Qiao Tang asked, “What is it?”
Su Hao replied, “Whether Yu Xiaxing is going to ruin my marriage.”
“Our future is entirely riding on my status as the Yu family’s son-in-law.”
“Although that detective took the money and agreed to keep quiet, Yu Xiaxing isn’t someone to underestimate. I’m afraid she still has another card up her sleeve, and that she’ll take what she found straight to the Old Master.”
“When that happens, having us end up with nothing will be the least of our problems…”
At the thought of that possibility, a chill ran down Su Hao’s back.
As long as he failed to become the Yu family’s son-in-law, all his schemes would come to nothing. He might even have to face the Yu family’s retaliation.
“What should we do?” Qiao Tang panicked as well.
Su Hao fell silent for a moment, his mind racing.
They couldn’t just sit around and wait for death.
Perhaps they should cause some trouble and keep Yu Xiaxing too busy to deal with them.
After pondering for a moment, Su Hao asked, “Is your son about to be expelled?”
Qiao Tang was speechless. “I’m only seven years older than him. Since when did he become my son?”
Su Hao said, “I’m not in the mood to argue with you. You know what I mean, don’t you?”
Qiao Tang was silent for a moment before muttering, “No. He chickened out and wrote a letter of self-criticism.”
Su Hao said, “Good. Have him cause trouble at school every day, or lead his classmates in making a scene. That way, Yu Xiaxing won’t have the time or energy to deal with us.”
Qiao Tang thought it would be easy enough and nodded in agreement. “Okay. I’ll talk to him when I get home tonight.”
After a pause, Qiao Tang whined coquettishly, “That bitch Shen Zhi is still targeting me on set. I’m pretty sure she was the one who filed that anonymous report… Brother Hao, if you don’t stand up for me soon, I won’t be able to keep working!”
Su Hao understood that she was trying to use this opportunity to get revenge.
He did have the authority to do so.
Su Hao reassured her, “Don’t worry. Lingyi said I’m fully in charge of the follow-up. I’ll help you vent your anger when we shoot tomorrow. Then you can torment her all you like.”
“That’s wonderful!” Qiao Tang cried out happily. “Brother Hao, you really are capable.”
Su Hao smiled faintly.
This was the feeling of being in control from a position of power.
A man really needed authority.
With a casual word, he could deal with the career rival of his woman. The feeling was simply intoxicating.
-
Over the two-day weekend, Yu Xiaxing continued living a healthy life.
By Sunday evening, however, she began to feel anxious.
Ten million yuan in operating funds weighed on her like a mountain.
With that money, it seemed that she really could build the school properly…
After all, watching the students and teachers go to the police station to welcome her and show their support, and seeing the online discussions about the original purpose of education… She couldn’t say that she had felt nothing deep down.
But she wasn’t the real Yu family member.
What was the point of working hard?
If an ordinary employee knew that no matter how hard they worked, their eventual success would simply be snatched away by someone parachuted in from above, would they still make the effort?
She was destined to have everything taken away from her.
The entire Yu family placed tremendous importance on blood relations.
When Sixth Sister was little, she had once asked the family in front of a large gathering of elders, “If I were a fake heiress who had been switched at birth, would you still love me?”
Her father had said, “Of course not. I love you because you’re related to me by blood.”
Sixth Sister, unwilling to give up, had asked, “But I won a little red flower a few days ago! I’ve also been very filial to Mom and Dad, and I’m outstanding and capable. If our family ever ran into trouble in the future, I could even help. Would you love me then?”
Her father had replied, “There are countless outstanding people in the world, but the only people related to me by blood are my children. So no matter how many thousands of times I had to choose, I would still choose my biological child.”
Sixth Sister had burst into tears.
The adults had all laughed at her. “Why are you crying? It was only a hypothetical situation. You’re your parents’ biological daughter. Would you really be happy if we said we’d love the fake heiress?”
At the time, Yu Xiaxing had even laughed along with everyone else, making fun of Sixth Sister.
Later, after Sixth Sister had calmed down, she had tearfully explained to the adults why she cared so much about whether a fake heiress would be loved.
It was because she had raised a cat, and she loved her little cat very much.
One day, the cat had gone missing, and she had felt as if the sky were falling.
She had spent the entire day searching without eating or drinking. Fortunately, she had finally found it.
She continued to love the cat and pampered it every day, although she felt that its personality was different from before. It seemed much clingier than it used to be.
She assumed that the cat had become more dependent on her after getting lost, so she didn’t think much of it.
Unexpectedly, one day, an identical cat came back as well.
Sixth Sister discovered that this cat was the one who could understand the commands they had agreed upon, and its personality was just as it had been before.
That was when she realized that this was her real cat—the other one was the fake.
But by then, she had already formed a deep bond with the fake cat. She couldn’t bear to abandon such a well-behaved animal, so she raised both cats together.
She had asked the adults those questions because she wanted their approval. She wanted to know whether it was right to love them both so dearly.
Instead, the adults had taught her a harsh lesson.
At the time, everyone had treated it as a child’s fanciful joke. They had laughed and forgotten about it.
Who could have imagined that Sixth Sister wasn’t the fake heiress after all?
That she was.
The way Grandpa had always acted also showed that his attachment to bloodlines was almost obsessive.
He had built his fortune from nothing and was extremely wary of outsiders.
The women of the Yu family all took husbands who married into the family. Once a man married in, after his daughter or granddaughter had given birth to the number of children Grandpa deemed satisfactory, he would require the son-in-law to undergo sterilization. This was to ensure that no outsider could exploit the law through the inheritance rights of an illegitimate child and seize the Yu family’s assets and bloodline.
He valued the abilities of his grandchildren, but the “Yu” bloodline was a threshold more fundamental than ability.
Grandpa doted on her now.
But if her identity as a “fake heiress” were exposed, what would become of her?
The love Grandpa showed her now, and the love her brothers showed her, would all turn into the cruelest mockery.
Those brothers and sisters who had long been watching her like predators would certainly take advantage of her downfall.
The more she thought about it, the more anxious she became.
After being anxious for a long while, Yu Xiaxing decided that she might as well continue courting disaster.
She would get her severance pay as soon as possible and leave this place.
Then she would go look for her biological parents.
In her previous life, after the real heiress returned, Yu Xiaxing had investigated the hospital where the two of them had been born. The nurses said that the babies had been switched due to a work error.
Later, someone had hacked into the hospital’s database, so there was no way to find out who her biological parents were.
The real heiress hadn’t been raised by her biological parents either. She had been adopted by a foreign couple at the age of three.
Yu Xiaxing decided to keep working hard to earn her severance pay. That way, if she became seriously ill again in this life, she would at least have money for treatment.
Once she had reached that conclusion, she finally calmed down.
Tomorrow, she would regroup and strive to sink even further!
-
Monday morning, Saint Virtue Academy.
Yu Xiaxing had just parked her car and was walking toward the administration building when she ran into Principal Wang at the entrance.
Principal Wang saw her as well and gave her a friendly smile before taking the initiative to speak.
“How was your weekend?”
In his view, after the passionate scene outside the police station on Friday, they were practically comrades-in-arms.
He still didn’t understand many of her methods.
But as long as they were for the students’ benefit, he was willing to take a step back.
He’d even prepared a few polite platitudes about “communicating more in the future” and “learning more from you.”
Yu Xiaxing’s heart lurched, and she stared at him in surprise.
Seriously, old man? You were the only person at the entire school with any real say who kept going against me!
Don’t tell me you’re trying to make up with me now?
I! Don’t! Accept!
