Big brother Liu Chengjun was dressed in a tailored high-end suit, wearing a smile, his demeanor refined and courteous, as he thoughtfully set the tableware for Liu Tiancheng.
"Father, try this. The kitchen made it specially for you today."
Liu Tiancheng didn’t even glance at the bowl of soup, his gaze cold and distant.
Second brother Liu Xiao and third brother Liu Feiyu sat at the other end of the table, both with their heads down, silently eating the food in front of them, indifferent to everything around them.
Coldness was the main theme of this household.
Chen Guan’s eyes lingered on Liu Feiyu for a moment. He could sense that Liu Feiyu appeared calm, but the fingers gripping his knife and fork were tense.
Mrs. Liu stirred her soup with a silver spoon and suddenly muttered a complaint.
"The food is salty again today."
With a sharp crack, Liu Tiancheng slammed his chopsticks onto the table, startling Mrs. Liu.
"If you don’t like it, get out!"
The entire dining room went silent in an instant—even the clinking of knives and forks faded away.
Liu Chengjun immediately stepped in to smooth things over, his flawlessly genial smile still in place.
"Father, please don’t be upset. Mother was just speaking casually. I’ll have the kitchen remake the dishes."
An Changqing also spoke up at the right moment, his voice warm and steady.
"Chairman Liu, Mrs. Liu, it’s not good for your health if the food gets cold."
His words were appropriate and helped ease the tension, but they couldn’t dispel the icy chill that hung so thickly over the dinner table.
Chen Guan watched all of this quietly.
He noticed that although Liu Tiancheng lashed out at everyone, most of his vigilance was directed at his eldest son, Liu Chengjun.
Baal’s voice drifted lazily through his mind.
"What an interesting family dinner."
"This old man is about to crack. The smell of fear is practically pouring off him."
"Three sons—one wants to kill him, one wants to watch him die, and one... wants him to die slowly."
"Heh, what a loving family. You humans are endlessly entertaining."
As Baal chuckled to himself, dinner reached its midpoint.
Suddenly, Liu Tiancheng broke into violent coughing. His face flushed red, as if he couldn’t catch his breath.
The old butler, who had been standing nearby, quickly stepped forward, patting his back gently while pulling a small pill bottle from his pocket. He shook out a pill and fetched a glass of warm water.
"Sir, it’s time for your medicine."
Liu Tiancheng stared at the white pill in the butler’s palm, and the fear in his eyes erupted completely.
His face turned pale, and he swept the glass and pill out of the butler’s hand with a single motion.
The glass hit the floor with a sharp crack.
He pointed at the old butler, whose face was equally stunned, then turned to Liu Chengjun beside him, his voice trembling with terror as he rasped.
"You... you’ve conspired together!"
"You’re trying to kill me!"
For the first time, a crack appeared in Liu Chengjun’s usually flawless smile. He stood up, his eyes filled with pain.
"Father, what are you saying?"
His voice trembled, heavy with the grievance of being wronged.
"How could I ever harm you?"
The old butler also fell to his knees in fright, his face pale.
"Sir, you’ve been taking this medicine for years. How would I dare—"
Liu Tiancheng refused to listen. His shaking finger darted back and forth between Liu Chengjun and the old butler, his bloodshot eyes wild with madness.
"You’re all in this together!"
"You ungrateful son! You just can’t wait, can you!"
At the table, Liu Feiyu set down his knife and fork, letting out a soft sigh that cut through the deathly silence of the dining room.
"Father, please don’t get worked up. Big brother... I’m sure he didn’t mean it."
His words sounded like a placation, but they only added fuel to the fire.
Liu Xiao remained silent, deaf to the unfolding drama around him, quietly cutting into the steak on his plate as the knife scraped faintly against the porcelain.
He felt like that steak—just meat on a chopping board, waiting to be carved up.
The city was a maze of traps. If he could, he’d rather go back to the Academy.
"Get out. All of you, get out!"
Liu Tiancheng grabbed a porcelain plate nearby and was about to hurl it at Liu Chengjun.
"Chairman Liu."
A voice rang out. It wasn’t loud, but it instantly cooled the boiling tension in the room.
Chen Guan had spoken.
Every pair of eyes turned to him.
But Chen Guan wasn’t looking at Liu Tiancheng. His gaze was fixed on the white pill lying on the carpet.
"Is this a standard prescription from your doctor?"
Liu Tiancheng paused mid-swing, breathing heavily and staring at Chen Guan, as if trying to figure out what this young man was up to.
Chen Guan continued. "We’ve taken on this security detail, so it’s our responsibility to account for every possible risk."
"That includes every bite of food you take, every glass of water you drink, and every pill you swallow."
He raised his head and looked at Liu Tiancheng.
"If you don’t mind, we can have this pill—along with the broken glass—sent for lab testing right away."
"That’s the most direct way to settle this."
An Changqing quickly added, his voice composed and convincing.
"Chen Guan is right, Chairman Liu."
"Rather than suspecting each other, let the facts speak for themselves."
"Until the results come back, the four of us will stay by your side around the clock, guaranteeing your absolute safety."
The logic was sound, giving Liu Tiancheng a way out while offering a concrete solution.
Liu Tiancheng’s chest heaved violently. He glanced at his eldest son, whose face was full of hurt, then swept his eyes over his other two sons, who remained silent, before finally settling his gaze back on Chen Guan and An Changqing.
The madness in his eyes slowly receded, replaced by bone-deep exhaustion as reason returned to him.
"Fine..."
The family dinner ended in disarray.
……
In the guest room of the Liu estate.
Long Ao paced the room restlessly.
"What a mess. This whole family is insane."
Hong Yuan leaned her massive battle-axe against the wall, equally baffled.
"That Liu Tiancheng looks like he could drop dead at any moment. Who would even bother to assassinate someone like him?"
"He’s not dying."
An Changqing sat on the sofa, his expression more solemn than they had ever seen.
"He genuinely believes someone wants to kill him."
He looked at Chen Guan. "Liu Chengjun’s reaction was too perfect."
"A son truly misunderstood by his father would react with shock and anger. Instead, his performance was the right amount of grief and grievance."
"Every word he said felt like scripted lines."
Long Ao stopped pacing. "So you’re saying he really wants to off his old man?"
"I don’t know."
An Changqing shook his head. "But someone in this house definitely wants Mr. Liu dead."
Baal’s voice echoed lazily in Chen Guan’s mind.
"This kid’s got a sharp eye."
"But the truly interesting thing isn’t something these pups could pick up."
Chen Guan asked mentally, "What did you find?"
Baal chuckled softly. "There’s a presence in this estate that doesn’t belong to anyone in the Liu family."
"Like a viper lurking in the weeds, waiting for its prey to come close."
ng to die together with you." Lin Xuan is dead, his body thrown into the river by his scumbag lover and her accomplice. She, the president of the Su Group, is decisive, ruthless, and ice-cold. For three days and three nights, she had his body fished out of the river, and without hesitation, she kissed the bloated corpse of Lin Xuan. She laid down beside him in a cold coffin, their fingers intertwined, a smile lingering on her lips as she closed her eyes. The noble and cold-hearted woman, only bending for one man—Lin Xuan. Lin Xuan, with his golden finger, is reborn and returns to the day of his wedding to the treacherous woman. Su Qiang comes to steal the bride. Lin Xuan's eyes light up, eager to pledge his loyalty on the spot, but instead, her kiss transfers a glass of drugged wine into his mouth, causing him to pass out... 【Male Protagonist with Single Female Lead】【Yandere Tycoon】【Action-Packed】【True vs. Fake Heir】
ive and Ruthless] Before his transmigration, Ye Xuan was playing a game called "Severing Emotions to Attain the Dao." The game's core wasn't about leveling up by fighting monsters, but about conquering various "bad women" with wicked personalities and cold, fickle natures. There was only one method to conquer them: stay unwaveringly by their side, then die at a critical moment, driving them to madness after losing the protagonist. The higher their level of regret, the higher the player's score. To dominate the server, Ye Xuan conquered all the bad women. In the early stages, he showered them with boundless tenderness, only to choose to sacrifice himself for them later, making them weep bitterly and drown in regret. Among them were: Xia Lengyue, the unfaithful immortal wife who chased after powerful men and discarded her husband like trash. Ye Qingcheng, the Demonic Venerable of the Joyous Union Sect, who appeared pure and innocent but was, in reality, promiscuous. Wu Lingxiao, the Empress of the Great Xia Dynasty, who lusted after men and loved maintaining a harem. Bai Qiangu of the Endless Demonic Sect: a bloodthirsty mass murderer. However, when the protagonist transmigrated into the game world, he made a horrifying discovery. Eight hundred years had already passed. The bad women he had conquered had now each become deities and revered ancestors. Faced with the endless stream of toxic women coming for him, Ye Xuan could only rely on his god-tier acting skills to carve a path of survival through this world of treacherous women.
ut it can buy an entire year of absolutely perfect training results! Su Yu stared at his empty wallet and decisively opened up various online loan platforms. “Borrow a thousand bucks! Recharge my vitality!” Boom! His vitality broke a hundred points, shattering the limits of the human body! “Borrow ten thousand bucks! Recharge my combat skills!” Boom! A basic punching technique so common it was everywhere instantly maxed out, revealing the ultimate assassination technique of Five Elements Unity—Inner Force! When a rich kid hired assassins for a midnight ambush, aiming to break both of his legs, they instead ran headfirst into a monster—a human-shaped tyrannosaur, brimming with dragon-like vitality. With just two fingers, Su Yu snapped a steel staff reinforced with alloy. Staring at the killer’s stash of stolen cash—a staggering quarter-million dollars—he showed a corporate-sincere smile: “Thanks for the pre-exam gift pack, Mr. Zhao! I’m gonna go re-invest this!” Three days later, at the National Martial Arts College Entrance Exam, while everyone else struggled just to reach the passing line, Su Yu threw a single punch—and more than a thousand vitality points literally detonated the entire arena!
lan, the Luo family, tracked him down - along with the babies in their arms. Mo Xuan stared pensively at the paternity test results from over a dozen top institutions, both domestic and international, showing a 99.99% match between himself and the two baby girls. At 23, Mo Xuan, a doctoral student, had become the father of two three-year-old children. The kicker? The mothers weren't even the same person! He gradually realized he was being lured step by step into an elaborate trap designed by these two yandere sisters. "Be good, little Xuan. Sister's life belongs to you entirely." "Brother, if you try to run away, I'll have no choice but to tie you up." Mo Xuan: "Do whatever you want, ladies. I give up."
