Although Ling Xuewei’s body was naturally flexible, she had only started dancing when she was eight years old. Compared to those students who had started learning at the age of four or five, her progress was a lot slower.
Therefore, when she had just started learning, she had also suffered a lot.
Fortunately, Ling Xuewei’s character was tenacious. Moreover, she knew that if she learned one more skill, she would be able to compete with others when she grew up in the future. Therefore, she never complained about being tired.
She studied hard in every class and practiced hard after class. She would always complete the assignments given by the teacher with high quality.
Under such hard work, she improved at a rapid pace and soon caught up with her classmates who had been dancing since primary school.
During this process, her stepmother would pick her up and drop her off every day, rain or shine. She would also tell everyone that it was rare for her child to be so talented and that she would definitely give her full support.
Furthermore, her stepmother liked to brag to others that Ling Xuewei was good-looking and had special dance skills. She also said that she might even be able to enter the entertainment industry in the future and become a star or something.
Or even if she couldn’t become a star, she could at least enter a dance academy and become a dance teacher after graduation. At least she would be rich and stable, and she wouldn’t have to worry about food and clothing.
During that period of time, everyone praised her stepmother as a rare good woman.
It was truly rare for her to be able to spend money and effort as she did for a child who wasn’t related to her by blood and to plan for the other party’s future.
Even Ling Xuewei herself had the illusion that her stepmother was really doing this for her own good.
She even hypnotized herself, turning all the torture and humiliation from before into a form of discipline.
Those few years were the best Ling Xuewei and her stepmother had ever gotten along with each other.
They were also the best years for her stepmother’s reputation.
It wasn’t until Ling Xuewei turned 14 that the situation started to become a little weird.
Ling Xuewei had good genes. She was tall and her body developed a little faster than her peers.
That was why she was already graceful at the age of 14, and her body was slightly curvy.
Her stepmother accompanied her to dance lessons every day, so she naturally saw the changes in her body.
She was very happy about this and began to find various reasons to bring Ling Xuewei to the dinner party.
At the beginning, Ling Xuewei did not understand anything and thought that it was just a simple meal.
The adults talked about business that she did not understand, so she quietly buried her head in eating and drinking.
When her stepmother asked her to perform, she would dance for the adults.
After the performance, she would hear them applaud and then, she would say thank you to the middle-aged men.
Later, Ling Xuewei began to realize that something was wrong.
She gradually realized that the so-called uncles didn’t pay attention to her dance at all.
They didn’t care if she danced gracefully or professionally.
Their eyes were always on her chest and thighs. That kind of gaze made her instinctively nauseous and inexplicably embarrassed.
She felt like a piece of delicious meat or a lamb waiting to be slaughtered.
In short, it was not like an elder’s appreciation of the younger generation.
At that time, she still did not understand the dirty and lewd thoughts of those old men.
She just relied on her sharp instincts as a young girl and vaguely felt that something was not right. It was abnormal.
Therefore, she began to resist. She was no longer willing to meet those so-called uncles. She was even more unwilling to dance in front of them.
As a result, she was naturally beaten up by her father and stepmother.
After the beating, she still had to go.
Sometimes, the bruises on her body could not be covered and would accidentally show during the dance.
In the end, the way those people looked at her made her feel even more nauseous and uneasy.
She could not understand.
She was also extremely terrified.
But nothing could change.
She had tried to reveal a little to the teachers in the school.
Besides, among her stepmother’s friends, there were a few ladies whom she thought were nice people. She had also tried to ask for help.
But in return, there was only one sentence:
“You’re thinking too much.”
No one helped her.
No one could help her change the current situation.
On the contrary, there were people who passed the message to her stepmother, giving her a beating in exchange.
Slowly, Ling Xuewei completely gave up hope.
She no longer sought help from the people around her, and she no longer resisted in vain.
She was like a marionette, being brought by her stepmother to different dinners. She had seen countless different faces and the same gaze.
As she grew older, Ling Xuewei slowly began to understand that the dishes on the table were just decorations. She was the real dish.
The so-called training of her stepmother was not for her future, but for her own benefit.
What being a celebrity in the entertainment industry, what being a teacher in the dance academy, they were all bullsh*t for outsiders to hear!
From the beginning to the end, her stepmother had only treated her as a tool.
Training her to learn dance was only to make her a more valuable tool.
After all, there were a lot of beautiful little girls.
However, at the same time, there weren’t that many beautiful little girls who could excel in a certain aspect.
The rare ones were always more precious.
As Ling Xuewei won prizes in all kinds of dance competitions, her hands went soft.
The “middle-aged men” she saw also became more and more sanctimonious.
They all put on the airs of a gentleman and said pretentious things.
However, Ling Xuewei would never forget that gaze that was filled with desire for the rest of her life.
She knew what she was in the eyes of those people, but at that time, she was still too weak and didn’t have the ability to get rid of all that.
Hence, she could only endure and pretend to be obedient.
Then, she worked hard in secret to win more awards because only in this way could she become more precious and valuable in the eyes of those people.
Her stepmother would not sell her most precious thing so easily.
Only then could she be used as bait to exchange for endless benefits for her stepmother, but she was never really eaten.
Ling Xuewei was so careful that it was as if she was treading on thin ice, enduring all the way until she was 18 years old.
She endured until she finally became an adult.
At the same time, as she wished, she received the admission letter from the top dance academy in the country.
Other than herself, no one knew how much blood and tears she had spent in order to obtain all of this.
But she did it.
Under a situation that was far darker and crueler than her peers, she did it.
She thought that by leaving her hometown to go to school, she could gain more freedom and have more time to continue accumulating strength.
But she was wrong.
Her stepmother found a “buyer” who she thought was the best and wanted to give her away.
Ling Xuewei knew that she would not be able to escape this time.
Therefore, she found an opportunity and stole a large sum of money from her stepmother. She hid her identity and went far away, starting her first venture.
That venture ended in a fiasco.
Moreover, it made her take on a large amount of debt..