If Li Xiujian's revelation of the "switched heiresses" was a nuclear bomb of public opinion, then Lu Chenyuan's detonation of the "Shengtian Realty investigation" was a precision-guided apocalypse.
The former destroyed hearts and reputations, while the latter severed the very lifeline of Lu Corporation.
The moment the official announcement appeared online, the internet's frenzy over the wealthy family's scandal came to an abrupt halt. All eyes were drawn to this far more explosive news.
"Holy shit! Didn’t Lu Corporation just acquire Shengtian Realty? This… this is a surgical strike!"
"Is Lu Mingshi some kind of business prodigy? The moment he takes over, he buys a company hiding a ticking time bomb?"
"Tax evasion, major safety violations… This isn’t something you can just pay a fine for—this is prison time!"
"Lu Corporation’s stock… it’s over. It’s already unsalvageable. Tomorrow’s opening bell? Hell, there might not even be a tomorrow."
Public sentiment flipped in an instant.
Netizens who had been sympathizing with the Lu family’s "18-year deception" mere seconds ago were now cursing Lu Corporation’s management as incompetent, negligent, and a cancerous blight on the capital markets.
The financial markets responded with brutal efficiency.
Lu Corporation’s stock, already limping along at the daily limit-down, collapsed completely in after-hours trading and futures markets. All related financial derivatives turned to worthless paper overnight.
Rating agencies scrambled to issue reports, downgrading Lu Corporation’s credit rating to "junk" and slapping it with warnings of "imminent bankruptcy and liquidation."
Three-pronged annihilation.
Public opinion. Stock prices. Legal repercussions.
Three nooses tightening around Lu Corporation’s neck, waiting only for the executioner’s final command.
......
Li Family Study.
Crash!
An antique crystal glass, worth a small fortune, shattered violently against the floor.
Li Xiujian stared at the official announcement on his screen, his face ashen. The smug triumph in his eyes had vanished, replaced by the stunned fury of a hunter realizing his prey had outmaneuvered him.
"Lu. Chen. Yuan."
He ground out the name between clenched teeth, each syllable dripping with venom.
He couldn’t understand it.
His 18-year-long scheme had been flawless—triggering a scandal to destroy their reputation, shorting their stock to cripple their foundation. The Lu family’s empire had been on the verge of total collapse, and he had been moments away from savoring the sweetest revenge.
But how had Lu Chenyuan done it?
How had he known about the landmine Li Xiujian had buried within Shengtian Realty?
And how had he dared—how had he managed—to weaponize the government itself to detonate that bomb right under Lu Corporation’s feet?
This wasn’t just cutting out the rot. This was strapping on explosives and blowing both himself and his enemies to smithereens.
What the hell was he trying to accomplish?
For the first time, a chilling sense of losing control seized Li Xiujian’s heart.
Somehow, without him noticing, the chessboard had changed hands.
......
Western Hills Estate, Study.
Lu Chengsi sat slumped in his armchair, his face as lifeless as a corpse. In just one day, he seemed to have aged another decade.
The phone rang incessantly—banks issuing panicked warnings, board members screaming demands, his own sons wailing in panic.
He ignored them all.
Because he knew. It was over.
The Lu family, the colossal ship he had steered for a lifetime, was sinking for good this time.
Regret, despair, unwillingness—all of it dissolved into a hollow, ashen numbness.
With trembling hands, he picked up the phone again.
This time, he dialed without hesitation.
Three rings. Then, a connection.
"Speak."
Lu Chenyuan’s voice was calm. Ice-cold.
"Chenyuan…" Lu Chengsi’s voice was a broken wheeze, like a rusted bellows. "Grandfather… I beg you—"
Those four words drained the last of his strength.
The once-untouchable patriarch of the Lu family, the man who had commanded absolute authority, now knelt—figuratively—with all his pride and dignity shattered.
A pause on the other end.
"Fine."
That single word sparked a faint glimmer in Lu Chengsi’s clouded eyes.
"But my terms are non-negotiable," Lu Chenyuan continued, his tone still even but laced with steel.
"Starting today, I will establish a new investment firm to acquire—at current market value—every share of Lu Corporation held by you, my uncles, and every other branch of the family."
Lu Chengsi’s heart plummeted.
"After the transfer, I will create a family trust," Lu Chenyuan went on.
"Each of you will receive annual dividends proportional to your original holdings. The payout will ensure the Lu family’s wealth and status for generations."
"But,"—his voice hardened, like a judge delivering sentence—
"from the moment the contracts are signed, none of you will have any say in Lu Corporation’s decisions, operations, or management. You retain profit rights. Voting rights and control are forfeited."
Lu Chengsi’s breath hitched.
He understood.
This was scorched earth. A complete severance of the family’s influence over the company.
A wave of humiliation crashed over him—the shame of being stripped bare.
But then his mind flashed to his sons’ petty squabbles, to Lu Mingshi’s catastrophic incompetence, to the sight of Lu Corporation crumbling under endless infighting.
And suddenly, he saw it.
Perhaps Lu Chenyuan’s goal wasn’t to build a personal dictatorship.
This was radical surgery—a ruthless, unflinching amputation to separate ownership from management.
He was transforming Lu Corporation from a nepotism-riddled family empire into a modern enterprise with clear governance.
The family trust would act as an impenetrable firewall, shielding the Lu family’s core assets, ensuring their preservation—not their destruction at the hands of future generations’ greed and ineptitude.
"Three generations from shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves"—the curse of family businesses.
Its root lay in the conflict between bloodline and capability.
And Lu Chenyuan, with merciless precision, was cutting that root away.
The humiliation remained. But beneath the grief and reluctance, a sliver of clarity took hold—a grudging awe.
Lu Chengsi had built the Lu family’s glory. Yet in his twilight years, his lenience had nearly destroyed it.
Now, his grandson, with a ruthlessness even he had never wielded, had carved out the only path forward.
"I… accept."
Lu Chengsi closed his eyes. Two silent tears streaked down his weathered face.
He knew that from the moment he uttered those words, an era he had pioneered—an era belonging to traditional family businesses—had come to a definitive end.
transmigrates into the world as the sect master of the Heavenly Yan Sect, which is on the verge of being wiped out. He binds a system that grants him cultivation power based on the number of disciples he has: for each disciple, he automatically gains a year's worth of cultivation every single day! Take one disciple: every day he gains 1 year of cultivation power. While others struggle through a year of bitter training, he gets the same just by sleeping through a single night. Take ten disciples: every day he gains 10 years of cultivation power. Foundation Establishment, Core Formation, Nascent Soul—he breezes through all bottlenecks without lifting a finger. Take one hundred disciples: every day he gains 100 years of cultivation power. Even a Soul Transformation Venerable before him can’t survive a single blow. Take ten thousand disciples: every day he gains 10,000 years of cultivation power! With a wave of his hand, he topples empires. With a single step, he crushes the sacred grounds of the universe. ... While others fight tooth and nail for secret techniques, Lin Yan casually hands out Nascent Soul-level cultivation manuals as beginner textbooks. While others strain to find talented recruits, Lin Yan opens his doors to anyone—so long as they’re human. In just three short years, the Heavenly Yan Sect went from a backwater sect made up of three crumbling huts to a sacred land that every cultivator under heaven would kill to enter. ... One day, otherworldly demon gods invade, with a million demon soldiers pressing down upon the realm. Lin Yan, yawning, rises from his lounge chair and glances at the system panel: [Current Disciples: 1.28 million] [Daily Cultivation Increase: 1.28 million years] He waves his hand casually, and the countless demon soldiers are reduced to ashes in an instant. “So noisy… interrupting my fishing.”
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.
rowess are unmatched, commanding a million-strong army! Yet, the Emperor wants to depose him for the sake of a false prince? Hold on, are you throwing me into some female-oriented romance plot? How can I tolerate this? With a grand wave of his hand—the Nine Clan Extraction Technique! Slander the Emperor? Very well, all of you shall die! ... The False Prince: "Although I am not the biological son, Father and Mother love me more. The throne should be mine!" The Female Lead: "Qin Xiao, you are the Emperor, and I am a commoner. If you wish to marry me, you must abdicate. Otherwise, you will never have me!" The Empress: "After we divorce, you must give me half the empire!" The Transmigrator Consort: "You worthless Emperor, why should I kneel to you? All men are equal—I advise you to be kind!" The Great General: "The enemy general is my childhood sweetheart. For her sake, I willingly abandon the frontier defenses!" The Retired Emperor: "Although Yu'er was adopted, I prefer him. Qin Xiao, you should abdicate and let him become Emperor!" ... Very well! So this is how you want to play? Facing this twisted world of female-oriented tropes, Qin Xiao grins and raises his hand to unleash—the Nine Clan Extraction Technique! I am the Emperor. Why would I bother reasoning with you? Seal the gates! Leave none alive!
nto another world, I bought a slave for the first time, never expecting the silver wolf girl to be so cute... Lin Feng: I know it's cold, but you don't have to sneak into my bed! Yuna: Just sharing body warmth, if you dare do anything naughty, I'll definitely...
