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

In the president's office of Imperial Capital University, she was still soaked from the rain, water droplets dripping from her hair. The air conditioning blew a chill into her skin, but the president's words the next second plunged her into an abyss.

"This is a decision made by the higher-ups. You will be expelled from school and removed from the program. What happened last time has seriously damaged the school's reputation. The city has also decided to revoke your honorary student title. This matter should not be blown out of proportion. Sign the confidentiality agreement here. Starting tomorrow, you do not need to come to school anymore."

Song Qingran's face instantly lost all color. "No... that's not it. I've never interfered in anyone's marriage, and I'm not a third party. Principal... I beg you, please don't expel me." Her trembling voice brought tears to her eyes.

Whether this happened or not, you know perfectly well; there's no point in telling me.

"Watch her sign it." The principal instructed his assistant before leaving the office without looking back.

The principal's assistant looked at her with a mocking gaze, pushing up the glasses hanging on his nose. "Blame it on the fact that you offended the wrong person. Expelling you is already giving you a lot of face. Don't be ungrateful."

Song Qingran: "I won't sign it. I haven't done anything wrong."

The other party scoffed dismissively, "You, a country bumpkin, dare to dream of fighting against the powerful and wealthy in the capital?"

“If you don’t sign this today, you won’t be leaving here.”

"If you really anger the people above, forget about Imperial University. Even if you retake the exam and get into another school, they have hundreds of ways to make it impossible for you to stay."

He placed the pen in front of her and said, "Isn't that how men are? When they like you, they can give you everything. But when they don't like you anymore... you're not even worth an ant on the ground."

"You're still young, you have plenty of opportunities."

"No matter how long we drag this out, it's just a waste of time..."

Song Qingran didn't know how she left the school. The rain pattered on her, making her numb and as if she had lost her soul. The rain drizzled down, then grew heavier, blurring her vision. All the emotions surging within her surged up: resentment, unwillingness, sadness, grief, hatred...

You forced me to accept all of that from the very beginning, so why should I bear the consequences in the end?

I don't know what I did wrong, Mr. Pei... why are you doing this to me?

I've tried my best to forget you and not appear in front of you, but for her sake, you still chose this method to try and erase me from your world. That's why you chose this method.

You're even going to take away my future...

Why did you give me hope in the first place? If this is how it ends, I would rather stay in the darkness forever and never have met you.

Am I a plaything you can summon and dismiss at will?

...

"Miss Jiang, would you like some more tea?"

Jiang Hua looked at the message she had just sent, and after fifteen minutes there was still no reply. Her expression changed slightly. "No need." She picked up her phone, stood up, and left the private room, her back view showing some emotion.

After Pei Zhan finished the meeting, it was already 8:30. As he walked out of the meeting room, he took out his phone from his pocket and saw a message from Jiang Hua that had been sent an hour earlier: I'm at Xiangweiju, come pick me up.

Pei Zhan tapped the phone number and dialed it…

Jiang Hua glanced at the person already sitting in the taxi, then expressionlessly turned off her phone.

Pei Zhan heard that the phone went from being unanswered to being switched off, so it seemed that the caller was angry.

"That's it for today."

Zuo Xiangnan: "Yes."

I replied to her message: I was just in a meeting.

A few seconds after sending it, Pei Zhan added: "Be careful next time."

Jiang Hua returned to Jinsha Shallow Bay, drank the medicine brought by Xu Ma, and went upstairs without saying a word. She was fine, but now she doesn't know what's wrong with her.

Half an hour later, as darkness fell and the rain still hadn't stopped, the man got out of the car, carrying a pastry in his hand. His suit jacket covered the delicate pastry packaging, so it wasn't wet.

Pei Zhan walked into the entryway with a damp feeling. After going upstairs, he found that the master bedroom light was off. He gently pressed the doorknob, pushed the door open, and touched the wall lamp to turn it on. The person on the bed seemed to be asleep.

The heavy red soles of his shoes made a soft sound as he stepped on the wooden floor. Seeing the lace lingerie that had fallen by the bed, Pei Zhan bent down, picked it up, and placed it aside. Jiang Hua didn't have the habit of tidying up her room and often left her clothes lying around. If she didn't clean up for a day, her room would be a mess. Back in the Flower Garden, no matter how late Pei Zhan came home, he would always tidy up for her as long as he wasn't busy.

A dark shadow fell, obscuring her sleeping face. He sat down by her bedside, reached out and brushed the hair behind her ear. The ticklish sensation on her skin made Jiang Hua open her eyes abruptly. Her eyes held a hint of relief that she hadn't fallen asleep, but she still said, "You woke me up."

"Would you like a midnight snack?"

"I went to cook."

Jiang Hua glanced at his watch; it was already 9:30. Too lazy to pay attention to him, she turned her back to him and said, "I don't want to eat, I have no appetite, don't bother me."

"I went to Xiangweiju and brought back some pastries."

Jiang Hua covered herself with the blanket, the meaning of which was obvious.

After a while, Jiang Hua heard the person beside the bed get up, and then the sound of a shower came from the bathroom. She turned her head and saw the snacks on the bedside table. Without giving them a second glance, she got up, turned off all the lights in the room, closed her eyes, and went to sleep.

Pei Zhan came out of the bathroom and went downstairs a short while later. Hearing the door close, Jiang Hua immediately threw off the blanket. "He coaxes Song Qingran with one trick after another."

Half an hour later, Pei Zhan went upstairs, turned on the light, walked to the bedside and picked up the person with her eyes closed. Jiang Hua opened her eyes in surprise, frowned and looked at him angrily, "What are you doing? I was asleep."

"Have a meal."

"You're crazy, why are you eating so late at night? I don't want to."

As they spoke, Pei Zhan had already carried her downstairs, saying, "Just consider it keeping me company."

"I'd rather die than spend time with you."

"Well, I'll trouble Mrs. Pei to be a ghost for one night tonight."

Jiang Hua: "You are a ghost, your whole family are ghosts."

After going downstairs, Pei Zhan placed her in front of the dining table, then took a pair of slippers from the shoe cabinet and helped her put them on.

"I'll go get the rice."

When he came out of the kitchen, there was a big bowl full of rice. "Why did you give me so much rice? I can't finish it."

Pei Zhan: "Give it to me if you can't finish it."

There were only a few simple dishes on the table, all of which were the dishes that Jiang Hua used to like to eat when he cooked. He had spent three days with her at Jinsha Shallow Bay, and a lot of company business had piled up. Most of the time, he could only deal with some of it in the middle of the night.

Now that he's back at the company, he hardly has any time to stop.

"I've been a bit busy at work lately. Sorry I was in a meeting when you messaged me."

Jiang Hua: "Oh."

It's become indifferent.

"I'm still busy, but I'll come back to be with you as soon as possible."

He's always busy, busy, busy, busy, all day long, but I have no idea what he's busy with.

Pei Zhan: "If you feel like you don't know what to do at home alone, I'll go with you to Yulong Bay for a few days?"

Jiang Hua: "It's fine if I go back to live alone."

To Pei Zhan, it sounded like he was saying something out of spite.

Pei Zhan reached out and placed his hand on the top of her head, gently rubbing it...

After eating a few bites, the two went upstairs. "You go to sleep first, I'm going to the study to take care of some things." Pei Zhan was probably really tired, because his tone was weary.

Jiang Hua: "Oh."

Before she could turn and go into the room, he hooked his arm around her waist, leaned down, and kissed her soft lips. "Goodnight, my wife."

After returning to her room, Jiang Hua looked at the ceiling above her head, slowly closed her eyes, and a faint smile remained on her lips.

In the latter half of the night, Jiang Hua didn't know when he got into bed. When she slept soundly until dawn, the person beside her was gone. When she lifted the blanket and drew back the heavy curtains, it was a gloomy, rainy day outside, and the car in the villa's yard drove away.

In the morning, Xu Qiulan helped Jiang Hua pack her things and returned to Yulong Bay.

Day after day passed, and more than half a month went by. He was still the same, leaving early and returning late, and no one could see him or know what he was busy with.

Her father probably found seeing her boring and tedious, and wanted to take her out to meet some of his friends, but she resolutely refused, saying there was nothing worth seeing in front of those people.

Jiang Hua had no interest in going out and stayed at home all day. Even though she should have gone out for a walk, she didn't want to go anywhere.

Having learned his lesson from last time, he kept his phone on at all times and would reply to her messages no matter how busy he was…

If it weren't for his contact information and message replies, Jiang Hua would almost have thought she had entered into a fake marriage and married a dead man.

In the mall, Jiang Hua suddenly became interested and took a picture of a haute couture dress in the shop window. Next to her was a man in a suit of the same color: "Does it look good?"

Jiang Hua's graceful figure was reflected in the glass window. Her long, wavy hair fell over her shoulders, and she wore a black fitted dress with a slight slit on the side, revealing her straight and slender legs. She had changed her shoes from high heels to flats. The doctor said that wearing high heels for a long time was not good for her health, so she simply changed her shoes.

At this moment, the group was holding a high-level meeting. Pei Zhan pressed his fingers to his temples, crossed his long legs, and leaned to one side, listening to the quarterly summary report from the marketing department. His brows and eyes already revealed a hint of impatience. The people below all lowered their heads, not daring to speak, for fear that the anger would be directed at them.

Just as the man was about to explode, the cell phone on the table suddenly vibrated. The people below felt a jolt in their hearts and were about to break out in a cold sweat.

"Continue." The marketing manager continued his report. At this moment, the heavy atmosphere in the conference room was barely noticeable. When the president picked up his phone and looked at a message from someone, the oppressive atmosphere instantly disappeared.

Pei Zhan: Yes, it looks good.

Jiang Hua looked at the message that came back almost instantly, then put her phone away without replying.

Pei Zhan zoomed in on the clearly outlined figure in the photo, a smile playing on his lips.

Bao'er, arm in arm with Jiang Hua, stood a short distance away and spotted someone. "Huahua, does that person look familiar? Isn't she Song Qingran's mother? What's she doing here? Why is she carrying so many things?"

However, the sales clerk disgustedly chased the person away, and Shen Bao'er pulled Jiang Hua forward, asking curiously, "What happened to that person just now?"

The sales clerk smiled ingratiatingly and said, "Miss Shen, the lady just now said that she had ordered several sets of clothes from us, but now she wants to return them to get money for her daughter's medical treatment."

"Treatment?" Shen Bao'er looked at Jiang Hua in surprise. "What illness does her daughter have? Why does she need so much money?"

A single set of custom-made LV clothing costs around 100,000 yuan, and the amount she just mentioned must be at least 700,000 to 800,000 yuan.

Salesperson: "We don't concern ourselves with customers' private matters, and we didn't ask any further questions."

“Those are all custom-made clothes. Even if they haven’t been worn, they’re not guaranteed to sell even if they’re resold in the store. After all, they’re made to fit the customer’s body. It’s really hard to find a customer with the same body size to resell them to. Besides… the customers who come here are all people of high status, like Miss Jiang and Miss Shen. No one would want these secondhand items, so… there’s nothing I can do about it.”

Song's mother secretly wiped away her tears and could only return to the hospital. Looking at the unconscious person, Song's mother's heart clenched. Lu Yuanzhou temporarily put aside his work to take care of her.

"If I had known, I shouldn't have let her go to school alone. She got caught in the rain after coming back from school. If I had stayed by her side, she wouldn't have gotten infected and turned out like this."

"A day's stay in a hospital room here costs several thousand yuan, plus medication... It adds up to over ten thousand yuan a month. How can we possibly afford that!"

"Thank goodness you're here, Yuanzhou. Without you, I don't know what I would do."

"Don't worry about the medical expenses, I'll find a way." Lu Yuanzhou held her hand, a faint worry in his eyes. You've been asleep for so long, it's time for you to wake up.

You want to break off the engagement? I'll agree as long as you wake up.

...

Jiang Hua returned to Yulong Bay at 8:30 p.m. and saw the car parked in the yard. Unexpectedly, this was the first time in two months that Pei Zhan had returned home before her.

She returned to her room upstairs and happened to see Pei Zhan carrying a basin of water out of the bathroom. Jiang Hua dropped her bag, sat on the foot of the bed with her legs crossed, and looked at him. "Mr. Pei, you're here so early today!"

Pei Zhan, carrying water, knelt down in front of her with one knee slightly bent, as if bowing in submission. He took off her shoes, held her feet, and placed them in the warm water. Jiang Hua watched this scene with great interest, her feet in the water, his rough fingers gently washing them.

"Huahua, could you... bring me a gift again?"

"Everything is fine."

He looked up at her, his eyes filled with piety and utter humility.

Jiang Hua's thoughts drifted back to the past, to the year their relationship was at its worst, the year they argued the most...

She still remembers what she said that day.

"...Do you remember what I told you?"

"If one day I see you wearing the suit I gave you on another woman, Pei Zhan... I will never buy you another gift in my life..."

"This is my punishment for you."

Jiang Hua: "..."