Lu Zhiling set the freshly steeped tea before Ding Yujun, the steam rising in delicate curls between them. “Bo Wang has no shares and no formal title within the conglomerate,” she began, her voice soft but heavy with concern. “Without a foundation, it will be nearly impossible for him to truly rise.”
She was gently suggesting that the matriarch should grant Bo Wang a foothold—a piece of the Bo empire to call his own.
To her surprise, Ding Yujun didn’t offer a sharp retort. Instead, a bitter, weary smile pulled at her lips, and the light in her eyes seemed to extinguish. “Do you think I haven’t considered that? It’s just that Bo Wang… he lacks the ability.”
Lu Zhiling froze, the silence stretching uncomfortably.
“He was gone for fifteen years,” Ding Yujun continued, her voice trembling. “In those years, he lived a life entirely removed from ours. That world taught him how to navigate the darkness with terrifying ease, but now that he has stepped into the light, he is paralyzed. Every path before him is choked with thorns.” Tears pooled in the older woman’s eyes as she gripped her teacup, her knuckles white. “Zhi Ling, you cannot imagine the horrors he survived…”
As Lu Zhiling walked away from the Wutong Courtyard (a traditional courtyard residence named after the Phoenix trees, symbolizing high status and shelter), her steps felt like lead. The fragments of history she had gleaned from Jiang Fusheng were nothing compared to the complete, harrowing map of Bo Wang’s past that Ding Yujun had just unveiled.
It was a descent into a living hell. At five, a car accident stripped him of his memory. Taken in by a peasant woman only to be tormented by village children, his small reprieve ended when she suffered a stroke. He was sold—traded like livestock—to the Huangs.
For five years, the Huangs used him as a “free laborer” in their slaughterhouse. By day, he was drenched in the blood of livestock; by night, he was forced to sleep in a literal dog cage. When a fire finally consumed the Huang house, he didn’t scream for help—he crawled out of the cage and fled into the gutters of Beigang to beg.
The years that followed were a cycle of betrayal. In the orphanage at eleven, he worked himself to the bone just to be allowed to stay. By sixteen, he was a footman for casino thugs. By eighteen, just as he gained the favor of a casino boss, his “brother” Su Li sold him out. He was beaten until his bones were like glass and then cast into the degradations of being a “gigolo” (a male escort for wealthy women) to pay off debts that weren’t his.
The betrayal peaked at twenty, when his only other friend, Tang Wei, lured him into a dark tunnel. There, his old boss and his former “brother” were waiting with a mob. They didn’t just want to hurt him; they wanted to erase him. Beaten to the edge of death, he was dumped into the sea, drifting toward Jiangbei until the Bo family pulled his broken body from the waves.
Lu Zhiling stopped in her tracks. She finally understood his haunting question: Can you tell if this is heaven or hell? To a man raised in a slaughterhouse and a dog cage, the gilded halls of the Bo family were just another cage—perhaps cleaner, but no less predatory.
Looking up, she saw his car. He hadn’t left. Through the windshield, she met his gaze—dark, bottomless, and utterly unreadable. He looked like a king of the underworld, one hand draped over the window, lazily biting on a cigarette.
She remembered her grandmother’s parting plea: “He has suffered too much betrayal. If he senses even a hint of falsehood, he will cut you off. But he trusts you now, Zhi Ling. Only you can pull him out of the dark.”
Trust? she thought bitterly. Is that why he hired Li Minghuai to shadow my every move?
She composed herself and approached the car, pulling her suitcase behind her. “I thought you were gone,” she said with a faint, tired smile.
Bo Wang’s eyes flicked to the small army of bodyguards following her. “What’s this?”
“Grandma gave them to me. She’s afraid I’ll get hurt again.”
He let out a sharp, mocking sneer. “If I truly wanted to get to you, an entire army couldn’t stop me.”
Lu Zhiling didn’t argue. “Let’s keep them. Grandma says they’re loyal. I can’t always count on you to swoop in and save me.”
Bo Wang’s expression shifted. He tossed his cigarette aside and commanded, “Line them up.”
Confused, she signaled the men. They stood in a rigid row. Bo Wang’s eyes swept over them like a wolf grading sheep. His voice was a low, menacing growl. “Numbers one, four, five, and nine. They stay. The rest—get lost.”
“Do you read faces now?” she asked, surprised. “Can you see their loyalty?”
He looked at her as if she were a particularly slow child. “Is there anyone in this world who is truly loyal? No. But those four have families. Wives, children, parents. They have ties. If anything happens to you, I will ensure every single one of their relatives dies with you. They’ll stay loyal because they’re terrified.”
The bodyguards turned ashen. Those not chosen scrambled back, relieved to be spared such a heavy burden of “loyalty.”
The drive to the hospital passed in a violent blur of lights and speed, the city dissolving into streaks beyond the windows. By the time they reached the private ward, the tension coiled between them had stretched to its breaking point.
The moment the door closed behind them, it snapped.
Bo Wang kicked it shut with a hard, echoing bang and pulled her straight into his arms, the force of it knocking the breath from her lungs. He didn’t ask. He didn’t pause. His mouth crashed down on hers with a fierce, claiming urgency, all restraint stripped away. This wasn’t tenderness—it was hunger, sharp and unfiltered, as though he were trying to devour the chaos boiling inside him through her.
His tongue forced its way past her lips, demanding, overwhelming, while his hand slid up her back, fingers pressing hard through the thin barrier of fabric, leaving heat in their wake. Lu Zhiling gasped, instinctively bracing her palms against his chest, but all she felt was the solid warmth beneath his shirt, the rapid, restless beat of his heart beneath her hands.
A low chuckle brushed against her mouth, dark and rough.
“So impatient?” he murmured, his voice thick with something dangerous. “You like this, don’t you?”
He drove her backward, step by relentless step, until the edge of the bed pressed against the back of her knees. His intention was unmistakable—raw, urgent, almost reckless. He wanted to drown everything burning inside him in her body, to silence his rage with sensation.
“Bo Wang—wait—”
“You gave me your word,” he cut in, teeth grazing her lip, the sharp scrape sending a jolt of pain and heat through her at once. “Sleep with me once, and I’ll burn your enemies to the ground. Fair trade, isn’t it?”
Before she could even process the cruelty of the word trade, he pushed her onto the mattress, his weight settling over her, heavy and consuming. His breath brushed her cheek as he spoke again, lower now, hoarse with desire.
“Worried about the pregnancy?” His lips curved faintly. “Fine. You stay on top. I won’t crush you.”
The absurdity of his solution struck her—and then, all at once, so did everything else.
As he bent down to kiss her again, the world tilted violently. The sharp scent of his cologne, the heat trapped between their bodies, the exhaustion and terror of the day—it all surged upward in a sudden wave.
“Ugh—”
She tore herself free, stumbling toward the bathroom. Barely making it to the sink, she retched, her body betraying her with painful force.
When the spasms finally eased, she lifted her head—and froze.
Bo Wang stood in the doorway, tall and unmoving, his shadow stretching across the tiled floor. His face had gone utterly cold, fury barely contained beneath the surface.
“You’re so disgusted by me,” he said slowly, “that you throw up at the sight of me?”
“No,” she rasped, rinsing her mouth, her hands trembling. “It’s morning sickness. It happens.”
He didn’t believe her. She could see it in the way his jaw tightened, the way his eyes darkened. He turned as if to leave, pride stung raw.
Panic flared.
Lu Zhiling rushed forward and caught his wrist, her fingers closing around the heavy bracelet there. “It’s not you,” she said quickly. “I swear. I’m not playing games.”
He spun around in an instant, slamming her back against the wall. His hand closed around her throat—not tight enough to choke, but more than enough to warn. His presence loomed over her, oppressive and volatile.
“I’m done playing,” he said quietly. “If this is a trick, it’s your last.”
“It’s not,” she whispered, her eyes softening despite the fear tightening her chest. “I just… don’t want you to see me like this. At my weakest. I don’t want to fall apart in front of you.”
Time passed before the air finally eased.
They ended up sitting at a small white table, the distance between them tense but controlled. To prove her words, she unlocked her phone and scrolled through article after article—about nausea, dizziness, exhaustion, even loss of bladder control during early pregnancy.
Bo Wang’s gaze stalled on the last line.
He looked at the screen. Then at her waist.
Something flickered in his eyes—something like disbelief.
“…Go change your pants,” he said at last, his voice stripped of its earlier sharpness.
She hadn’t actually had an accident, but she didn’t correct him. She let the misunderstanding stand, grateful for the excuse to escape the charged gravity of the bedroom.
When she returned, the atmosphere had shifted. The hunger had receded, replaced by a colder, sharper focus.
“What did you want to tell me?” he asked.
“I don’t want to be a victim anymore,” she said, her voice steadying. “I want to fight back. But I don’t want blood. I don’t want broken bodies. I want to destroy their world.”
His brow lifted slightly. “Go on.”
“They’re not targeting me,” she said, resting a hand over her stomach. “They’re targeting this child. The Bo succession. So give it to them—by taking it first. Bo Wang, I want you to take control of the conglomerate.”
He laughed softly, a lazy, dismissive sound. “Why bother? If the kid dies, he dies. If he lives, I’ll just kill whoever stands in his way.”
“No.” She leaned forward, her reflection sharp and unwavering in his dark eyes. “You can’t just be a weapon. A gun is useless once the bullets are gone. You have to be a skyscraper. You have to be the shield that stands between him and the storm—until he’s strong enough to stand on his own.”
He frowned, a strange irritation flickering in his chest. “What do you mean ‘bullets gone’? Are you questioning my endurance? That night you begged me to stop…”
“That’s not what I meant!” she flushed, frustrated by his sudden “freeway” turn into lewdness. “I mean that I can only stay for two years. After that, you’ll be the only one left for this child. If you aren’t the strongest man in the room, who will protect him when I’m gone?”
The room went silent. Bo Wang stared at her, the word gone echoing unpleasantly in his mind.
“Then I’ll say it directly,” she whispered. “And please… don’t be angry.”