Shen Linchuan’s hatred made his heart bleed. Never had there been a moment when he wanted to kill someone more than he did now.
“You think someone else took your place, but have you ever done a single good thing in your own place? And yet, even after all that, you can still come back.”
“Liu Tanghuan, I really hate you.”
Liu Tanghuan’s face flushed bright red, the veins on her forehead bulging. The whites of her eyes began to roll upward, and she looked as though she was about to pass out.
Shen Linchuan finally mercifully released her. He stood up and took a wet wipe, carefully wiping the fingers that had touched Liu Tanghuan.
Liu Tanghuan coughed uncontrollably. Using both her hands and feet, she crawled forward and curled up in a corner, staring at Shen Linchuan warily. She no longer dared to provoke him.
“Liu Tanghuan, don’t you want your identity back? I’ll give it to you.”
Shen Linchuan clapped his hands.
A large group of servants filed in, followed by countless beautiful outfits and stylists, all standing neatly in place.
Shen Linchuan looked at Liu Tanghuan coldly and instructed the people beside him,
“No matter what methods you use, make sure there are no flaws in her appearance.”
“Yes!”
After saying that, Shen Linchuan left the room.
The Liu family’s old residence was enormous, and Liu’s parents had yet to return from a business trip to a nearby city.
After Shen Linchuan married, Xiaoman wanted to stay with her parents all the time, so they had been living at the Liu family residence.
Some people even joked that Shen Linchuan seemed to have married into the Liu family.
Shen Linchuan ran into the garden. Looking at the empty cat room, he took a towel and carefully wiped it down.
He was completely different from the cold and ruthless person he had been moments ago. He gently leaned against the cat tree.
Sunlight fell over him, outlining his silhouette in gold.
“That’s so damn twisted.”
Xi Yu watched Shen Linchuan and gave his assessment.
Lu Zhixing looked at the enormous flower beside Xi Yu now, then at the buzzing sound produced by the beating of his own wings. After a long while, he finally asked weakly,
“Is there really no more dignified animal?”
“Does it really have to be a mosquito?”
Lu Zhixing landed on a flower petal. He couldn’t be bothered to flap these annoying wings that made such an irritating sound. He even felt like smacking himself.
Xi Yu chuckled.
“There isn’t an animal smaller than this that’s easier to get in and out with.”
Even though Xi Yu put it that way, Lu Zhixing still found it difficult to accept that he had become a mosquito.
It felt like someone could swat him to death at any moment.
Seeing how awkward Lu Zhixing looked, Xi Yu poked him with his pointed mouth.
“Stop being so fussy. You’re a good mosquito who doesn’t bite people. No one will hate you. Be good, okay?”
After being coaxed, Lu Zhixing finally followed Xi Yu around reluctantly, flying from place to place.
…………………………..
After being put through all that by Shen Linchuan, Liu Tanghuan didn’t dare throw another tantrum. She sat quietly in her place.
Following Shen Linchuan’s orders, the makeup artist didn’t say a single word from beginning to end, simply moving her tools across Liu Tanghuan’s frighteningly gaunt face.
Two hours later, everyone gradually left.
Liu Tanghuan was left alone sitting in front of the mirror. She looked at her reflection in disbelief.
The makeup artist’s skills were remarkable, concealing all the sunken areas of her face.
It was as though she had returned to the way she used to be.
Liu Tanghuan leaned closer to the mirror, carefully, afraid this was all an illusion.
After a while, she pinched the back of her own hand.
It hurt.
It was real…
She was back.
Shen Linchuan had actually made that monster leave and brought her back.
Why…?
Liu Tanghuan didn’t understand, but that didn’t stop her from being happy. And she was certain Shen Linchuan must have had no choice but to bring her back for some reason.
Whatever the reason was, she was back!
A fierce hatred burst from Liu Tanghuan’s eyes.
That monster had occupied her identity for so long, enjoying wealth and luxury while she was beaten and cursed at by Qian Xiaohu. She would definitely kill that monster!
And Shen Linchuan too, that ungrateful bastard who had repaid kindness with betrayal!
She would definitely tell her parents and make them avenge her!
Anyway, that monster had already dealt with the matter of her poisoning them. All she needed to do was pretend that the monster had bewitched her.
As Liu Tanghuan thought about this, her gaze lowered.
Even her clothes had been changed.
A dark green qipao.
This wasn’t something she would wear.
It was something that monster would wear!
Liu Tanghuan reached out to tear it off, but forcibly restrained herself.
She took a deep breath and told herself not to act impulsively.
She needed to see what Shen Linchuan was planning first.
Shen Linchuan was ruthless. Now that she had just returned, she couldn’t confront him head-on. She needed to think of another way.
She turned her head and looked at the decorations around her.
This was her room, but it was no longer her room.
Wedding photos of Shen Linchuan and “her” hung inside.
Liu Tanghuan’s expression darkened, and a cold smile curled at the corners of her lips.
A monster had taken on her appearance and enjoyed the perfect life that should have belonged to her.
Other parts of the room had changed as well.
Her once-clean balcony had been turned into a plant display, filled with succulents and flowers.
Liu Tanghuan walked onto the balcony and touched a brilliantly blooming rose.
The next second, she crushed the rose in her palm.
Crimson flower juice seeped through her fingers. When she opened her hand again, the beautiful flower had been reduced to a mangled mess.
Liu Tanghuan’s expression turned deranged as she whispered,
“Bitch! Bitch! Bitch!”
Footsteps approached from the doorway.
Liu Tanghuan hurriedly composed herself, hid her hand behind her back, and used her body to conceal the branch where she had plucked the flower.
Shen Linchuan pushed open the door and looked at Liu Tanghuan. After a moment, he sneered.
“You and her are worlds apart.”
Even with the exact same face and the exact same clothes, their entire temperaments were completely different.
The hatred and ambition in Liu Tanghuan’s eyes were impossible to conceal. Even though she had tried her best to disguise them, Shen Linchuan saw through her at a glance.
Liu Tanghuan had never been particularly clever. That was why she had ended up where she was.
She had been handed a winning hand and played it into ruin.
Shen Linchuan didn’t care about her hatred. He had returned Liu Tanghuan’s position to her.
Only then would his Xiaoman have even the slightest chance of survival.
Although Xi Yu had said there was nothing he could do and Xiaoman had less than two days left to live…
Xi Yu had taken Xiaoman away, and Shen Linchuan believed Xi Yu had a way.
He hadn’t interacted with Xi Yu much, but he could tell that Xi Yu was cautious yet soft-hearted.
He wouldn’t promise something he couldn’t accomplish.
But he hadn’t said that it was impossible.
That meant there was still a glimmer of hope.
For that tiny bit of hope, he was willing to do anything.
“Your parents are back. Remember what you can say and what you can’t.”
Shen Linchuan narrowed his eyes.
“Do you understand?”
Liu Tanghuan nodded, her shoulders shrinking.
“I understand.”
Shen Linchuan turned and left without expression.
The moment he turned his back, Liu Tanghuan’s expression changed. She followed behind him with a dark look on her face.
Xi Yu and Lu Zhixing stood side by side on the edge of the window.
After the two left, Lu Zhixing finally spoke softly.
“This Liu Tanghuan… it feels like she hasn’t realized what she did wrong.”
Xi Yu said, “There really are people in this world who are born rotten. Luo Shujing was one. Liu Tanghuan is another.”
“They’re naturally cold-hearted. No matter who treats them well, they think it’s only natural.”
“But if, after treating them well for a long time, someone suddenly refuses to indulge them over some small matter, they immediately become hateful.”
“Luo Shujing even betrayed his own parents in prison just to reduce his sentence. He exposed the other things his parents had done. He even spilled the fact that Luo Shan had kept an underage mistress.”
“And Liu Tanghuan is no better. If anything, she’s worse.”
“Xiaoman certainly made mistakes and had her own selfish motives, but her intentions were good. She could give up her life for the person she loved. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have exhausted her entire lifespan and ended up in this state.”
“Later, Xiaoman returned the position to Liu Tanghuan. That was the best opportunity Liu Tanghuan had to come to her senses.”
“But Liu Tanghuan remained stubborn and refused to repent. After she began harboring resentment toward her parents, she even poisoned them and tried to kill the parents who had doted on her for more than twenty years.”
Xi Yu thought about what Lu Zhixing had said that morning and suddenly asked,
“This morning, you said that if Xiaoman hadn’t appeared, perhaps Liu Tanghuan wouldn’t have poisoned her parents. Did you really mean that?”
Although Lu Zhixing had said that his purpose was to draw out Xiaoman’s sense of guilt and make her return to the Liu family and reveal the truth of all these years to everyone…
What Lu Zhixing had said wasn’t baseless. Every word had seemed to make sense.
No one knew what direction the Liu family would have taken without Xiaoman.
If an outsider heard all this, they might really think Xiaoman had done something wrong.
“No,” Lu Zhixing said. “Someone like Liu Tanghuan would have reached this point even without that demon.”
Xi Yu laughed quietly to himself.
No one knew whether Liu Tanghuan would have done something wrong without Xiaoman.
But Xi Yu knew.
He had already seen Liu Tanghuan’s fate in Qingliang Village.
Unmatched wealth and honor, free from worry and sorrow.
That was the first half of Liu Tanghuan’s life.
But she wasn’t like Luo Cheng’an, who carried an enormous amount of merit.
Someone without merit couldn’t remain wealthy and fortunate their entire life.
Liu Tanghuan’s good fortune would take a sharp turn for the worse when she met Qian Xiaohu.
That was her tribulation.
Her path of fate wouldn’t change at all before she ran away from her wedding.
The change came after she ran away—and it wasn’t because of him.
It was because of Liu’s parents.
Originally, Liu’s parents were destined to die young.
If Xiaoman had never appeared and Liu Tanghuan had followed the fate originally laid out for her, then after running away from her wedding, she would have waited for her parents to be the ones to lower their heads first and bring her back, along with that man.
Liu Tanghuan would have won yet again, while Qian Xiaohu wouldn’t have had the chance to reveal his true nature.
After marrying Liu Tanghuan, he would act submissive and meek in front of her, gradually driving a wedge between her and her parents.
When Liu Tanghuan once again asked to take over the company and was rejected, she discovered Liu Father’s unwitnessed will.
………………….
It turned out that when Liu Father brought his daughter back, he had already prepared a will.
He didn’t want his life’s work to be ruined in the hands of his daughter and Qian Xiaohu.
So he secretly made a will leaving the company to Shen Linchuan, instructing him to give his daughter a fixed allowance on a regular basis after his death.