These past few days, Jiang Ning had been arriving at the company early to avoid being seen by too many people. When Wang Chenyu came by to deliver documents, he noticed that the cut on her lip still hadn’t healed and asked with concern, “How did you get such a bad case of internal heat?”
Jiang Ning’s hands stiffened for a moment, but she nodded without changing her expression and signed the documents. Hearing the System’s snickering, she muted it outright. The thought of meeting Lin Zhiyuan later made her feel awkward for the first time.
She hadn’t expected Lin Yiren to bite down so hard. The wound still hadn’t healed after several days.
With the company safe for now, Jiang Ning began quietly investigating the car accident that had killed Father Jiang and Mother Jiang. The Chen Family had covered their tracks cleanly. The driver responsible had died of a heart attack not long after entering prison, and every transfer record had been scrubbed without a trace.
But the System was, after all, technology that surpassed anything in this world. It soon reconstructed the call logs and audio recordings from the data. The driver, worried the other side might silence him, had recorded everything and hidden a copy with his wife. The Chen Family had found and deleted it, but fortunately they still had some scruples. Vicious as they were, they hadn’t gone so far as to kill the woman after destroying the evidence.
That was how the System got its hands on it. But this alone wasn’t enough. Jiang Ning had the System keep a close watch on the Chen Family’s movements while she secretly began cooperating with Lin Zhiyuan.
The Lin Family’s core business was real estate. With the System’s analysis, Jiang Ning could feed Lin Zhiyuan fairly accurate data, letting him bid or pull out of investments a step ahead of everyone else. Several smooth collaborations later, Lin Zhiyuan’s guard around Jiang Ning began to loosen.
“Sit.” Lin Zhiyuan glanced up at her and closed the file in his hands, no longer as politely formal with her as before.
The room was private enough. Jiang Ning nodded without any small talk, placed a document on the desk, and laid out the next phase of the plan with him.
A corporation could put down roots in a city because its branches and tendrils reached everywhere else. The Lin Family’s main business was real estate. Last century, Father Lin had seized the initiative and bought up a plot of land in Jiangcheng, building his real estate business on top of it. The timing was perfect, since policy was favorable at the time, and soon the Lin Family had secured a firm foothold in the city.
The Xiao Family had invested primarily in medical equipment. In the early 2000s, a serious epidemic had broken out in Jiangcheng, plunging everyone into panic. Father Xiao had sensed the warning signs early, and before the epidemic even erupted, he had spent a fortune stockpiling medical facilities and basic supplies, which were later requisitioned by the state. Because the Xiao Family cooperated with the government’s rescue efforts during that period and donated a great deal for free, they earned official commendations and widespread public support after the epidemic ended. The family then branched into other industries. Though they couldn’t match the Lin Family or the Chen Family, their network of connections was exceptionally broad.
The Chen Family was a rising star built on their entertainment company. Their rapid growth came from the fact that one of Father Chen’s older brothers had once saved the life of a high-ranking official, who looked after the Chen Family in many ways. The official himself was far from clean and needed a company to launder his money. In today’s digital age, celebrities carried enormous sales power and influence, making money laundering incredibly fast. That was why the Chen Family’s artists always received the best resources, and it dragged the whole family up along with them.
The Jiang Family was an entertainment company founded only ten years ago. Its reputation had grown after producing a Best Actress. For the Chen Family’s Chengxing Entertainment, the pressure wasn’t significant, but letting the Jiang Family grow unchecked was out of the question. Earlier, the Chens had sent someone to negotiate an acquisition with Jiang Tianci and been refused. As their ambition swelled, they had cooked up this scheme.
The Xiao Family’s interest in acquiring Jiangtian Entertainment was probably just an attempt to skim profits off the entertainment industry. Their goal was clear and, for now, their ambitions weren’t that grand. Keeping an eye on them would suffice. According to the original story, although Xiao Yisheng was ruthless, he played fairly. The matter with Xiao Lin was likely ordered by Old Man Xiao, who wanted to give his younger son a way to save face. And if the Xiao Family could pick up Jiangtian Entertainment in the process, so much the better.
Jiang Ning’s aim now was to bring down the Chen Family. They might look like they were riding high, but once the supreme backer propping them up fell, they wouldn’t be worth fearing. She could use other means to keep that official busy, accelerate Jiangtian Entertainment’s growth, and cripple Chengxing Entertainment’s pillar stars. Meanwhile, the Lin Family would quietly inflict some financial losses on the Chens’ real estate holdings. Once real estate and entertainment both hit trouble, the dirty business they did in the shadows would have to operate more frequently, exposing itself.
Of course, everything right now was still just probing. The two of them were treading carefully, not daring to truly provoke anyone all at once.
“This plan cannot drag my sister in.” Lin Zhiyuan was ambitious, but he was also extremely cautious. Even if this plan failed, the Lin Family’s losses would be limited. They would only be drawing some surface-level fire, and no matter how closely anyone looked, no real fault could be pinned on them. The Chen Family wouldn’t dare break with them over this, and pushing the Lins too hard would win them nothing.
What worried him most was that silly sister of his. She kept sending him messages telling him to take good care of Jiang Ning, while her words carried constant concern for Lin Zhiyuan himself, leaving him equal parts irritated, jealous, and helpless.
But now, seeing the cut at the corner of Jiang Ning’s lips, he began to wonder. Could that soft, delicate little sister of his actually be the one above? Turning that possibility over, combined with Jiang Ning’s assurances, his attitude toward her warmed considerably.
“Naturally. Even if something happens, I’ll protect her. I won’t let her come to harm.” Jiang Ning couldn’t guarantee those people wouldn’t drag Lin Yiren into things, but protecting her was a promise she could make and keep.
She would protect the Lin Family too. In the original story, when disaster struck the Lins, Lin Yiren had been forced to beg Xiao Yisheng for help, beginning that tortured love affair built on being kept, weeping her days away. The mere thought of it left Jiang Ning feeling uncomfortable.
While Jiang Ning’s arrangements proceeded in secret, these past six months she had still been socializing and networking openly to secure resources. Anyone who approached her with bad intentions got turned into gossip material and bled for a hefty price. Jiang Ning had no backing, but her lightning-fast information network and methods created the illusion that she did. Quite a few people struck up conversations hoping to fish out some tidbits, and every one of them was smoothly deflected.
Jiang Ning had taken the initiative to explain all of this to Father Lin. He was older, more experienced, and better connected. With his help, the whole matter would be much easier to resolve.
Two months after laying her cards on the table with Father Lin, Jiang Ning kept plotting steadily, determined to minimize the damage when the storm hit. Meanwhile, the news that shook the entertainment world to its core broke: Lin Xiao’s identity as the Second Young Master Xiao was exposed.
The identity gave him an enormous buff. Handsome and rich, all his previous scandals were suddenly reframed as normal dating. The story went that he had only hidden his identity at first, and the woman had dumped him out of disdain before later regretting it. Overnight, he became the victim. Then the public learned he had left a wealthy dynasty to chase his dreams, and his next inspirational album shot straight to the top.
At the same time, once Xiao Lin’s image was cleaned up, marketing accounts began exposing his past “romance” with Jiang Ning. They painted Jiang Ning as a woman who had used power and influence to coerce Xiao Lin into a relationship, then dumped him when she grew tired of him. Her current closeness with Lin Yiren, they claimed, was because she was involved with Lin Zhiyuan, and they released plenty of photos of Lin Zhiyuan and Jiang Ning together.
Several of Jiang Ning’s classmates also spoke up, claiming that after graduation, Xiao Lin had been set to leave and further his studies at another academy, but had given up that opportunity for Jiang Ning’s sake and returned to Jiangtian Entertainment to support her. According to them, after using Xiao Lin, Jiang Ning had abandoned him and thrown herself into Lin Zhiyuan’s arms, and a heartbroken Xiao Lin had gone to Chengxing Entertainment to start over.
Someone else leaked that the earlier dirt on Xiao Lin had come from Jiang Ning herself. It all sounded so well-evidenced that netizens had their worldviews upended and began furiously cursing Jiang Ning as shameless. The Lin Corporation got dragged in too, with accusations of sugar relationships and homewrecking heaped onto Lin Zhiyuan’s head. The stock prices of both Jiangtian Entertainment and the Lin Corporation took a hit. This one-stone-two-birds move was vicious. Jiang Ning’s classmates were all genuine, and from their perspective, what they had witnessed really did match the marketing accounts’ story. More and more people joined the discussion.
Meanwhile, another wave of marketing accounts started claiming it was Lin Zhiyuan who had stolen another man’s beloved and driven Jiang Ning and Xiao Lin apart. They attached ambiguous photos that made the story sound convincing, but this version directed all the artillery at Lin Zhiyuan while scrubbing Jiang Ning clean.
One couldn’t help but wonder if this was Jiang Ning’s own gambit to protect her reputation and Jiangtian Entertainment. While everyone argued, Xiao Lin even posted on Weibo saying he had genuinely loved Jiang Ning, that fate was cruel, and that he hoped everyone would stop discussing the matter.
Did that help? Of course not, what utter nonsense. The entire internet began wailing, Poor big brother, it’s so hard for you! Don’t be afraid, we love you! Then they went right back to cursing Jiang Ning, dragging Lin Zhiyuan and Lin Yiren into the pile-on along with her. Xiao Lin’s Weibo post was the epitome of speaking from a position of comfort while lecturing the suffering, a masterclass performance from a scheming male white lotus.
From Xiao Lin’s image rehab to the romance reveal, there had actually been a buffer period, and Jiang Ning had sensed something off about it well in advance. How had Lin Xiao entered the Xiao Family and transformed into Xiao Lin so quickly? Granted, Old Man Xiao seemed to be softening, but Xiao Lin had failed to obtain Jiangtian Entertainment and was now covered in mud, a personal stain on the family. Taking him back at a time like this offered no benefit and would only damage the Xiao Family’s reputation.
Besides, the speed of the spread was no joke. Money alone couldn’t do that. When Jiang Ning had leaked Xiao Lin’s scandal, she’d used a newspaper with an impeccable reputation. Would they ruin their own credibility for money? Clearly, some greater power had convinced them to sacrifice the small to protect the large.
Chengxing Entertainment’s full-throated support was another confusing point. Even if Xiao Lin was a Xiao, would they pour that much effort into rebuilding him over mere family ties? From PR campaigns and image rehab to albums and concerts, the manpower and resources invested had to be substantial. Without some greater profit driving them, no one would sink that much capital into Xiao Lin.
So what connected them all, aiming to drag Jiangtian Entertainment, even the entire Lin Family, into the water and swallow them whole?
Jiang Ning stared at the file in her hands, mind racing, until her gaze settled on a single name: Bai Keke.
