Chapter 231 Now

Seventeen's expression instantly became alert, and his voice was cold, "Why would I do something that has no benefit to me?"

Chi Qi lowered her eyes and felt guilty for the first time in her life. Asking Seventeen to testify in court was equivalent to asking her to sacrifice herself.

Compared with Shi Nian'an, Shi Qi was destined to be the one to be sacrificed, because she had done so many bad things and felt no shame.

More importantly, she is not in line with human morality.

But in order to achieve the goal of destroying Huangtian, Chi Lu had no choice but to make this choice. She also knew very well what words to use to convince Seventeen.

"If Shi Nian'an loses the case, Qiao Yanzhi will be deified. In life, he was the all-powerful Crown Prince. After his death, he becomes a victim, slandered and worthy of sympathy, the perfect white moonlight in the eyes of the world."

Seventeen frowned, as if he was disgusted by these words.

She hated Qiao Yanzhi so much that she was willing to use Shi Nian'an to kill him. How could she tolerate this man being liked by the world?

Chi Yan knew exactly what she was thinking and said coldly, "Besides, I can also help you get rid of Qiao Zhizhang."

"No, I can do this kind of thing myself."

"I know your method is nothing more than killing one thousand enemies and injuring eight hundred of your own. But I can, without bloodshed, bankrupt him, ruin his reputation, and slowly languish in agony until he dies."

Seventeen looked at her in surprise, as if she had been reminded of what she was thinking.

Then, a hint of anger and doubt after being denied appeared in his eyes, and his tone hardened a little, "You say this on the premise that I believe you. But this is just the first time we meet, right? Who knows if you just want to use me to protect your daughter."

Chi Li looked at the familiar gloomy expression on Shiqi's face and couldn't help but curl her lips and smile slightly. "You don't have to rush to reject me. My goal is the same as yours."

Seventeen was stunned when he saw her smile.

In her life, she had never met anyone who remained calm despite being scolded so coldly by her.

The humans she met always said one thing and meant another. Even if they hated someone to death in their hearts, they would appear friendly on the surface. But once she exposed their lies, everyone's faces changed.

"That's a monster, and monsters' words can't be taken seriously."

"No wonder they call her a monster, hahahaha..."

Seventeen regards language as truth, but humans regard language as power.

It was then that she began to understand the rules of human society: "Lies are the first necessity for human survival."

She learned to lie, but she disdained to lie.

Seventeen sensed a familiar aura from Chi Li. She was born with a gift—the ability to distinguish between her own kind. But before today, this gift had never been used.

She suddenly felt relaxed, pursed her lips, and sneered, "What could your purpose be? You just want to bring down Huangtian. But if Huangtian falls, it will not benefit me."

Seeing her being so frank, Chi Qi knew that she had let down her guard against him.

"But what you want is definitely not the little wealth and protection that God bestows upon you, right?"

The sneer on Seventeen's lips froze, and there was a hint of confusion in her eyes. What did she want?

A cold voice rang out in the closed carriage, "Freedom."

“It’s not the freedom to do something, but the freedom not to do something.”

"Freedom is freedom, freedom from the threat of power, freedom from the temptation of profit, freedom from moral condemnation, freedom from the constraints of rules."

Seventeen suddenly opened his eyes wide, and a light gradually appeared in his cold eyes.

She suddenly had a lot of words in her mind and wanted to confide in Chi Yan, but Chi Yan turned away first and looked at the time. "The court is about to start. You should go quickly."

Seventeen suppressed the impulse in his heart and responded softly, "Okay."

She opened the car door and was about to get out when someone suddenly grabbed her arm tightly. "It's been cold lately. Don't wear so little just because you're afraid of trouble."

Seventeen frowned. Why did she have to tell her this? She wasn't a child anymore. It was really confusing.

She broke free from Chi Ling's hand and said, "When I get to prison, come back and bring me some warm clothes."

With a click, the car door was closed again. Chi Qi looked out the window and did not look away until the black figure disappeared into the back door of the court.

She sighed softly after a long absence, leaned her head back on the chair and closed her eyes.

The plot of the novel in this world came back to my mind.

In the original plot, Shiqi's appearance was very rare. She was just a cannon fodder to push the plot forward. After being used by the male protagonist Qiao Yanzhi to kill Qiao Zhizhang, she was sentenced to death. Qiao Yanzhi, on the other hand, successfully inherited the Huangtian Group without getting his hands dirty.

Chi Qi's lips curled up into a self-deprecating smile. This was really sad, but unfortunately, Seventeen was not dead.

With her as an additional variable this time, it is even less likely that Seventeen will die.

Liu Shenai said that if one wants to become a god, one must abandon family and friends, experience countless separations and deaths, and endure eternal loneliness.

Perhaps, this is a particularly painful thing for many people.

But for Chi Li, it is not.

Because she has no relatives or friends, and is happy to enjoy solitude, and an ordinary life like ordinary people is not what she pursues.

Compared to this, she wants freedom above the rules.

I want a pair of eyes that can see through the heavens, the earth, humans and ghosts, the past, present and future. I want a sharp blade that can kill all the flying gods in history, old gods and new gods.

Above the gods and Buddhas, she is the only one.

————

Seventeen stayed with his grandmother in the old house in the countryside.

She remembered that she was only eight years old at that time, and she often played in the water and climbed trees with her friends.

One summer night, they learned from the adults to fish for frogs.

When Seventeen saw the frog struggling in his hand with its limbs and its white belly bulging out, a thought suddenly popped up in his mind: what's in this little belly?

A little girl said, "Let's release it. The teacher said frogs are beneficial insects."

The others also responded in a crisp voice, "Quick, quick, let it go, let's catch another big one."

Seventeen clenched the frog in his hand and said, "Don't let go. I caught it."

The girls were anxious, "What do you want to do? Are you going to eat it?"

"I want to see what's in its stomach." Seventeen said, picked up a stone, pressed the frog to the ground, and cut open its stomach.

When the companions shone their flashlights over, they saw a pale, fat worm wriggling in the frog's belly, and along with the flowing internal organs, it rubbed against Seventeen's shriveled and skinny fingers.

"Ah——!" After a scream, the children ran away.

Seventeen stood alone in the darkness, his big black eyes filled with confusion. How could he still be alive after eating something from a frog's stomach?

What puzzled her even more was that from then on, her friends started avoiding her.

"I don't want to be friends with you anymore! You killed a frog! You're so scary!"

So, frogs can’t be killed?

But compared to the children's seriousness, what Seventeen couldn't understand even more was the adults' indifference.

"A frog? If it dies, it dies. The price of frogs has gone up again recently, so I have to find a way to catch more tonight."

So, can frogs be killed and eaten?

Who should she listen to? Why are the rules of the human world so complicated, with children and adults being held to different standards?

If only there was a book full of human rules, then she would know what she could do and what she couldn't do, and then become a standard perfect human being.

Grandma listened to Seventeen's question, smiled kindly, then pushed her down on the chair and combed her messy hair with her fingers.

Seventeen felt the old man's calloused fingers touching his scalp. It was a little rough, yet a little warm, just like the spring sunshine, making him feel extremely comfortable.

After combing the hair, the old man divided it into two parts, then took a piece of red string and tied up the left side of the hair.

Seventeen waited for a while, and when she found that the old man had not made any further move, she became anxious. She wanted to turn her head to look at the old man's face, but she didn't dare to move.

I could only urge: "Grandma, hurry up, there is no time left."

The moment I said this, I was stunned. Why is there no time?

Seventeen opened her eyes suddenly, and the white ceiling came into view. She sat up, feeling a strange sense of loss in her heart. It turned out to be just a dream.

Then she frowned in confusion. She hadn't thought about her childhood for a long time. Why did she suddenly dream about this?

And grandma, she had passed away for so many years, but this was the first time she appeared in her dream. It should be the influence of what Tianqiong President Zhou Fanyi said to her last time.

After that, Seventeen never saw Zhou Fanyi again.

Because the crime she committed was not serious and the victim forgave her, she was sentenced to two years of probation with the efforts of the Tianqiong legal team. During this period, she lived in the house arranged by the other party.

She watched the nationally famous hearing and was also shocked by Huangtian's spectacular downfall. During this period, when she went online, all she saw were posts cursing and complaining by Huangtian's laid-off employees.

Seventeen had never thought that Tianqiong could bring down Huangtian at such a fast speed, and all of this could be said to be the work of that woman.

This made her admire the other person, but also gave rise to an urgent curiosity to understand the other person and a competitive spirit to surpass the other person.

How on earth did that woman do it?

Seventeen had never cared so much about someone before. In the past, she had only cared about the symbol of human beings. She watched the various aspects of life with cold eyes and thought she was an outsider.

But he didn't know that he had already been in the game.

Seventeen really wanted to see Zhou Fanyi again. She had a lot of questions in her heart that she wanted to ask her, but she seemed to have forgotten about her and just left her there without paying any attention.

She is not the type to sit and wait for death. If the other party doesn't show up, she doesn't mind going directly to the company.

Thinking of this, Seventeen got up, put on his clothes, put his hand on the door handle, and was about to open the door when he heard footsteps in the living room outside.

When she opened the door, the indifferent face that had kept her tossing and turning suddenly came into her sight.

Seventeen was stunned.

The woman stood tall and straight, wearing a black windbreaker over a gray turtleneck sweater. One hand was in her pocket, and the other hand was half raised in the air, which immediately dropped when she saw her.

Seventeen likes her dressing style very much, simple and cool.

She spoke first, "Mr. Zhou."

The other party nodded and said, "I've got the visitation application. Come with me to see Qiao Zhizhang for the last time."

————

At the same time, Qiao Zhizhang in prison was standing in front of the plastic mirror in the bathroom, looking at himself in the mirror.

The old man, who is nearly sixty years old, looks younger than his peers because of proper maintenance. His skin is very smooth. Even though fine lines have appeared at the corners of his eyes, it does not detract from his elegant and calm temperament.

But he couldn't be happy at all, because the prisoners in the prison liked people like him.

In recent days, he had keenly felt that he was being targeted by a group of prison bullies. Whether he was taking a walk in the playground or taking a shower in the bathroom, there were always malicious glances cast at him.

Qiao Zhizhang never imagined that he, a sixty-year-old old man, who was once the head of a powerful chaebol, had worked hard all his life and enjoyed such glory, but ended up with such a disgrace in his later years and even had to worry about the safety of his family.

Fortunately, he has already found some connections and will be able to get out of this prison in a few days.

Qiao Zhizhang exhaled, pressed his osteoporotic waist with his hand, turned around and was about to leave the bathroom when a large shadow suddenly fell in front of him.

He looked up in horror, only to see the burly prison bully and his henchmen blocking the door, looking at him with a hideous grin on their faces.

He looked around fearfully, but saw no prison guard.

In this isolated place, his identity as the chairman of Huangtian has no deterrent effect on these death row prisoners.

Qiao Zhizhang could only step back, his voice trembling, "You, don't come over here!"

The prison bully approached with a snarl in his face, grabbing Qiao Zhizhang's neck with his large hands. "Isn't this Chairman Qiao? I've seen you on TV many times before. But here, you're only fit to be our dog!"

The followers burst into laughter, and the ugly desires in their eyes when they looked at Qiao Zhizhang were not concealed, as if they wanted to tear him to pieces immediately.

Qiao Zhizhang was extremely scared. He wanted to run away, but he was suddenly hit in the stomach. The pain was so severe that he fell limply to the ground.

Then, the group of vicious prisoners pounced on him.

"Ah——!" A shrill scream rang out.

When the prison guards arrived calmly, the torture had already ended. Qiao Zhizhang was lying on the ground in pieces, with a pool of dirty blood under him.

His face no longer had the powerful aura it once had, only endless despair remained.

After the prison guard apprehended the bully, he walked up to Qiao Zhizhang and said coldly, "Someone's visiting. I'll give you five minutes to clean up this place first."

Qiao Zhizhang looked at him in disbelief. These people were simply devils, right?

When he gets out, he will kill all those who insulted him, no matter if they are prison bullies or prison guards, no one will have an easy life!

But now, he could only grit his teeth and stand up, endure the humiliation and pain, lie on the ground, and wipe the blood with a rag.

After changing into his prison uniform, Qiao Zhizhang followed the prison guard to the visiting room.

On the way, he kept wondering who would come to visit him. Since he went to prison, all his former business partners and friends have avoided him, and none of his relatives or children have come to see him.

He hated the thought that his little remaining property would fall into the hands of these cold-blooded and ruthless people.

But he didn't expect that someone would actually come to visit him.

Qiao Zhizhang felt a glimmer of hope. Could it be one of his many children who came to visit him this time? If he was sensible enough, he wouldn't mind leaving all his property to him after he left.

After all, he won't stay in this damn place called prison for the rest of his life. Those who hurt him will be made to pay the price sooner or later.

At this time, the prison guard stopped and pushed open the door of the visiting room, "Come in."

Qiao Zhizhang endured the pain and walked in pretending nothing had happened.

However, after seeing the two people sitting behind the bulletproof glass, his pupils suddenly changed, and the little hope in his heart disappeared.

Although he particularly hated Shi Qi for testifying in court on behalf of Shi Nian'an, he had never doubted her intentions. But now, she appeared with his enemy Zhou Fanyi.

He gritted his teeth and said, "You are indeed in the same group!"

"Long time no see, Mr. Qiao. Oh no, Huangtian has gone bankrupt. Should I call you Qiao Zhizhang?"

Chi Li's tone was calm, but to Qiao Zhizhang it sounded extremely mocking.

His face turned pale, and the pain of the humiliation he had just suffered found an outlet to vent.