No reconciliation, no forgiveness! Mr. Pei leaves with nothing.

Shen Yebai's cold gaze was deep. Just as he put down his phone, a figure appeared outside the study—it was Bao'er.

Shen Bao'er looked at her with red eyes, "Brother, are you serious?"

"Ji Liangchuan is not dead. You want to ruin Huahua's wedding. Why are you doing this? If you really do this, I will hate you to death."

"I don't want you to be my brother anymore."

Hearing the commotion, the maid came upstairs. "Miss Bao'er, what's wrong?"

Shen Yebai looked over with icy eyes and said, "Get out."

The maid left in fear, and Shen Yebai finally turned his gaze to Shen Bao'er. "Whatever you heard today, forget it all. If you dare to say a word about it, you'll be staying home for the rest of the time and not going out."

"Even if you want to kick me out of the house, I won't let you hurt Huahua. Huahua is doing very well now. Although I don't like that country bumpkin either, you can't ruin Huahua's wedding. If you really like Huahua, when Aunt Qingcheng arranged your engagement with Huahua, Huahua should have stood up to stop it and Uncle Jiang should have canceled the engagement, instead of leaving back then."

“Now that her brother has his own baby, Huahua can’t accept that her brother has this child.”

Each word fell upon Shen Yebai, leaving her speechless. "Enough!"

Shen Bao'er was startled by Shen Yebai's cold and harsh tone. Her body trembled, and she looked at him with fear and a defiant attitude. Shen Yebai sighed, and seeing her like this, his tone softened. "Whether Ji Liangchuan is dead or alive, I don't care. Now it's your turn to take care of yourself. Don't tell her whereabouts of Ji Liangchuan. I'm afraid it will distract her. Even if your brother likes her, it's too late now. Once it's missed, it's missed."

"My brother just wants to know who the other party is."

"have you understood?"

Shen Bao'er blinked repeatedly, her eyes already moist. "Brother, I don't want anything to go wrong at Huahua's wedding. Can you help Huahua?"

Shen Yebai: "I know."

"I'll investigate this phone call. It's getting late, you should go and get some rest."

Shen Bao'er: "Brother." She seemed to want to say something more.

Thinking of her brother, she figured he wouldn't do anything to hurt Huahua. With a hint of unease, Shen Bao'er left.

Ji Liangchuan didn't die, and Huahua has liked him so much since she was little. If he appears, will he disturb Huahua's wedding?

As she pondered this, she returned to her room. Huahua quite liked that country bumpkin, Ji Liangchuan… but Uncle Jiang didn't…

Shen Bao'er lay in bed, conflicted and unable to fall asleep...

At this moment, in the hospital, Huo Ling asked Kager and learned that her mother had been beaten and injured and was unconscious. She saw bodyguards guarding the door and nurses pushing a medical cart. When the nurses came out of the ward, she saw her mother with a strange look in her eyes, but she quickly looked away. At first, Huo Ling was a little puzzled.

When she entered the ward, Huo Ling saw Xu Zhoulan sitting by the bed making a phone call. She looked at her in shock and asked, "Why are you here?"

"Xu Zhoulan, who exactly are you?!"

Xu Zhoulan sat down next to Xia He, who was covered in injuries. Xia He's head was wrapped in bandages, with only her mouth and nose exposed, and she was wearing an oxygen mask.

"Little Ling'er, what kind of person do you think I am?"

Huo Ling noticed that the floor in front of the table in the ward was a mess, as if something had happened in the room. A decadent atmosphere permeated the air, and images immediately flashed through her mind.

For the first time, Huo Ling felt disgusted by him, and she felt disgusted by his gaze. Now she understood the meaning behind the nurse's look at her earlier.

She suppressed the urge to vomit and looked at him questioningly, "Brother, we've arranged bodyguards on this floor, Xu Zhoulan... how did you get in!"

Xu Zhoulan sat down unhurriedly in the chair, took out a pack of cigarettes from his pocket, took one out and put it in his mouth. The metal lighter was lit, and when he exhaled a puff of white smoke, the smell of smoke was blown away by the wind and quickly spread throughout the room.

"The door is right here, so my brother can come whenever he wants."

When Huo Ling first met him, she felt a chill run down her spine. Now, the way she looked at him had changed from the ambiguous teasing of the past to disgust. As she spoke, Huo Ling took out her phone from her bag and was about to dial the number in her contacts.

In the blink of an eye, Xu Zhoulan suddenly appeared behind her and snatched her phone, shouting, "What are you doing!"

"You disgusting, horny bastard, let me go!"

"Don't touch me! I find you disgusting!"

Just as Huo Ling was about to resist, the man suddenly hugged her tightly from behind, pinched her chin, and pressed himself against her. His warm breath brushed against her neck, and she looked down to smell his unique scent. "Little Ling'er smells much better than that woman just now."

Huo Ling struggled, "Don't touch me with your dirty hands!"

Xu Zhoulan clung to the girl like a venomous snake, her delicate body flicking its tongue dangerously closer. Huo Ling's face was pinched, forcing her to look at the person on the bed. "Little Ling'er, do you think she... isn't this karma?"

Huo Ling's eyes widened: "You did this to my mother?"

"If Xiao Ling'er thinks it is, then it is; if she thinks it isn't, then it isn't."

He was definitely not; he was just an ordinary designer. Huo Ling quickly calmed herself down. She had practiced martial arts, but her fancy moves were completely useless against him.

Why isn't Little Ling'er saying anything?

Huo Ling said coldly, "What do you want me to say? We have nothing to say. If you want to leave, then leave quickly, or I'll call the police."

"Be gentle, you're hurting me."

Xu Zhoulan chuckled softly, "I'm sorry, Ling'er."

The man quickly released her, but Huo Ling still harbored suspicion towards him. It seemed he was about to tell her older brother about Xu Zhoulan.

He is definitely not simple. He has such a good relationship with his elder brother and has been by his side for so many years. Didn't his elder brother notice anything at all?

Huo Ling glanced at the heart rate monitor; all frequencies were normal. She ignored him and silently went forward, picking up everything on the ground and throwing it into the trash can. The remaining broken glass couldn't be picked up; she would have to sweep it up later.

When she straightened up and saw the pool of unknown liquid on the cabinet, Huo Ling suddenly felt nauseous. She covered her mouth and ran to the bathroom, where she vomited violently.

She hadn't eaten much that night and could only vomit some sour fluid. After a while, she rinsed her mouth in the bathroom and looked in the mirror at herself, her eyes red from vomiting, feeling utterly pathetic.

From childhood to adulthood, she has never regretted anything she did, except for this time…

She had no idea what kind of person she had messed with.

She calmed herself down, and when she walked out, her gaze towards Xu Zhoulan was only one of unfamiliar coldness. Huo Ling looked at him with the same expression, "I've never seen anyone as disgusting as you before."

"Little Ling'er, is this a compliment to your brother?"

This person is utterly hopeless.

"You're...so dirty!"

After uttering those words, half an hour later, downstairs in the inpatient ward, Huo Ling was hoisted onto someone's shoulder and then shoved into a car.

"Xu Zhoulan, what exactly do you want to do!" Huo Ling struggled incessantly, desperately trying to open the car door and get out. Xu Zhoulan, annoyed by her excessive fuss, tore off his tie, tied her hands together, and held her in his arms. "Call the police? Little Ling'er can try. Right now, I don't think your good brother can take care of you."

"What...do you know?!"

"If you want to know, then little Ling'er, you'd better behave, otherwise... I don't know what I might do."

"Don't touch me with your filthy hands! Xu Zhoulan, you really disgust me and make me want to vomit. How can there be such a disgusting thing as you in the world, you bedbug, you bastard, you scoundrel... Go to hell!" At this moment, all the etiquette that Huo Ling had learned from a young lady since elementary school had vanished without a trace, leaving only her inner thoughts as she cursed this person indiscriminately.

"Do you even know who I am! If you dare touch me again, I'll tear you to pieces."

Huo Ling never expected that she would be kidnapped so young and beautiful, and even taken to a villa deep in the mountains. Once in the room, Xu Zhoulan threw her onto the bed. "Little Ling'er, why are you so resistant to me?"

“Little Ling’er wasn’t like this with her brother before.”

"Xu Zhoulan, stop acting crazy with me. I feel disgusted just looking at you." One-night stands are definitely not a good thing, because you never know what you've gotten yourself into.

As Huo Ling got out of bed and was about to leave him, Xu Zhoulan gave a wicked laugh. He grabbed the girl's wrist and threw her onto the bed. Then he took out a delicate and sturdy silver chain from the foot of the bed and used it to restrain Huo Ling's ankles. The silver chain was only a dozen meters long, which could only allow her to walk to the door. She could not go any further.

Xu Zhoulan arrived with a stool and sat in the girl's room. He pressed a switch somewhere, and the silver chain retracted, causing Huo Ling to stagger back to him.

"She slapped you, and your brother avenged you. Aren't you happy, little Ling'er?"

"You keep calling him your elder brother, but what has he done for you?!"

Huo Ling looked at him with surprise and disbelief, "Mom... how do you know she's my mom!"

"How could you have done this to him? Impossible! Do you even know who she is? She has bodyguards all around her; an ordinary person like you could never get close to her!"

"You know who I am!"

Xu Zhoulan's smile held a playful curve. His slender, well-defined fingers gently traced her face. "I've told you all my secrets, Little Ling'er... how are you going to repay me?"

...

Two days later, Jiang Hua was having her makeup done. Jiang Zhu and Huo Ling didn't come today, only Bao'er, who lived near Yulong Bay, came over. "Hua Hua, I heard that the person who posted on the school forum has been found. Guess who it is!"

Jiang Hua: "Who?"

"It's actually Xue Ruyao."

"After she was expelled from school, she secretly went to the school's computer lab and posted something online, thinking that she was being sneaky and no one would know. Who knew that she had already been caught by the school's surveillance video, and the information used to register the account just happened to match hers."

"This Xue Ruyao is really heartless. No matter how bad Song Qingran is, she still helped them pay off so many debts."

"She deliberately spread posts that Song Qingran was the third party, that she interfered in your relationship with that country bumpkin... No wonder Jiang made a clarification, but no one in the school believed it. Now... as soon as this post was published, everyone saw it, and public opinion sided with Song Qingran. She said that she was bullied and pointed at at school, and she couldn't bear it, so she chose to jump off the building."

Jiang Hua fell into deep thought. "Bao'er, what kind of person do you think Song Qingran is?"

Shen Bao'er only said three words: "A bit stupid."

Jiang Hua: "I don't think Song Qingran would be driven to jump off a building because of this public opinion. I always feel that it shouldn't be so bad that she would jump."

Shen Bao'er: "Could it be that she's still plotting something? To make people pity and sympathize with her?"

"Who does she want to sympathize with? I see on my phone that there are still quite a few people calling her a country bumpkin."

There are fewer of these now; many news stories like this have been blocked.

Jiang Hua glanced at the mirror and saw that most of her makeup was done, but the makeup artist had only done half of it. She immediately rejected the idea, saying, "Never mind, let's leave it at that for today."

"Wipe it off."

"Good lady."

After Jiang Hua removed her makeup, did her skincare routine, and applied a face mask, she said to Bao'er, "What do you think? Who does Song Qingran want to pity and sympathize with?"

Shen Bao'er wasn't stupid, and given their years of tacit understanding, she immediately had an idea. "A country bumpkin! No way..."

"What's so good about him? He's good-looking, but he's too poor. He's penniless. If you marry him, Huahua, you'll have to pay him out of your own pocket. Song Qingran... what's in it for him?"

"Is it because he's poor, or because he's old?"

'Hmm~' It seems there's someone with discerning eyes, no, it should be said that everyone understands.

"Yes! Tell me... what exactly is Song Qingran after?"

When Jiang Hua and Bao'er came downstairs, their father, Pei Zhan, and Shen Yebai were both downstairs, drinking tea and chatting about something. Jiang Hua was wearing pajamas, her face still glowing. She was applying serum and realized she had applied too much to her hands. Not wanting to waste it, since the serum cost tens of thousands of yuan a bottle, she went to sit down next to Pei Zhan, took his hand, and applied all of it to him.

"Don't waste it, it's quite expensive."

"Ah."

Jiang Hua wiped both of his hands, and Shen Yebai quietly watched their affectionate scene, his heart stirred with emotion...