gfresh nightclub.
VIP room on the second floor.
Fu Lingchu sat on the sofa, a cigarette between his fingers.
He wasn’t wearing a perfectly tailored suit today, but a silk black shirt with a few buttons undone at the collar. His black hair was pulled back, a few strands falling on his forehead. His handsome, sharp brows and eyes had a relaxed air, giving him a somewhat dashing look.
The glass table in front of him was filled with expensive spirits, any one of which would cost an ordinary worker a year’s salary, and Fu Lingchu drank them like water.
—Ye Yan was sick, and he couldn’t do anything, but Du Jinghuai had run around for her all night.
Even so, the kind Ye Yan would rather choose to bear it herself than trouble them. In the end, Fu Lingchu got the news from the top doctors in the country, and only then did he know what a difficult night Ye Yan had endured.
“It’s okay, Lingchu, don’t worry about me.”
“Although this night was hard, I’ll be able to come back to see you all when I get my illness under control.”
Ye Yan’s voice was as gentle as water, as it was in his memory. Her personality was still as pure as the moon, even though she was enduring so much pain, she never changed herself.
—And what was Fu Lingchu doing this night? He was actually thinking about Li Jing, the substitute.
Regret, accompanied by a sense of shame he couldn’t quite describe, attacked Fu Lingchu’s mind. It finally brought him back to his senses from the days of inexplicable confusion.
Yes, she was just a fake.carpreads.pages.dev
Even still, a fake who had already fallen from grace.
It didn’t matter that she had once been innocent and naive. She was the one who said that she could be bought with money.
Then Fu Lingchu should just satisfy her.
Let Li Jing be a woman who could be summoned with money.
It should be like that.
When Li Jing walked into the nightclub, she almost got knocked over by the sound waves inside.
Fortunately, after being escorted to the second floor by the bodyguard, the sound was somewhat muffled.
Standing at the entrance of the private room, she took a deep breath in a very “little white flower” manner, then pushed the door open and walked in.
—And her eyes met Fu Lingchu’s dark, gloomy gaze directly.
Li Jing had deliberately changed her clothes. She wasn’t wearing the tattered single garment she usually wore, nor the uniform of the cake shop. The simply cut clothes, when worn on her, perfectly outlined the slender and supple figure of a young girl. Standing in the dim nightclub, she had a clean and beautiful look.
But Fu Lingchu found it very irritating.
“So—you’ve already tasted the sweetness?” Fu Lingchu said sarcastically as he drank, “Why don’t you let Acting Emperor Du buy you something else? Clothes are only worth a few bucks.”
Li Jing: ?
Honey, did you forget that you didn’t pay a dime last time during the showdown?
Today, you have to make it up to me!!!
The young girl subconsciously tightened her thin shoulders. Although she was still stung by his sarcastic words, she held her white neck high and said fiercely, “President Fu forgot? Mr. Du is going to share his box office revenue with me.”
Fu Lingchu’s gaze turned vicious.
What did Du Jinghuai’s box office revenue matter? A capitalist’s money was inexhaustible. If he gave Li Jing a little bit of his shares in Fu Group, it would be endless wealth.
But an indescribable rage surged through his heart. It was as if he wanted to see through her stubborn expression and understand what was truly going on in her heart.
The nightclub was a world of intoxication and extravagance. People were reveling on the dance floor, and the deafening sound faintly seeped through the soundproof glass, but it only made people feel even more lonely.
Fu Lingchu suppressed his emotions and looked at Li Jing with a mocking smile, “So, if I give you money too, you’ll do anything, right?”
Li Jing clenched her fists, “Yes!” Hurry up and present it to your master.
Fu Lingchu finally let out a cold laugh.
The man tilted his head back and drained the amber liquid in his glass. Then, he casually flicked his wrist, and the glass shattered against the wall, sending sharp shards of glass flying everywhere.
Li Jing immediately cowered—Did you get drunk, my old bro? This is so dangerous, it’s going to hurt others and yourself!
He was truly the male lead of an old-fashioned, bloody, melodramatic novel!
Fu Lingchu stared intently at the expression on Li Jing’s face, seeing a trace of genuine panic. He smiled coldly and beckoned with his hand.
Soon, the door to their private room was pushed open from the outside by the bodyguards. The bodyguards who walked in carried a briefcase in their hands and, with practiced movements, placed it on the table.
The lid of the case opened, revealing stacks and stacks of neatly arranged pink banknotes!
Li Jing: It’s here, it’s here, it’s here!
At this plot point, Fu Lingchu gradually lost control of his feelings for the substitute. Underneath his pity for the sickly White Moonlight, he found what he should have been doing all along—inflicting physical and emotional abuse on the substitute.
So, he did something that was very common in old-fashioned melodramatic novels: he threw the banknotes at the female lead.
This was a blatant humiliation, especially for a female lead like her, who was strong and self-respecting, a little white flower.
The system made a prediction this time: “I understand. The original owner won’t take the male lead’s money, but you will! Then the humiliation will be maxed out, and the melodramatic love will be deep!”
“No, no.” Li Jing said.
How much thrown money was that?
Li Jing said to the system, “We can have another way to dig deeper into this plot point!”
System: “W-what is it?”
The plot had progressed to this stage, and the character arc had already been revealed. It was time to elevate Fu Lingchu’s love line!
Hehehe.
Fu Lingchu was indeed a little drunk. When he got up to take the money, his body swayed slightly.
Just as his hand was about to reach the table, the slender young girl suddenly rushed forward and grabbed his hand, “Be careful!”
Fu Lingchu snapped back to his senses and realized that the small hand holding his was trembling.
He lowered his head and saw.
On the table, there were sharp shards of glass from the shattered glass.
And she… was afraid he would get hurt.
Earlier, Fu Lingchu had humiliated her, mocked her, and she hadn’t been afraid. Now, her pale little face was bloodless, her long eyelashes fluttering rapidly—she was trembling with fear.
In that moment. Li Jing’s expression was so urgent, all her forced pretense vanished, revealing only that instinctive concern.
In a flash, something in Fu Lingchu’s mind exploded like fireworks—
It turned out, it turned out all this time.
It was because Li Jing had fallen in love with him.
She had fallen in love with the man who humiliated her, who hurt her, and she hated it all, so she could only self-destruct.
It turned out… it was like this.
—Fu Lingchu Favorability +5%
Unbelievably, Fu Lingchu was the first to break 60%.
Li Jing: I’m freaking laughing to death.
This teaches us a lesson, men, you guys really can’t be too confident!
And she was simply using the principle of Fu Lingchu’s love for Ye Yan to create the same psychological process for him—that the high and mighty, omnipotent President Fu also had a vulnerable side, needing protection.
Ye Yan would never have imagined that upon her return, Fu Lingchu’s scales of justice would completely tip.
Fu Lingchu’s gaze was so deep it seemed to draw Li Jing in.
And she seemed to finally realize this, quickly releasing Fu Lingchu’s hand, saying stiffly, “So much money, are you giving it all to me? Okay.”
Fu Lingchu even found it laughable.
Seeing that he didn’t refuse, she even boldly made a more outrageous request: “I want my name written on every single one of these.”
—She was waiting for his humiliation and hurt, so she could stop loving the man who tormented her.
Fu Lingchu had completely seen through Li Jing.
And a strange, sour yet intense sense of satisfaction, like sulfuric acid, spread through him, making his heart burn.
“Okay—” he heard his own voice say calmly.
Each bill was inscribed with Li Jing’s name, scattered from the air in the bustling bar.
Everyone frantically picked up the money, then frantically shouted the name on the bills:
“Li Jing! Li Jing!”
Li Jing: I’m here!!!!
—Daddy is here!!!!
She suppressed her inner joy, tears of disbelief welling in her eyes as she looked at Fu Lingchu.
The man stared unblinkingly at the girl before him, his heartbeat quickening—
Her biggest secret had been discovered by him.
She could no longer… escape his grasp.
—Backend Income: Cash, 5,000,000 yuan
Li Jing listened to the loud shouts of her name from downstairs.
She watched Fu Lingchu’s completely captivated expression.
Her tears flowed freely, her heart filled with only these words.
It’s so heart-wrenching!
So heart-wrenching!!!