This "home" clearly does not refer to a house under Luyu's name.
After passing through the bustling commercial street, the driver brought her to a secluded residential area. Lu Xiaomi looked out the car window and saw dozens of towering trees lined both sides of the road. At the end of the continuous greenery of these trees, the luxurious villa that was called home finally came into view.
Even though she had seen many magnificently renovated houses, Lu Xiaomi couldn't help but exclaim in amazement.
The text message also said that someone was waiting for her.
She didn't know who this person was, but she was likely someone she knew.
Lu Xiaomi followed the servant's directions and entered the villa through the main gate. The huge living room was empty. The maid poured her a cup of coffee and told her that the master would be coming down to see the guests soon.
She suddenly felt a little uneasy.
Fortunately, footsteps soon came down the stairs. Lu Xiaomi looked up in the direction of the sound and saw a man in a black suit slowly walking down. He looked very young and had a very calm expression.
Lu Xiaomi didn't know this person.
She pinched 0413 in her arms and asked it in her mind about the identity of the NPC that had appeared before her.
Before 0413 could find the results, the man in front of him suddenly spoke.
"You disgraceful thing! How did such a useless piece of trash end up in our family?"
*
These words hit Lu Xiaomi like a ton of bricks, leaving her stunned on the spot.
Then came 0413's weak voice, saying, "Host, this person is called Lu Yuan, and he is the original owner Lu Yu's older brother."
Lu Yu is an only child, so where did this brother come from?
0413 sighed and said, "You don't understand. Lu Yu's family relationships are quite complicated. His father only married Lu Yu's mother in his life, but he has never stopped having mistresses outside. The person in front of you is his father's illegitimate son."
If he's an illegitimate child, why does he speak so arrogantly in front of me?
Thinking of this, Lu Xiaomi took a step forward with some force.
“I’m here to see my father, it has nothing to do with you.”
Upon hearing this, Lu Yuan snorted coldly.
"You dare mention your father? Think about all the stupid things you've done."
He said you've repeatedly defied your father's wishes, even hitting someone in front of all the employees on your very first day at Xihe. Not only that, you've repeatedly given special treatment to a woman, causing chaos throughout the company. Last time, you even abandoned your work to go abroad. Your father thought something terrible had happened, but after asking around, he found out, oh, your mistress was in a bad mood, so you went abroad to travel with her.
"Since you know perfectly well that you are a good-for-nothing, you might as well make way for the capable people."
Lu Yuan's pupils were a pale amber color, and his slightly upturned chin gave him a somewhat disdainful look.
“I know why you’re here today. Chen Fu isn’t a top-tier artist at Xihe, so the PR department can’t afford to invest a lot of money to help her overcome the public relations crisis. You’ll have to fill this hole yourself. But your father has frozen all your cards, so you don’t have a single penny to your name right now.”
He pushed the safe in front of Lu Xiaomi; inside was a whole box of hundred-yuan bills.
"Do you want it?"
The next second, the banknotes rained down on Lu Xiaomi's head, stacks upon stacks of heavy banknotes hitting her body and face like she was being slapped in the face.
Lu Xiaomi looked as if her soul had been ripped out; she knelt down, utterly exhausted.
"Kneel down in front of me and pick them up one by one, then take this money to save your beloved little lover."
--------------------
Author's Note:
The last update was due to an outbreak in my area; I've been undergoing repeated nucleic acid tests recently...
Having written novels for so long, this is the first time I've ever gone so far as to write something angsty that I feel is a bit excessive.
Originally, I decided to have Lu Yu, who was filling in for Chen Fu, be more ruthless, but I softened when I was writing it and changed it to just shaking her shoulder.
Don't worry, I'm always fair. We've almost finished torturing Fufu; now it's just pure torture for Xiao Lu Zong.
Chapter 42 CP42
She shouldn't kneel.
Lu Yuan only wanted to humiliate her. Besides, there's always a solution. She could sell the real estate under Lu Yu's name to raise cash, or she could go to her father's house to ask for help. If all else failed, she could contact 0413. It deserves some credit for bringing about today's situation, so it can't just wash its hands of it.
It felt like a tingling itch seeped into every crevice of her bones. The rapidly unfolding plot caught her off guard, and a growing sense of panic crept into her mind. All the ideas that had just sprouted quickly crumbled, and she realized that there was an ambiguous and eternal question behind each of those solutions.
Perhaps she can get rid of it quickly, perhaps her father will give her help, or perhaps 0413 will bear the consequences.
She had played too many unknown games, and had long since grown tired and weary of them. She no longer had the energy to plan or devise cost-effective solutions. Exhaustion finally made her unable to continue, and under Lu Yuan's scrutinizing gaze, Lu Xiaomi heard a voice deep within her own heart.
"Kneel down."
Apologize and beg for forgiveness in front of Lu Yuan, satisfying his pride as an illegitimate child who has been abused for more than 20 years. In this way, the most pressing predicament can be resolved, and Chen Fu's reputation will be entirely tied to this decision.
Chen Fu.
These two words made her laugh bitterly; every single outrageous thing she had been dragged into was thanks to Chen Fu.
But she couldn't blame Chen Fu.
After learning that Yanshan was responsible for her miserable situation, Lu Xiaomi was filled with rage. However, she was completely unable to control her body at the time and could only face her lover with her anger. From then on, she probably only felt guilty towards Chen Fu.
Like a building collapsing with a roar, Lu Xiaomi felt a dull pain in her temples.
She staggered and knelt down under Lu Yuan's mocking gaze.
The banknotes, scattered all over the ground, were laid out in front of her, raining down on her head and face like a blizzard, as if she would eventually be overwhelmed by them.
*
Lu Yuan still had a conscience. After witnessing Lu Yu kneeling at his feet, he actually kept his promise and gave Lu Xiaomi a large sum of cash, which was more than enough to fight a media war against a second-rate celebrity.
Lu Xiaomi didn't want to think about how she got the money.
Strangely enough, she wasn't Lu Yu; Lu Yuan was a stranger to her, and there weren't many complicated interpersonal relationships between them. Besides, kneeling before a stranger was obviously much more acceptable than kneeling before her own father's illegitimate son, so being humiliated in front of Lu Yuan shouldn't have broken her. Not only that, but this was actually a huge good thing for her; kneeling once could earn her a seven-figure sum of RMB, so Lu Yuan should be prepared to be driven bankrupt by her kneeling.
Instead of feeling shrewdly relieved, she was so agitated that she felt like she was about to die.
As if Lu Yu were truly inside her body, Lu Xiaomi felt nauseous the moment she saw Lu Yuan's face, which bore a striking resemblance to her own. Suddenly, 0413 in her mental sea began reading in her ear, and past memories surged up one after another. She saw Lu Yuan standing arrogantly in front of her, and the floor gradually crumbling in the firelight.
Being repeatedly tormented by memories is truly torture. In Lu Yu's home, there is a wine cabinet several meters high. Lu Xiaomi silently took off her coat and randomly picked up a bottle from the top.
Lu Xiaomi doesn't drink alcohol, and she couldn't name a single one of the many fine wines on the menu. Not only that, she had no idea where the corkscrew was. Actually, it wouldn't have mattered anyway, because her hands were trembling so badly she couldn't focus.
So he could only turn around and go to the kitchen to get a cleaver. After chopping up the mouth of the glass bottle, he put the glass shards in his mouth and, unsurprisingly, cut his lips. The taste of rust mixed with the bitter wine filled his throat, and the cuts caused a stinging pain.
No, not this bottle.
The memory seemed to be awakened by the pain, and Lu Xiaomi said it wasn't this bottle.
This red wine from Northern Europe is known for its sweetness and low alcohol content. Many people enjoy the pleasant buzz it gives them. Lu Xiaomi, however, needs a strong drink to numb her senses, so the bottle in the upper left corner is her best choice.
So she propped herself up and stood up, deftly taking down the bottle of strong liquor.
The wine swirls on the glass, leaving a faint trail. Lu Xiaomi suddenly recalls the last time she drank this wine.
She had just returned to China when her father asked her to take over the family business. She coldly told her father that she had no interest in it.
"Unless you hand over the core resources in Lu Yuan's hands to me."
Upon hearing her mention Lu Yuan, her father's smiling face instantly darkened. He said, "Your brother has worked for me for so many years; he knows the company better than you do."
"Of course."
Upon hearing this, Lu Yu impatiently fiddled with his hair.
She said Lu Yuan has always been smarter than me, good at socializing and being perfunctory, and even his mother is the same; women who climb up from the bottom are used to being adept at navigating social situations.
"You don't remember what they did to me a few years ago, do you?"
As she spoke, she rolled up her sleeves, revealing large, gruesome burn marks on her bare arms.
The scar had been on her body for a long time; it was now just a faint mark.
Lu Yu grasped it with his hand, and even today he could still feel the burning heat emanating from the surface of his skin, as if the earth had cracked and split open by scorching flames, leaving deep wounds.
She still remembers that night. After her parents divorced, she was still living in her father's big house. The stairs of the duplex villa were made of wood, and she slept in a room on the second floor.
Someone wanted to burn her alive.
"That woman wanted to burn me to the ground so that her son would be your only heir."
He has been suffering from this ever since; he is terrified of fire. When his roommates chose barbecue for a college dinner, Lu Yu, who rushed over later, almost died on the spot.
Lu Yu looked up at his father.
The man in front of her was no longer as shrewd and capable as he had been a few years ago. His feigned composure appeared somewhat weak and intimidating under Lu Yu's cold gaze.
It had been a long time since he'd seen Luyu. Ever since that incident, Luyu had grown weary of the hypocrisy and deceit of adults. She ran away from home, and at first, her father thought she was just throwing a tantrum, so he impatiently told her that if she was going to break up, she should do it cleanly.
“You won’t starve even if you go out now. All the people who have taken care of you are only doing so because I am your father. They want something from me. If you want to leave completely, you might as well give everything back to me.”
These words were indeed very effective on a spoiled brat who threw a tantrum, but Lu Yu was neither throwing a tantrum nor a spoiled brat. She once thought her father was right, so she changed her name and changed schools, completely escaping her family's control. Under these circumstances, she lived in dire straits for a time, having to take on part-time jobs to support herself, relying on Alipay every month, and almost unable to repay her loans.
Good ambition.
Even if he disliked the child in front of him and her arrogant and haughty mother, he had to admit that this child was the one who resembled him the most among all his children.
Equally steadfast and resolute, equally ruthless.
Memories flooded into Lu Xiaomi's mind like a tidal wave. The wine bottle in her hand fell to the ground, wetting the carpet. Her hand was cut open, and drops of blood fell to the ground.
it hurts.
Awakening memories seemed similar to rebirth. Lu Xiaomi felt a burning sensation in her abdomen. Her remaining rationality, like immune cells, desperately tried to expel the virus implanted in her body. This was not her memory; she was not Lu Yu. This world was merely a novel she had created.
There is only one thing that can prove this.
scar.
Lu Yu was injured at the age of fourteen, and the scar on her arm has faded a lot. The scar on Lu Xiaomi's body was from saving Chen Fu, and it hasn't healed much yet. As if she had grabbed a lifeline, she quickly took off her shirt. The original grotesque scar, which was like a tree branch, was gone, replaced by a light pigmentation.
It matches up.
Everything matches up.
She was afraid of fire because she was almost burned to death by her father's lover when she was a child. She was poor in college because she had become self-reliant long ago. Her childhood sweetheart, Yan Qing, moved into the same dormitory as her to persuade her to go home. Lu Yu was furious when she found out. In other people's eyes, their relationship had always been bad.
Lu Xiaomi sat on the carpet in the room, chuckling softly.