We Weren’t Fated, I Just Played My Cards Right - Chapter 25
After completing the statements, the relationship between the Zhan family and Ning Yuan became clearer.
While being treated as an honored guest by Zhan Hongye, Ning Yuan had secretly been in contact with Zhan Huitian. He had likely planned this entire scenario from the beginning.
Unfortunately, Zhan Huitian knew little about the private dealings between his father and Ning Yuan. He only knew that Zhan Hongye had paid a fortune to acquire that vase from Ning Yuan, along with instructions for its use. As for where Ning Yuan obtained it, he had no idea.
Zhan Huitian’s testimony wasn’t immediately useful—to the outside world, he remained a critically ill patient fighting for his life.
Leaving the hospital room, Fang Chuan pulled Yan Xiu aside and asked quietly, “Zhan Huitian’s condition has stabilized. What about Jenny’s situation?”
Yan Xiu shook his head. “It’s unlikely she’ll wake up.”
Having been forewarned by Yan Xiu earlier, Fang Chuan wasn’t surprised.
“Without Jenny’s testimony, pinning this on Ning Yuan won’t be easy. Since he’s not a major player, we’ll have to use him as bait,” Fang Chuan mused. “I’ll have Ning Yuan detained for a few days while leaking news of Jenny’s coma. Someone will likely come to check on Zhan Huitian’s condition.”
“Making him appear on death’s doorstep won’t be difficult,” Yan Xiu understood Fang Chuan’s plan.
Fang Chuan grinned. “Good. How big a fish we catch depends on how tempting our bait is.”
After arranging matters at the hospital, Fang Chuan generously treated Liu Mumu to dinner and helped her pick out a new phone before driving her and Yan Xiu to a hotel near the police station.
Liu Mumu rushed to the front desk and slapped her ID card on the counter. “One luxury suite, please!”
Before she could finish, she was pulled aside. Yan Xiu placed both their IDs on the counter. “Two deluxe single rooms, please.”
The receptionist smiled at the flustered Liu Mumu behind him and proceeded with their check-in.
After getting the rooms ready, Yan Xiu handed Liu Mumu her key card and ID together.
Liu Mumu leaned against the reception desk with both hands, staring longingly at the price tag for the top-floor luxury suite, trying to catch Yan Xiu’s attention.
As he passed by, Yan Xiu casually turned her head away. “Let’s go.”
Unmoved.
“Cold, heartless, unreasonable! What’s wrong with wanting to stay in a suite? Don’t I, a master, deserve a bigger room?” Even the chance to spend her own money was denied. Liu Mumu grumbled under her breath in the elevator.
Fang Chuan chimed in with a grin, “Do you want the suite, or do you want to share it with our consultant Yan?”
“Of course a big room should be shared, otherwise it’d be a waste!” Liu Mumu retorted shamelessly.
The elevator reached the twelfth floor. Before stepping out, Yan Xiu remarked, “That’s why I booked a single—so you wouldn’t waste it.”
Liu Mumu nearly fainted from frustration.
Fang Chuan shrugged at her. Their consultant Yan was just that stone-hearted and sarcastic.
The three of them went to Yan Xiu’s room first, where he applied another talisman for Liu Mumu. “Set a timer. Come back every two hours to replace it,” he instructed.
Sitting on the soft bed, Liu Mumu looked at him expectantly. “Since none of us are sleeping tonight anyway, why don’t we—”
“No.” Yan Xiu cut her off before she could finish.
“I wasn’t even done! I just wanted to play a round of Doudizhu!”
“No one’s playing with you.”
“Fang Chuan would!”
“Yes, he would. But he’s going back to work overtime soon. And I have things to do too.” To her surprise, Yan Xiu actually bothered to explain.
“Fine…” Liu Mumu wilted, as if she were the only one slacking off.
Fang Chuan stayed briefly before leaving. With no excuse to linger, Liu Mumu still made sure to grab Yan Xiu and add him as a friend before heading out.
Watching them exchange contacts, Liu Mumu bounced out of the room happily with her phone. Fang Chuan couldn’t help but suspect that her enthusiasm for helping might’ve been just an excuse to get Yan Xiu’s contact.
Is this the difference between men? Kinda jealous.
Back in her own room, Liu Mumu checked her phone—rows of missed calls from Dong Zhenghao in the neighboring city.
Coincidentally, another call came through just then. She answered.
“Mumu, where are you? Why haven’t you picked up all day? Aunt Jiang said you haven’t come home—did something happen?” Finally getting through, Dong Zhenghao fired off questions without pause.
“I’m fine. Staying at a hotel tonight, heading back tomorrow.”
“Why suddenly stay at a hotel? Are you alone? Should I send Yueyue to keep you company?”
“No! No need! Bye!”
“Ah, this kid…”
Hanging up, someone at the lively dinner table joked, “Checking up on your daughter, Boss Dong?”
“Exactly. Spoiled rotten, never listens. Starting college this year, and I can’t control her anymore,” Dong Zhenghao half-complained.
“True, girls these days are so delicate. Can’t scold them too harshly, or they’ll get mad at Dad,” another chimed in, nodding sympathetically.
The person sitting beside him was a certain high-ranking official, someone you couldn’t just casually network with. Being able to invite him for a meal was already an enormous honor. Who would have thought that Dong Zhenghao’s phone call would actually catch his eye?
The two men enthusiastically began discussing the art of raising daughters, with Old Dong putting on the airs of an experienced father. Anyone unaware of the truth might think he’d gone through great hardships raising Liu Mumu.
The others at the table looked at Dong Zhenghao with envy. As the saying goes, “The monk from afar recites scriptures best”—this Boss Dong certainly had his ways.
*
Liu Mumu remained unaware that she’d become Old Dong’s prop daughter. She set an alarm on her new phone, downloaded a few mobile games, and started playing.
Time flew by quickly. Curled up in bed playing games and watching dramas, it was suddenly midnight—the time when Liu Mumu felt most energetic.
Unfortunately, the drama she’d been following had already finished. After scrolling through her phone for a while and finding nothing interesting, she tapped on Yan Xiu’s profile picture.
Yan Xiu’s profile picture was the default system image, making his account look fake.
She sent him a sticker.
Liu Mumu: [Bunny stretching its paws.jpg]
Yan Xiu: What do you want?
Liu Mumu: Are you asleep?
Yan Xiu: Who do you think is talking to you right now?
Liu Mumu: I was just asking out of politeness. You could’ve said you weren’t asleep.
Yan Xiu: Oh. I’m asleep.
Liu Mumu: …
Talking to this guy was so difficult.
Liu Mumu: [Bunny rolling around.jpg]
Yan Xiu: Spit it out.
Liu Mumu: I can’t sleep. Let’s chat.
After waiting a while with no response, Liu Mumu pouted and buried herself under the blankets.
The next moment, a voice call came through, which she quickly answered.
Yan Xiu’s voice carried a hint of laziness: “Whatever you have to say, say it quickly.”
“With that tone, there’s no atmosphere for conversation at all,” Liu Mumu complained.
“Then I’ll hang up.”
“Fine,” Liu Mumu conceded. After gathering her thoughts, she finally said, “I’m feeling a bit sad suddenly. Comfort me.”
“Because of Jenny?”
“Yeah…” Liu Mumu’s voice was muffled. “I never told you guys before, but when I did her fortune telling, what I actually saw was a turning point in her fate.”
Yan Xiu paused, realizing what was troubling her.
When she’d read Jenny’s fortune, the outcome should have been good—yet the final result was completely opposite to what she’d predicted.
“Didn’t your grandfather ever tell you that whether a person’s fate turns out good or bad ultimately depends on themselves? A fortune teller can’t control it.”
“But this outcome happened because I interfered. If I’d done nothing, she might never have known and wouldn’t have made that choice.”
Liu Mumu sometimes couldn’t help but wonder—with her own fate being so unfortunate, wouldn’t telling fortunes for others actually make them more unlucky?
Her grandfather said it wouldn’t, but Jenny’s outcome made her uncertain.
“If even you don’t believe in yourself, who else will?” Yan Xiu’s words were brutally cold. “Fortune-telling is just a transaction. A person pays the price to glimpse their own fate, and whatever the outcome, they must bear it themselves. All you need to do is take the money and do the job.”
“That’s so heartless,” Liu Mumu muttered under her breath.
Unfortunately, no matter how softly she spoke, Yan Xiu still heard her. “If you weren’t wallowing in melancholy in the middle of the night, I wouldn’t have to be so heartless.”
“Fine.”
“Also,” Yan Xiu added solemnly, “from the moment of the first sacrifice, Jenny was destined to be influenced by the cursed artifact. The more lives it claimed, the deeper its hold on her became. That wasn’t your fault.”
“I know.” Liu Mumu glanced at the time and hopped off the bed. “Ten more minutes—I’m coming over!”
She dawdled until there were only five minutes left before appearing at Yan Xiu’s door, which was slightly ajar, as if he had been waiting for her.
Inside, Yan Xiu sat leisurely at his desk, wearing only a white dress shirt. A laptop lay open in front of him, his phone resting nearby. A pair of gold-rimmed glasses perched on the bridge of his nose, softening his appearance entirely—nothing like the cold, distant demeanor he carried during the day.
When she entered, he stood and moved to another table to draw talismans for her.
Liu Mumu took a seat, propping her chin on one hand as she watched him work.
“Do all mystics know how to draw talismans?”
“No, it depends on personal preference.”
“How long did it take you to learn?”
Yan Xiu handed her the completed talisman and answered casually, “Two years.”
Comparing that to her own years of struggling with divination techniques, Liu Mumu silently seethed with envy.
She felt the need to prove herself—to show Yan Xiu that she, too, had skills worth acknowledging.
Pulling out her coins, she slid them across the table toward him. “Is there anything you want me to divine for you? I’ll cast a hexagram for you.”
Yan Xiu seemed amused, as if wondering what went through her head. “You won’t be able to read mine.”
“Impossible!” Liu Mumu bristled at that—she was usually quite accurate!
Truthfully, as she grew older, she had developed a certain intuition while casting hexagrams—a feeling that helped her gauge their accuracy.
Her grandfather had once made her practice daily, saying that practice makes perfect. She had thought it was just empty encouragement, but later realized it was true. As a diviner, she found it absurd.
Occasionally, when her emotions were turbulent, she would passively glimpse fragments of visions. Over the past year, these occurrences had increased.
She felt she could now, at least marginally, pass as a master.
Yan Xiu didn’t argue with her. He picked up the coins. “Then divine my financial luck for tomorrow.”
He tossed them casually. Liu Mumu stared at the result for a long time but saw nothing.
“This was just a fluke. Try again.”
So Yan Xiu cast another hexagram.
Still nothing.
“Best of five—three more tries.” Liu Mumu felt her dignity as a diviner was being trampled on.
Yan Xiu sighed. Was this a competition now?
He shook the coins three more times, thoroughly frustrating the young girl.
There was truly nothing—no vision, no sensation. The reading wasn’t about wealth at all; the entire divination was completely scrambled.
Yan Xiu stacked the coins one by one, then gently slid them toward Liu Mumu with his fingers. “Has no one told you? A mystic’s fate is obscure—it’s not easily divined.”
“But I divined you before!” Liu Mumu retorted stubbornly.
“Did it ever occur to you that you might have misread the subject? For example—”
Under Liu Mumu’s furious glare, Yan Xiu swallowed Fang Chuan’s name. Never mind.
“No, it was you!” Liu Mumu huffed and stormed off.
Watching the door slam shut, Yan Xiu chuckled wryly as he settled back into his chair. For the first time, he realized that even matters of romantic fate could be forcibly imposed.
At 8:30 the next morning, Liu Mumu headed downstairs to the hotel buffet, refreshed and energized.
Though waking up every two hours at night wasn’t ideal, she’d still managed a solid seven hours of sleep.
After breakfast, she returned to the twelfth floor only to find Fang Chuan knocking on her door with another man in tow.
Upon closer inspection, she realized—wasn’t that her father?
Dong Zhenghao had wrapped up his business negotiations successfully the night before. After calling home and learning Liu Mumu hadn’t been in touch, he deliberated and decided to return early, driving straight to the police station to check on her.
Coincidentally, he ran into Fang Chuan, who brought him along.
Initially, Dong Zhenghao wasn’t thrilled to hear Liu Mumu was staying next door to Fang Chuan’s colleague, but he kept his displeasure hidden. Instead, he pulled her aside and whispered, “You’re a young woman—how could you casually stay at a hotel with a man?”
“We’re not sharing a room,” she said, though she wouldn’t have minded.
“That’s not the point! What if he takes advantage of your acquaintance?”
As Dong Zhenghao continued lecturing, the door across the hall opened, and Yan Xiu stepped out. His cool, detached gaze swept over them, perfectly embodying an air of refined elegance and noble restraint.
This guy’s even more handsome than I was in my prime.
Dong Zhenghao couldn’t help but feel a twinge of envy.
Yan Xiu’s eyes briefly scanned the group gathered in the hallway before giving Dong Zhenghao a slight nod.
Dong Zhenghao quickly smiled. “My daughter can be a bit thoughtless. Thank you for looking after her.”
“You’re too kind.”
Now that Dong Zhenghao had returned, Liu Mumu no longer needed the bl00d talisman. When she explained this to Yan Xiu, he didn’t press for details, simply handing her a freshly drawn talisman as a precaution. Then he and Fang Chuan headed downstairs to check out.
Father and daughter walked behind, Liu Mumu glanced at the man ahead and said disdainfully to Dong Zhenghao, “You were just worried he’d take advantage of me.”
“I hadn’t seen his face then. The young man’s quite handsome—you didn’t take advantage of him, did you?”
His sharp eyes immediately recognized the man’s considerable wealth, refined demeanor, and good looks. Given his daughter’s tendency to expect everything—even a fiancé—to be handed to her by the family, she might have acted impulsively.
“Am I that kind of person?” Liu Mumu pouted.
Dong Zhenghao gave her a look that clearly said, “Aren’t you?”
After a brief staring contest, both looked away.
Bl00d relations were truly annoying—how could Old Dong know her so well?
When they returned home together, Jiang Li asked no questions, but Dong Qi, seeing Liu Mumu back, opened his mouth to say something—only to be silenced by his mother’s hand.
A warm family of five.
Standing at the doorway, Dong Zhenghao ignored his youngest son and sighed inwardly.
After that day, Liu Mumu paid no further attention to the Zhan family affairs.
The subsequent events were only brought up by Dong Zhenghao during dinner one evening.
Since his eldest daughter had complained about his drunken late-night returns disturbing her sleep, Dong Zhenghao had been making an effort to come home on time after work, cutting social engagements short to return by nine.
Previously, his drunken homecomings would rouse the entire household, no matter the hour. But after his mother passed, his status at home had declined—even Jiang Li dared to use Liu Mumu as leverage against him now.
At around seven in the evening, the family sat around the dining table in harmony.
After nearly a month of coexistence, Dong Qi had learned one thing: when his elder sister was present, silence was golden. Any conflict between them would never see their father take his side—a lesson learned through bitter experience.
Jiang Li broached the topic. She had visited her parents earlier and heard some news about Jiang Jia.
“Apparently, both of the Zhan children met with misfortune,” she told Dong Zhenghao. “Jiang Jia is gloating, saying she might reclaim Old Zhan’s entire inheritance.”
She glanced at Liu Mumu, who had previously claimed Jiang Jia was cursed with bad luck. Now, it seemed the tables might be turning?
Jiang Li even felt a twinge of regret for having driven Jiang Jia away so harshly in the heat of the moment.
Dong Zhenghao scoffed. “It won’t be as easy as she thinks.”
Lowering his voice as if sharing a major scoop, he continued, “Something big happened today. Zhan’s deputy told me several people showed up at their company with lawyers, claiming ownership. One had a share transfer agreement signed by Zhan Hongye, stating that if his heirs were gone, all his shares would go to this person.”
“Really? Is that even possible?” Jiang Li gasped.
“Seems legitimate. What’s puzzling is why he’d sign such an agreement.”
The three children at the table were riveted, even forgetting to eat as they waited for Dong Zhenghao to continue.
“What happened next?” Jiang Li pressed eagerly.
“Things got even more interesting later, beyond anything you could imagine.” Dong Zhenghao teased, keeping them in suspense. “Rumors were flying that the eldest son of the Zhan family had died in an accident, but then he suddenly showed up at the company, completely unharmed.”
“So those people got nothing in the end?”
“Exactly. They left empty-handed, tails between their legs.” Dong Zhenghao took a sip of wine. “If I were Zhan Huitian, I’d sell the company shares for cash now to avoid future trouble.”
“True. That so-called agreement Old Zhan left behind always felt shady.”
Dong Zhenghao nodded. “Zhan Hongye rose to success quickly back then. People said he had investors backing him. I suspect this inheritance agreement is somehow connected to those investors.”
Later, Dong Zhenghao looked into what happened to the company Zhan Hongye left behind. As he predicted, Zhan Huitian sold all the inherited shares and disappeared without a trace.
As for Zhan’s daughter, she never showed up again.
No one knew if she’d really met with misfortune or left with her brother.
Meanwhile, those who came to claim the company—while onlookers thought they’d slunk away in defeat—were actually taken to the police station for questioning.
The police were curious about how they’d learned of Zhan Huitian’s supposed death. Each was detained for a full 24 hours before release.
By the time they left, their identities had been thoroughly investigated.
People inevitably slip up when desperate. Even the wealthiest individuals get rattled when billions are at stake.
One Ning Yuan might not reveal much, but with multiple people involved, one or two were bound to lead to bigger clues.
Fang Chuan worked swiftly, uncovering detailed backgrounds and histories of these individuals.
Yet beyond discovering they worked for a branch of an overseas investment company in the capital, little useful information emerged from their files.
He handed the documents to Yan Xiu, for whom these details took on new significance.
For instance, their accompanying lawyer, Wang—a top attorney from a prestigious capital firm—typically handled affairs for wealthy families.
Traveling all this way for an overseas investment firm showed remarkable dedication.
Yan Xiu tapped Attorney He’s file. “Found it.”
Fang Chuan leaned in. “He represented Zhuo Yongqi twice in court. What’s suspicious about that?”
“Zhuo Yongqi’s mother was a mystic practitioner. After marrying into the Zhuo family, she barely managed to bring them into the metaphysical circle.”
Fang Chuan’s expression turned serious—only this person was involved in the metaphysical circle.
“Later, when that person passed away, the Zhuo family barely managed to stay in the circle through arranged marriages and by spending heavily to support practitioners.”
“So the Zhan family incident was their doing?”
Yan Xiu shook his head. “They’re not qualified enough—at best, they’re just hired muscle. There must be someone else behind them, likely one of those few families.”
Fang Chuan sighed in disappointment. “Seems like we can’t touch them for now.”
The case left too little evidence, and the other side had cleaned up thoroughly. Ning Yuan had committed countless crimes, but due to insufficient evidence, he was only sent to a special prison instead of receiving the death penalty.
Meanwhile, the powerful families orchestrating everything continued to enjoy their privileged lives.
“No rush. Now that we’ve got a lead, they won’t escape.” Yan Xiu gazed out the window, his tone icy.
This was only the beginning.