"Brother, let's wait for the professionals," Chen Meng urged with palpable anxiety, her voice trembling as she attempted to restrain him.
Zhao Wan'er swiftly intercepted Chen Liang's movements, her concern etched across her face. Chen Liguo's injuries were critical—the man had fallen into complete unconsciousness, and his fragile condition was intolerable to any reckless intervention. What if their actions precipitated irreversible harm?
Chen Liang turned with grave determination burning in his gaze. "Trust me, both of you. I must conduct a thorough evaluation of Father's injuries."
The women exchanged uneasy glances. While they'd grown accustomed to relying on Chen Liang's judgement in mundane affairs, this diverged entirely—a human life teetered on the brink.
Noticing their hesitation, Chen Liang locked eyes with Zhao Wan'er. That familiar wave of conviction washed over her anew, the same unshakeable faith that had carried them through countless trials. She nodded resolutely and began persuading Chen Meng.
As uncertainty lingered in the air, screeching tyres announced the medical team's arrival. Chief Physician He Feng from City Hospital—a silver-haired diagnostician renowned among the urban elite, now paradoxically relegated to emergency duties due to his refusal to court bureaucratic favour—pushed through the gathering crowd.
"Clear the perimeter! Administer oxygen immediately!" a nurse barked at the spectators.
He Feng's clinical gaze swept the scene. "Who assumes familial responsibility here?"
"I am his son," Chen Liang asserted, stepping forward. "The patient sustained bilateral tibial fractures from a third-floor fall. A subsequent collision with a tree trunk caused rib fragmentation, penetrating the left lung, resulting in massive haemothorax. Current status: critical."
The medical team froze mid-action. This precise trauma analysis belonged in surgical textbooks—the domain of seasoned ER specialists. Zhao Wan'er and Chen Meng stared in bewildered awe. When had he acquired such medical expertise?
Tang Mengru's derisive laughter shattered the moment. "Medical proficiency? This academic failure barely completed junior high! His sole 'qualification' derives from round-the-clock gaming binges!"
The revelation transformed the medical staff's initial respect into open contempt. "Have you lost all reason?" spat a bespectacled resident. "Your groundless conjectures could prove fatal!" Nurses withdrew their equipment, refusing accountability under such amateur interference.
Chen Liang's jawline hardened. Through the cacophony of jeers ("Pretentious imbecile!" "Let qualified practitioners handle this!"), he activated his newly acquired [Stellar Infusion]. Emerald luminescence shimmered imperceptibly around his palms as he lunged toward his father's thorax.
"Restrain him!" He Feng, he commanded. Yet as orderlies dragged Chen Liang backward, the verdant energy had already permeated Chen Liguo's torso.
A system notification flashed: **[Skill duration expired. Daily usage limit: 1/1.
Breathing laboriously, Chen Liang leaned against Zhao Wan'er. "Divine providence... shields Father now. He'll... endure."
His declaration coincided with Chen Liguo's sudden coughing fit—blood-tinged yet conscious. Unseen by all, the displaced rib had miraculously avoided vital vasculature; the internal haemorrhage mysteriously arrested.
First, Deal with Your Wife!
The medical staff stood frozen in uncertainty, their professional ethics wrestling with the fear of being ensnared in Chen Liang's potential schemes. Despite holding video evidence, they hesitated to intervene in Chen Liguo's deteriorating condition. The crowd, momentarily swayed by Chen Liang's demonstration of medical skill during his father's brief recovery, resumed their scornful whispers:
"What a reckless idiot! His meddling exacerbated his father's plight!"
"Thank Providence the medics documented this—otherwise, we'd witness another extortion plot!"
"Like father, like son—a gambler's spawn breeds nothing but deception!"
Chen Liang swept an arctic gaze across the jeering mob. Though privy to his father's true prognosis, public revelation remained implausible. Suddenly, Zhao Wan'er erupted like a protective tigress: "Silence! Our familial affairs demand no commentary from spectators!" Her fiery defence ignited unexpected warmth in Chen Liang's chest, starkly contrasting with Tang Mengru's veneer of solicitude.
"Expedite the examination!" Tang Mengre urged Dr He Feng, her feigned urgency barely concealing private satisfaction. To her bewilderment, Chen Liguo exhibited only paroxysmal coughing without haemorrhagic relapse. Intrigued by the youth's earlier intervention, Dr He Feng extended an olive branch: "Young man, accompany us to deliberate treatment modalities." Chen Liang declined tersely, wary of professional scrutiny.
At the hospital, Tang Mengru carped about "fiscal profligacy", while Zhao Wan'er offered silent solace through lingering tactile reassurance. Post-operation, Dr He Feng's evaluative gaze lingered—this enigmatic youth might harbour unconventional medical wisdom. Meanwhile, Tang Mengru's machinations deepened as Zhang Minghao's debt-collection ultimatum loomed like Damocles' sword.
Returning to the suffocating apartment, Chen Liang packed his belongings with finality. Tang Mengru's shrill command—"Prepare supper!"—was met with the thunderous percussion of a slamming door. Zhao Wan'er's pursuit faltered at her mother's venomous glare.
In a shadow-draped negotiation, Tang Mengru wheedled: "We require three days' grace for the 500,000..." Zhang Minghao countered with ophidian charm: "Let Wan'er grace the bar tonight. We shall... *cultivate rapport*." Disconnecting, Zhang moistened his lips—tonight's agenda prioritised "handling" the wife before pulverising the husband.
A Mother's Betrayal
"Your verdict?" Chen Liang's father-in-law queried, fingers drumming arrhythmically against the armrest.
Tang Mengru's gaze remained fixed on her phone's glaring screen, her expression a tempest of conflicting emotions.
"Out with it!" The elder's voice cracked like dry timber.
Her glare could've frozen magma. "This debacle reeks of your incompetence. On your knees!"
The man's joints hit hardwood floorboards before her final syllable faded, his bowed crown gleaming under lamplight. This display of servility only stoked her fury. With a derisive snort that could curdle milk, she swept from the chamber like a monsoon wind.
Her endorsement of Zhang Minghao's machinations stemmed from decades of smouldering ambition. While other matriarchs boasted of daughters wed to tycoons, hers remained shackled to this human-shaped disappointment. Yet even her steely resolve wavered at the thought of coercing her flesh and blood—a fleeting hesitation she drowned in bitter tea.
At supper, Zhao Wan'er's chopsticks hovered over braised pork. "Father's absence...?"
"A migraine," Tang interjected, the lie smoother than jade.
"I should—"
"He requires rest."
Postprandial silence draped the living room like funeral silk. Mother and daughter sat parallel yet galaxies apart—the younger worrying her wedding band, the elder calculating angles of seduction.
When credits rolled, their voices collided:
"Mother—"
"Darling—"
Wan'er's plea emerged first. "I must see them."
Tang's brow furrowed theatrically before enlightenment dawned. Clasping her daughter's hands with counterfeit tenderness, she sighed. "Go. Mend what's broken."
The younger woman's eyes widened—doves startled by sudden freedom. "Truly?"
A maternal nod, more puppetmaster than parent. As Wan'er's hurried kiss graced her cheek, Tang's thumbs danced across her phone screen, dispatching coordinates to Zhang Minghao with viperous precision.
"Wait!" Tang's voice halted her at the threshold. "Seeking phantoms in hospital corridors?"
Wan'er froze. Chen abhorred spirits—even medicinal ones. "Then where—?"
"Liquor's embrace numbs sharper pains." Without permitting rebuttal, Tang bundled her into a taxi, watching its taillights bleed into urban gloom before smirking at Zhang's confirmation text.
---
Meanwhile, Zhang Minghao lounged in velvet shadows, a cerulean tablet pirouetting across his knuckles. "How poetic," he mused to the absinthe-scented air, "that familial love becomes the Trojan horse." His fantasy unfolded in vivid strokes—Wan'er pliant, Chen Liang broken, himself triumphant.
---
The taxi disgorged its passenger before a neon-lit abyss. Wan'er hesitated, her reflection warping in the bar's obsidian windows. Within, sultry saxophone notes coiled around private booths like smoke serpents. Each velvet-curtained alcove whispered secrets through sporadic giggles and clinking crystal.
Approaching the appointed niche, her rebuke came half-formed: "Chen, must we meet in this den of—"
The curtain was swept aside.
Her spine straightened. "You."
Zhang's smile could've charmed Medusa. "Chen's detained. Business complications."
She perched on the booth's edge, handbag clutched like a talisman. "What dealings could you possibly share?"
"Even rivals find common cause in desperation." He swirled his brandy, the ice cube's clink accentuating his next move. "A toast to temporary truces?"
Her lips remained sealed.
The hour crawled by on crippled legs. As Wan'er rose, Zhang materialised a stein of amber liquid. "At least, honour our city's finest brew."
The first sip carried bergamot notes. The second brought swirling ceilings. Stumbling through a psychedelic haze, she thumbed Chen's number. "Seduction Bar—" The words slurred as concrete rose to meet her.
Through kaleidoscope vision, a silhouette materialised—not her husband's familiar gait, but a predator's measured tread.
Steady Your Hand, Strike Hard!
The bathroom door trembled under Zhang Minghao's vicious kicks, his lips twisting into a predatory sneer as the dull impacts reverberated through the confined space. When the stubborn lock refused to yield, he threw his full weight against the wooden barrier with a guttural roar.
Inside lay Zhao Wan'er, her porcelain skin flushed scarlet like overripe peaches. Collapsed on the cold tiles like a shattered lily, her laboured breaths sending wisps of mist spiralling into the stagnant air.
"Gulp..." Zhang's Adam's apple bobbed convulsively as he knelt beside her. Though accustomed to gold-diggers flocking to his opulence, this married siren had haunted his darkest fantasies since their first encounter—each coy smile fanning an obsession no brothel could quench.
His quivering fingers hovered millimetres from her jawline...
---
"Chen Liang... save me... Temptation Bar..." The fragmented plea from Zhao's phone ignited volcanic fury in Chen's veins.
"Lay a finger on my wife, and I'll flay your skin inch by inch!" he bellowed, hurtling down the mountain where he often sought solace in nature's embrace.
Slamming a crumpled hundred-yuan note against the cabbie's dashboard, Chen erupted into the neon-drenched bar. Strobe lights warped his vision as he ploughed through undulating bodies, roaring "Wan'er!" until the manager materialised. Seizing the man's silk collar, Chen suddenly recalled his latent ability—"Eagle's Soar."
A metallic voice resonated: "Anivia, guide me!"
Instantly, his consciousness expanded like sonar waves—every detail within 150 metres imprinting with crystalline clarity, including the familiar silhouette being dragged toward a black Mercedes.
---
"Zhang Minghao!" Chen's bloodshot eyes locked onto the predator manoeuvring Zhao's limp form into the leather seat.
Zhang turned, momentary surprise dissolving into contempt as he noted Chen's alcohol-induced stagger. The beer bottle swung in a feeble arc, easily dodged.
"Pathetic worm," Zhang sneered, wrenching the bottle away. "No wonder her womb's remained barren all these years." Leaning until their breaths mingled, he hissed, "I'll etch the memory of true virility between her thighs. This... is your karma for daring to defy me."
As tyres screeched into the night, darkness encroached Chen's vision... until golden coins materialised in his mind's eye.
_Stamina is restored through fiscal alchemy.
---
Reborn via monetary transmutation, Chen seized the bottle and materialised before the accelerating Mercedes. Brakes shrieked as the bumper kissed his shins.
Zhang leaned out, mockingly tapping his temple: "Encore, weakling? Steady your hand! Strike hard! Make it _hurt_!"
Decadal Retribution
"Pathetic worm—"
The insult crystallised mid-air as a Bordeaux bottle arced through chiaroscuro lighting, exploding against Zhang Minghao's parietal bone in a cathedral-like shatter of crimson droplets and fractured glass.
"Agh—!"
A guttural scream tore through Zhang Minghao's throat, his manicured hands fluttering like wounded doves over the arterial spray patterning his Brioni shirt. Through vision blurred by pain and disbelief, he gaped at Chen Liang—this human doormat had metamorphosed into something primal, eyes glinting like honed Damascus steel.
"You gutter-born cur—"
*Crack!*
Chen Liang's calloused palm engulfed Zhang's accusatory finger, executing a precise metacarpal dislocation with the clinical efficiency of a Hangzhou noodle chef snapping dried bamboo shoots. The would-be Casanova crumpled against Lamborghini leather, his ashen complexion mirroring the car's pearl-white interior.
Methodically, Chen Liang brought his size-43 oxford down in piston-like strikes—a cobbler's hammer meeting spoilt hide. The Gucci seatbelt transformed into a silken straitjacket, trapping Zhang's thrashing form as the polished brogue imprinted bloody tread patterns across features once deemed "charmingly roguish" by society pages. Only when the face resembled a Pollock painting executed in haemoglobin did Chen Liang's breathing regulate to a combat medic rhythm.
"Mercy! I implore—!" Zhang's plea emerged as a wet gurgle, tears diluting the carmine streaks on his cheeks.
Bystanders coalesced like vultures drawn to roadkill, smartphone flashes illuminating the scene. Chen Liang remained unmoved until a whimper from the backseat sliced through his wrath—Zhao Wan'er's drug-slurred murmur, her Dior blouse gaping like a storm-ravaged peony.
He fisted a handful of Zhang's greasy hair, yanking until their noses almost touched. "Should there be a next encounter", Chen Liang's whisper carried the frost of Harbin winters, "I'll gift-wrap your genitals for your mother's Qingming altar." Dragging his semi-conscious wife from the vehicle, he paused at the driver's window to spit a globule of contempt that sizzled against bulletproof glass.
"Vermin."
The Lamborghini's custom exhaust roared a futile counterpoint to Zhang's animalistic howl that echoed through the Gangnam-style night.
---
In the ER's fluorescent purgatory, Chen Liang cradled Zhao Wan'er as her Chanel No. 5 perfume warred with ketamine-sweat musk. The taxi driver's rearview mirror eyes narrowed at their dishevelment until Chen Liang's guttural "Floor it!" shattered his judgement.
"Incinerating..." Zhao Wan'er's fingers clawed at her throat, the Rohypnol transforming her usually poised movements into a marionette's jerky dance.
"Arctic blast!" Chen Liang barked at the climate controls. The cab became a meat locker, their mingled breath crystallising as her whimpers crescendoed—a dissonant opera punctuated by honking BMWs.
Nurses recoiled upon recognising Chen Liang from last month's "espresso machine assault incident". His barked "Stabilise her!" sent them scrambling like kicked pebbles.
Post-gastric lavage, Zhao Wan'er's porcelain complexion rivalled the hospital sheets. Chen Liang maintained his deathwatch vigil, the cardiac monitor's blips counting seconds as his mind dissected ugly probabilities: *Why the clandestine rendezvous? Had the prenup's ink dried too slowly?*
Dawn's first rays gilded her fluttering eyelids. "Hydrosphere..." she croaked, tongue thick as a Shanghai dumpling.
Chen Liang angled the straw with bomb-disposal precision. "Tepid hydration," he intoned, the IV drip keeping tempo with his clipped words.
"Geo...location?" Her pupils contracted in post-trauma confusion.
"Peking Union ER. Zhang's cocktail hour required...intervention."
Her gasp parted cracked lips. "We didn't...conjoin?"
"Rectitude prevailed." His jawline hardened. "Even beggars decline stolen banquets."
Her laughter tinkled like shattered stemware. "Prevaricator! Had passion's flame—"
The EKG's staccato alarm severed her accusation. Beyond quarantine glass, the rising sun gilded Beijing's skyline, where Zhang Minghao—his face resembling a poorly wrapped zongzi—painstakingly dialled his pawnshop using splinted fingers.
"Ransack Tingyunzhai!" he snarled through missing incisors, blood speckling the gold-plated iPhone.
Studying his reflection in a chrome bedpan—this once-dapper predator now reduced to a mummified caricature—he lisped through swollen lips, "Chen Liang, I shall sculpt your suffering like jade—stroke for stroke, decade for decade."
The Audacity of Dowry Demands
Following Zhao Wan'er's departure, Tang Mengru promptly notified Chen Liang's father-in-law regarding Zhang Minghao's orchestrated drinking rendezvous with her daughter. The conspiratorial pair uncorked crimson libations to toast their machinations. Should their scheme succeed in binding Zhang Minghao through matrimony, not only would familial debts dissolve like morning mist, but they would gain an ostensibly impeccable son-in-law while extracting an additional million from Chen Liang's coffers.
*A full million!*
Though aware of Chen Liang's gaming proclivities and Old Ma's recent financial interventions, the couple remained blissfully indifferent to monetary origins - their avaricious gaze fixed solely on the glittering prize.
When Zhao Bao'er returned to witness her parents' jubilant atmosphere, she quipped with adolescent impudence, "Plotting to expand our impoverished household with a third offspring? Have you forgotten our destitute circumstances? Another month would bankrupt us completely!" Her barbed humor nearly induced cardiac arrest in the middle-aged pair, who barely restrained themselves from administering corporal punishment to their impertinent progeny.
As midnight's cloak enveloped the city, the wine-slackened couple retired with conspiratorial smiles, their eldest daughter's continued absence met with perverse satisfaction.
---
By midday's golden hour, Zhao Wan'er emerged from clinical sterility into the sunlight's embrace. Chen Liang, however, steadfastly refused homecoming. The spectral memory of his mother-in-law's venomous provocations that drove his father to the brink kept him exiled, unable to endure either her basilisk glare or inevitable financial reclaims. Wan'er herself returned alone, psyche still lacerated by recent traumas.
Tang Mengru descended upon her daughter like a carrion bird spotting weakness. Observing Wan'er's tousled tresses, smudged cosmetics, and soul-weary countenance, she erupted in cryptic, triumphal laughter. "Splendid, simply splendid!" she crowed, a talon-like grip imprisoning her daughter's wrist. "You must be utterly spent, darling. Name your culinary desire - Mother shall prepare a feast!"
Wan'er's brow furrowed. *Spent?* Where were the expected interrogations regarding her nocturnal absence?
"Mother... what shadow play are you staging?" Wan'er demanded, cornering Tang against the kitchen's stainless steel.
The older woman fumbled with cookware, ocular contact evasive. "Preposterous! Would I—"
"Then illuminate last night's treachery!" Wan'er's voice cracked like a whip. "Your fabricated tale of Chen Liang at the tavern concealed Zhang Minghao's snare! Had my husband not intervened, he would've—" Her vocal cords constricted, strangling the unspeakable.
Tang Mengru conjured counterfeit contrition, though her vulpine gaze betrayed calculation. Too enervated for combat, Wan'er sought sanctuary behind locked chamber doors.
---
The shrill persistence of cellular summons shattered her tenuous repose. Xu Jialing's effervescent tones bubbled through the receiver: "Wan'er! I'm expiring from ennui! Rendezvous at our habitual haunt!"
Despite melancholic inertia, Wan'er changed from Chen Liang's gifted gown - now psychologically contaminated by Zhang Minghao's violation - discarding it into refuse like soiled innocence.
At the coffee emporium, dual beauties magnetized every masculine ocular orbit. Xu lamented her vanished digital paramour: "Two sunless cycles offline! My essence withers like unwatered peonies!"
Wan'er's eyeballs performed an exasperated revolution. "What if your 'Lion Hound' proves wedded? Or worse - feminine?"
"Impossible!" Xu declared, tossing her mane like an offended thoroughbred. "No mortal compares to my celestial 'Shi' Quan'—not even your ne'er-do-well spouse!" Their silvery laughter ignited jealous conflagrations among adjacent couples, distraught girlfriends torqueing their companions' auricular appendages.
---
Meanwhile, Tang Mengru's simpering tones slithered through telephone lines: "Regarding our... understanding about debts and the bride price—"
Zhang Minghao's voice congealed to arctic frost: "Madame Tang. You dare broach *dowry* with me?"
An Unexpected Encounter
Tang Mengru stood motionless, her knuckles whitening around the phone.
Zhang Minghao's voice carried a metallic harshness, tinged with an unfamiliar edge.
After three measured breaths, she ventured cautiously, "Minghao? Has some trouble arisen? Wan'er returned at noon after being absent all night. Weren't you accompanying her?"
"Keep your mouth shut!" The venom in his retort made her recoil. "Transfer the 500,000 debt by dawn tomorrow, or there will be consequences neither of us desires." A pause crackled through the line. "Your precious son-in-law shoulders full responsibility for this."
Before her lips could form another inquiry, the dial tone hummed its mechanical dirge.
"That wretched Chen Liang!" She growled through clenched teeth, stabbing at her phone's screen with manicured nails. "What fresh calamity has he conjured?"
When the connection was established, her fury erupted like magma through a volcanic vent: "You incompetent leech! What unspeakable folly have you committed?"
The ensuing diatribe would have shamed a dockworker, each syllable dripping with decades of accumulated resentment. When the tempest subsided, only digital silence answered.
"Are you feigning deafness now?" She barked, verifying the ongoing connection with a glance.
After two heartbeats, Chen Liang's voice emerged—steady, almost detached: "Did you require something specific?"
The realisation that he'd muted her tirade transformed her rage into supernova intensity. "You will deliver the funds by sunrise, or I swear by every ancestor—"
Her oath dissolved into empty air as the call terminated.
"Impudent whelp!" She glared at the darkening screen as if it housed his essence. "Just await your reckoning at twilight's return!"
---
**People's Hospital**
Chen studied his smartphone's blank face, then shifted his gaze to the hospital bed where his father lay enmeshed in a spiderweb of tubes. Though his digital accounts still displayed six figures, the financial vise tightened mercilessly—upgrading his [Clairvoyant Perception]^1 to Tier IV demanded a king's ransom of ten million.
After murmuring final instructions to his sister, Chen Meng, he strode toward destiny's next act: West Street's Antique Bazaar.
---
**Antique Market**
Old Ma, the septuagenarian appraiser whose eyes held eight decades of forged jades and genuine regrets, greeted him with a tobacco-stained grin. "Young Master Chen! To what do we owe this unexpected honour?"
"Liquidity concerns," Chen replied, fingertips brushing against a Han dynasty bronze. "Are there... alternative revenue streams you might recommend?"
The antiquarian's smile withered. "There exist the jadeite gambling dens^2—a viper's nest compared to our gentlemanly trade here. Misjudge a single stone's heart, and you'll exit carrying your entrails in a beggar's sack."
Chen's palms moistened. His [penetrative gaze]^1, which revealed the spectral haloes of antiquities, might pierce sedimentary secrets.
"Be my Virgil through this inferno," he implored.
---
**Jade Gambling Venue—Junyue Mansion**
Gleaming Lamborghinis and stately Rolls-Royces lined the circular driveway, where black-suited sentinels examined invitations like Vatican archivists. As Old Ma presented their credentials, a mechanical snarl shredded the twilight calm.
"Well, well... If it isn't Chen Liang?"
A coterie of silk-clad princelings emerged from their automotive armada. At the vanguard stood Xia Yu—his middle school infatuation who'd orchestrated his public humiliation via forged love letters. Her current consort, Meng Chen, surveyed him like a biologist examining a lab specimen.
"So this is the proletarian poet who serenaded you with doggerel verses?"
Their retinue's laughter cascaded like shattering crystal.
Not Enemies Do Not Gather
The crowd's derisive laughter drew swelling waves of spectators. Chen Liang cast an indifferent glance toward Xia Yu, offering no explanations.
Meng Chen draped his arm over Chen Liang's shoulder with theatrical condescension. "What's this? Even gutter vermin dare tread these hallowed halls of gemstone gambling?" He addressed his entourage with a sneer, curling his lips, "How far this event's standards have fallen. Now, every alley rat thinks itself worthy of a jade appraisal. What incompetent curators permit such defilement?"
His sycophantic chorus erupted in cruel cachinnation.
At the velvet-rope checkpoint, Old Ma turned with leonine dignity, his gaze sweeping over Meng Chen. "Young Chen, are these peacocks known to you?"
Chen Liang's eyes traversed Xia Yu's crimson-flushed countenance before replying with glacial composure, "Strangers all."
Meng Chen's smirk congealed into a rictus grin, venom pooling in narrowed eyes. Xia Yu worried her rosebud lips between pearl-white teeth, affronted by this street urchin's insolence. Yet, compared to Meng Chen's bespoke Savile Row elegance, Chen Liang's threadbare attire confirmed his irrelevance. She suppressed a contemptuous sniff.
Old Ma, sensing the charged atmosphere, gestured toward the marble archway. "Shall we proceed?"
As Chen Liang moved to follow, Meng Chen materialised as a human barricade. No provincial upstart humiliated Meng Chen publicly and escaped unscathed. Honour demanded recompense in blood.
"Objection?" Chen Liang enquired, his voice as calm as still waters.
"Merely educational." Meng Chen's arm coiled around Xia Yu's wasp waist, crushing her against his Armani-clad torso. Before the gawping mob, he devoured her mouth in a bruising kiss that left her gasping. Xia Yu performed a coquettish protest, rapping manicured nails against his chest before melting into the embrace, her LV satin clutch glinting under crystal chandeliers.
"Behold your chaste campus goddess," Meng Chen sneered, lips glistening with transferred lipstick. "My obedient b*tch who dances to my whistle." He hungered for Chen Liang's erupting fury – the perfect pretext for demolition.
Yet Chen Liang merely turned away, disappointment shadowing his gaze like tarnished silver. The ethereal maiden of his memory now reeked of cheap opium perfume and desperation. Her complicity in this vulgar theatre extinguished his final ember of nostalgia.
Meng Chen's jawline hardened at the anticlimax. Xia Yu fluttered anxious fingers over his Brioni lapel. "Why soil your magnificence with gutter refuse, Young Master Meng? He's beneath your notice."
With a vicious chin pinch that left crescent marks, Meng Chen barked mirthless laughter. "Silver-tongued serpent." His entourage swaggered past unchecked security into the gated sanctum.
---
**The Stone Colosseum**
Beyond lay an open-air plaza sprawling with sixty canopied pavilions – a mineral kingdom of raw jadeite boulders. Old Ma surveyed the scene through half-moon spectacles. "I've witnessed minor auctions, but never ten thousand nephrite embryos in congress. Many fortunes shall be midwifed tonight."
A bombastic voice interrupted: "Child's play compared to Mogok's gem bazaars!" A jewellery magnate waddled forth, his bull neck draped in Imperial Green jade necklaces. Recognising Old Ma, his bluster evaporated into obsequious bowing. "Master Ma! This humble merchant is honoured beyond measure!"
Old Ma presented Chen Liang as a protégé. The merchant's porcine eyes narrowed appraisingly – until Meng Chen's mocking baritone cut through the murmuring crowd.
---
**Clash of Celestial Blades**
The trio turned to behold Meng Chen's approach, with Xia Yu draped over him like human bijouterie. Chen Liang's gaze met hers – a spark of old electricity that stained her cheeks peony red.
Meng Chen's grin revealed lupine incisors. "Fancy encountering trash compactors in this rarefied air." His jackals formed a tightening perimeter, nostrils flaring for bloodsport.
Chen Liang's fingertips brushed a nearby nephrite monolith, its veined surface whispering geological secrets. Let them bark. Soon, very soon, the stones would sing their mineral truths.
Teaching Him a Lesson!
Xia Yu momentarily froze in place.
Having crossed paths at the entrance moments prior, she never anticipated encountering Chen Liang again amidst the labyrinth of fifty-odd exhibition stalls. Deliberately turning her porcelain features away, she feigned obliviousness - resolved to maintain this charade even should he initiate conversation.
She dared not risk rekindling Meng Chen's wrath.
In her mental calculus, Chen Liang remained perpetually branded as the lovelorn "underdog" who'd once penned adolescent missives. Though now draped in Armani finery, she rationalized it must be some online counterfeit worth mere hundreds - perhaps even dozens - of yuan. The notion of him possessing genuine luxury seemed less credible than trusting Meng Chen's saccharine vows of eternal devotion.
Chen Liang's gaze sharpened upon the jadeite monolith before him. Through his clairvoyant perception, the stone's outer crust dissolved like morning mist, revealing a pulsating crimson core - a colossal slab measuring 30x40cm and weighing over a hundred _jin_ (50kg). His breath shallowed.
Though a neophyte to stone gambling, basic knowledge whispered that blood-red jadeite eclipsed common emerald varieties in rarity. More astonishing still, its heart harbored a fiery nucleus resembling molten sunset - premium-grade material exceeding 10kg. Properly carved, this leviathan might command nine figures...
"Chen Liang?" Old Ma's query hung unanswered as the youth remained transfixed by the price plaque.
**"Fifty million yuan!"
The figure struck like a physical blow. Burdened by his mother-in-law's extortionate demands, he'd leveraged Old Ma's connections to infiltrate this high-stakes arena. Yet after hemorrhaging 200,000 yuan on gold coins, designer façades, and paternal surgery, his remaining half-million constituted a mere 1% of this colossus's value. The cruel irony - discovering El Dorado while lacking pickaxes.
"Fancy this specimen?" Old Ma probed.
"Potentially," Chen Liang conceded through tight lips.
"Fifty million?!" The veteran's gasp echoed through the hall.
Dealer Zhao interjected with the merchant's fervor, "Young Master Chen possesses a falcon's vision! This rough could crown the event's champion!" The assessment aligned with Chen Liang's intuition, yet he turned away - a predator forced to hunt sparrows for capital.
Meng Chen observed through slitted eyes as the "ant" departed without customary deference. How dared this gutter-risen wretch slight him? Noting Chen Liang's tentative foray into gambling, a venomous scheme crystallized: **"Let me instruct this parvenu in his rightful station."**
Still Not Humiliated Enough?
The crowd overflowed beyond containment, leaving not an inch of breathing room. Impatient spectators behind Meng Chen shouldered past those obstructing their path, their tailored suits and predatory demeanor silencing complaints from displaced onlookers who resorted to craning necks at the periphery. All eyes tracked the stallkeeper's grinding wheel biting into Old Ma's jadeite rough.
*"Vrrrrrrmmm..."
The relentless whine of machinery accompanied dozens of bated breaths as the stone fractured under pressure. When Old Ma's chosen specimen revealed only pallid granite beneath its weathered crust, a collective groan rippled through the assembly.
"Devil's luck! Fifty-three thousand evaporated like morning mist," Old Ma cursed, his celebrated expertise in Ming porcelain authentication offering cold comfort against this brutal gamble.
"Fortune favors the persistent, Old Ma. Let's test mine next," consoled Mr. Zhao, presenting his selected boulder. The shopkeeper positioned it with ceremonial precision beneath the spinning disc.
*"Emerald! The green reveals itself!"
A faint jade hue emerged through the swirling dust. Mr. Zhao's lips twitched with restrained triumph as he rolled up his silk sleeves. "Allow me," he declared, taking command of the grinder.
The crowd erupted into frenzied bidding:
"One hundred thousand! Cease grinding!"
"One-fifty!"
"Two hundred!"
Contrary to expectations, Mr. Zhao accepted the highest offer. The transaction completed, the new owner resumed cutting with feverish urgency - only to expose a thumb-sized jade fragment drowning in a granite matrix. "Ruined! Two hundred thousand for scraps barely worth ten!" the assembly lamented.
Chen Liang observed in contemplative silence as attendants positioned his chosen specimen - the stall's crown jewel priced at seven figures - beneath the steering wheel. Meng Chen sneered through cigar smoke: "These inferior stones from obscure quarries wouldn't qualify as landscaping gravel. Only brain-addled fools purchase such dregs." His sycophantic entourage erupted in obsequious laughter.
When initial grinding revealed barren stone, Meng Chen shoved his companion Xia Yu toward Chen with malicious glee: "Should this refuse yield jade, you may claim her company tonight!" Chen stepped aside with feline grace, sending her sprawling across the gritty pavement.
"You...!" Xia Yu scrambled upright, her vermilion nails quivering as she jabbed accusatory fingers. "Still the same wretched failure! What sightless creature would shackle herself to your misery?"
"My marital prospects remain none of your theater," Chen countered calmly, watching her raised palm tremble in mid-air.
Meng Chen yanked her back with icy control: "Enough pantomime." As they turned to depart, a collective gasp froze them mid-stride - within Chen's stone glimmered the telltale verdant whisper of buried jade. The crowd's indrawn breath mirrored Meng Chen's petrified smirk; his absolute judgment was defied by the unlikeliest of challengers.
I Acknowledge Your Judgment
Meng Chen's entourage pivoted in orchestrated disdain, their aristocratic gazes dripping glacial contempt as they vocalized their derision:
"What emerald novice dares trespass upon the jadeite's ballet? Clinging still to delusions of concealed fortune?"
"Certified simpleton. Even His Grace Meng's sagely verdict proclaimed it valueless."
"Let the mendicant beggar indulge! Cleave the stone and witness his tearful enlightenment!"
"HAH!" Their crystalline laughter froze the marketplace atmosphere.
The portly merchant hesitated, cradling the quarry of dwindling worth. "Young master... further incision yields no terrestrial purpose."
Zhao tendered measured counsel: "Consider this your initiation tax. All neophytes pay their tribute." Even Elder Ma bore a fractured visage—half yearning for alchemical revelation, half anticipating the upstart's humiliating descent.
Undaunted, Chen Liang ignited the polishing mechanism. His artless maneuvers bred fresh mockery until...
"By the Celestial Jade Emperor's beard! Liquid-glass jadeite!"
"Six hundred thousand!"
"Seven!"
The throng erupted as viridescent splendor emerged beneath Chen Liang's grinding wheel. The merchant blanched—this Myanmar discard from tertiary pits should never have harbored such divine treasure.
Meng Chen's countenance darkened. Though the gem measured mere signet dimensions, its existence defied his prophetic decree. Through quicksilver-stiffened lips, he intoned, "A million. And tonight's celestial banquet at Moonlit Lake Manor."
When Chen Liang withheld the prize, Xia Yu thrust promissory parchment into his palm: "Dost thou dare scorn His Grace Meng's magnanimity?"
Yet as Meng's jackal reached covetously, Chen Liang snapped the jewel beyond mortal grasp: "When did consent ever grace thy serpent's tongue?"
Shameless!
Chen Liang pressed the jade into Boss Zhao's weathered palms.
"Mr. Zhao, I'll part with it for eight hundred thousand," he declared, thrusting Meng Chen's million-yuan check back at the henchmen.
The crowd stood in stunned silence. Meng Chen's entourage froze mid-step as their leader removed his sunglasses with deliberate slowness, his glacial stare piercing through the humid air. "You dare spurn my generosity?" His velvet tone carried the edge of a whetted blade.
Xia Yu, desperation twisting her cosmetic-perfect features, dragged Chen Liang aside. "Accept his offer," she hissed, scarlet lips brushing his earlobe in a cloud of cloying perfume, "and I'll... compensate you privately tonight."
Chen Liang recoiled as memory assaulted him - the classroom humiliation years prior, when this same woman had theatrically shredded his anonymous love note before sneering classmates, crowning him "the pond-dweller craving swan's flesh."
"Unthinkable," he ground out, striding away with Boss Zhao and Old Ma.
Meng Chen's laughter pursued them like shattering crystal: "Mark this - not one stone in this market shall grace your hands until you kneel in supplication!"
---
**Dusk's Embrace, Junyue Mansion Perimeter**
A black Lamborghini materialized from the twilight; its engine snarl was echoed by a pack of growling sports cars. Meng Chen emerged haloed in neon, a smirk carved from arctic ice: "The rules are mine to shape, Chen Liang. This playground admits no interlopers."
Xia Yu staggered from a convertible, evening gown torn at the shoulder. "Please," she clawed at Chen Liang's sleeve, mascara bleeding down porcelain cheeks, "dine with him, and I'll... arrange private accommodations tonight!"
Before breath could shape refusal, Winter's voice crystallized the air:
"With whom do you intend to lodge?"
Zhao Wan'er materialized like moonlit jade, her understated elegance reducing Xia Yu's garish allure to carnival tinsel. The color drained from Xia Yu's face as Old Ma's knowing chuckle sealed judgment on her shameless theatrics.
To be continuous…