Following her conversation with Murong Wan'er, the latter departed from Rainflower Terrace Villas. Though her affection for Gu Chen lingered, haste held no merit in matters of the heart.
Within the villa, Ling Meixue perched rigidly on the sofa, feverishly cycling through phone contacts.
"Commissioner Li, rumors suggest a dignitary of extraordinary stature has taken residence in Jiangzhou! Any insights?"
Chairman Liu, my sources indicate that an official communiqué regarding this eminent figure is forthcoming—could you verify?
Her inquiries yielded naught but evasions. The midday spectacle of armored convoys patrolling downtown had confirmed the arrival's gravity, yet the identity remained shrouded—no name, rank, or provenance was revealed.
*What manner of titan commands such clandestine reverence?
Junli Group's precarious state demanded intervention from such power, yet without leads, desperation gnawed at her resolve.
"Still no progress?" Lin Shiyu's voice softened with concern.
A defeated headshake. "Not a whisper—even industry titans await revelations. Only shadows where substance should dwell."
She sipped chrysanthemum tea, its bitterness mirroring her thoughts. "A single audience with this enigma might unravel our woes—gold unlocks many doors."
Gu Chen's entrance shattered the tension. "Darling, this 'dignitary' you seek—"
"Spare me your theatrics!" Ling Meixue's glare could frost glass. "Your honeyed words wither when action's required—typical masculine vacuity!"
"Name your tormentor," he countered, steel beneath the levity, "and I'll transform their skull into a trophy."
For a heartbeat, his earlier valiance resurfaced in her memory—that primal instinct shielding her from corporate hyenas. Beneath the roguish veneer, perhaps integrity lingered.
"You imagine brute force conquers boardroom stratagems?" Her retort dripped acid. "Fists falter against dynastic machinations."
"Snow! The bulletin!" Lin Shiyu's tablet glowed with breaking news.
The article unfurled—verbose yet vacant—until two words blazed forth: "Tiger Marshal", a prodigy governing tri-provincial domains before thirty.
Gu Chen's water glass halted mid-sip. *My codename!* The media circus exceeded his clandestine accord—this calculated ambiguity was dual-edged, masking identity while stoking intrigue.
"Ceremonial honorifics," he dismissed with practiced nonchalance.
Lin Shiyu snorted. "The profile depicts urban legend material—oligarchic wealth meets tactical genius."
"*Coupled*," he smirked, "with Adonisian refinement."
Ling Meixue's gaze turned inward, strategising approaches to this phantom saviour. "If only the Marshal's ear could be bent—"
"*Your conduit stands before you*," Gu Chen interjected.
Silence crystallised.
Then derision erupted.
"Credentials?" Lin Shiyu's laughter rang discordantly. "Delusion suits you poorly."
"At least my mirror affirms superiority!"
"Superiority in lunacy," Ling Meixue muttered.
Gu Chen's groan echoed through the marble halls. Must truth wear such farcical vestments?
"My commission papers—"
"Belong in pulp fiction," came the riposte. "Court jester proclaiming sovereignty!"
"Blast!"
"..."
The Masquerade of Hearts
Faced with pervasive scepticism, Gu Chen dispensed with futile explanations. His fabricated mantle as "Vermilion Tiger Marshal" served merely as an expedient stratagem – a chrysalis shielding his true identity from Huamen's watchful hierarchs, who trembled before his five mythic tutors from Demon Isle. The mere spectre of Grand Matron Hua's wrath, they knew, could topple dynasties.
"Freedom's fragrance outweighs imperial incense," he mused, retreating from political entanglement.
"Tarry, rogue!" Lin Shiyu's command halted his exit. "Your service is required."
His lips curled wolfishly. "Does my lady require nocturnal tutoring? Though fair warning – my lawful bride slumbers abovestairs..."
A silk cushion exploded against the wall where his head had been. "Scoundrel! Tomorrow, you'll enact courtly devotion – floral tributes at my alma mater to repel these tiresome suitors."
"Conscripting me as a simulacrum suitor?" His laughter rang like temple bells. "Maiden's line celestial steps seeking my favour, never the inverse."
"Perform this masquerade," she bargained, eyes glinting like honed steel, "and I'll whisper honeyed words to thaw Ling Xue's glacial heart."
"Pact sealed."
---
**Chamber of Secrets (Ling Xue's Soliloquy)**
Moonlight pooled around Ling Xue's trembling fingers as encrypted messages blurred before sleep-deprived eyes. The ephemeral "Tiger Marshal" remained wraith-like despite her investigations – until fresh correspondence materialised:
> **Phantom Correspondent:**
> *High noon morrow. Haitian Pavilion. Let us converse regarding your enterprise's... resuscitation.*
Her pearlescent incisor sank into the rosebud lip, etching a temporary resolve over eternal doubt.
---
**Dawn's Prelude**
Gu Chen's tai chi forms wove silver threads through morning mist when Ling Xue descended – a winter storm in Prada armour. "Commercial parley claims my noon," she declared, heels cracking frozen cobblestones.
"My digits now grace your celestial directory," he bowed mockingly. "Summon this humble servant should dragons arise."
"You violated my encrypted sanctum?!"
"Child's arithmetic," he dismissed, winking as vanished warriors dissipate. "The People's Bank security protocols posed a greater challenge last solstice."
---
**Academia's Amphitheater**
Lin Shiyu's satin slipper beat a staccato rhythm beneath lecture hall columns. "Where lurks that feckless thespian?!"
Her ivory tower proved besieged – roses wilted in sweaty palms, and Lamborghini keys jingled like fool's gold. "Bestow your favour, goddess!" the chorus implored.
"My betrothed approaches!" Her declaration sparked a derisive chorus: "This phantom lover? Seven dawns we've heard this fable!"
The cacophony stilled as bicycle spokes sang a death knell to pretensions. Gu Chen's arrival scattered pigeons and suitors alike, his offering – a windblown dandelion – settling in her hair like a fallen star.
"Make way," he commanded, "for autumn's final bloom graces my queen."
The Dazzling Counterattack
At that moment, everyone turned to look at the roadside, where Gu Chen was parking a shared bicycle and walking toward them.
When Lin Shiyu saw his outfit, she instantly regretted asking him to help her out of this predicament the night before. His faded T-shirt, nondescript casual pants, and counterfeit "Adidas" shoes (with the misspelt logo "A-Di-Da-Si") screamed utter disarray.
"Oh my god..." Lin Shiyu rubbed her temples, mortified. Would you ride a shared bike while dressed like this? He wasn't here to rescue her—he was here to embarrass her. By tomorrow, she'd be the laughingstock of the entire school.
"Shiyu! Let's go. I'm here to pick you up!" Gu Chen waved at her in the crowd, calling out cheerfully.
All eyes instantly locked onto her.
"Shiyu... Is this your so-called *boyfriend*?" sneered a young man with a slicked-back hairstyle, gesturing at Gu Chen.
Lin Shiyu's heart sank. How could he show up looking like this? Didn't he even bother to dress properly? "Y-yes!" she stammered, forcing a smile as she hooked her arm through his. "This is my boyfriend!"
The crowd of suitors froze in disbelief.
The slick-haired guy scoffed, "Are you mocking us, Shiyu? Any one of us is better than this loser! You'd choose a bike over a Range Rover or BMW?"
"Hey, pal, you've got it all wrong," Gu Chen retorted with a sly grin. "Money isn't everything. Some things can't be measured by wealth."
"Stop acting high and mighty, you pauper!" Another suitor brandished a diamond ring. "Ever seen a 10-carat diamond? This is a French water diamond!"
Lin Shiyu pinched Gu Chen's arm discreetly. "Where's the bouquet? I told you to bring flowers!"
He'd shown up empty-handed instead.
"Pfft, a diamond?" Gu Chen smirked. "I brought her a truckload."
The suitor glared. "If you can produce a truck of diamonds, I'll eat every last one of them!"
Just then—
*Vroom!
A rumbling truck approached, its cargo hidden under a black tarp.
"Last chance to back out," Gu Chen taunted.
"Never!" the suitor spat. "I'll eat from the front bumper to the tailgate if that's real!"
The truck halted, and the tarpaulin was yanked off.
Sunlight blazed across a mountain of glittering diamonds. The crowd gasped, shielding their eyes from the dazzling reflection.
"Fake! Those are just glass shards!" The suitor scoffed, though his voice trembled. "Mine's a genuine French—"
A sharply dressed man stepped out of the truck, cutting him off. "Sir, these are certified conflict-free diamonds from our Antwerp vault. As per your request, we've delivered 1.2 tonnes."
Silence fell. The suitor's face turned ashen.
Gu Chen crossed his arms. "Bon appétit."
Diamonds and Defiance: A Reckoning at Zhou Dafu
"Uncle Zhang?!" The youth gasped, his voice quivering with disbelief as he beheld the impeccably tailored gentleman.
The latter scarcely acknowledged him, his polished Oxfords clicking rhythmically as he approached Gu Chen. "Mr Gu, I am Zhang Fushan, General Director of Zhou Dafu's Jiangzhou Division. Regrettably, temporal constraints permitted only partial fulfilment of your request—a mere half-container's complement. Might this provisional arrangement suffice?"
"Pray enlighten our young connoisseur regarding the nature of these baubles," Gu Chen rejoined, his fingers drumming an amused cadence upon the man's bespoke shoulder padding.
Zhang Fushan's sigh carried the weight of bureaucratic weariness as he pivoted. "Young Master Meng, these are veritable French Cristaux Diamants—each bearing the Geneva Gemological Institute's imprimatur."
"Preposterous!"
The youth's countenance mirrored one witnessing celestial bodies invert their cosmic dance. Having endured interminable waiting lists merely to procure a solitary carat, the spectacle of this threadbare cyclist conjuring a lorry's bounty defied comprehension.
"Chicanery! Collusion!" he sputtered, jabbing an accusatory digit. "Your establishment's edicts decree singular purchases! Queues spanning lunar cycles! How dare this... this plebeian..."
Zhang Fushan's gaze assumed the melancholy of a Confucian scholar confronting impetuous youth. "Regulations govern ordinary patrons. Those transcending mortal constraints"—his" eyes flickered toward Gu Chen's nonchalant silhouette—"reforge" destiny's edicts."
**"Shall we commence with cranial or caudal mastication?"** Gu Chen's mirth sparkled sharper than the gemological hoard.
As the youth wheeled to flee, twin argentine filaments materialised in his patellar hollows, rendering him a marble statue mid-stride.
"Unleash the torrent," came the laconic command.
The articulated behemoth reversed with hydraulic hisses, its maw disgorging a crystalline deluge that entombed the petrified scion up to his clavicles.
**"Vengeance shall be mine!"** The muffled oath emerged through a gritted gemstone carapace.
Gu Chen's retreating figure bisected the diamond drifts, his hand alighting upon a battered bicycle's cracked vinyl seat. "Mademoiselle Lin," he intoned, executing a mock-courtly bow, "your chariot awaits."
Lin Shiyu's suppressed mirth threatened ocular effusion. This bravura performance, she mused, would reverberate through campus gossip channels like wildfire through parched tinder.
**"A masterful theatric,"** she conceded, settling onto the squeaking framework. "Theatrical props and corporate collusion? Submit your expense ledgers posthaste."
Gu Chen's profile remained inscrutable against the sunset's vermilion wash: **"The chronicler's quill oft blunts truth's edge, my lady. Behold nature's crystalline arithmetic."
"..."
The Provocative Pedaler—A Distress Call in Daylight
Gu Chen offered no elaborate justification. Truth or fabrication mattered little when the objective had crystallised.
"Admit it," Lin Shiyu's laughter rippled through the bicycle's rattling frame, "your command to 'Dump it!' carried theatrical flair."
He navigated the traffic with sardonic ease. "Your delayed perception is almost poetic. The universe long acknowledged my brilliance. Consult an ophthalmologist – ocular degeneration demands urgency."
"*You're* the walking cataract exhibit!" She jabbed his ribs, suppressing giggles. "But since celestial mercy blesses me today, prepare for gastronomic enlightenment!"
Their two-wheeled odyssey through asphalt veins became urban theatre – a threadbare-clad cyclist trailed by luxury vehicles whose drivers gaped at the human paradox: a commoner's transport crowned with ethereal beauty.
At the scarlet glare of a traffic signal, a Bentley materialised parallel. Its silver-haired occupant lowered tinted windows, a voyeuristic gaze dissecting Lin Shiyu's silhouette. "Enlighten a novice," he drawled, extending a Cuban cigar, "how does gutter alchemy ensnare celestial game?"
Gu Chen accepted the offering, igniting it with deliberate languor. "Poverty is curable. Savagery can be polished. But genetic mediocrity?" He exhaled a smoke ring framing his profile. "Cosmic lottery leaves no refunds."
The emerald light baptised the intersection with poetic justice. As the bicycle surged forward, steering-wheel-pummelling fury echoed behind them. "Get me Seoul's top ten aestheticians!" the Bentley's Bluetooth system transmitted hysterical commands.
Lin Shiyu's mirth cascaded like wind chimes. "You're humanity's collective blood pressure spike!"
"Mediocrity's allergic to truth," Gu Chen countered, his whistle weaving through the honking cacophony. "My existence? An immovable monument to perfection."
"Monument to pathological narcissism, more like—"
Their verbal sparring dissolved upon reaching "Lotus & Truffle" – a culinary chimaera where Peking duck shared menus with truffle risotto. "Their Wagyu tomahawk redefines bovinity," she proclaimed, ignoring his raised eyebrow at the "Sichuan peppercorn crème brûlée" specials.
But destiny intervened with electronic urgency. His screen illuminated:
*"Shiyu – Haitian Club. Drink compromised. NOW."
The Poisoned Chalice and the Savior's Arrival
The caller ID still glowed with "Ling Meixue"—a digital masquerade Gu Chen had orchestrated by altering his contact designation. A message meant for Lin Shiyu now pulsed in his palm.
He stood transfixed, pixels casting ghostly light across his features. At the threshold, Lin Shiyu pivoted with theatrical exasperation: "Must I etch an invitation in stone? Your glacial pace could fossilise champagne!"
"Bon appétit," he retorted, stowing the device with finality. "Consider this raincheck collateral."
"Since when did Mercury acquire a temper?" She pursued him down the colonnade, stilettos clacking like impatient metronomes.
"Not your theatrics. Priorities beckon." His fingers danced across a communal bicycle's QR cypher, its mechanical click slicing through the twilight.
"Your destination?" Her query dissolved into urban cacophony as he vanished through a kaleidoscope of neon.
---
**Haitian Club's Celestial Chamber**
"What alchemy taints this chalice, Wang Tao?" Ling Meixue's words slurred against brocade cushions, her limbs leaden as consciousness fragmented. The emergency text hovered in digital limbo—had her desperate semaphore found its mark?
"Patience, lotus blossom." The magnate swirled garnet liquid, his Windsor collar loosened like a predator's loosened cravat. "We cultivate joy here, not screen-staring peasants."
Investment propositions cascaded like venomous petals:
"Two million for a sip from your goblet!"
"Twenty for the honour of unclasping that pearl necklace!"
Silk stockings hissed under wandering palms. Through a narcotic fog, she glimpsed wolfish dentures gleaming—corporate sharks who knew their prey's vulnerability. To expose this bacchanal meant corporate crucifixion, with the Wang dynasty holding both hammer and nails.
Wang Tao's tongue caressed the crystal rim. "Merely...enthusiast's ambrosia. Fear not—ecstasy arrives posthaste."
The room froze. Leather jackets slithered to marble tiles. A sardonic chuckle coiled through the sudden silence.
---
Oaken doors exploded inward.
A figure materialised through cigar haze—damp locks framing eyes colder than winter's zenith. The intruder knelt before the trembling magnolia, his touch contradicting the glacial gaze.
"Your carriage awaits, milady."
(Gu Chen's arms became both sanctuary and siege engine as he bore her from the vipers' nest.)
Defiance in the Dark
He shouldered past the two men flanking Ling Meixue, his presence carving a glacial path through the opulent chaos of the VIP lounge.
"Who—?" Her fingers trembled against his chest, the words dissolving into the alcoholic fog clouding her senses.
A calloused palm cradled her cheek. "Breathe, snowflake." Gu Chen's voice, honeyed yet edged with winter, cut through her disorientation.
Recognition dawned as chemical warmth bloomed beneath her skin—not merely intoxication but betrayal. "Gu...Chen?" Her whisper fractured against the thrumming bass. "The wine...they..."
His thumb brushed her fevered temple. Even this infuriating enigma, with his penchant for calculated mischief, now radiated lethal clarity amidst the vipers coiled in velvet. Where others wielded deception as a blade, he wore transparency like armour.
Wang Tao's goblet exploded against onyx tiles, ruby droplets staining his monogrammed sleeves. "You dare?" The heir's snarl echoed hollowly against soundproofed walls.
Gu Chen didn't turn. "Your exit music's playing, princeling." Ice crystallised his words. "Bow out gracefully."
"Grace?" A hyena's laugh. "My family built this city's bones! Ten billion yuan flows through—"
"Bottoms up." Gu Chen hefted the obscene decanter, its amber contents sloshing like trapped lightning. "To your health."
Gasps rippled as he drained the fusel oil concoction—enough to fell an elephant—in seven measured gulps. His Adam's apple barely bobbed.
"Insipid poison." He let the crystal vessel shatter, a thousand fractured prisms catching his disdain. "Shall we discuss your exit strategy?"
Wang Tao's signal sent eight thugs surging forward. Gu Chen's kick transformed the 200-pound marble coffee table into a projectile, its trajectory crunching through kneecaps and ribs with geometric precision.
"Worthless." The tycoon's son stumbled over his whimpering entourage. "Touch me, and Junli Group will—"
The slap resonated like a gavel strike. "You mistake threats for currency." Gu Chen's grip lifted Wang Tao until their eyes levelled—predator to prey. "Let's audit your sins."
The Reckoning
The once haughty and tyrannical Wang Tao now cowered like a chastened pup, his bravado dissolved into trembling submission.
"Was it _you_ who orchestrated those rabid journalists and rabble-rousers to besiege my wife's company?!" Gu Chen snarled, his fingers twisting viciously in Wang Tao's scalp.
Wang Tao's gaze skittered like a cornered rat, synapses firing futilely for escape.
Crack!
A slap echoed like a gunshot.
"**Speak!**" Gu Chen's roar vibrated with primal fury.
"Y-yes! My doing—all mine!"
"**Splendid.**"
Yanking the man's head backward, Gu Chen's lips curled in a predator's grin. "Does my wife possess beauty?"
"S-she does!"
Thwack!
"Lovely or loathsome—**she is _never_ yours to appraise!** "The iron grip tightened." Again: "Is she beautiful?"
This time, Wang Tao's head shook frenetically. "N-no! A hag! A crone!"
Smack!
"**Dare you insult my discernment?**"
Tears streamed down Wang Tao's bloated cheeks. Never had humiliation been carved so deep—when had cruelty become such exquisite torture?
"Mercy! Name your price!" he wailed.
Gu Chen's eyebrow arched, a viper toying with prey. "Final query."
"Anything! Ask anything!"
"**Am I... comely?**"
"H-handsome! Beyond measure—"
Crack!
"**Hesitation stains your flattery.**"
By now, Wang Tao's face resembled overripe fruit—purpling flesh, teeth adrift in a sea of blood. Each slap, though restrained to a titan's flick, held force enough to stagger oxen.
"You eclipse the gods! Apollo himself would weep at your splendor!" The words tumbled out in a frothing plea.
Gu Chen's nod dripped with mock grace. "**Adequate.**"
Relief lasted but a heartbeat. As Gu Chen's hands moved to his belt, Wang Tao shrieked, "I swear—no taste for men!"
"**Silence!**"
Minutes later, Wang Tao lay trussed like a festival hog—nude, gagged with rancid socks, vision blotted by his shirt. The liquor-crate ropes bit deep as Gu Chen delivered a final pat to his welted cheek.
"**The curtain rises.**"
Labyrinth of Shadows – The Alchemist's Penance
**"Ghnn! Ghnn!"** Wang Tao's serpentine contortions beneath hemp bindings painted grotesque hieroglyphs on the floor, his stifled protests devoured by pandemonium.
When consciousness seeped back into the drunken revellers, Gu Chen had already vanished into smoke-laden corridors with Ling Meixue cradled like a sacred relic. The trussed figure's obscene nakedness – a plucked pheasant writhing in its disgrace – bore no resemblance to Wang Tao's former grandeur. Even his sycophants would mistake this debased spectacle for some deranged performance artist.
Gu Chen's measured footsteps echoed through the crimson-lit passage as a phalanx of bouncers materialised, brass knuckles glinting like carnivorous teeth.
"Desist!"
His command froze the advancing horde. **"The Young Patriarch decrees: sequester this lotus blossom at the Jade Pavilion. The rabble within that chamber..."** A pause pregnant with malice. "Especially the vermin bound in his own shame – let their bones sing symphonies of regret. The maestro of pain shall drink from golden goblets tonight."
A pockmarked bartender dared to question: **"But Wang Shao's whereabouts—"**
Crack!
Gu Chen's palm became a guillotine. **"Since when do maggots interrogate celestial beings? Fulfil your Darwinian purpose."
The mob surged like rabid wolves. Wood met flesh in a percussive crescendo. A guard's baton descended upon the squirming package: "Defiler of Wang's honour! Let your marrow paint these walls!"
**"I am Wang Shao!"** The gag became projectile, hurling dignity into oblivion.
The blows intensified. "Mocking the Azure Dragon's lineage? Let his tongue feed the hounds!"
——
Taxi headlights sliced through opium-thick night. Ling Meixue's fevered undulations transformed the backseat into a pagan altar.
**"This lotus-eater your companion?"** The driver's eyes mirrored rearview suspicion.
**"My Persephone,"** Gu Chen murmured, watching streetlamps gild her sweat-sheened throat. Her questing fingers mapped constellations across his chest until he gently disentangled her embrace: "The chrysanthemum chooses its season to bloom."
Silence reigned as the taxi ascended toward Rainflower Heights' gilded spires – where penthouse gardens cascaded like Midas' tears over bulletproof glass.
——
In the boudoir's jasmine-perfumed twilight, Ling Meixue became kudzu vine, her limbs weaving Gordian knots around his torso.
**"Hell's teeth! You mistake chivalry for celibacy?"** His growl belied trembling hands. The antidote's calculus grew complex – honour warring with primal hunger.
Pinning her thrashing form, his fingers became divining rods tracing meridian rivers. **"Guanyin's Delirium? No... This reeks of Tangmen's Crimson Nirvana!"** Recognition dawned like a poisoned sunrise. The antidote demanded sacramental precision – a surgeon's blade dancing between virtue and necessity.
**"Consort..."** Her breath carried opium-dream promises.
**"By the Nine Celestial Courts!"** His protest dissolved as her teeth grazed his jugular. The final hairline fracture is resolved.
"You courted this kalpa's fire."
——
Dusk bled through stained glass, gilding their tangled silhouette. Gu Chen slumped against moon-washed walls, life force drained like ceremonial wine. The purification ritual had exacted its toll – half his qi had been sacrificed to banish Tangmen's alchemical abomination.
**"Crimson Nirvana... more potent than ancestral texts foretold."** His cigarette trembled in a post-battle tremor. The bitter jest lingered: playing Confucian saint while the biological imperative screamed for Dionysian release. Future chroniclers would brand him either a sage or a madman.
**"Virtue's path is paved with shattered jade,"** he whispered, draping brocade over her moonlit curves before collapsing onto the chaise longue. The void embraced him like a jilted lover.
A Curtain of Dreams, Ten Miles of Tenderness
Chen Gu lay ensnared upon the divan, his slumber invaded by phantoms of memory.
Infernal flames devoured his vision, their crimson tongues caressing the rafters. A delicate frame—frail as winter's last leaf—shielded a child of tender years with lioness ferocity.
"Forgive me, Chenchen... My strength fails," her voice fractured like porcelain. "The road ahead, you must walk alone."
"Swear you'll never seek vengeance! Let Kyoto's shadow never fall upon your path!"
"Flee this cursed earth! Let survival be your anthem—now and always!"
A hunched servant prostrated himself, words tumbling like scattered coins: "My flesh I sacrificed as a decoy. Let the pyre's ash-cloaked remains deceive their eyes."
Beyond the mullioned glass, the moat's obsidian waters beckoned. With Valkyrie's resolve, the woman gathered the child—his limbs trembling like captured sparrow wings—and cast him toward liquid night.
"Bind this oath to your soul!" Her cry pierced the smoke-choked air. "Breathe when I cannot! Live when I—"
"Mother! MOTHER—!"
Saltwater trails glistened on Chen's lashes as his lips shaped silent litanies: "Māma... Māma..."
Cascade!
Arctic shockwater shattered his dream-painted world. Darkness draped the chamber like funeral crepe, its hour unmarked by moon or clock.
Through water-beaded vision emerged Meixue Ling and Shiyu Lin—nymphs of judgment carved from moonstone and storm.
"Beloved", he rasped, knuckling moisture from stinging eyes, "has the celestial choir misplaced its harp?"
Shiyu's fingers twisted his collar like a silken noose. "Confess your digital treachery! Those texts—destined for my inbox—now nest in your profane device!"
"Guilty as charged." His grin held a wolfish gleam. "Had your tempestuous self stormed that vipers' nest, you'd have become their main course. Do you fancy becoming another Helen, launching wars with your... shall we say, strategic assets?"
Understanding bloomed between the women like a poisonous orchid. Shiyu's slipper struck marble with artillery precision. "This feud outlives empires!"
Meixue's restraining hand held courtly grace. "Peace, sister. Your presence would have poured oil on hellfire." Her gaze—a blade sheathed in velvet—turned to Chen. "The antidote... required disrobing?"
The unspoken truth coiled between them: the aphrodisiac's fire demands flesh's surrender. Yet dawn revealed her garments pristine as virginal snow.
"Anatomical precision demands access," he purred, physician's detachment warring with rogue's smirk.
"Did your eyes... wander?"
"Shall I swear upon Hippocrates' scroll?" His laughter held honeyed blades. "These hands mapped meridians before they held chopsticks. Need I light candles to find Polaris?"
"Good."
Her exhale of relief birthed silent laughter in his throat. Does the rose believe the gardener's shears caress without admiration?
If denied ambrosia's taste, may not a poet drink beauty with his gaze?
Yet honour's chains held fast—a physician's sacred dance with death leaves no room for errant breaths. White lies, like medicinal wrappings, sometimes staunch deeper wounds.
Meixue's trembling fingers slid jade-touched plastic across teak. "Five million yuan. Take flight from Jiangzhou's poisoned soil."
"The deed to this mausoleum follows with autumn's first frost."
"..." Chen's silence echoed louder than temple bells.
The Junli Crucible
Ling Meixue remained silent, ascending the staircase with measured steps.
**A thunderous slam** reverberated from the second floor.
Gu Chen pivoted toward Lin Shiyu, bewilderment etching his features. "Paradoxical – I delivered her from peril, yet she retreats cloaked in storm clouds?"
Lin Shiyu exhaled a lamentation weighted with foresight. "Salvation and ruination dance as twins. Junli Group dangles by spider-silk these three moons past, sustained solely by her indomitable will."
"**Enlightenment eludes me...**" His voice trailed into the amber-lit parlour.
"Foolhardy!" Her jadeite eyes flashed. "The cur you battered owns the name Wang Tao – scion of Tengyuan's imperial house. Their coffers bulge with nine dragons of gold, while Junli's coffers rattle with copper pennies. Wang Fujiang has sworn an oath: both the Group and its defender shall kneel before sunset."
Earlier that day, the heir apparent had been conveyed to the intensive care unit – twelve ribs fractured, visage resembling crushed persimmons. Between morphine haze and vital monitor screams, he'd rasped two demands: corporate annihilation and Ling Meixue's prostration.
---
Chamber of Isolation (Second Floor):
"Uncle De..." Her knuckles whitened around the phone. "Might your venerable connections intercede? One final boon?"
Static crackled before yielding to sepulchral tones. "Child of Ling, sever this thread. No collaboration survives the morrow."
"Uncle? Uncle DE!"
Subsequent calls dissolved into electronic voids – unanswered rings, crimson rejection notices. The universe had contracted to four ivory walls. She burrowed into her bedspread, silent tears carving trails down her pallid cheeks.
---
**Ground Floor Theatre (21:37):
Gu Chen extinguished his cigarette against a celadon ashtray. "A provincial merchant clan incites such terror?"
"Arrogant fledgling!" Lin Shiyu's porcelain features flushed vermilion. "Their roots strangle municipal arteries. Those banknotes she pressed upon you weren't petty cash – they purchased your worthless hide!"
Her ire softened momentarily. "Not that blame rests solely upon you. Junli's collapse loomed regardless – tonight merely tightened the hangman's knot."
"Exit required." He strode toward the oaken doors.
Her cry pursued him through the foyer: "Imbecile! Your escape funds gather dust on the console!"
---
Nocturne Beyond the Estate (21:49):
Smartphone glare illuminated his face – nine missed calls. Six hours of oblivion had stolen daylight. At the crossroads where sycamores whispered ancient secrets, he summoned a number from memory.
"Chenchen?" The voice carried autumn's crispness. "Midnight confessions?"
Observing Orion's belt through light-polluted haze, he articulated with lethal calm: "Grandsire Jiang. The hour demands unconventional remedies."
"**Parameters?**"
"**Phoenix Protocol.**"
"..."
In Which Retribution Takes Human Form
*Tengyuan Tower, Jiangzhou West District*
"The physicians report the young master's nasal architecture shattered, eight costal fractures sustained," the grey-suited attendant whispered, spine curved in deference. "Though stabilised, his countenance... shall bear permanent rigidity."
Wang Fujiang remained motionless before the panoramic glass, his silhouette devouring the city's electric constellations below. When he spoke, each syllable crystallised the air: "Unearth the mongrel's lineage. His visage shall grace tomorrow's tabloids. As for Ling Meixue—deliver her bound to my son's chambers. When his amusement wanes, consign her to the flesh markets."
"And the Ling clan's... potential objections?"
"Must I diagram the obliteration of ants?!"
The attendant's retreating footsteps still echoed when screams erupted—a staccato symphony of snapping bones and silenced alarms.
Emergency lights bathed the corridor in sickly amber. Sixteen guards lay contorted like broken marionettes, the grey-suited man's skull nested grotesquely against a potted fern.
Wang Fujiang's knuckles whitened around the aluminium bat. "Reveal yourself!"
Only the CEO office's slit-eyed door answered, its hinges keening a funeral dirge.
Within the sanctum's womb-like darkness, Gu Chen exhaled a serpentine plume, the Zhonghua cigarette's ember staining documents crimson. "Provincial swill," he remarked, grinding the stub into ivory parchment embossed with the Wang crest.
"Name your vintage," Wang's chuckle slithered through clenched teeth. "My cellars hold Cuban wrappers from the Batista era."
Gu Chen's laughter was a blade meeting bone. From his breast pocket emerged a matte-white cartridge stamped with a phoenix sigil—the 54th Division's exclusive blend. "Your trinkets amuse."
The older man's carotid pulsed like trapped prey. "What grievance binds us?"
"Grievance?" Gu Chen's boots struck marble, each step a death knell. "I require no provocation to trample roaches."
"You dare—"
The bat clattered as Gu Chen's palm transformed Wang's trachea into a sculptor's clay, pinning him mid-air against ancestral portraits. "Shall we test your family's extermination threshold?"
As Wang's oxygen-starved vision tunnelled, the younger man produced an ironclad cigarette case engraved with coiling dragons. The match's sulphurous birth illuminated his smile—a predator savouring the hunt.
"Kneel at Junli Group's gates at dawn. Your spawn whimpering apologies to my bride... or witness Jiangzhou's skyscrapers digest your dynasty's ashes. Choose swiftly."
"Ling's mongrel!" Wang rasped, spittle flecking Gu Chen's immaculate collar. "That pauper clan licks crumbs from my—"
The grip tightened, vertebrae creaking. "You stalk shadows yet recoil from sunlight?"
"The boy at the hospital—your doing?!"
"Mercy", Gu Chen purred, releasing him to crumple like desiccated leaves. "A currency your bloodline squanders."
The Hourglass of Dominion
"Did you presume the Wang lineage constituted trifling adversaries?" Gu Chen's lips curved with glacial composure.
Wang Fujiang arched an eyebrow, his arms forming a barricade of contempt. "Naturally not!"
"Your clan scarcely registers as a footnote in my chronicle." Gu Chen extinguished his cigarette with surgical precision, the ember tracing a parabola into a distant brass receptacle. "Choose: genuflect before Junli Group's edifice at dawn to prostrate before my consort or witness your dynasty's erasure from Jiangzhou's cartography. The sand drains swiftly."
"Preposterous! A century's legacy cannot be extinguished like a candle flame!" Wang Fujiang reclined into his Chesterfield, porcelain teacup trembling imperceptibly. "Your theatrics amuse me, boy."
"Twenty-three seconds expended in bravado." Gu Chen's timepiece glinted ominously. "Shall I enumerate the twelve methods to dismantle your empire? The chemical plant's safety violations... The offshore shell corporations..."
The patriarch's jade ring clinked against bone china. "Barbaric threats! This isn't the Warring States era!"
"Fourteen seconds. The municipal land deeds you forged... The mayor's disappearing audit reports..."
Sweat crystallised along Wang Fujiang's collar as the grandfather clock thrummed. When the final chime of 10:00 reverberated, his laughter cracked like dry parchment. "Your bluster expires with the hour!"
The vintage rotary phone's shrill cry severed the tension.
"Fujiang! You viper!" The speaker's roar distorted through the receiver. "My board just revoked all joint ventures! Twenty years' collaboration obliterated!"
"Zheng, you misunderstand—"
"Save your lies for the creditors! The financial bureau's freezing your assets as we speak!"
Another line blared to life – his CFO's voice unravelling: "The properties... they're haemorrhaging value! The flagship towers—"
Wang Fujiang's teacup shattered against mahogany as the world dissolved into cacophony, Gu Chen's silhouette already evaporating into the midnight mist.
The Arrogant's Demise – A Lesson in Humiliation
"Every property slashed to a single copper! Two developments devoured in sixty seconds!"
"..."
Wang Fujiang clawed at the ledger, its pages screaming betrayal. Prestige towers, once commanding 20,000 per square metre, now stood devalued to a beggar's ransom. Some phantom investor had claimed entire complexes with pocket change while algorithms twisted remaining prices into obscenity. His empire dissolved like sand through trembling fingers – eight zeroes erased between two heartbeats.
*"The portfolios! Stabilise the portfolios!"* The tycoon's manic keystrokes echoed through hollow offices. Stock indices yawned open like burial pits, his crown jewel enterprises cascading downward in crimson waterfalls. Three million evaporated per tick of the clock, terminal velocity dragging his life's work toward a financial event horizon.
The landline's shriek pierced his paralysis. *"Chairman... trading suspended... shadow syndicate froze all transactions..."* The receiver slipped from sweat-slicked palms as quarterly reports burst into funeral confetti.
Thud!
Italian leather met his collapsing knees. "Gone... all gone..."
Mobile screens erupted in a demonic chorus – QQ notifications shrieking alongside WeChat's relentless pings. His wife's distorted wail cut through digital static: *"They're taking the children! Interpol at the penthouse! What have you DONE?!"
Through trembling lashes, Wang glimpsed his executioner – Gu Chen's languid silhouette etched against floor-to-ceiling windows. The young predator stretched like a satisfied jungle cat, amber eyes holding galaxies of calculated malice.
Crack!
The oligarch's forehead crashed against marble in a primal rhythm. "Mercy! Let me scrub Junli Group's toilets! Let my bloodline survive!"
Gu's polished oxfords halted millimetres from broken fingers. *"Now you comprehend?"* Velvet menace dripped from every syllable. *"Your dynasty was ever but sandcastles before tide."
A snap of fingers. Silicon Valley's dark arts retreated – stocks tentatively crawling from gravesites, property values resurrected sans fifteen billion. The reaper's bargain is sealed in digital blood.
*"Dawn finds you kneeling at Junli's gates,"* Gu's departing shadow whispered. *"Or my algorithms feast anew."* The elevator's chime tolled like an executioner's bell.
To be continuous…