In truth, Jiang Wan was the true daughter of the Jiang family, but shortly after her birth, she was abducted by human traffickers due to an accident and abandoned by the roadside. Her adoptive mother found her on her way to work, took her in, and raised Jiang Wan as her own daughter.
It wasn’t until she turned eighteen that Jiang Wan was told about her true origins and brought to the Jiang family to be reunited.
The Jiang family, upon seeing Jiang Wan for the first time, immediately confirmed that she was their long-lost daughter.
However, the Jiang family already had a daughter.
That was Jiang Lan…
As a result, no matter how hard Jiang Wan tried, she could never integrate into the family of three who had spent eighteen years together.
After all, in their eyes, Jiang Wan was merely a stranger connected by blood, while Jiang Lan was the daughter they had lovingly raised for over a decade.
Because of this, the treatment of the two daughters was worlds apart, and this disparity reached its peak when it came to the matter of marriage.
The Jiang and Sheng families, due to the deep revolutionary friendship and life-and-death bond shared by the older generation, had arranged a marriage alliance long ago.
The groom was Sheng Lianjue from the Sheng family, and the Jiang family unhesitatingly chose Jiang Lan.
The Sheng family was very pleased with this arrangement, as Jiang Lan and Sheng Lianjue were childhood sweethearts.
To give them more opportunities to spend time together, both sets of parents arranged for Jiang Lan, who was still in school, to join the Sheng family’s enterprise. She was groomed as the future young mistress of the group, trained to become Sheng Lianjue’s most capable assistant and right-hand woman.
Thus, Jiang Lan and Sheng Lianjue were perfectly matched, both professionally and personally.
They attended banquets together in elegant attire, photographed under flashing lights, and over time, they became seen as the most compatible couple in the eyes of outsiders.
Everyone in the capital knew that Jiang Lan would one day become Mrs. Sheng.
But no one expected that, as the wedding date approached, the Jiang family suddenly proposed a change for some unknown reason, arranging for Jiang Wan to become engaged to Sheng Lianjue instead.
The Sheng family had little grounds to object, as Jiang Wan was indeed the Jiang family’s daughter.
They had no choice but to agree to the change.
In the end, Jiang Wan married into the Sheng family as the Jiang family’s daughter, but she knew that neither the Jiang family nor the Sheng family held her in any regard…
Because the Jiang family had never truly acknowledged her as their daughter, and the Sheng family could not accept the idea of the future Mrs. Sheng, the first lady of the capital’s most prominent family, being a country girl raised in the countryside.
Jiang Wan stayed in the hospital for several days, with Zong Wangchuan taking care of her the entire time.
Apart from Zhou Guihua, who came to visit once, no one else from the Sheng family showed up.
Qiu Meilan had never acknowledged her as her daughter-in-law and likely wished for her to die sooner so Jiang Lan could take her place.
Today, when Zong Wangchuan came, he brought a bank card containing all the money he had saved from farming.
The modest sum was used entirely to pay Jiang Wan’s medical bills.
Jiang Wan sat in a wheelchair while Zong Wangchuan handled her discharge procedures.
Faced with countless calls and messages, Jiang Wan felt exhausted.
Most of them were from her so-called “mother.”
[Have you forgotten the rules I taught you? Now that you’re in the Sheng family, follow the rules, settle down as Mrs. Sheng, and don’t embarrass our Jiang family.]
[I know you’re my biological daughter, and the Jiang family has already acknowledged you. What more do you want!]
[Jiang Wan, where are you right now? Disappearing again and again, making everyone worry. If you keep acting this immature, I’d rather have never given birth to a daughter like you!][“I’ve already called Jiang Lan. They’ll be back tomorrow or the day after. Jiang Lan has already compromised. Otherwise! The person sitting in Mrs. Sheng’s position wouldn’t be you at all. If you weren’t my daughter, even if you died outside, I wouldn’t care!”]
[“See the message and call Grandma Sheng back immediately…”]
…
Besides these, there was also a missed call from Jiang Lan.
The missed call records included everyone’s, but only Sheng Lianjue’s was missing.
But it didn’t matter anymore. She was already prepared to go back to Wuchuan with her brother.
The train was at 1:30 p.m.
But before that, there was still a place she needed to go.
The Sheng family’s old mansion.
The car stopped at the entrance, but only Jiang Wan got out.
She had asked her brother to wait for her at an inn.
Because she didn’t want the family she had lived with for eighteen years to see her living so humbly.
The Sheng family’s old mansion was very large, with the whole family living together, except for her and Sheng Lianjue, who lived separately outside.
But most of the time, it was just her alone, guarding a cold villa.
Grandpa Sheng had passed away early, and in the earlier years, only Grandma Sheng had been holding the Sheng family together.
In a quaint courtyard with pointed corners, an elderly woman with snow-white hair held a pair of scissors, trimming the excess leftover flower branches. These flowers were rare varieties specially cultivated by a team of plant experts hired by Sheng Lianjue. A single branch could sell for over a hundred thousand yuan outside, but this amount of money meant nothing to the Sheng family!
Maid Mei’s eyes lit up when she saw the person not far away, reminding her, “Madam… it’s… it’s Mrs. Sheng who’s back!”
Grandma Sheng’s hand trembled as she looked at the person not far away, “Wanwan…”
Jiang Wan’s expression was calm. She walked forward without saying a word, supported herself by the stone table beside her, and slowly knelt down.
The gentle, slender corners of her eyes were slightly red.
Grandma Sheng quickly helped her up, “Child, what are you doing? Get up quickly!” Her gaze fell on Jiang Wan’s bandaged forehead.
“I’m sorry, Grandma! The baby… is gone…” Jiang Wan’s voice was soft and slow. She didn’t know how to say these words.
She just felt cold all over, trembling uncontrollably.
Grandma Sheng’s body shook, and Maid Zhou beside her hurriedly supported her.
Grandma Sheng: “What… what exactly happened? The baby was fine, how could it be gone?”
Grandma Sheng was the only one in the Sheng family who had been good to her.
So when she had become pregnant, she had only told her.
Previously, whenever she had repeatedly wanted to divorce Sheng Lianjue, it was Grandma Sheng who had pleaded with her, and she had agreed to stay.
But now that the baby was gone, she couldn’t hold on any longer.
Jiang Wan told Grandma Sheng everything that had happened.
“…It’s all my fault. I was willful and threw a tantrum, which led to the argument with Sheng Lianjue. The doctor said… my uterine bleeding was severe, and I might not be able to get pregnant again.” Jiang Wan knelt back a step and kowtowed, “Wanwan knows that all these years, only you have been the best to me. But Grandma… Sheng Lianjue doesn’t love me at all. Being with someone who doesn’t love you, a marriage won’t last.”
“This baby came unexpectedly. I once thought I would just spend my life guarding this child.”
“But now, this baby is gone…”