The morning sunlight broke through the clouds, drying the flagstone road in Changning Alley. The dampness from the past few days had finally dispersed.
Su Muchen was squatting in the backyard, watering the few pots of half-dead mint.
When he had bought them, the shopkeeper had said they were very easy to care for and would survive no matter how casually he raised them. But somehow, in his hands, that did not seem to be the case.
He could only continue his active “treatment.”
Suddenly, his phone vibrated.
He freed one hand and glanced at it. It was a message from Lawyer Liang. The content was brief, only saying that there had been new progress regarding the ownership documents for Guichen House, and that it needed to be discussed in person. Someone would come over this morning.
After reading the message, he put down his phone and continued watering.
He did not take it too seriously.
Over the past few months, he had heard the words “legal documents” enough times. Every time he heard them, he felt that the matter was about to be resolved, only to find that things were never as simple as he thought. After so many times, he had already learned not to hold too many expectations.
Thus, he put down his phone, watered the last pot of mint, and patted the dirt from his hands.
Just as he walked from the backyard back into the front hall, he heard the sound of a car door closing outside.
The sound of a car door closing was rarely heard in Changning Alley.
This place was too remote. Apart from delivery vehicles and tourists who occasionally took a wrong turn, hardly any cars would deliberately stop here.
He walked over to the counter and looked out the window. A black sedan was parked in front of Guichen House.
The car door opened, and two people got out.
One of them he recognized. They had met online several times before. It was Lawyer Liang, dressed in a dark suit, carrying a briefcase in his hand, his steps brisk.
The other was a woman he did not recognize. She looked to be in her thirties, with neat short hair and a well-tailored dark-gray suit jacket. Her steps were somewhat slower than Lawyer Liang’s, and before entering, she had already swept her gaze over the entire shop.
She wore thin-framed glasses and had no unnecessary expression on her face.
Su Muchen turned his head and glanced behind the counter.
Xiao was still sitting there, his tablet propped up on its stand, his posture almost exactly the same as before, as if he were looking at some information.
But Su Muchen noticed that when the car stopped outside, Xiao’s gaze had already moved away from the tablet and swept toward the window.
Very quickly, as if merely confirming who had arrived, he withdrew his gaze.
Ding-ling—
The copper bell rang.
The door was pushed open.
“Mr. Su, sorry to disturb you.” Lawyer Liang entered first and nodded slightly. “This is my supervisor, Su Yingying.”
Su Yingying stood by the door. Her gaze moved from Su Muchen’s face, swept over the counter and shelves, and then returned to him.
She did not rush to speak. She merely handed him a business card.
Su Muchen took it and lowered his head to look.
The business card had the words “Chenghui Group Legal Department” printed on it. Beneath that was a line of smaller text indicating her position. He did not look carefully, because his attention had been drawn away by the words “Chenghui Group” and the name Su Yingying.
He raised his head, his gaze first falling on Su Yingying’s face.
“Are you also my distant relative?” he asked.
It was difficult not to make that association. The name was simply too much in the style of the Su family.
The corners of Su Yingying’s lips moved slightly. The curve was so small that it could not be considered a smile, more like a professional response.
“No. We just happen to share the surname Su.”
Su Muchen turned to look at Xiao.
Xiao was lowering his head to look at the tablet. Several seconds later, he finally raised his head and met Su Muchen’s gaze, giving a slight shrug.
The movement was very light, as if saying, “I don’t know.”
But Su Muchen had known him long enough to distinguish it clearly: Xiao knew, but he either did not want to say or was too lazy to explain.
He remembered when he had first met Xiao. Xiao had also deliberately concealed from him the fact that he was a distant cousin.
Su Muchen withdrew his gaze and did not ask further.
“Let’s go inside,” Lawyer Liang said.
The three of them sat down at the table and chairs in front of the counter.
Xiao remained seated behind the counter. He did not get up to join them, but he no longer looked at his tablet, as if he were listening.
Su Yingying placed a kraft paper envelope on the table and pushed it toward Su Muchen.
She did not hurry to open it. Instead, she said first, “Mr. Su, we can help you get Guichen House back.”
Su Muchen’s fingers stopped against the rim of his cup.
Su Yingying said, “We investigated the documents your father, Su Jiancheng, used when he mortgaged Guichen House back then. There are problems with the validity of that mortgage document.”
She paused, as if making sure of her wording.
“The ownership registration of Guichen House was not entirely under Su Jiancheng’s name. Guichen House was originally established by an ancestor of the Su family. Through generations of inheritance, the scope involving joint inheritance rights is more complicated than simple ‘father-and-son inheritance.’ Simply put, your father did not have complete authority to dispose of it. The mortgage document itself may contain legal defects.”
Su Muchen remained silent for a while, digesting those words.
He understood the general meaning.
Legally, Su Jiancheng did indeed have the right to mortgage it.
But Guichen House did not belong solely to Su Jiancheng. It involved inheritance rules from an earlier period.
The special inheritance clauses left behind by the ancestors of the Su family, the shared inheritance rights, and historical documents concerning the Su family’s collateral branches could render the mortgage made by Su Jiancheng invalid.
“So… the judicial auction can be stopped? Guichen House can be taken back?”
“Procedurally, yes,” Su Yingying said. “As long as you agree, we can immediately raise an objection to the property rights. Once the documents are submitted to the court, there will be a subsequent hearing process. But based on the evidence we currently have, the result should develop in your favor.”
Su Muchen did not speak immediately.
He lowered his head and looked at the kraft paper envelope without opening it.
Guichen House could be taken back without being auctioned.
That meant Sheng Chengxiu would no longer be able to use this shop to force him.
He suddenly remembered not long ago—when he had just received the news of his father’s death and had been suffocated beneath the weight of debts and the judicial auction notice, thinking that he would be dragged down by this broken shop for the rest of his life.
And now, someone was sitting before him, telling him in an ordinary tone:
This shop is yours. No one can take it away.
“I…” He paused. “Do I need to go to the court myself?”
Su Yingying smiled slightly. “No. We will handle all the procedures. You only need to stay here and wait for the notice.”
Su Muchen looked at her and nodded.
It felt far too simple, leaving him somewhat uneasy.
For some reason, he remembered what Su Huaishan had said that day at Jiyuan:
“You don’t need to worry about anything. Just be responsible for getting married and having children.”
Could this be a sign that the collateral branch of the Su family was planning to cause trouble?
The other two did not stay long.
When Su Yingying stood up, Xiao remained seated behind the counter, silent throughout.
As she passed by the counter, she did not slow down. Her gaze paused in Xiao’s direction for a moment, very naturally, as if merely confirming that he was still there.
After the door closed, Guichen House became quiet again.
Su Muchen was still sitting at the table, looking at the kraft paper envelope without opening it.
He picked up the business card again and glanced at the words “Chenghui Group Legal Department.”
“Lawyer Liang… he’s actually a lawyer from your group, right?” he said.
Back then, he had asked Xiao to help him find a lawyer he could trust. Thinking about it now, if Xiao was looking for one, he would naturally find a lawyer from his own group’s legal team.
And Su Yingying was one of them.
Xiao yawned. “Probably.”
Su Muchen turned to look at him. “Probably?”
“I’m just a shop employee,” Xiao said. “What the group wants to do isn’t my business.”
Su Muchen looked at him but did not continue questioning him.
Guichen House—or rather, the “Door”—was very important to the collateral branch of the Su family. Therefore, they certainly would not let Sheng Chengxiu take Guichen House away.
Now that ownership of Guichen House was about to be recovered, the only thing left for him was to repay all his debts. With Xiao Yuan’s support, that should not be a problem.
Just as he thought this, a bank notification popped up on his phone. It was a deposit notification.
He opened it and froze after seeing the number.
He continued scrolling down, and another notification appeared. He swiped twice, his gaze rapidly moving across one message after another.
Those debts were being settled one by one, at astonishing speed, as if an invisible hand were turning over the pages of documents he had thought he would have to carry for many more years.
When he reached the end, only one debt remained on the account—
His student loan from his university years.
He raised his head and looked at Xiao, his voice filled with disbelief.
“…Do you know what’s going on?”
Xiao lowered his head and scrolled through his tablet, his tone as indifferent as if he were talking about something completely unrelated to him.
“Who knows? Maybe the old man finally found his conscience.”
Su Muchen did not respond.
He lowered his head and looked at the rows of accounts on his phone screen that had already been reduced to zero, remembering the family meeting at Jiyuan last time, when those old men had sat around the long table and used a presentation to discuss his life.
He remembered those faces.
He also remembered the matter-of-fact expression on Su Huaishan’s face when he said, “You’re the only one left of the direct lineage.”
But if they really wanted to say that they had “found their conscience,” perhaps it was because that day they had finally realized that the sole descendant of the direct lineage had already begun preparing to run farther than all the ancestors before him ever had.
Suddenly, everything had returned to the state it had been in before that night.
Although he had lost his job at the hospital, if he wanted it, he still had a chance of getting it back.
He had regained his freedom.
He began to think about how he had studied so hard and endured so much, only to miss out on becoming a doctor. To say that he had no regrets would be a lie.
But…
A figure surfaced in his mind.
The person who had once told him, “Wait for me.”
“I’ll come back.”
He put down his phone.
Outside the window, sunlight was seeping through the crack in the door, leaving warm-colored traces across the wooden floor.
Changning Alley was very quiet. The sound of Xiao scrolling through his tablet was very soft.
It seemed that nothing had changed.
And yet, it also seemed that something had already changed long ago.
◆◇◆◇◆
Yunjing City, Shaohua Center.
When Sheng Chengxiu turned to the final page of the report that had just arrived, his gaze paused on the paper for a moment.
Then he closed the entire report and placed it on the desk, remaining silent.
His secretary stood before the desk, looking down at the tips of his shoes.
“Guichen House’s ownership is going to be taken back?” Sheng Chengxiu’s tone contained no fluctuation.
“Yes.”
“The debts have also been cleared?”
“Everything owed by Su Jiancheng has been repaid. Only Su Muchen’s personal debt remains.”
Sheng Chengxiu was silent for a while.
He did not become angry. His expression remained calm, but the air in the office was clearly a degree colder than before.
The secretary did not raise his head or offer an explanation.
There was no point in explaining. It had already happened, and there was no way to stop it.
“Who did it?”
“Chenghui Group.”
Sheng Chengxiu’s gaze fell upon the line of words printed on the report.
He had already investigated the background of Chenghui Group before. It was an old-fashioned comprehensive conglomerate whose businesses spanned logistics, warehousing, trade, construction, and cultural assets. It was so low-key that it hardly seemed like a company of this era.
He was not surprised.
What surprised him was something else—
The person in charge of Chenghui Group was surnamed Su.
He had his secretary pull up Chenghui Group’s public information. The legal representative column indeed read—
Su Huaishan.
He stared at those three characters for a moment.
So, the person he had been dealing with all along was not merely Su Muchen himself.
Behind him stood the entire Chenghui Group, backing him.
This Chenghui Group was not as simple as it appeared on the surface. It controlled the deepest secret within Guichen House.
Dealing with Su Muchen alone was simple.
But dealing with an entire group was difficult.
He leaned back against the chair, his fingers lightly tapping the armrest twice.
Sheng Chengxiu had never failed.
Whether it was commercial acquisitions, political lobbying, or even more clandestine matters, he could always take one step ahead of his opponents. While others were still hesitating, he would already have a knife pressed against them.
But this time, he had already failed too many times against Su Muchen.
He had even been unable to deal with Xiao after sending people to eliminate him.
That feeling was like standing before a door, knowing there was something behind it, yet being unable to push it open no matter how hard he tried.
He raised his eyes.
“How far along is the analysis of the ancient book?”
The secretary said quietly, “It is still in progress. Some of the pages are severely damaged and need time to restore.”
Sheng Chengxiu said only, “Speed it up. Put everything else aside for now. Prioritize restoring that book.”
Outside the floor-to-ceiling windows, darkness was gradually descending, and the lights of Yunjing City were turning on one by one.
Sheng Chengxiu sat between that sea of lights and darkness, looking down upon the entire city.
Perhaps the answer he wanted was in that book.
He absolutely could not let his prey escape from beneath his claws.