Fang Qingci didn't know why Gao Xiang was asking her out again. Although her uncle hadn't told her about what happened that day, Xiao Wu had indignantly described it to her and even showed her photos.
The filter through which Fang Qingci viewed Gao Xiang had completely shattered, but she just couldn't understand why her uncle always seemed so calm.
Faced with Gao Xiang's invitation, she only thought for a moment before readily agreeing.
"I bought two tickets to the border. I heard the scenery there is exceptionally beautiful. Wasn't that painting of yours ruined by your brother? I'll paint a new one for you!" Gao Xiang spoke very sincerely, but in her heart, Fang Qingci felt he was being incredibly fake.
This feeling was exactly like the day her mother forced her to marry.
They were never considering her; they were only considering themselves.
Even knowing all this, Fang Qingci still agreed. However, along the way, she noticed that Gao Xiang was constantly sending messages, seemingly chatting with some girl.
But none of that mattered anymore.
She just wanted to know what Gao Xiang was up to.
From a plane to a train, and from a train to a bus, they finally arrived at the picturesque border town Gao Xiang had talked about.
Fang Qingci's heart was full of vigilance, and Gao Xiang's attitude also began to change. His initial attentiveness along the journey turned somewhat perfunctory, and even a bit hostile. They walked from the streets into the wilderness, with Gao Xiang claiming he wanted to find a place with good scenery.
It wasn't until they reached a wasteland where an off-road vehicle was abruptly parked.
"Hurry up and get in the car, it's going to be dark soon," Gao Xiang urged.
Fang Qingci clearly sensed something was wrong. There were two men in that off-road vehicle, and their eyes were unfriendly.
She wanted to step back, but Gao Xiang stepped forward and tried to grab her: "You little bitch, you still want to run? If it weren't for you, how could I have been expelled!"
Fang Qingci raised her hand and slapped him hard across the face. Gao Xiang grew furious: "You hit me? You dare hit me? I am Gao Xiang! You're nothing but a cheap bitch abandoned by your family! Stop pretending! Do you think you're so great just because you go to college?"
Suddenly, a figure flashed by, and Gao Xiang flew sideways through the air.
"I've been wanting to beat you up since last time, you little brat!"
Two vans arrived, and the moment the doors opened, knives, spears, and clubs were revealed first.
"You really dare to mess with anyone, huh? Try touching our Qingci again!" While speaking, Gao Xiang took a knife to the buttocks, making him scream in pain. Seeing that things were going south, the off-road vehicle tried to leave. Gao Xiang anxiously shouted: "Wait for me! Wait for me!"
At this moment, Fang Qingci said something, and both Xiao Wu and Old Yao slowed down their pursuit.
They just watched Gao Xiang jump into the car, and then that battered off-road vehicle disappeared down a dirt road.
"Qingci, why did you let him go? We should catch him and send him to the police station!" Xiao Wu was a bit indignant.
Fang Qingci, however, stared intently in the direction the car disappeared: "I calculated it on the way here. The bus tickets, plane tickets, accommodation, meals... they spent so much capital, and even sent a car to pick him up. I didn't go, Xiao Wu, what do you guess will happen to him when he gets there?"
Xiao Wu froze for a moment, while Old Yao started laughing: "I have to say, you're becoming more and more like your dad."
Fang Qingci was stunned for a second: "Right, where is my uncle?"
"Giving a statement."
"Huh?"
Old Yao waved his hand: "It's nothing else, just that accomplice of Gao Xiang's. Your dad just pinned the guy down. They had originally tricked several people into coming, and now they're all sitting in the police station. As a good citizen who acted bravely for a just cause, your dad has to give a statement, right?"
Fang Qingci was a bit anxious: "Then let's hurry up and go..."
Old Yao looked at her hurried pace: "Xiao Wu, do you think our boss has an addiction?"
"What addiction?"
"The things he does every day... Tsk, maybe we should just go back and open a private police station."
"Are you even listening to what you're saying?"
Clutching his buttocks, Gao Xiang cursed continuously. In his view, he and these people were on the same side, but when he was twisted and turned out of the border, he realized something was wrong.
The driver and the thugs dragged him directly out of the car, and what greeted him was a severe beating.
"You, from today onwards, you work here. If you don't do a good job..." After the beating, the man raised the electric baton in his hand.
"No, there's a mistake, I'm with Wu Liang! Wu Liang!" Gao Xiang quickly explained.
"Wu Liang? Who is that?" The man thought for a moment, then shook his head. "Anyway, right now you are our cargo. The expenses for this trip were at least a hundred thousand. Don't even think about leaving until you pay it back!"
"Where did you get that number!" Gao Xiang jumped up, only to receive another severe beating.
He finally realized that he was also one of the duped fools, but it was already too late.
Time flew by, and Fang Qingci, far away from her hometown, began to study earnestly. Then, on the day she graduated, Fang Zhiyi handed all his businesses over to her without a second thought.
Fang Qingci wasn't surprised, because her uncle always talked about this.
He was either complaining about being tired or grumbling about having too many troublesome matters.
Over these few years, she had also returned to the village twice with Fang Zhiyi. Fang Mingshan and Liu Wenxia's attitudes had changed a lot. They were always talking about "my daughter" this and that. Only Old Lady Fang and Old Man Fang still looked at her with displeasure, but she never stepped foot into their house either.
She heard that the blow Fang Tianqi took left some lingering effects; he was always half a beat slow in speaking and acting, and had a bad temper, so he could only drop out of school and stay at home. Meanwhile, the Wu family and the Fang family had become blood enemies. Fang Mingshan's hand was chopped off in a conflict, and for that, Boss Wu was also sent to prison.
If it weren't for coming to the countryside to do charity work, Fang Qingci wouldn't have even wanted to come back. She now knew very clearly what she wanted.
"Zhaodi, Mom made something delicious for dinner tonight, come home and eat."
Fang Qingci frowned: "No, besides, that's not my home."
"This child is still angry. Everything the family did back then was for your own good. Mom was strict with you just so you could stand out in the future. Look at you now."
Xiao Wu suddenly interjected: "How well she's doing now has nothing to do with you!"
"Hey? You person, I'm talking to my daughter, what does it have to do with you?"
Old Lady Fang also nagged from the side: "You're already this old, hurry up and find someone to marry. Your uncle's businesses should be handed over to your brother. A girl not getting married will make people laugh at her..."
Fang Qingci shook her head: "Are you done talking? If you're done, I'm leaving."
"Hey, hey, daughter, you can't forget your roots. You were born from me. Now that you're doing well following your uncle, do you want to abandon your parents? That won't do, we are a family." Liu Wenxia's face was full of smiles, but this smile looked disgusting.
"What kind of parents are you? Huh? Do you even deserve the title?" Xiao Wu frowned and scolded from the side. "Have you forgotten all the things you did?"
grated, and just when he finally managed to get into an elite academy, he discovered that he actually had a system, and the way to earn rewards was extremely ridiculous. So for the sake of rewards, he had no choice but to start acting ridiculous as well. Su Cheng: "It's nothing but system quests after all." But later, what confused Su Cheng was that while he was already quite ridiculous, he never expected those serious characters to gradually become ridiculous too. And the way they looked at him became increasingly strange... (This synopsis doesn't do it justice, please read the full story)
s the Eldest Princess, renowned for her cold and aloof detachment, became the most docile of lambs, obeying his every command without question. But when the final move was played on the chessboard, as Gu Chenghan seized everything and ascended on the verge of apotheosis, that very Princess suddenly embraced him from behind, her tone carrying a dependence never heard before: "Wait... you haven't yet... commanded me to love you forever." Gu Chenghan froze abruptly. She... hadn't been hypnotized?! ... [The Eldest Princess's Diary] [When my soul was extracted, becoming the sole spectator outside my own shell] [At first, there was overwhelming fury, until I saw] [How he used my sword to effortlessly shatter my inescapable doom] [How he wielded my authority to eradicate fatal conspiracies I had never even detected] [Like a deity, he rescued me from the deep mire I was trapped in] [If not for those annoying vixens, he and I would be a match made in heaven] [I think I am ill, gravely ill] [My deity should belong to me alone] ... "Hypnosis? Oh, it succeeded, my dear Master." "Only this time, it's my turn to hypnotize you."
nd fell into a coma while saving his younger sister from an out-of-control car. He became a vegetable. No one knew that his consciousness had crossed into a world of cultivation. Over the course of sixty years, he began as the lowest kind of mine slave, struggling to survive amid mountains of corpses and seas of blood. By sheer chance, he eventually obtained the complete memories of a fallen Immortal King. Alchemy, medicine, formations, feng shui, physiognomy, artifact forging… Every great inheritance of the cultivation world was now his. But when he opened his eyes again, he discovered that ten full years had passed in the modern world. To pay for his treatment, his father had sold the family’s shop and house, leaving himself covered in lasting injuries and illness. His mother had cared for him day and night, and more than half of her hair had already turned white. His younger sister, who had been only fifteen back then, was now twenty-five. To help repay the family’s debts, she had been forced to lower her head and put on a smiling face in places of glittering lights and endless revelry. Only then did Chen Xuan understand that what he had lost was not merely ten years. He had lost the life his entire family was meant to have. The good news was that he had brought back the memories of an Immortal King’s entire lifetime. The bad news was that his soul had returned alone—his cultivation had not come with him. Spiritual energy was scarce, resources were depleted, and the modern world still had firearms, surveillance, capital, and laws. If he wanted to protect his family, break free from everyone’s control, and become truly invincible beneath the heavens, he would have to start all over again.
e bizarre and supernatural had descended. The previous emperor was a thoroughgoing tyrant; no longer satisfied with human women, he had set his sights on a stunningly beautiful supernatural entity. He met his end in his bedchamber, drained of all his vital essence. As the legitimate eldest son and crown prince, Wang Hao was thus hastily enthroned, becoming the young emperor of the Great Zhou Dynasty. No sooner had he awakened the "Imperial Sign-In Intelligence System" than he was assassinated by a Son of Destiny—a classic villain's opening. The Great Zhou, ravaged by the former emperor's excesses, was in national decline. The great families within its borders harbored their own treacherous schemes, martial sects began to defy the imperial court's decrees, and border armies, their pay and provisions in arrears, grumbled incessantly against the central government. Fortunately, the central capital was still held secure by the half-million Imperial Guards and fifty thousand Imperial Forest Army who obeyed the court's orders, along with the royal family's hidden reserves of power, barely managing to suppress the realm. As the Great Zhou's finances worsened and supernatural activities grew ever more frequent, the court sat atop a volcano. Ambitious plotters everywhere dreamed of overthrowing the dynasty, and even some reclusive ancient powers emerged, attempting to sway the tides of the world. At the first grand court assembly, the civil and military officials nearly came to blows, fighting tooth and nail over the allocation of fifty million taels of silver from the summer tax revenues. The spectacle opened Wang Hao's eyes—the Great Zhou's bureaucracy was not only corrupt but also martially proficient, a cabinet of all-rounders. Some officials even had the audacity to suggest the emperor release funds from the imperial privy purse to address the emergency. Wang Hao suddenly felt weary. Let it all burn.
