“Regiment Commander Ji, do you also think I’m lying?” Su Nuannuan’s eyes were icy as she turned to look at the man behind her.
The sun blazed overhead in the scorching July heat, cicadas buzzing incessantly in the courtyard.
Ji Xiao’s thin lips trembled, words of rebuttal stuck in his throat, impossible to utter.
Su Nuannuan curled her lips in self-mockery. “As someone trained as a scout, if you truly cared about Su Nuannuan, how could you have allowed her to be abused by your mother for eight years?”
“You weren’t blind to it—you just didn’t want to intervene. After all, I’m the outsider here.”
Ji Xiao’s jaw tightened, and when he met the girl’s calm gaze, a pang of bitterness stirred in his dormant heart.
“That’s not true, Nuannuan, big brother…”
Su Nuannuan raised a finger to her lips. “Shh, no need to explain, and there’s no point. From today onward, I will leave the Ji family and have nothing more to do with hypocrites like you.”
“Nuannuan, don’t be impulsive.” Ji Xiao’s jaw clenched, his voice cold and strained.
What could someone like her, who couldn’t even tell the five grains apart, possibly do in the countryside?
Mother Ji covered her chest, weeping sorrowfully. “Leave the Ji family? Nuannuan, are you abandoning us? Wuwu…”
“Mom, don’t get worked up. Nuannuan won’t leave. She doesn’t know how to do anything—how could she survive without the Ji family?” Ji Xue whispered soothingly, her words laced with warning.
Yes, in the past, she had been penniless, without family or attachments, and her greatest fear was being driven out of the Ji family.
The Ji mother and daughter used this to control her, making her work for them day and night like an old ox.
Everyone believed Su Nuannuan was a bloodsucker leeching off the Ji family, and that leaving them would mean certain death.
[Host, two minutes left.] the System reminded.
Su Nuannuan rolled up her sleeve, revealing a withered, emaciated arm covered in bruises and dark scars—burns, old knife wounds—with almost no patch of unblemished skin on her slender arm.
The crowd gasped in shock.
“Heavens, so… so many injuries. They don’t look like they happened in just a day or two.”
Ji Xiao’s tall frame swayed, his sharp eagle-like eyes trembling. He took a swift step forward, wanting to grab her but afraid to touch her.
“How did this happen? Who hurt you? Why did you never say anything?” His cold voice was hoarse, like sandpaper scraping against the ground.
Su Nuannuan lowered her head, her voice faint. “Say something? To whom? You? Would you have believed me?”
She pointed to a scar that nearly ran the length of her arm, speaking as if it were an insignificant matter, her tone devoid of any emotion.
“This was from when I was eleven. Your dear mother deliberately cut me. Want to know why?”
The scene fell deathly silent, so quiet you could hear a pin drop.
Pairs of eyes stared at her with shock and pity.
No one responded, so Su Nuannuan continued indifferently, as if talking to herself. “Ji Xue got a new dress, very pretty. I couldn’t resist touching it. Ji Xue cried, saying I’d dirtied it. Madam Ji was furious and said she’d chop off my hand.”
“Pity,” the girl sighed softly, as if lamenting. “The firewood axe was too dull—it only cut to the bone.”
Ji Xiao’s Adam’s apple bobbed, his throat feeling as if blocked by a mountain.
He remembered that incident. Back then, Su Nuannuan had cried until her face was pale, saying Mother Ji had injured her.
But what had they said at the time?
They said she was being mischievous, that she was falsely accusing others.
No one had believed her.
Su Nuannuan glanced at the man’s reddened eyes and secretly curled her lips.
Feeling guilty now?
Not enough. She needed to add more fuel to the fire.
To deal with a cold, rigid, and upright tough man, guilt was the only thing that could quickly soften his heart. She needed to ride this wind and crush the weight in Ji Xiao’s heart.
Only when the scales tipped in her favor could she gain greater benefits.
Su Nuannuan looked up, her calm and clear almond-shaped eyes staring directly at Ji Xiao. “I did speak up, but no one believed me. Because under Mother Ji’s spreading rumors, I’ve already become a wicked child capable of any evil.”
Her fingers traced another raised, hideous scar. “Want to know how this one came about?”
“Enough, stop talking.” Ji Xiao, his eyes red, growled to cut her off.
No matter how wrong his mother was, she was still the mother who gave birth to him and raised him.
“Nuannuan, Big Brother knows you’ve been wronged. I will make it up to you, just stop talking.”
Su Nuannuan sneered, “Why should I stop? Didn’t you ask me where these injuries came from, why I got hurt and still didn’t want to tell you or Uncle Ji?”
She stepped closer until the man’s clean, soapy scent enveloped her, then stopped.
Raising her hand, she pressed it against his chest, feeling the hot, powerful heartbeat beneath her palm.
“It’s beating so fast. Is it fear or guilt?”
Ji Xiao looked down at the girl who only reached his chest—thin and small, like a kitten driven mad by life, her calm pupils filled with a desperate, all-or-nothing madness.
She wanted to blow things up, to drag the Ji family’s reputation through the mud, regardless of the consequences. Even if a cliff lay behind her, she would fight back with her life.
A pang struck Ji Xiao’s heart, his gaze turning cold. He couldn’t let her continue.
A chop of his hand struck the back of her neck.
[Host, one minute left.]
Perfect timing. Su Nuannuan curled her lips and allowed herself to sink into darkness.
Her petite body went limp and fell softly into Ji Xiao’s arms.
Ji Xiao, his face icy, scooped her up horizontally and faced the crowd. “Today is Uncle Su’s memorial day. Nuannuan is overwhelmed with grief and has started hallucinating, which is why she’s talking nonsense. Let’s all pretend we never heard this. If I find out anyone spreads rumors, don’t blame me for being ruthless.”
As he spoke, his imposing aura erupted like a war god emerging from mountains of corpses and seas of blood, his sharp gaze making people afraid to look directly at him.
The onlookers forced awkward smiles.
“Human nature, we understand, we understand, hehe…”
“This child is pitiful too. Ever since her parents passed, her temperament has changed completely. It must have been hard raising her all these years.”
“Ah… what a tragedy. Let’s disperse, everyone.”
“Oh dear, I forgot there’s still food cooking for the kids at home. I should go…”
“Sister Wang, wait up. I’ll come over for a bowl of soup…”
The crowd of onlookers scattered in an instant.
The front of the Ji household returned to quiet.
Holding the girl in his arms, Ji Xiao pressed his thin lips together and gave a cold glance to Mother Ji and Ji Xue. “You’d better think carefully about how to explain this to Dad. I will tell him everything truthfully.”
With that, he carried Su Nuannuan toward her bedroom.
His arms were stiff; the person in his embrace was as light as a cloud, as if with just a little more force, he could crush her.
Pushing open the door, he looked at the room as dark and oppressive as a coffin, a vein throbbing at his temple.
Narrow, dark, damp, and stiflingly hot—it was hard to breathe.
This was his first time entering Su Nuannuan’s room. He never imagined that for eight years, she had lived in such a place.
His thin lips pressed tightly together, he stood at the doorway for a moment before turning and heading upstairs.
Pushing open the first door on the left, he carefully placed her on the bed.
Standing by the bedside, he looked seriously for the first time at this girl he had despised for six years.
She was very thin, with not a trace of flesh on her face. Though she was the same age as Xiao Xue, she stood a full head shorter.
The little girl who once held a doll, delicate and fair as if carved from jade, was now being raised in their home like a flower on the verge of withering.
As if guided by some unseen force, he reached out and brushed aside the sweat-dampened hair from Su Nuannuan’s forehead. His gaze once again fell upon her rosy, full lips, and he slowly leaned in…