Chapter 99: A Small Matter Concerning the Fact That My Father Was Actually a Hidden Big Shot, Part 9

The prey they chose first were international students just like themselves, except from poorer families. Next came the people on the margins of foreign society: homeless drifters under bridges, illegal immigrants, and the like.

The white-haired one’s confession, however, blew the lid off a whole nest of second-generation monsters back home.

These people were used to treating human life as nothing overseas. In the brief time after returning home, more or less all of them had been involved in traffic accidents.

No one had imagined they had actually driven straight at their victims on purpose, so every case had simply been handled as an ordinary road accident.

Among them, Meng Yuan was not actually a member of the group. He himself had not committed anything serious, or rather, what he had done did not even count as illegal.

Looking down on classmates from above, regarding others as beneath him, and the like—those were only his personal flaws.

Young Master Meng was so proud that when he hit someone, he would not even do it himself. Such brute behavior was too crude, and it would only dirty his own hands.

On top of that, once the Meng family learned what had happened, they immediately began looking for a way out. In the end, it was not even much trouble before he was released.

After all, it really had been the white-haired one’s perverse craving acting up on impulse, causing him to go out and ram Qin Yancheng with his car.

If this had happened to an ordinary person, the white-haired one would have gotten exactly what he wanted, just as in the original course of events.

Unfortunately for him, his luck was bad. The one he ran into was Qin Ye.

And Qin Ye was a kind-hearted man who cherished the light, a righteous little companion always aligned with the side of order and good.

Otherwise, the white-haired one would not merely have been arrested and left awaiting judgment. He would have encountered a true outlaw beyond the reach of law, one who would let him taste, a thousandfold, the terror and despair suffered by those victims he had treated as prey.

Tan Yuanyuan was also among those taken in as accomplices, though she and most of the other second-generation rich kids were not in any real danger.

At most, they were frightened a little inside. After all, not everyone regarded being detained as an everyday matter.

Ordinary law-abiding people felt uneasy just stepping into an official enforcement office once.

Much less being swept up in confusion and dragged away with the rest of the group.

There was shock, yes—but it was still better than something truly happening and never getting out.

Tan Yuanyuan was personally picked up by Tan Jian. He was better informed than most.

Moreover, ever since Qin Ye had publicly paid off Madam Tan’s absurdly inflated child-support figure, Tan Jian had realized that the information he had uncovered about the Qin family being merely an ordinary middle-class household might only be the extent of what he was able to find.

There might be far more that someone at his level had no chance of uncovering at all.

At that moment, Tan Jian’s attitude underwent a complete reversal.

Madam Tan remained indignant and wanted to use the media to paint Qin Suqing as an ungrateful ingrate, so that the whole family would be reviled by the world.

Tan Jian stopped her. Had she lost her mind?

She believed with certainty that the Qin family could never possibly produce that much money, yet they had produced it. So where had the money come from?

When the other side came to see their daughter, official personnel had even accompanied them.

Madam Tan thought they were merely some ordinary low-level employee, but after checking the surveillance footage at home, Tan Jian recognized that the person was someone even capital tycoons with far greater wealth than the Tan family would have to treat with utmost courtesy and deference.

The main reason Tan Jian had not immediately brought Madam Tan with him to beg forgiveness was, first, that he truly could not spare the time then.

Second, his biological daughter was the child the Qin family had raised as their own for eighteen years.

With that connection alone, once he finished his work and returned, he could take his wife and daughter to apologize in person. As long as his attitude was sufficiently sincere, then for the child’s sake alone, the relationship between the two families would not be ruined.

In that case, they would not have offended the Qin family, or the connections standing behind them.

But Tan Jian never imagined that he would end up rushing back after abandoning his project, and the reason would be his own long-lost biological daughter.

It was not as though he felt some deep bond with a daughter he had never even met.

He simply did not want the Tan bloodline to remain out in the world.

As for feelings, he did have a little toward his adopted daughter, but only a little.

Tan Jian had a string of illegitimate children outside. With so many children, each individual one mattered less.

Especially the children from outside, who had been taught by their mothers since childhood to curry favor with him by every means possible. Under those circumstances, Tan Jian’s attitude toward children grew even more indifferent.

Rather than vague sentiments, he valued profit more.

His adopted daughter had been carefully nurtured from a young age and, in the future, could be used in a powerful marriage alliance between equally matched elite families.

His biological daughter had lost eighteen years, yes, but it was not too late. With proper education and training, she too could become an excellent marriage candidate.

As for the illegitimate children outside, their only value was to please Tan Jian and let him enjoy some semblance of family happiness.

Nothing else could be expected. People in that circle were highly intolerant of illegitimate children.

Unless one of them was so outstanding that others had no choice but to submit in admiration, the status of being illegitimate was, to them, simply beneath notice.

That same circle which despised illegitimate children was also, ironically, the greatest producer of illegitimate children.

Tan Jian had thought everything through rather neatly: two daughters, two important partners, and then he would pick the most outstanding son among the illegitimate children to inherit the family business.

Everything was arranged perfectly.

Who would have thought the household would then be shaken by one matter after another.

He had said long ago that even if one disliked someone inwardly, one should still make the proper gestures outwardly, and never drive things to an extreme.

Leave a line so there will be a path to meet again later.

But his wife simply would not listen. She could not get along with the women in the circle, could not get along with her own daughter, and spent all day eating, drinking, and having fun with a bunch of plastic-sister friends who were only after her money and flattering her.

They ate and drank and played together, but every time the bill came, it was always on her.

And then, to make matters worse, she had managed the affairs at home into complete chaos.

Before he left, he had repeatedly instructed her to teach their biological daughter properly. After all, the girl had been out in the world for so many years; if she were not properly educated, she would inevitably make a scene at banquets later and become the laughingstock of the Tan family.

Yet she had gone and become a complete hands-off manager.

Tan Yuanyuan, together with a bunch of spoiled rich kids, had specifically lured out the son of her adoptive parents, and then the whole group had driven into him?

Tan Jian would not even dare say he would dare to toy with human life in such a way.

How did these children dare?

And Tan Yuanyuan—he had called that boy her brother for eighteen years. Just because one day she found out he was not blood-related, she could stand by and watch him die?

Fine. Very good.

The first thing Tan Jian did when he got home was fly into a rage, only to have Madam Tan shout even louder, bringing up his mistress and illegitimate children outside.

The two of them argued bitterly.

After the quarrel, Madam Tan slammed the door and left, and Tan Jian still had to drive out to bring Tan Yuanyuan home.

Once he got her back, he had another explosive outburst.

Unfortunately, Tan Yuanyuan was not Qin Suqing. Qin Suqing was steady in emotion, sensible, reserved, and even when Tan Jian cursed at her, she would only explain in a low voice.

Tan Yuanyuan was different. Tan Yuanyuan felt even more aggrieved than he did, and, just like Madam Tan, she erupted on the spot.

She said things like she had been willing, from the moment she was born, to be switched with someone else, that she had been born just to embarrass her own parents.

She chose the most cutting words she could find.

Tan Jian still felt a little guilty toward her.

After all, the Qin family’s circumstances were indeed inferior to the Tan family’s, and from Tan Yuanyuan’s perspective, she truly had suffered.

Although the Qin family had not mistreated her, compared with the vast majority of people, she had actually been quite fortunate.

But that depended on whom you compared her to.

After all, she had been the legitimate daughter on whom he had once placed such high hopes; even Tan Jian’s temper cooled.

He chose to speak to Tan Yuanyuan in a soft, conciliatory voice.

“All right, all right, it’s my fault. We should not have let you drift outside for so many years.

Fine, I will not say anything to you, I will not scold you. Rest well tonight, and tomorrow we will go to the Qin family with your brother and your adoptive parents to apologize properly.

You will just say that you knew nothing, that you were not close to those people, that you only feared being looked down upon and desperately wanted to fit in with them, which is why you obeyed them so completely. Understand?”

“I am not going.”

Tan Jian: ???

Tan Yuanyuan covered her face. “How do you expect me to face them? My brother almost died. I was the one who called him out.

And this time Meng Yuan was also dragged in. To him, such a huge disgrace—he must hate me to death, despise me to death.

He will never possibly like me. I have lost my love forever. Do you understand?”

Tan Jian: ...

What the hell am I supposed to understand?

“I thought it was because you knew Meng Yuan had an extraordinary background and was the most outstanding and capable among your peers, so you deliberately tried to get close to him.”

“Do not make my beautiful love sound so ugly. I love him enough to die for him.

For his sake, I would do anything. But it is over. Everything is over. He will never look at me again.”

At this moment, Tan Yuanyuan looked far more distraught than she had when Qin Yancheng lay unconscious.

Tan Jian tried to understand. He failed.

He sorted through it again, but it would not straighten out. It felt like a pile of dog shit; there was simply no need or value in trying to smooth it out.

Forget it. This account was ruined. Open a new one.

Tan Jian put away what little guilt he had left.

“Tomorrow, even if you are only pretending, you must make yourself look tearful and full of remorse, otherwise you will not get a single cent from me.”

“If I do not get it, then I do not get it. You think I care about your filthy money?”

Tan Yuanyuan kicked over the chair and stormed out, slamming the door behind her.

Within one day, being stormed out on twice in a row left Tan Jian with a dark expression. He did not bother staying home. Leaving the mess behind for the servants to clean up, he went instead to see his little lover.

Naturally, the next day still brought no softening from Tan Yuanyuan.

Tan Jian had all her allowances cut off, and at home they even stopped leaving meals for her.

As for the Qin family, Qin Yancheng ended up in the hospital again after a second turn in custody.

Fortunately, this time there was nothing serious, and he did not need to be admitted.

Still, it gave Feng Xiaolian quite a scare.

As for the fact that Tan Yuanyuan had called him out, only for her companions to treat him as though he were not human at all, Qin Yancheng did not tell Feng Xiaolian. Feng Xiaolian only thought he had nearly been in a car accident.

Qin Yancheng had actually thought that perhaps this was not entirely Tan Yuanyuan’s fault. After all, she had only just gone back; how could she know what sort of people the Tan family were, or what they might do?

But even so.

Some time had passed since Tan Yuanyuan had called him out and then caused trouble, and Qin Yancheng’s leg had even healed to the point where the doctors said it was as stable as before the fracture. Yet Tan Yuanyuan still had not shown her face.