Running into Qi Yiming first thing in the morning had truly ruined Ji Yang’s appetite. He put down his breakfast after only a couple of bites.
Ji Mingyue lent him her car.
According to her, after the original owner’s car accident, he had smashed every sports car in his garage, along with two of Ji Chengyi’s cars. Back then, he had constantly shouted that Ji Chengyi was trying to kill him. This made his good-for-nothing father suspect that he suffered from paranoid delusions, so he had nurses inject him with tranquilizers every day.
As expected, having a stepmother meant having a stepfather. Even the villain’s younger self couldn’t escape this rule.
His stepmother, Yao Zhaoling, was Ji Chengyi’s biological mother.
She was the pure first love that Ji Yang and Ji Chengyi’s biological father, Ji Changshou, had betrayed in his youth.
In the author’s portrayal, she was a pitiful woman who had been abandoned by a man and given birth to a child alone. Later, moved by her soft heart and the man’s lingering remorse, she chose to marry Ji Changshou after his wife passed away.
That year, Ji Chengyi was ten.
The original Ji Yang was nine.
After Yao Zhaoling married into the family, she never fought for anything and constantly taught Ji Chengyi to give way to others. Ji Changshou continued his philandering ways outside the home and barely bothered with family affairs. This made many readers feel sorry for Ji Chengyi, seeing him as a pitiful little victim who was bullied by everyone.
When Ji Yang read the book, he had wondered whether the people responsible for this moral outlook had gotten a little water in their brains.
Fortunately, the couple hadn’t returned from overseas yet. Otherwise, Ji Yang would absolutely have thrown up right in front of them.
Ji Yang rolled down the car window.
The car traveled along the estate’s smooth asphalt road. After about ten minutes, it entered the main road around the city center. Suddenly, there were many more cars. The widely spaced palm trees lining the road, combined with the blue sea and sky, gave Ji Yang a sense of being grounded in the real world.
Horns blared from every direction. While waiting at a red light, he could even hear other drivers complaining about Fanzhou’s ridiculously congested traffic.
Ji Yang finally accepted that the world he now inhabited wasn’t virtual.
It was just like Jinzhou, where he had lived in his previous life.
Perhaps even that place had appeared in someone else’s manuscript—or in a world created from reality as its foundation.
Driver Liu received a phone call along the way.
He was getting on in years and had once driven for Old Master Ji. Now retired and enjoying his later years, he only filled in when someone in the family needed a car and no other driver was available.
“Yes, we’re going to the company,” Old Liu replied into the phone, occasionally glancing at the back seat.
Ji Yang noticed and turned around to ask, “Uncle Liu, who is it?”
Ji Yang then noticed that Uncle Liu seemed to have received some kind of instruction. He turned around and handed him the phone.
“Hello?” Ji Yang took the phone, somewhat bewildered.
A familiar voice came through the receiver.
“Fifteen minutes ago, the location data showed that Miss Ji’s car, which was originally supposed to head to Nancheng Shopping Mall, had gone in the opposite direction. For security reasons, if Fourth Young Master has any private plans other than going to the corporation, I’ll dispatch additional personnel.”
Ji Yang said, “I don’t think I do?”
The person on the other end replied, “Understood.”
Such routine, businesslike coldness.
Ji Yang asked, “What if I do? What if I change my mind at the last minute?”
Nie Xu said, “The corporation is a key security location. As long as you don’t deliberately sneak out and avoid people like you did before, reallocating personnel—”
Ji Yang interrupted him. “What are you doing?”
There was a two-second silence on the other end.
“A shipment just arrived at the docks. I’m busy.”
Ji Yang said, “You’re so busy, yet you still care about me?”
He leaned against the car window, letting the wind blow his hair around.
Before the other person could answer, he continued on his own. “Brother Xu, you’re so cold. You won’t even answer me. Grandpa and Eldest Brother are both very concerned about what’s going on between you and me, you know.”
As he spoke, he ended up laughing at his own words.
“Also, aren’t you my personal bodyguard? The twenty-four-hour kind? I told you to recuperate, but you said you were busy. Is being busy more important than me?”
As Ji Yang spoke, he could hear the sound of waves at the docks coming through the phone.
There seemed to be quite a few people around Nie Xu, too.
Occasionally, snippets of conversation drifted over.
“Over here! Move the cargo this way!”
“Careful with it!”
“Boss, everything’s here! The quantities all match!”
“Seal the boxes as soon as the inventory check is finished.”
Ji Yang heard Nie Xu respond to someone, then speak to him again.
“Twenty-four-hour personal protection is an industry term. Time spent accompanying you won’t exceed fifteen percent of all working hours. If you have outings every day, other designated personnel will be assigned to take turns covering them.”
Ji Yang rested his head against the window.
“Oh. So being busy is more important than me?”
As soon as Ji Yang finished speaking, he heard Old Liu laughing in the front seat.
Having gotten his revenge for being rejected five times, Ji Yang felt a little guilty and immediately hung up.
He looked toward the front. “Uncle Liu, is it really that funny?”
“Sorry, Fourth Young Master.” Old Liu smiled warmly. “It just reminds me of how nice it is to be young. Back when I was a dockworker, my wife would call me several times a day, too, always going on about this and that.”
Ji Yang thought, How could I ever compare to you?
I’m just bored, that’s all.
Besides, Nie Xu wasn’t merely a dockworker. Once the time was right, he could blow up the entire dock and reclaim the land from the sea.
Blow it up and reclaim the land?
At that thought, something flashed through Ji Yang’s mind.
Why had Nie Xu blown up the docks in the first place? It hadn’t happened at this point in the story. A shipment had just arrived? What kind of cargo would require Nie Xu to be there in person?
Thinking back to the original plot, after Ji Yang had been completely abandoned by everyone and Nie Xu had been reassigned to Old Master Ji’s side, what exactly had happened?
Oh, no.
Ji Yang shuddered all over.
Looking at the phone he had just hung up, he immediately called back.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
The line was busy.
He tried again. Still busy.
Old Liu noticed and said, “Is something urgent, Fourth Young Master? The security center and I have always communicated through a dedicated line, and the number is different every time. Besides, I’ve had this phone for years. It acts up quite often, and the signal isn’t very good either.”
Ji Yang immediately took out his own phone. His contacts were a chaotic mess of people he didn’t recognize.
Without thinking, he logged into his old account.
The moment he signed in, a whole string of notification sounds rang out.
Apart from the group chat called “The Rules-Taming Selection Center,” there were now a lot of private messages.
“Fourth Young Master? What’s going on? Why did you block Brother Wei?”
“Did something happen?”
At first, the messages were all questions like these.
Later, they changed.
“I saw the news. Congratulations, Fourth Young Master! You finally won one against Ji Chengyi.”
“Is Ji Chengyi freaking out? Hahaha!”
“But hurry up and add Brother Wei back. Brother Wei has been asking around everywhere, wondering if he did something wrong to upset you.”
Ji Yang ignored all this irritating nonsense and found the person who had been pushed far down his contact list.
He sent two messages.
“Is there someone named Jiang Lei with you?”
“Don’t let him board the ship!”
There was no reply.
Afraid the other person wouldn’t believe him, Ji Yang sent another message.
“There’s someone on that ship. He’ll be crippled there.”
The shipment that had arrived at the port was real.
It was the result of a private agreement between Old Master Ji and one of the Ji Corporation’s business rivals. The cargo would go to the other party, and in return, they wanted one of Jiang Lei’s hands.
There was no other reason for it. The Ji family only needed people who obeyed orders.
And Jiang Lei, Nie Xu’s right-hand man, had stopped taking orders from the Ji family at some point in the past.
This was a warning from Ji Yan Song.
Jiang Lei wouldn’t merely be crippled there. After losing his hand, he would go on a mission at sea two months later. Thanks to the machinations of someone named Lu Li, he would never set foot on land again.
It was the scene in the book where Nie Xu took his revenge.
A sea of dark-clothed figures stood at the docks, watching towering flames, ignited by gasoline, blaze into the sky. The fire burned for an entire night.
Ji Yang had always felt that the trouble Jiang Lei encountered at this point was directly connected to Nie Xu’s increasingly reckless pursuit of revenge later in the story.
Giving such a warning without any prior explanation was admittedly rather rash. From the perspective of the original Ji Yang, it could even be considered betrayal—turning against his own family to help an outsider.
But what choice did he have?
The Ji Corporation’s downfall was already inevitable.
Was he supposed to rely on his cold-blooded grandfather, his brother who would eventually come to his senses, his biased biological father, or himself, who couldn’t be relied upon?
Ji Chengyi might still have some ambition left.
After all, the Ji family’s downfall was another turning point for him and Nie Xu. From that point onward, their epic tale of love and hatred would officially begin.
Ji Yang had seen spoilers posted by readers online.
Ji Chengyi would accuse Nie Xu of being unscrupulous and harboring ulterior motives, only for Nie Xu to throw him into a basement and lock him up for five whole days.
The sheer intensity of the brutal, violent atmosphere had given Ji Yang a headache just reading about it.
He couldn’t imagine what would happen if he were the one in Ji Chengyi’s place.
Would his fate be even more miserable than the original ending?
While he still had the chance—
If he could make himself useful, he had to step up.
Unfortunately, even after the car stopped in front of a massive office building, his phone still hadn’t received a single reply.
Uncle Liu took the wheelchair out of the trunk and carefully helped him.
“Fourth Young Master, take it slowly.”
“It’s fine.”
Ji Yang put his left foot on the ground first and transferred himself into the wheelchair with ease.
It was the morning rush, and people were coming and going through the entrance.
Ji Yang’s arrival attracted quite a bit of attention.
Some people were curious; others scrutinized him.
At first, no one seemed to recognize who he was.
Only after they noticed the familiar face of Uncle Liu did they begin to guess his identity.
At that point, the looks directed at him instantly grew sharper.
Suspicion, shock, and even disdain and disgust.
Ji Yang ignored those gazes. He unfolded the light gray blanket Uncle Liu handed him and draped it over his knees.
Uncle Liu asked cautiously, “Would you like me to take you upstairs?”
He was simply worried because Fourth Young Master had never had a good reputation at the corporation and had caused plenty of trouble in the past. Today, however, he sat there with a clean face, black hair, and black eyes, looking almost excessively well-behaved. He even had a sickly pallor, and now he was in a wheelchair. What if people bullied him when he entered the company like this?
Ji Yang had no idea Uncle Liu was being so considerate. He simply smiled and declined.
“It’s fine. There aren’t any slopes or bumps. I can manage on my own.”
It was at that moment that another voice came from beside him.
“Why are you here?”
It was Ji Chengyi.
He also seemed to like wearing white, but unlike Ji Yang’s casual style, his suit was perfectly pressed, lending him an air of refined seriousness.
Ji Yang’s eyes curved into a smile. His greeting was both perfunctory and enthusiastic.
“Oh, it’s Third Brother! Good morning!”
Not only did Ji Chengyi pause, but the several office staff members accompanying him also exchanged bewildered glances.
Ji Yang said, “It’s been so long since I came here. I was worried everyone missed me too much.”
A middle-aged man standing to Ji Chengyi’s back left said, “Fourth Young Master, you should stop joking around. Our President Ji has been rushing around all morning preparing for the bidding meeting, barely having a moment to breathe. And here you are, coming to make trouble.”
“It’s fine.” Ji Chengyi raised a hand to stop the man behind him.
He nodded to Old Liu, who had remained standing to one side, acknowledging his greeting. Then, without drawing attention to himself, he looked around.
Ji Yang’s smile remained in place.
“Looking for Nie Xu?”
Ji Chengyi’s expression turned a degree colder. He seemed to care even more than Ji Yang had expected about his failure to get Nie Xu transferred to his side.
In the book, Ji Chengyi was considered someone who was good at concealing his emotions. Since Old Master Ji had personally spoken up, he should, by all rights, have chosen to back down and wait for another opportunity.
But now, he couldn’t even be bothered to hide his displeasure.
He even said, “I thought you’d shown up here specifically to bring your people along and flaunt your power.”
“I wanted to,” Ji Yang replied, his smile trembling slightly as he spoke. “But he’s injured, and it breaks my heart.”
Ji Yang was actually in a better mood now.
He had discovered that whenever he dealt with Ji Chengyi, his mood wasn’t too bad.
Ji Yang tilted his head back and looked at the enormous building above him, where the words Ji Corporation Haicheng Group were faintly visible.
He thought of the spoilers about the basement he had found online, along with the excited comments from netizens.
“Captivity! Yes, that’s exactly the vibe! They met when they were nobodies, but their difference in status forced them apart. One runs, the other chases, and the one running can’t escape even if he grows wings!”
“Angst, angst, angst! Bring on the angst! I love this kind of story where the shou suffers first and then the gong suffers. I can’t wait to see Nie Xu consumed by grief and regret, wishing he could suffer in the other person’s place!”
“Poor Chengyi! Don’t forgive him too easily!”
“Exactly! Eldest Brother loves you so restrainedly, that lovesick, obsessive Lu Li is still waiting for you, and Wang Weitao is a good man too… So many people love you! There’s absolutely no need to waste your life pining after someone who will use you!”
“Don’t give in! One day, Nie Xu will regret everything, and sooner or later, you’ll take back the Ji family!”
“Love can overcome any hardship, and it can also make people let go of their hatred.”
“I’m just waiting for the day Nie Xu presents everything to Chengyi with both hands, letting our Chengyi do whatever he wants with him!”
Ji Yang sighed inwardly. These people had really poisoned their brains by shipping couples.
Someone whose parents and siblings had all perished at the bottom of a lightless sea, and who had been consumed by the flames of hatred for more than a decade—could a person like that really do such a thing?
Even if Nie Xu were overwhelmed by grief and regret, wasn’t it far more likely that he would imprison Ji Chengyi for the rest of his life?
“Fourth Young Master, what are you looking at? You can’t see very far sitting down, can you? Why don’t I help you?”
Another person behind Ji Chengyi spoke up, his laughter clearly tinged with malice.
Ji Yang withdrew his gaze.
“Are you making fun of me?”
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Ji Zhonglin emerging from the building with several people.
What a way to be a vicious villain. I’ve barely come to work, and one important character after another keeps showing up.
Ji Yang lowered his eyes to his legs. The next second, he gave a bitter smile and spoke softly.
“That’s true. In my current condition, what right do I have to compete with anyone? I’m not even worthy of competing. You’re targeting me for Third Brother’s sake. I can understand that.”
The other man had also noticed Ji Zhonglin. He turned back and met Ji Yang’s smiling face, growing both annoyed and furious.
“You—”
“He didn’t mean it that way.” Ji Chengyi frowned and looked at Ji Yang.
“Is that so?” Ji Yang propped his chin on his hand and looked at Ji Chengyi. “Then when Third Brother eventually takes the highest position in the Ji Corporation, you must remember to promote this fine employee of yours and give him a raise… Oh.”