Volume One, Chapter 102: Arriving Prepared

A million yuan. Leave the imperial capital.

As soon as they sat down in the roadside cafe, Madam Ke pushed a bank card across the table.

Straight to the point, she said, "Sang Wan, I've already looked into you. Your father vanished years ago and no one knows where he is. Your mother is still in prison."

Sang Wan's expression changed slightly.

Madam Ke went on, "And on top of that, you're divorced, with nothing to your name."

When they had first met, Sang Wan had seemed polished and poised. Madam Ke had even assumed her marriage to the head of the Lu family had ended in a breakup of affection, and had looked at her with a bit more respect, thinking her bold and decisive.

But after a closer investigation, all Madam Ke felt was contempt.

An idiot.

A complete idiot.

If she had only endured for a while, peace would have returned. Men, after all, were all cut from the same cloth.

If she had endured and waited it out, the Lu family would have been hers. The man, the child, the fortune, the household... all of it.

In the end, who would not have praised her for waiting through the clouds until the moon appeared, for having both strategy and grit?

And yet she had been foolish enough to give up everything and leave with nothing.

Now it was better than ever: the Lu family had nothing to do with her, the Lu fortune had nothing to do with her, and even her son—what kind of future he would have was hard to say.

Where there is a stepmother, there is a stepfather. Once the new Mrs. Lu moved in and had children of her own, how much of the family property would he still receive from the charity of his stepmother and half-siblings ten or twenty years down the line?

What should have been his from the start.

All of it had been dragged down by Sang Wan's short-lived temper.

Sang Wan was simple-minded and impulsive; that was not Madam Ke's concern.

But this involved her son, and she could not sit by and watch things worsen.

"Sang Wan, I know this million yuan is nothing to you."

"I also know that right now you only have yourself to feed, and on top of that you're working at the Lou Group. They probably pay you over ten thousand a month, which is enough for you to live on."

"But have you thought about what will happen when your mother is released? How will the two of you live then?"

Seeing that Sang Wan had not said a word since entering, her face only growing more unpleasant, Madam Ke knew she had struck at the heart of the matter, and her expression became even more certain.

"I'm an older woman. I've eaten more salt than you've eaten rice. Take the money, leave the imperial capital, and go back to your hometown if you like. Or find some small, charming city with flowers and scenery. With your looks, your bearing, and this money, you could buy a house and live properly with your mother. What do you say?"

"Is the imperial capital your home? If I tell you to go, you go?"

Those were the first words Sang Wan had spoken since entering.

Madam Ke froze. The smile on her face turned to poison in her eyes.

It had been more than half a month since their last meeting, and in all that time Ke Yifan had not once come home.

Even when she and her husband called him, he would not answer. Either his assistant would pick up and say that Doctor Ke was in surgery.

She had gone to the hospital to wait for him, but before everyone’s eyes, her once-filial son gave her no face at all. "If you want everyone in the hospital to know that I, Ke Yifan, am a mama's boy, then go ahead and make a scene. I don't care!"

After that, she never went to the hospital again.

Relatives persuaded her, leaders mediated, and after much effort the relationship had finally begun to thaw a little. An old superior even arranged a blind date for Ke Yifan.

Ke Yifan went.

Madam Ke had been overjoyed, believing her son had finally seen sense.

But she had not expected that he would not even sit down. The moment he entered the restaurant, he said, "We're not suited for each other," then turned and left.

Because of that, she had to make calls and visit in person just to avoid offending the old superior.

Madam Ke knew the source of everything lay with Sang Wan.

Either Sang Wan married someone else and cut Ke Yifan's thoughts off early.

Or Sang Wan left the imperial capital, and the two of them parted forever.

She did not believe for a second that Ke Yifan would abandon his future and career just to chase Sang Wan all the way to some minor city.

She had planned for everything, only to find that Sang Wan was stubborn as a stone and impossible to deal with.

"Of course the imperial capital isn't the Ke family's..." Madam Ke said coldly. "But if you don't leave, I have plenty of ways to make you leave."

She had come prepared.

With a snap, she took a stack of papers from her bag and threw them in front of Sang Wan, along with the bank card.

Madam Ke was overbearing. "Sang Wan, with your background, even managing to get close to the Lu family means your ancestors must be smoking on their graves. But you had a good hand and played it into complete ruin. Staying here will only make you a joke. A person should have some self-awareness, don't you think?"

The thick dossier was astonishingly detailed.

It began with the disgraceful things her biological father had done when he was young, including the time he had been sent to jail.

Then came the sensational newspaper reports about Sun Yueqing's murder case.

Then, after her divorce, the many speculative stories the media had spun about the collapse of her marriage.

Her hasty departure from the marriage, leaving with nothing, had become a target the media eagerly dug into, as if because she was the guilty party and had committed some enormous wrong, she had chosen to keep the peace by walking away empty-handed.

In those reports, the sins attributed to her included, but were not limited to, infidelity, gambling, violent tendencies, and drug use.

"Either you take this million yuan and leave the imperial capital in peace."

"Or I make thousands of copies of these materials and hand them out one by one to every colleague of yours at the Lou Group. Sang Wan, tell me, how would they look at you then? By that time, you, with nothing left, could only be driven out of the imperial capital like a homeless dog, utterly disgraced."

In that instant, Madam Ke no longer resembled the kind, benevolent physician people spoke of. She looked instead like a she-wolf baring her fangs, ready to fight the enemy to the death for the sake of the cubs behind her.

And Sang Wan was that enemy.

Madam Ke was certain Sang Wan cared about her reputation.

The job at the Lou Group was indeed excellent, but once her dignity was gone, how long could she keep forcing herself to endure?

Not to mention that, given her current abilities, this million yuan would take her more than ten years to save.

Madam Ke believed any intelligent person would know how to choose.

Then Sang Wan reached out and pushed both the stack of papers and the bank card back toward her.

Madam Ke froze.

Sang Wan rose slowly. "Then tomorrow you can go prospecting at the Lou Group. Since you've retired, you might as well keep yourself busy..."

"Sang Wan..."

Sang Wan turned and left.

Madam Ke rushed out of the cafe in disbelief. Watching Sang Wan's retreating back without a single glance over her shoulder, her face darkened with rage.

Refusing a toast only to be forced to drink a penalty.

Then she would not be blamed for showing no mercy.

Madam Ke stormed off.

Outside, traffic streamed endlessly past. Sang Wan walked forward without stopping, her heart a wasteland.

She had never judged others with the harshest malice.

Yet she had not been granted the same treatment in return.

Her phone chimed.

Xu Yiyi called to ask whether she had worked so late she had lost track of time.

Lou Ye sent a message on WeChat, asking whether he should come pick her up.

Sang Wan walked on in a daze, as though surrounded by exhaustion and helplessness, unable to break free.

In the driver’s seat of the Maybach outside the apartment building, Lou Ye started the car. Before he could pull out of the parking space, he saw Sang Wan approaching.

"Sang—"

Before he could even get her name out, Sang Wan, as if possessed by a wandering soul, drifted past him, ascended the steps, and entered the lobby in a daze.

After a moment of silence, Lou Ye cut the engine, opened the door, got out, and followed her inside.