"Grandma appeared in my dream and said you were staying up late again." Ruan Yu placed the milk on the corner of the table, her gaze sweeping over the "Smart Healthcare Community" planning map on the screen. "This health and wellness center's location... is only 500 meters from the old house?"

Shen Yanzhi looked at the rhinestone hair clip in her hair, a gift he had given her for her birthday last year. Mu Hongyan was wearing the same style today, but in a different shade of emerald green. Two women, one carrying the warmth of his youth, the other the sharp edge of the business world, strangely overlapped in his world.

"Ayu," he suddenly spoke, "if one day I need to choose between my ideals and...the important people in my life..."

Ruan Yu paused as she turned around, noticing the red roses quietly blooming on the windowsill. She remembered passing by Shen's Group this morning and seeing Mu Hongyan leaning against the door of his office, holding the same red roses as the ones in her vase.

"If it's a business marriage," she chuckled suddenly, her fingertips tracing the creases of his suit, "you should at least find someone who knows how to make tangerine peel porridge." The door closed softly, and Shen Yanzhi heard her humming a childhood lullaby, the tune his grandmother used to lull them to sleep.

Suddenly, a message from Mu Hongyan popped up on the computer screen: "President Shen, I've added an additional clause to the cooperation agreement—the nursing team for the health and wellness center must be dispatched by the Su family." Attached at the end was a photo of her standing in front of Munich Hospital, with a field of red roses behind her.

Shen Yanzhi leaned back in his leather chair, gazing at the myriad lights of the city outside the window. The distant clock tower struck twelve, and he suddenly remembered that Ruan Yu's birthday was only one day different from Mu Hongyan's. The two women were like the two poles of his business empire: one a gentle childhood sweetheart, the other a powerful alliance, and he stood in the middle, suddenly unable to distinguish which side was his true self.

Chapter Four: Delicate Balance

At the headquarters of Su's Medical Center on the weekend, Mu Hongyan looked at Shen Yanzhi reflected in the glass curtain wall. He was discussing fiber optic cable upgrade plans with an engineer. The jade bracelet on her wrist tapped against the table, making a crisp sound that startled the sparrows outside the window.

"Director Mu seems particularly interested in Zhou's project." The administrative assistant handed over coffee, his gaze falling on the framed photo on her desk—it was from twenty years ago, showing a little girl hugging a doctor in a white coat, with a temporary medical station in an earthquake-stricken area in the background.

Mu Hongyan traced her fingertips across her mother's face in the photo frame. She was eight years old that year, wandering through the ruins with her mother, who was a volunteer. Shen Yanzhi's childhood, on the other hand, was spent in the courtyard of the old house, counting stars with Ruan Yu and listening to his grandmother tell stories from the "Compendium of Materia Medica".

A post popped up on my phone from Ruan Yu's WeChat Moments. It was a picture of a flower arrangement: a white lisianthus branch next to red roses in a celadon vase. The caption read: "Some flowers are meant to bloom in greenhouses; some flowers are meant to grow in the open fields."

She suddenly recalled the scene she had witnessed in the coffee shop: when Ruan Yu was bandaging a stray cat, Shen Yanzhi's eyes held a tenderness she had never seen before. That gentleness contrasted strangely with the sharpness he displayed when examining business data.

"Director Mu, President Shen asked if you would like to have lunch together." The assistant's voice interrupted her thoughts. Mu Hongyan looked at herself in the mirror and touched up her lipstick—a dusty rose color, the same color Ruan Yu was wearing today.

In the restaurant, Shen Yanzhi was serving food to Ruan Yu, his movements as natural as breathing. When Mu Hongyan sat down, she noticed the tofu soup in front of Ruan Yu, which was Shen Yanzhi's favorite dish, while the steak in front of her was medium-rare with black pepper sauce—a habit she had when she was in Germany.

"The Su family's nursing homes in Southeast Asia use intelligent care systems?" Ruan Yu suddenly asked, her spoon creating ripples in the bowl. "Grandma said before she passed away, 'No matter how good the machine is, it can't compare to the warmth of a human hand.'"

Shen Yanzhi's chopsticks froze in mid-air, and Mu Hongyan saw a flicker of pain in his eyes. It was the look on his face when they received news of his grandmother's serious illness in Munich.

"Therefore, our wellness center will be equipped with a professional nursing team." Mu Hongyan suddenly smiled, her fingertips tracing the orange juice in front of Shen Yanzhi, "Just like how President Shen, no matter how busy, will always come home to have dinner with Miss Ruan."

The restaurant's crystal chandelier suddenly flickered, and Ruan Yu saw the jade bracelet on Mu Hongyan's wrist and the silver lock she had worn since childhood, their surfaces shimmering in the light. The silver lock was a gift from Shen Yanzhi's grandmother to her future granddaughter-in-law, while the jade bracelet was an heirloom from Mu Hongyan's mother.

When it came time to pay, Shen Yanzhi's credit card and Mu Hongyan's black card were handed over at the same time. The cashier smiled and took Shen Yanzhi's card, saying, "Mr. Shen is our VIP, this transaction will earn points." Mu Hongyan looked at his handwriting when he signed it, noting that it had a similar curve to the doodles in Ruan Yu's notebook.

Stepping out of the restaurant, the setting sun cast long shadows of the three of them. Ruan Yu suddenly remembered the two rose bushes that Shen Yanzhi had planted at the alley entrance before he went abroad that year—one red and one white. Now, the red rose bloomed in his study, while the white rose sat in a crystal vase in Mu Hongyan's office.

Her phone vibrated; a message popped up in the family group chat: Shen Yanzhi and Mu Hongyan had been named "Business Partners of the Year" at next week's charity gala. Looking at the photo of the two standing side-by-side, Ruan Yu suddenly noticed that the slit in Mu Hongyan's cheongsam had the same curve as the hem of her dress.

The night breeze carried the distant sound of a piano, the melody of "Für Elise." Looking at the two women beside him, Shen Yanzhi suddenly understood that some destinies had been foreshadowed twenty years ago—while Ruan Yu was counting stars in the courtyard of their old house, Mu Hongyan was watching shooting stars in the earthquake-stricken area; while he was calculating data models at Stanford, two women were there, one researching an intelligent nursing system in the lab, the other learning to make tangerine peel porridge in a traditional Chinese medicine pharmacy.

At this moment, three souls, intertwined by business and emotion, form a delicate balance. Just like the celadon vase and crystal vase on his desk, one holding the warmth of everyday life, the other reflecting a business blueprint, together they radiate a unique brilliance in his world.

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