Chapter 1

When I was ten, my half-brother poured oil in front of my mother’s bedroom.

He wanted my eight-months-pregnant mother to slip when she stepped outside—killing her and the baby she carried—so his mistress of a mother could take her place as the legitimate wife.

After checking the security footage, my father said only, “He’s a child. He was just fooling around. He didn’t know any better.” And that was the end of it.

That night, I grabbed an iron bar and kicked his bedroom door open.

He was wearing headphones and gaming. He didn’t even look up as he taunted me.

“Well, well. Out this late to be my punching bag?”

I looked at him and smiled.

Three seconds later—

“Ahhh!”

Shen Jingze went deathly pale and tumbled out of his chair. His calf quickly swelled, turning a frightening shade of blue and purple.

I clutched the iron bar.

As he howled in agony, my gaze didn’t waver.

Shen Jingze trembled all over. He stared at me, eyes wide.

“Shen Xiangyi, you bitch! I’m telling Dad. I’ll make him kill you! I’ll have him chop you and your mother into a hundred pieces!”

I crouched and clamped a hand around his chin, each word cold and deliberate.

“Shen Jingze, remember this lesson.”

“If you try it again, you won’t get off with just a broken leg.”

Forced to tip his head back, he looked at me in terror.

“You lunatic!”

“You’re completely insane!”

I gave a scornful laugh, took out a handkerchief, and carefully wiped down the iron bar.

The servants huddled outside the door, watching me in fear, but not one dared speak.

A moment later, hurried footsteps sounded in the hall.

Chen Meiyi rushed in, hair disheveled. When she saw Shen Jingze sprawled on the floor, his legs bent at an unnatural angle as he wailed, her knees nearly gave out.

“Jingze, don’t be scared. Mom’s here.”

She pulled him tightly into her arms, eyes bloodshot as she glared at me.

“Shen Xiangyi, you’ve got some nerve! How dare you hurt my son!”

I kept wiping the iron bar without looking up.

“Didn’t Dad say it? My little brother was just playing. I wanted to play with him, too.”

“After all, I’m only a child. I don’t know any better.”

Chen Meiyi pointed at me, shaking with rage.

“What are you, to think you can compare yourself to my son?”

I raised an eyebrow and looked at her in silence.

She must have been holding that in for a long time.

My parents’ marriage had been a union between two powerful families.

Not long after they married, my father met Chen Meiyi and fell madly in love with her at first sight.

He wanted the benefits of the alliance and the beauty in his arms, so he kept Chen Meiyi as his mistress.

It wasn’t until Shen Jingze turned seven that Father brought the two of them home, under the pretty excuse that the Shen family’s bloodline could not be left to languish outside.

After Chen Meiyi crossed the threshold, she never stopped scheming to take my mother’s place.

I stared at her.

“Because I’m the eldest daughter of the Shen family.”

“And because your son nearly made my pregnant mother fall today.”

Chen Meiyi’s face turned ashen. She tried to deny it.

“You—you’re talking nonsense.”

“Brother Shen already said the oil by the door was spilled by a careless servant. It had nothing to do with my son!”

“Is that so?”

I dragged the iron bar toward her, taking one slow step at a time.

A flash of caution crossed Chen Meiyi’s eyes. She cried out in panic, “W-what are you going to do?”

Just then, there was another commotion at the door.

My father entered with the family doctor, pushing through the crowd.

The moment he saw Shen Jingze’s bruised, swollen leg, his expression changed.

“What happened?”

Chen Meiyi saw him and immediately reddened her eyes.

“Brother Shen, you have to stand up for us.”

“The eldest young lady went crazy in the middle of the night and barged in to beat Jingze. If anything happens to him, how am I supposed to go on living…?”

She had only gotten halfway through before tears poured down her face.

My father’s expression darkened. He turned to me.

“You wretched girl! You even dared to hurt your own brother? Have you lost your mind?”

“Guards! Take her to the basement. Make her think carefully about what she’s done. Don’t let her out until she admits her mistake.”

The guards advanced at his command.

I backed away two steps, sweeping my eyes around the room until they landed on the nearby window.

At last, I gritted my teeth, shook off a guard’s hand, and darted onto the windowsill.

We were on the fifth floor. If I jumped, I might not die—but I would be crippled.

Everyone froze.

A vein throbbed in my father’s forehead.

“Shen Xiangyi, what are you doing?”

“I want to check the security footage,” I said, gripping the window frame, my voice icy. “I want to see who poured oil to hurt my mother. If you won’t let me, I’ll jump.”

When my mother rushed over, she found me on the windowsill, threatening to kill myself. Her face went white.

“Xiangyi, could you come down first?”

I didn’t look at her. My eyes stayed fixed on my father.

“Chairman Shen, isn’t the company at a critical stage in its IPO preparations? If word gets out that your mistress forced your legitimate daughter to her death, do you think the IPO will still go smoothly? And my uncle won’t let you get away with it, either.”

My father’s expression shifted.

The Shen family had spent far too long preparing for this IPO.

More importantly, I was the daughter of the marriage alliance between the Shen and Huo families. If anything really happened to me, the Huo family—now overseas—would investigate to the very end.

Then his affair and his humiliation of his lawful wife would no longer stay hidden.

Chen Meiyi realized it, too. Her sobbing stopped abruptly, and she spoke timidly.

“Brother Shen…”

This time, my father ignored her and turned to the housekeeper.

“I told you to investigate the oil spill. Did you check the cameras?”

The housekeeper lowered his head and stammered.

“T-that…”

I edged a little farther out. Wind rushed through the window, whipping my hair into a mess.

My father’s forehead was furrowed with bulging veins. He turned and snapped at the housekeeper.

“What are you standing there for? If you haven’t checked, bring the footage here!”

The housekeeper hurried out at a run.

The room fell so quiet that all we could hear was Shen Jingze trying to suppress his groans of pain.

I stayed on the windowsill, looking coldly down at everyone.

My mother stood among them, face pale, afraid to speak in case she upset me.

Less than two minutes later, the housekeeper came running back with a laptop.

In front of everyone, he opened the security footage.

At three that afternoon, Shen Jingze appeared in the hallway. He poured oil by the door and on the stairs, then smeared it around with a rag to make it look like an accident.

Afterward, he hid in a blind spot and stared fixedly at my mother’s bedroom door, a malicious smile curling his lips.

The room erupted.

My mother stared at the screen, one hand covering her mouth. Her eyes reddened in an instant.

Shen Jingze’s screaming stopped.

He leaned against Chen Meiyi, his face as white as paper. His eyes were fixed on me, filled with venom.

My father stared at the screen in silence for a long time.

The evidence was indisputable.

If I had been the only one to see it, he might have been able to bury the matter.

But with so many witnesses—and the security footage—he couldn’t silence everyone.

Three full minutes passed before he finally turned to Chen Meiyi, his voice low and suffocating.

“Do you have anything to say for yourself?”

Chen Meiyi trembled violently, tears spilling down her face.

She let go of Shen Jingze and rushed to grab my father’s hand, speaking in a panic.

“Brother Shen, Jingze is still young. He didn’t mean to!”

“It’s all my fault. I didn’t raise him right. Punish me if you must… But Jingze is your own son.”

My father closed his eyes.

When he opened them again, his voice was ice-cold.

“If you can’t raise your son properly, then you won’t raise him anymore.”

“Someone, escort Madam Chen out of Zijin Villa. She is not to return without my permission.”

Chen Meiyi’s face went deathly pale.

I sat on the windowsill and gave a soft laugh.

“That’s it?”

My father whipped around and glared at me angrily.

“What more do you want?”

I jumped down from the sill and walked up to him, raising two fingers.

“Two things.”

“First, from this day on, Shen Jingze is not allowed to set foot on the fifth floor.”

“Second, whenever you introduce Shen Jingze from now on, you will tell the truth. He is an illegitimate son. He will never be able to wash that from his name.”

Chen Meiyi jerked her head up. She didn’t even bother to wipe away her tears before shrieking,

“Are you insane?”

“Jingze doesn’t know anything! He’s innocent!”

I turned to her and smiled.

“Innocent?”

“He knew my mother was pregnant, yet deliberately poured oil by the stairs. You call that innocent?”

Chen Meiyi’s lips quivered. She couldn’t speak.

“The doctor said my mother’s health was poor. This pregnancy was already difficult.”

I glared at her, enunciating each word.

“If she had stepped on that oil and fallen, both she and the baby would have died. Your son wanted my mother’s life and the life of her unborn child. And now you’re telling me he’s innocent?”

Chen Meiyi blurted out,

“But she didn’t die, did she?”

The room fell silent for a moment.

I laughed.

“So I should thank him? Thank him for not killing her?”

Chen Meiyi’s face turned alternately green and white. She couldn’t come up with a single word in reply.

As the guards dragged her away, she struggled and twisted around to glare at me.

“Shen Xiangyi, you’re so young and already so vicious. You’ll get what’s coming to you sooner or later!”

I stood still and answered calmly,

“I don’t know if I’ll get what’s coming to me. But you’re definitely getting yours today.”

The door slammed shut.

The family doctor took Shen Jingze away to treat his leg. Before he left, he glanced back at me, his eyes as cold as a blade, hiding a malice no child should have.

I paid him no attention.

That night, the storm finally quieted down—for the time being.

I thought the matter was over.

Until the next morning.

I was having breakfast when two men in white coats walked in. In flat, bureaucratic voices, they began:

“Are you Shen Xiangyi?”

“Mr. Shen says you’re a rebellious young girl with serious violent tendencies. He’s asked our reform center to take you in and teach you some proper discipline.”

My mother’s face turned white. She shot to her feet.

“Where is Shen Wanjun? I haven’t agreed to this. What gives him the right to take Xiangyi away?”

The housekeeper pretended not to hear and signaled to the two men in white coats.

They came at me from both sides and grabbed my arms.

I struggled violently. My knee slammed into the table leg, and bowls and chopsticks crashed across the floor.

Before I could move again, the housekeeper stepped closer and lowered his voice in my ear.

“Eldest young lady, you’d better not resist.”