looked like nothing more than an ordinary, terrified old father who had been scared out of his wits by his daughter's scream.
Xu Qinghuan felt her eyes sting with tears.
The sense of emptiness brought by her modern dream began to dissipate little by little the moment she saw this scruffy old man.
She slowly reached out her hand.
Her hand was still trembling, shaking uncontrollably.
She grabbed onto the hand Xu Youde was about to pull back.
That hand was very rough, the palm covered in calluses left by years of flicking an abacus, and there were even a few cuts, likely left recently.
But it was very warm.
The rough, warm touch traveled from her fingertips to her heart, forcefully pulling her back from that freezing nightmare.
"Father..."
Xu Qinghuan opened her mouth, her voice extremely hoarse.
"Ah! Father is here! Father is right here!"
Xu Youde hastily gripped his daughter's hand back, holding it carefully with both of his hands, afraid it would shatter if he used too much force.
"I'm alive, right?"
Xu Qinghuan looked at him, her gaze still somewhat vacant, and asked this out of nowhere.
"This isn't a dream, is it?"
Xu Youde froze for a moment, and then his eyes grew even redder.
He sniffled, forcing out a smile that was uglier than crying, and slapped his hand on the edge of the bed.
"Pah, pah, pah! Children's words carry no harm! Let the wind blow them away!"
"What silly things are you saying? Of course you're alive! Alive and kicking!"
Xu Qinghuan twitched the corners of her mouth, giving a weak smile.
"And what about you?"
"You're actually alive too?"
"I thought that according to the plot's development, a major villainous corrupt official like you would definitely be killed off by the plot in that kind of bloodbath, used as a catalyst for me, the protagonist, to level up and awaken my power."
Xu Youde didn't understand what "killed off by the plot" or "awaken my power" meant.
But he understood that his daughter was teasing him.
If she could still be glib, it meant her soul was still there and hadn't been lost.
"You brat!"
Xu Youde's beard twitched in anger. He reached out to flick her forehead, but couldn't bear to do it at the last moment, merely helping to tuck the messy hair on her forehead behind her ear.
"My life is tough as nails!"
"I haven't even seen you buy this entire Jiangning City to use as your back garden yet. Would the King of Hell dare to take me?"
"Hmph!"
He stiffened his neck, his nouveau riche arrogance flaring up again.
"If he dares to send Black and White Impermanence to reap my soul, I'll crush them to death with bank notes! If ten thousand taels isn't enough, then a hundred thousand; if a hundred thousand isn't enough, then a million!"
"I refuse to believe there are no corrupt officials in the Underworld! As long as they are greedy, I can bribe them!"
Looking at his insufferably arrogant appearance, Xu Qinghuan couldn't help but burst out laughing.
As she laughed, tears began to fall.
"Father."
"Hmm?"
"I want to drink some water."
"Oh! Look at my memory!"
Xu Youde slapped his thigh fiercely, crying out in frustration.
"Wait! It's been kept warm this whole time!"
He turned and ran to the outer room, where a small red clay stove sat, constantly keeping a small earthenware pot warm.
He carefully ladled out a bowl of soup, took a spoon, blew on it spoonful by spoonful to cool it down, and tested the temperature before bringing it to the bedside.
"Here, this isn't water, it's ginseng soup."
Xu Youde sat on the edge of the bed and offered the spoon to Xu Qinghuan's mouth.
"This has five-hundred-year-old wild ginseng added to it, as well as deer antler and lingzhi mushrooms..."
"This is only possible in our family. If it were anyone else, this single bowl of soup could buy two of their lives."
Xu Qinghuan obediently opened her mouth and took a sip.
The soup was a bit bitter, but it had a strong sweet aftertaste. A warm current slid down her throat and into her stomach, dispelling the chill within her body.
"Is it good?" Xu Youde looked at her with a face full of expectation.
"Bitter." Xu Qinghuan frowned.
"Good medicine tastes bitter! Take another sip, just another sip."
While coaxing her, Xu Youde blew on another spoonful to cool it.
"Do you know how many days you've been asleep?"
"Three days! A whole three days!"
As he fed her the soup, he began to ramble and complain, venting the fear in his heart.
"Over these three days, I dragged all the famous doctors in Jiangning City here, making them line up to check your pulse."
"That Doctor Wang from Huichun Hall, just because he said 'excessive fright might damage the mind,' I almost had him thrown into the Qinhuai River to feed the fish."
"And that old monk..."
Speaking of this, Xu Youde wore an expression of deep physical pain, his facial features practically scrunching together.
"I said I wanted to pray for your blessings and offer the first incense."
"He actually opened his mouth like a lion, demanding money to recast the golden Buddha statue."
"In order to make you wake up sooner, I gritted my teeth, stomped my foot, and donated five thousand taels of incense money!"
"Five thousand taels! That's shining white silver!"
Xu Youde tapped the spoon against the edge of the bowl and said indignantly:
"I told that Buddha, if he takes the money, he has to do the job."
"If I spend this five thousand taels and my daughter still doesn't wake up, I'll bring people to tear down that temple and scrape the gold paint off that Buddha statue to pay off the debt!"
Xu Qinghuan patiently listened to his rambling.
"Father."
Xu Qinghuan swallowed a mouthful of ginseng soup and said softly.
"What's wrong? Did it burn you?" Xu Youde asked nervously.
"No."
Xu Qinghuan shook her head.
"The money was well spent."
She said.
"As long as we are both here, let alone five thousand taels, even if it's fifty thousand or five hundred thousand taels, we can earn it back."
Xu Youde's body paused for a moment.
Then, he slowly relaxed, and the hand holding the bowl stopped trembling.
He chuckled, the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes radiating pride.
"Of course!"
"Just look at whose seed you are!"
"Our Old Xu family might not have any other skills, but we sure know how to earn silver!"
"As long as we're alive, all the silver under heaven belongs to us; we can earn as much as we want!"
