Jiang Yan got out of the car, carrying the bouquet of flowers in his arms as he walked in.
Just a few meters inside the entrance stood a small security booth, glowing faintly with a yellow light. Other than that, there was no illumination. The entire cemetery was shrouded in darkness.
In the silence of the night, it felt a bit eerie.
Yet Jiang Yan’s face remained calm from beginning to end, completely expressionless.
He walked past the security booth and went straight into the depths of the cemetery.
Eventually, he stopped in front of a tombstone.
He crouched down and respectfully placed the bouquet before it.
Though there was no artificial lighting, under the soft glow of the moonlight, the inscription on the tombstone was still visible.
The tombstone was incredibly simple—so simple that just a few words summed up her entire life:
[Here Lies Shen Qiuya.
Born February 2004.
Passed away June 25, 2024.
Erected with respect by her friend, Jiang Yan.]
Jiang Yan’s face didn’t show sorrow or pain—if anything, it held only solemn dignity.
He crouched there, gently brushing the photo on the tombstone with his fingers.
The smiling girl in the photo looked exactly like Yu Youwei.
As he gazed at Shen Qiuya’s image, his expression turned distant, as if he had been pulled back into the memories of five years ago.
He had never actually known Shen Qiuya.
But Shen Qiuya had saved his life—or rather, she had died because of him.
It was the second year after he had been admitted to Tianhai University.
After completing a practical stock market class in his economics course, he used a few tens of thousands of yuan as capital to enter the stock market. With sharp instincts, he made over 100,000 yuan on his first trade.
That win inflated his confidence. He reinvested everything he had—capital and profit—back into the market. After several rounds of trading, he managed to earn 1 million yuan.
He was riding high, drunk on profit and ambition. Just as he aimed to hit an even bigger target, the unexpected happened—just as expected.
Because gains for some meant losses for others.
When he profited, retail investors elsewhere were losing everything.
Some of them had wiped out their savings and taken on massive loans. Enraged and desperate, they grouped up, used technical methods to uncover Jiang Yan’s identity and home address.
They tracked his routine for over ten days. Once they had everything figured out—time, location, person—they acted.
On June 25, the hired killer made his move.
He entered Tianhai University, found the economics class of 1705, and walked to the first row, third seat from the left. Without hesitation, he pulled out a knife and stabbed the target ten times straight into the heart and major arteries.
Everything was done in under ten seconds.
But he had killed the wrong person.
Jiang Yan hadn’t attended that class.
The girl sitting in that seat… was Shen Qiuya.
When the emergency team arrived, the doctors pronounced her dead on the spot. Just like that, an innocent life was gone.
Jiang Yan was furious. This chapter was taken from g.com without permission.
He spent 1 million yuan to hire a top lawyer, ensuring the killer and those behind it were sentenced. The killer and the mastermind both received the death penalty. The rest got suspended death sentences.
When Jiang Yan went to Shen Qiuya’s hometown to offer compensation to her family, he was stunned.
It finally made sense why no one had come to Tianhai City to handle her funeral.
She was from a remote mountain village.
She had been raised by her grandparents. The old couple told him about her parents—her father was a gambler, her mother an alcoholic, and she had a younger brother who bullied her constantly.
She was beaten and scolded regularly. Eventually, her family, possibly seeing no use for her now that they had a son, abandoned her on the roadside.
Her grandparents had taken her in and raised her.
Shen Qiuya was obedient and hardworking from a young age. She always ranked first in her class. She had earned admission to the prestigious Tianhai University. And just days before her death, she had been accepted into a graduate program at Central South University.
Such an outstanding girl… gone just like that.
His thoughts returned to the present.
Jiang Yan silently stared at the girl’s bright smile in the photo.
Even he couldn’t explain what exactly he felt toward her.
It definitely wasn’t love.
But the first time he saw Yu Youwei—whose face resembled Shen Qiuya’s by almost 90%—he had been shocked, even a little frightened.
Maybe out of guilt, or something else, he started spending time with Yu Youwei, trying to make up for what had happened, to deceive himself with some form of compensation.
But gradually, things changed.
He fell for her. Truly fell into the whirlpool of love.
Summer weather was always unpredictable.
A sudden gust of wind blew by, and dark clouds rolled in fast across the sky.
Jiang Yan came back to himself and looked up.
It was raining.
What started as a light drizzle quickly turned into a downpour.
It was time to go.
Just as he stood up to leave, a girl’s voice rang out suddenly.
“Ah!”
Caught off guard, Jiang Yan was knocked down by a girl who fell with him.
His back hit the ground hard.
The girl, however, landed on top of him and was completely unharmed.
“I-I’m sorry!”
A moment later, Jiang Yan felt the weight lift off his body.
He stood up and, under the pale moonlight, could just barely make out her outline.
From her voice, she sounded young.
She was dressed in all black from head to toe. If not for her fair and delicate face, he might not have realized she was even there.
The sudden appearance of someone like this in a cemetery at night… was honestly a little terrifying.
Rain fell harder and faster.
Jiang Yan patted the dirt off his clothes and said calmly, “Forget it, no harm done.”
The girl looked a little embarrassed.
“I’m sorry… I don’t have any money.”
Jiang Yan frowned slightly. “I didn’t ask you for compensation.”
He then asked, “Are you alone?”
The girl nodded. “Mm.”
“A girl alone in a cemetery at night. Aren’t you scared?”
She paused for a second, then replied, “Huh? Why would I be scared?”
Her question made him fall silent.
She timidly extended her hand and said with a shy smile, “Hi, I’m Gu Xinyou.”
Jiang Yan looked at her outstretched hand, suspicion rising in his heart.
Was she here deliberately to approach him?
He couldn’t help but wonder.
After all, the timing was too coincidental. Alone. Late at night. In a cemetery. And she just happened to run into him.
Too perfect. He didn’t buy it.
Jiang Yan calmly observed her, then reached out and said, “Jiang Yan.”
Their hands touched for barely a second before letting go.
But he didn’t miss the slight tremble in her fingers.
Testing her, Jiang Yan asked, “Who are you here to mourn?”
“My parents,” she replied.
Jiang Yan was taken aback.
“They’ve passed away?”
“Yes.”
“I’m sorry.”
That caught him off guard. Still skeptical, he continued probing, “May I visit them too? We met here by chance, and even if I didn’t know them, I’d like to pay my respects out of courtesy.”