Song Jianbai did not chase after him to ask what he was actually thinking.
Teenagers were all like that; the more you pursued them with questions, the more annoyed they would become.
It was better to let them have some time to calm down on their own.
In truth, kids were still quite capable of figuring things out for themselves.
Take his own younger sisters, for instance; they all managed to sort things out easily enough.
Yet Song Jianbai wondered if these approaches of his only worked on girls, and whether they would be of any use on a teenage boy.
Song Jianbai glanced at Chu Xingyan’s bedroom door, then got up to wash up.
When he finished, he still knocked on Chu Xingyan’s door, signaling him to wash up and rest early.
Originally, he hadn’t expected Chu Xingyan to open the door, but just as he was about to leave, Chu Xingyan suddenly pulled it open.
“Uncle, can I talk to you for a moment?” Chu Xingyan hesitated slightly, but still spoke up.
For Song Jianbai, this was entirely a major step taken forward by this kid.
Song Jianbai glanced at the time and naturally agreed.
Actually, what Chu Xingyan wanted to say was quite simple.
If it had been before, he might have truly chosen to return to the Lu family.
But now that he had his uncle, Chu Xingyan wanted to keep living with his uncle.
If he went back to the Lu family, Chu Xingyan wasn’t even certain he could live a better life than he did right now.
When Song Jianbai heard that Chu Xingyan had no desire to return to the Lu family and instead wanted to live with him, he looked quite pleased on the surface.
Yet deep down, he felt that the trajectory was heading in the wrong direction.
He was scheduled to fake his death four months later.
It was impossible for him to take care of Chu Xingyan for the rest of his life.
Chu Xingyan waited in eager anticipation for his uncle’s reply.
Even though they lacked blood ties.
Yet in his heart, his uncle was his only remaining family.
Therefore, as long as his uncle was around, that place was his home.
Song Jianbai smiled slightly before speaking up. “Xingyan, I cannot accompany you for a lifetime, do you understand? Regardless of whether you return to the Lu family or not, you are still a son of the Lu family. Therefore, whatever you ought to rightfully receive, you must not yield an inch.”
He still needed to impress upon Chu Xingyan that he must not back down when it came to property.
In the plot, Chu Xingyan did indeed commit an act that deeply infuriated the readers.
That was being overly tolerant toward the Lu family members, while remaining excessively cold-blooded toward the other male lead.
Consequently, Chu Xingyan received a torrent of harsh scoldings.
As a result, the author could not handle the readers’ criticisms and directly dropped the story and ran off.
The ending for the two male leads had remained unclear.
To keep the plot of this novel world moving forward, he naturally had to resolve the issue right at its root.
And the root was Chu Xingyan, who had not yet turned into a twisted individual.
No, once he returned to the Lu family, he would be Lu Xingyan.
“Is my uncle asking me to fight for the Lu family fortune?” Chu Xingyan looked somewhat surprised.
Although Jinyao Group was indeed one of the top conglomerates in the country, to say he had zero interest in that wealth would be untrue.
Yet if his uncle desired a lot of money, he would certainly work hard for it.
Hearing Chu Xingyan put it that way, Song Jianbai suddenly burst out with a chuckle, for reasons unknown.
“That is not what I mean. You simply need to understand that your existence is an eyesore and a thorn in the flesh for that pair of mother and son. Even if you claim to have no interest in that wealth, they will never believe you. Rather than passively taking hits, it is better to take the initiative and strike first.”
The fortune of Jinyao Group wasn’t enough to make Song Jianbai lose his head over money.
Besides, if Chu Xingyan didn’t step up to fight for it, Jinyao Group would end up being completely squandered by his older stepbrother.
In the end, when that mother and son ran off, all the debts would fall squarely onto Chu Xingyan’s shoulders.
Naturally, the subsequent plotline was never written.
Actually, Song Jianbai felt that once things reached that point, it was the prime setup for a comeback story, which would make the plot much more engaging.
Unfortunately, the author couldn’t withstand the readers’ abusive comments and ultimately abandoned the work.
If Song Jianbai hadn’t known about the tough plights writers faced in reality, he probably would have also thought the author didn’t cherish the characters they created.
Yet in truth, many authors couldn’t even afford proper meals and had no choice but to find regular jobs.
Meanwhile, workers like Xixi and himself existed precisely to maintain these literary worlds.
Since Song Jianbai himself was a character within a novel, he naturally hoped even more to complete his missions successfully.
Chu Xingyan闻言, also felt somewhat perplexed.
Clearly, he didn’t care about that wealth, so why did those people insist on projecting their own greedy motives onto him?
Since that was the case, he would definitely have to go back.
Just as his uncle said, even if he didn’t care about the fortune, the other party wouldn’t believe it anyway.
Although he held no real emotional attachment to his birth mother, the current husband and wife of the Lu family were the direct culprits who drove his mother to her death.
Even if they had truly loved each other back then, why did the man still agree to get engaged and married to his mother?
After marrying his mother, why couldn’t he sever ties with that woman?
Therefore, in Chu Xingyan’s heart, compared to that woman, he loathed the father he had never truly known even more.
That man could comfortably enjoy the love of two women with a clear conscience.
In Chu Xingyan’s eyes, that father was purely malicious to the core.
“I pretty much know what I need to do now,” Chu Xingyan stated.
Just as his uncle said, whatever rightfully belonged to him was definitely not something he should yield.
Seeing that Chu Xingyan seemed to have figured things out so quickly, Song Jianbai was somewhat astonished.
He had figured it out way too fast.
Originally, he had expected it to take a month for him to complete this mission.
Yet sometimes, the earlier Chu Xingyan learned about these truths, the more thorough his preparations could be.
According to the original plot, for reasons unknown, the original owner didn’t cripple Chu Xingyan, but he had nearly gotten him expelled from Beicheng University.
Normally, schools would only ask students to take a leave of absence or suspend their studies.
Getting directly expelled was definitely no minor matter.
This also resulted in Chu Xingyan’s status within the Lu family dropping significantly.
Originally, Elder Lu cared deeply about this estranged grandson living outside, but for some reason, that slight favorability from Elder Lu completely vanished later on.
In the end, Elder Lu was angered to death by Chu Xingyan’s older stepbrother, yet rumors spread in the outside world that Chu Xingyan was the one who had literally angered his grandfather to death.
This gave the Jinyao board of directors even more reason to refuse to acknowledge Chu Xingyan’s position as heir.
It wasn’t until Chu Xingyan’s older stepbrother inherited Jinyao, only for accidents to pile up one after another alongside massive transfers of capital, that things changed.
When the company was reduced to an empty shell on the verge of bankruptcy, this hot potato fell right back into Chu Xingyan’s hands.
By that point, the plot had already reached its middle-to-late stages.
That was when the other male lead reappeared.
Of course, if we talked about how mildly Chu Xingyan was scolded by readers earlier, it was mostly because they felt pity for him.
Yet starting from this period onward, the readers cursing him formed massive mobs.
In other words, after taking over this crumbling company, Chu Xingyan went on to subject the other male lead to a toxic romance, and then the author dropped the novel entirely.
Right now, Song Jianbai found himself growing somewhat more curious about the person who liked Chu Xingyan.
If he hadn’t experienced the whole ordeal involving his own younger sister and Fu Yi.
His choice would definitely be to tear those two apart first before doing anything else.
Song Jianbai returned to his own room and began to seriously ponder his next moves.
As for the matters concerning the Lu family, Song Jianbai wasn’t actually all that worried.
Protagonists like these possessed genuine capability.
Therefore, what he still needed to do was teach Chu Xingyan how to love someone, how to express his affections, and how to cherish the person he loved.
(Banhaia Novel, much joy)