Mo Xiuchen pushed open the door to the hospital room. On the bed, Mo Jingteng immediately turned to look at him.
In the air tinged with the acrid scent of disinfectant, the gazes of father and son collided—one filled with weighty complexity, the other cold and detached as ice.
Mo Jingteng's expression shifted subtly before he finally opened his mouth. "Xiuchen, you've finally come. Sit down, I have something to tell you."
He knew calling himself wouldn't bring Mo Xiuchen here, so he had Dean Gu—Gu Kai's father—make the call instead, persuading Mo Xiuchen to visit.
Mo Xiuchen said nothing, his thin lips pressed into a firm, indifferent line. His long legs carried him across the room, but he stopped a few paces from the bed and said coolly, "Whatever you have to say, get on with it. I need to return to the company soon."
A flash of sorrow appeared in Mo Jingteng's eyes. The boy Mo Xiuchen once was, cheerful and lovable, had long since vanished.
Since the day his mother leapt to her death, the look he gave his father brimmed only with hatred.
At eleven, he had been kidnapped—barely escaping with his life. When he returned, broken and bruised, the doctor told them he would never grow into a 'normal' man.
Perhaps from that moment on, not even hatred remained in his gaze.
Only an icy indifference sharper than any blade.
Mo Jingteng had tried to make amends, to bridge the chasm between them, to return to what once was. But no matter how he tried, Mo Xiuchen kept him locked outside his world.
The only gesture of goodwill he accepted was joining the company. Mo Xiuchen was a sharp young man. Ever since he cheated death at eleven, he understood a simple truth: he had to become powerful.
Only through power could he avoid being preyed upon—could he take control of his own life.
With no mother, and a father lost to betrayal, he had no one to rely on but himself.
His entry into the company wasn't due to nepotism. He earned it through merit. Born for the business world, he studied tirelessly—by high school, he was already self-studying college-level courses. While his peers obediently played the part of sheltered students, he already had several job offers from top firms.
Mo Jingteng looked at his son's sharp, chiseled features and recalled the bright, innocent child he used to be. His heart ached with a bitterness beyond words.
Moved, he called softly, "Xiuchen—"
Mo Xiuchen's expression turned to frost, unmoved by the complex emotion in the old man's eyes.
Mo Jingteng was long accustomed to his son's icy façade. Seeing he wouldn't speak, he continued alone, "I never meant for Wenran to become infertile. I only feared… after that night she was drugged…"
"Even if Wenran was harmed, it's not your place to intervene."
His sentence was abruptly cut off by Mo Xiuchen's chilling voice. His eyes were like blades as they pierced him. His fists clenched at his sides, veins standing out against his forehead in barely contained rage.
It wasn't enough that he had driven his mother to death—he now sought to harm his child.
Back then, he'd been too young to protect his mother. But now? As a grown man, if he still couldn't shield the woman he loved, what worth did he have?
Mo Jingteng's face turned ashen.
Mo Xiuchen sneered, voice laced with scorn: "Xiao Wenqing is your woman. Everything she does is under your command. She failed to kill me back then, failed to ruin me—now she wants to harm the woman I love and my child? I won't let her get away with it."
"Xiuchen, I had no idea she would go that far."
Mo Jingteng, for the first time, addressed Xiao Wenqing by full name. Mo Xiuchen's eyes flickered with surprise—then his sneer deepened.
"I don't care for your excuses. I will remember this."
Every word was carved from ice. Xiao Wenqing would pay the price.
"I'm willing to apologize to Wenran," Mo Jingteng said earnestly. How had he ever trusted Xiao Wenqing's words? How could he have agreed to her schemes?
Mo Xiuchen gave a cold laugh. "Wenran doesn't care for your apology."
"I know you hate me, Xiuchen. I was wrong. Nothing I say now can earn your trust, but I am truly, sincerely sorry…"
The pain overwhelmed him—cold sweat broke across his brow, and he clutched his chest, words trailing off.
Meanwhile, in the Zhou family's living room.
Zhou Lin and Zhou Mingfu sat in stony silence on separate sofas. The atmosphere was tense and heavy.
Since returning from F City, Zhou Lin had moved into the Mo residence without so much as a phone call home. Today, Zhou Mingfu finally lost patience and summoned her.
When he asked about her investigation into Wenran's background, Zhou Lin told him she'd made a mistake—Wenran was, in fact, Wen Hongrui's biological daughter.
Zhou Mingfu, a seasoned businessman and shrewd judge of character, didn't believe her for a second. His sharp eyes bore into his daughter, making her scalp prickle.
Suddenly, Zhou Lin gagged. She clutched her mouth and rushed to the bathroom.
Inside, she took a deep breath and quickly texted Mo Zixuan, My dad doesn't believe me. Come and help.
After vomiting for several minutes, she emerged pale-faced and sat back down.
Zhou Mingfu narrowed his eyes. "Lin, are you hiding something from me?"
Zhou Lin shook her head, eyes calm and steady now that she had summoned Mo Zixuan. "Dad, I hoped more than you that Wenran wasn't really Wen Hongrui's daughter. If she weren't, I'd have a better chance. But everything I found… proved the opposite."
Her voice trailed off with a trace of regret.
Before Zhou Mingfu could respond, her phone rang.
She glanced at the screen, delight blooming across her face. "It's Zixuan. He rarely calls me first."
Zhou Mingfu's stern face softened. "Answer it. The closer he is to you, the better your chances of marrying into the Mo family."
A marriage into such a powerful house would elevate the Zhou family beyond measure.
"Hello, Zixuan," Zhou Lin said sweetly.
"Where are you now?" Mo Zixuan asked, pretending not to know.
She glanced at her father. "I'm at home, visiting my dad. Why?"
"I'll pick you up. We're going to the hospital."
"To visit Chairman Mo? Alright, I'll wait here."
Ending the call, she gave Zhou Mingfu an apologetic smile. "Dad, Zixuan asked me to go to the hospital with him to visit Chairman Mo."
Zhou Mingfu nodded approvingly. "You should go more often. With the chairman hospitalized, now's your chance to solidify your place. Maybe even move up the wedding."
"I understand."
She'd thought the same. Their wedding, set for just before the Spring Festival, was still three months away. But she was desperate to marry into the Mo family as soon as possible.
Living at the Mo residence, treated like the future matriarch, surrounded by servants and luxury—she couldn't bear to lose this gilded life.
Back at the hospital's VIP ward—
From the moment Mo Xiuchen entered, the air had grown heavy with hostility.
To him, Mo Jingteng's apology was meaningless. Even his request to meet Wenran was flatly denied, leaving him no choice but to change the subject.
"Xiuchen, your Uncle Gu says I must rest and stop worrying. The group will eventually be yours. I'll call a board meeting tomorrow to officially name you as my successor."
Mo Xiuchen remained unimpressed. "Not every sin can be atoned for."
Mo Jingteng's face tightened. "Xiuchen!"
He stared at his son's frosty features. This wasn't a pretense—he truly had gone too far, hurt him too deeply.
Mo Jingteng knew his son's nature. Without Wenran, perhaps he'd have agreed.
But now, he truly had no interest in taking over the company.
Yet without Mo Xiuchen, with his brilliance and decisiveness, the MS Group would suffer. He couldn't die in peace if it fell into the wrong hands.
After a long silence, he steeled himself. "Xiuchen, if you really hate me, then you must accept the company. Only as president will you have the power to protect Wenran."
"I already do have the power to protect her," Mo Xiuchen replied coolly.
"Then are you willing to watch me pass it to Zixuan after all your years of hard work?"
Mo Jingteng searched his face for a flicker of protest, but Mo Xiuchen's expression remained unchanged—glacial, unmoved.
He truly did not care for the company Xiao Wenqing yearned to control.
"I know you've been investigating the past. Xiuchen, if you had the power you do now back then, you wouldn't have suffered as you did. If not for yourself, at least think of the child you'll one day have with Wenran. Do you want them to go through what you did?"
A long silence. Then, at last—
"Fine. I'll accept. But on three conditions."
Mo Jingteng exhaled in relief, hope lighting his gaze. "Name them."
Mo Xiuchen's lips curled into a cold, mocking smile. "First, once I take over, you are never to interfere again. Second, you will kneel before my mother's grave and beg her forgiveness. Third—divorce Xiao Wenqing."
Color drained from Mo Jingteng's face. He clutched his chest, visibly battling his emotions. After a long pause, he said stiffly, "The first two, I accept. The last—I can't."
That surprised Mo Xiuchen.
Mo Jingteng's obsession with Xiao Wenqing was no passing whim—it spanned years.
But truthfully, the one who killed his mother wasn't Xiao Wenqing.
It was the man before him.
Had he never betrayed her, would she have jumped?
Mo Xiuchen laughed—low, bitter, filled with fury. Mo Jingteng's expression shifted again and again before he finally said, "At least not now. Give me a few months—"
Just then, Mo Xiuchen's phone rang.
He pulled it out, and at the sight of the caller ID, the frost in his eyes melted like snow in sunlight. The coldness that clung to him receded, as if swallowed by warmth.
He answered in a voice uncharacteristically gentle. "Hello, Ranran?"
"I hope I'm not interrupting your work."
Her voice, soft as wind-borne petals, soothed him through the speaker.
Mo Xiuchen's eyes softened. "Not at all. What is it?"
"I need your help… Our pharmaceutical plant is short three ingredients…"
Due to recent storms and a landslide in J City, their usual supplier had lost an entire warehouse. Though she'd reached out to other vendors, the shortage couldn't be resolved quickly.
"No problem. I'll have Ah Feng contact you. Whatever you need, tell him."
He agreed without hesitation.
"Thank you, Mo Xiuchen!"
Her cheerful tone warmed the air. Her happiness was infectious.
Mo Xiuchen's lips lifted unconsciously into a smile. "If you really want to thank me, make dinner tonight."
"Tonight's not good—I have a dinner meeting. How about lunch instead?"
"Alright. Lunch it is."
Just a few words from her, and his entire world seemed brighter.
Mo Jingteng watched his son's face—truly smiling for the first time since he was eight—and felt a pang he couldn't name.