Lu Qingyan was explaining, trying to make Jiang Nanshu understand him.
Everything he had done was for her.
Even if it meant killing someone, as long as Jiang Nanshu was happy, he was happy.
Didn’t she want to exact revenge, even at the cost of her life?
He had made the people she hated die, so why wasn’t she happy about it?
Take Zhou Yanbai, for instance.
Everyone thought he accidentally fell from the building and stabbed himself to death.
Such a perfect crime, with absolutely no one noticing that he had helped it along.
And look at Chu Muxi.
How detestable she was.
Disgusting and stupid, she lost all sense of self-preservation when he so much as beckoned.
Now, she was really going to lose her life under his torment.
After Chu Muxi’s death, he had already picked out the next victim…
Those who had once scolded and hurt Jiang Nanshu.
Su Ran, Cheng An, Song Shizhao who was about to be released from prison, and that whole Song Family, slowly, one by one.
He was helping her get revenge, but she didn’t seem happy.
Jiang Nanshu pushed him out the door, closing it forcefully behind him without saying another word.
Lu Qingyan once again picked up the ring, then walked into the bedroom.
That evening, Lu Qingyan knocked on the door, “Nannan, it’s time for dinner. Even if you’re mad at me, you still need to eat, right?”
“Nannan, you haven’t eaten all day, come out quickly.”
There was no response from inside.
Lu Qingyan looked at the lock.
He turned to get the spare key.
He twisted the knob twice, but it didn’t open.
The lock had been changed.
He had a hundred ways to forcibly open the lock, but he held back every single one.
He couldn’t scare her.
Lu Qingyan grabbed his coat and left directly.
After he had left, Jiang Nanshu finally opened the door.
She went downstairs to eat, and the servants, seeing that she had finally come out, hurried to serve her food.
Jiang Nanshu was indeed hungry.
She ate heartily.
After she was full, a sense of lostness crossed Jiang Nanshu’s eyes.
She was walking into a dead-end.
He would certainly get into trouble if he carried on like this.
But, Lu Qingyan wouldn’t listen to her.
He didn’t even trust her anymore.
Jiang Nanshu looked up at the light above her.
What should she do?
…
A luxury car discreetly parked at Emperor’s Garden.
This was the house he once sold to Jiang Nanshu for five million, and it still belonged to her.
Only this house bore their beautiful yet shattered memories.
So, just like the ring, Jiang Nanshu didn’t want this place anymore.
Lu Qingyan smoked a cigarette, drawing on it only now and then.
He had his suit jacket draped casually over his shoulders.
It had rained outside.
His short hair was somewhat wet, hanging lifelessly over his forehead.
Using his fingerprint to open the villa, he was greeted by a chill in the air.
It wasn’t until Lu Qingyan turned on the lights that it felt considerably warmer.
He looked toward the living room sofa, remembering the snowy night years ago when she was Snow Rose, as if Jiang Nanshu still curled up shivering, lying right there.
In the end, he tenderheartedly covered her with a blanket.
Seeing her warm and relaxed expression made him smile for some reason.
Her beautiful hands were red with cold.
He applied ointment to her hands without letting her know.
He was afraid Jiang Nanshu would stab him in the back again.
That experience was truly painful.
On the night of the herbal medicine, he knew he had been manipulated.
He could only forcefully maintain his rationality, but unexpectedly, Jiang Nanshu arrived, and in her indifferent gaze, he couldn’t find even a hint of affection for him.
Later, he wanted to slash his arm with broken glass to keep himself alert. He wanted to ask Jiang Nanshu; he was so unwilling to let go, maybe he could have waited for her to come back, maybe she was just in a bad mood, and he needed to be understanding.
But in the end, through the crack in the door, Su Ran came instead.
He was the one abandoned.
He slit his wrist.
He thought, if he died, it was his fate.
If he survived, he would cut all ties with Jiang Nanshu.
The cigarette burned to his fingertips.
Lu Qingyan came back to his senses and ground out the cigarette in the ashtray.
Then he stood up and went to the basement of the house.
He didn’t know why, but he had a particular fondness for houses with basements.
Even though he had spent his childhood in such an environment.
Lu Qingyan thought to himself that perhaps the gene for perversion really was hereditary; his mother was just such an extreme person.
He slowly opened the basement door.
Seeing the wretched state of the person inside, his calm expression turned to one of pleasure.
“Long time no see, Chu Muxi… oh no, I should call you the transmigration traveler Tao Tao.”
Suddenly hearing Lu Qingyan’s voice,
Tao Tao, with Chu Muxi’s face, looked at him in terror.
She used to love seeing him smile, but now she could only see him as a demon with a knife behind his smile.
Her eyes were so sore that no tears could flow.
Her wrists, chafed by shackles, were covered in layers of scabs, her wounds oozed pus, and her face was so pale from years without sunlight, devoid of any color. Her emaciated frame was covered by a thin piece of clothing that hung on her, making her appear even more off-putting.
Even if Jiang Nanshu were standing here, she would not dare recognize that face.
Tao Tao was in despair, crying and kowtowing to Lu Qingyan, “Kill me, please, kill me, please… Kill me.”
She no longer wanted this experience of living someone else’s fate, replacing the life of a female lead.
She was trapped here, oblivious to time, to the world outside, to the difference between night and day. She had even become neurotic, any little noise could trigger uncontrollable shaking.
She regretted it…
All the other travelers had perfect lives replacing the female leads, enjoying the perks that the leads were meant to have.
Why did it all change when it came to her?
The family that doted on her, the lover who was wholeheartedly in love with her, her career that had reached its zenith, friends who were top-notch figures in their fields—she had none of it.
She even lost the original body she was meant to occupy, now stuck in this sickly and unattractive one.
She cried so hard that her face was a mess of tears and snot, and when she looked up, she saw Lu Qingyan’s face smiling but with icy-cold eyes, despair filled her heart.
Lu Qingyan was going to kill her.
He was going to torture her slowly until she died. He wouldn’t let her go.
“Sobbing, I’ve told you everything, about myself, about Jiang Nanshu, about this entire world, everything you wanted to know. I’ve told you everything. Please let me go,” Tao Tao begged Lu Qingyan, kowtowing until her forehead broke and the blood on the floor mixed with the filthy dust.
Lu Qingyan took out a cigarette pack from his pocket and leisurely lit another one.
The light flickered on his face, which was obscured in the gloom. His eyes were cold when he looked down, and yet, when he looked at her, his gaze held a hint of a smile.
“Let you go, but who would let go of my Nannan? When you knew her little life was going to end, did you ever think of sparing my poor Nannan?” Lu Qingyan murmured, “You all deserve to die.”
Tao Tao forgot to cry.
Why was no one coming to save her?
Where was Jiang Nanshu?
Why wasn’t she coming to save her?
She had clearly rattled the chains to alert her…