Chapter 217 Besieged on All Sides

Soon, Luo Huayi realized that the mental torment Xin Que had been suffering in the private room for the past few days was nothing compared to what she had experienced later.

Xin Que let the plot push her to relive her past memories.

Luo Huayi followed Xin Que, watching her struggle day after day under house arrest and subjected to mental torture. Despite being bound limbs, she managed to use only her mind to calculate the duty schedule of the people monitoring her outside the private room.

Finally, Xin Que pretended to be crazy and deliberately provoked the guards outside the door to initiate punitive measures.

Through repeated testing, Xin Que gradually deduced the weaknesses in the supervision and duty process from the frequency of punishments.

Seizing the opportunity, Xin Que finally found a chance to escape through the bathroom ventilation duct.

“No matter what, you will never accept your fate.” Luo Huayi looked at Xin Que, who was curled up in the pipe in the past, pulled out a short needle from an inconspicuous button under her coat, and threw the shackles that had been removed aside in a few quick movements.

"You think I won this round?" Xin Que's tone was normal, and it was impossible to tell what her emotions were.

When the other party has schemed against her to the extreme, accepting her fate or not accepting it will only be a futile attempt to push herself to her death.

Luo Huayi was taken aback.

"In fact, the Huo family is well aware of the weaknesses in the character of the cadres they have trained... Huo Fenglin and Lu Wei's so-called methods of using both soft and hard tactics to force me to defect were just a facade."

Xin Que's gaze darkened.

In this game, regardless of whether she actually switched sides or not, she was destined to be a pawn sacrificed in the Huo family's internal power struggle.

Chess pieces don't even have the right to say whether they win or lose; their only question is whether they are used to their fullest potential.

Lu Wei and his multi-city economic alliance plan is a major obstacle to Huo Chenglong maintaining the monopoly position of the Upper City after inheriting the Huo family.

The Huo family's cadres, from top to bottom, were all perfectly aware of how many tests and preparations Huo Tinghua had made in order to eliminate Lu Wei, and how much expectation he had for this mission.

Huo Fenglin had completely outmaneuvered Xin Que.

Xin Que returned alive? All her defenses to exonerate herself were twisted and manipulated by Huo Fenglin and Feng Caijun into claims that she was making excuses to escape punishment for failing to assassinate Lu Wei.

Either way, she couldn't escape death. Huo Fenglin also managed to break one of Huo Chenglong's arms through Huo Tinghua's help.

Xin Que died under house arrest? That's even better. Dead people can't talk. How she died and what she went through before she died are all up to Huo Fenglin and Lu Wei to decide.

The reason why Xin Que was able to be assassinated by Lu Wei must be because there was a traitor in the Huo family who killed the cadre that the Huo family had invested heavily in cultivating.

Huo Tinghua will also be suspicious and launch a purge within the Huo family. At that time, he can cooperate with Feng Caijun and Lu Wei from the inside and outside, using the purge as an excuse to eliminate dissidents and place their people to surround Huo Chenglong.

Seeing the barely concealed ferocity in Xin Que's eyes, Luo Huayi understood a bit of what was going on.

The fact that Xin Que was put in a mental prison shows that she has never escaped the shadow of the Huo family.

He ultimately said nothing.

I am merely an observer of Xin Que's past, and anything I say is a subjective commentary on Xin Que, who experienced it firsthand.

The bittersweet experiences, the full spectrum of flavors, are known only to Xin Que himself.

The ventilation duct was already small, so Xin Que and Luo Huayi huddled inside, their heads down and bodies hunched over.

In addition, the recent recurrence of these memories is so oppressive that the already cramped space has begun to feel suffocating.

Xin Que is currently in a completely passive state, doing everything only because of the plot and the administrator.

Of course, in Xin Que's eyes, she was using this to lull the enemy into a false sense of security and conserve her strength.

In Luo Huayi's eyes, it was like a person's painful past being exposed, a feigned strength;

To the administrators and engineers, the interrogation went by as smoothly as ever.

A brief period of harmony was achieved among all parties.

After escaping the club, Xin Que saw a wanted poster with her own image on it.

This time it wasn't Lu Wei who posted it.

It was the highest-level arrest warrant urgently issued by the Huo family.

"Does Huo Tinghua not trust you at all?"

Luo Huayi was somewhat incredulous, "You've risked your life for the Huo family for so many years, and Huo Fenglin just gave up on you as his subordinate with a few words?"

Xin Que, hiding in a dark alley, overheard the person next to her complaining. She turned around and glanced at him, "You think I'm a subordinate?"

Luo Huayi looked puzzled. "Although I'm set up to be the male lead in a tragic novel, in the stories I've experienced, people in high positions of power wouldn't be so easily swayed from trusting their right-hand men."

Xin Que smiled, her calm demeanor as if she were discussing someone else's experience.

The woman raised a finger and pointed to her neck. "Can't you see my number?"

Luo Huayi didn't understand, but she nodded nonetheless.

"Luo Huayi, your thinking was wrong from the very beginning."

“The head of such a large family should indeed be very careful about the affairs of his subordinates… but I am not a ‘subordinate’.”

"I'm just a disposable item that can be replaced at any time." Xin Que's dark eyes revealed no emotion.

Luo Hua wanted to refute, but Xin Que shut him down with a single sentence.

“How do you think the previous minister stepped down?” Xin Que said. “Cadre is just a slightly higher title for slave.”

"The Huo family has taken into account all aspects of restrictions in order to prevent us, the lower classes who were raised and nurtured by the Huo family, from threatening them."

For example, Xin Que, the so-called outstanding among the lower classes, was merely a "cog in the machine" cultivated by the Huo family using the most efficient methods.

If Xin Que gets into trouble, there will immediately be other candidates to take her place.

All of the officers' combat habits and mission skills were completely dismantled by the experts from the Huo family who were supervising them.

Nothing is irreplaceable.

People are the same.

"Actually, I haven't given up yet."

Xin Que's voice was very soft, "At this time, I was desperate and really thought that after fighting for the Huo family for so many years, it shouldn't end so hastily."

She wasn't someone who chose to die.

Even in the most desperate situations, she still wanted to forge a path for herself.

But once the Huo family issued their arrest warrant, she had no way to survive in the upper city.

But she wanted to try again.

If she couldn't wash the filth off herself, she would escape and find a place where she could stay.

At this time, Xin Que was only thinking about avoiding a head-on confrontation with the behemoth that was the Huo family. If all else failed, she would take the savings she had accumulated over the years, escape from Shangcheng, and start over.

Xin Que always made multiple preparations when doing things.

Over the years, she has used the pretext of collecting cold weapons to gradually spend most of her savings at auction houses of all sizes.

She needs to plan for the day when she loses her value.

But the Huo family clearly did not want Xin Que to make a graceful exit.