Chapter 26: Spoiler
On the second day of the Chinese New Year, not many people came to the East Building and it became quiet again.
Yu Yin reads art-related books in the library. As a curator, he needs to constantly enrich his knowledge.
After reading for a long time, she relaxed her eyes and looked around the library. This was a place that the Zhao family often used. They would read or entertain close guests. The space was large and the view was broad, and one could see the beautiful Victoria Harbour in the distance.
Yu Yin spotted a corner of the piano. She'd been married two years, and she'd never seen anyone play the grand piano. She figured it might just be for show. There was a piano room in the west wing, where she'd seen Zhao Xiyan and Zhao Yunxin playing.
Driven by curiosity, Yu Yin walked to the piano, opened the keyboard cover, pressed the white keys, and her fingers immediately withdrew. She didn't know how to play the piano, she was just playing for fun.
Zhao Shunian entered the library and heard the fleeting sound of a piano. He looked past two rows of bookshelves and saw Yu Yin standing in front of the piano. "Want to play?"
Hearing this, Yu Yin said, "I'm just playing out of curiosity. I don't know how to play. I don't think I've seen you use this piano before."
"This is the piano my grandfather gave me. I hardly use it now."
Zhao Shunian was tall and slender, about 185cm tall. When he approached Yu Yin, he could completely hold her in his arms. He held her hand and guided her to play a few simple notes. The muscle memory was still there.
When their hands intertwined and fell on the piano keys, Yu Yin suddenly found that Zhao Shunian's hands were beautiful and very suitable for playing the piano. Although the adjectives of distinct joints, slender and strong are clichés, they are very appropriate to describe his hands.
She looked at him sideways and asked, "Why not?"
"Simply because I don't like playing the piano, I rarely use it after I'm past the age of showing off my talents in front of my elders."
"You don't like playing the piano, what do you like?"
"Probably tennis, and I've been doing it for many years."
"What about golf?" Yu Yin had played golf with him before, and he had taught her how to play golf step by step.
"Okay, what sports do you like?"
Yu Yin said bluntly: "I don't like exercise, I prefer lying down."
Zhao Shunian knew what she liked to do while lying down. "Answering like that will spoil the fun. Let's end the conversation like this."
"I'm not afraid of you. You can say anything that might spoil the fun. I think you were a happy-go-lucky kid when you were little." Yu Yin's eyes fell on the grand piano as he said these words.
"You guessed right. Sometimes spoiling the fun comes at a price, and requires the capital to be willful. There are many things that go into it. However, my not spoiling the fun could also be seen as weakness."
Young Zhao Shunian was overwhelmed with endless classes each day, and he was expected to do everything to perfection and satisfy everyone. His every move was monitored, not only by Ms. Li but also by others. Any misstep would be magnified infinitely. Zhao Xinzhi's attention to him was like putting him on the spot, a burden he couldn't bear. He was not nurtured, but Zhao Xinzhi still had other grandchildren to cultivate. However, he had no way out, and he would not allow himself to retreat. The environment he grew up in shaped his disdain for family and his prioritization of profit.
"Isn't there a saying that whoever wears the crown must accept it? I think this makes a lot of sense. If you hadn't spoiled the fun back then, it might not be my second uncle and his friends who left Zhaoshi and set up their own business. No one outside says you are weak, they say you are heartless, profit-driven, and ruthless." On New Year's Eve, Yu Yin also saw the confrontation between Ms. Li and Ms. Jian.
"I think your focus is on the last sentence. You want to use this opportunity to scold me."
Yu Yin pretended to be innocent, "No, it's not me who said that. I was just relaying it."
At this time, the light of fireworks shone into the library, and they looked out the window at the fireworks show together.
The old house is located on the top of the mountain. From where they stand, they can have a panoramic view of the fireworks blooming over Victoria Harbour. The night view is particularly beautiful.
After a while, Zhao Xiyan came to find Yu Yin, and they and several other young people of the Zhao family went outside to watch the fireworks.
Zhao Shunian was left alone in the library.
After watching the fireworks for a long time, Yu Yin's interest gradually faded, so he walked back to the East Building alone and met Zhao Jinian head-on.
Yu Yin had only seen him a few times and was not familiar with him, so she nodded and smiled and prepared to leave.
Zhao Jinian took the initiative to talk to her. "I met Yilin in Africa not that long ago. She was quite carefree and happy. But I didn't tell her that her sister, whom I'd never met, had been married to her fiancé for two years. If she knew about this and wanted to come back to fight for what was hers, what would happen to you?"
Yu Yin asked him back, "So what you're saying is that I feel guilty towards her, and now that she's back, I have to return the property to its original owner and give her my place?"
Zhao Jinian shrugged and said indifferently: "I don't know, maybe you think so."
"I didn't think so. You hinted too clearly, making me speak out, and then put the blame on me. Actually, after hearing what you said, I felt that you were very disappointing. My original impression of you was shattered."
"What impression did you have of me?"
His question allowed Yu Yin to take control of the conversation. "At first, I thought you were open-minded and didn't like the constraints of a large family. You wanted to live freely. But now I think you're actually quite feudal. You think two sisters can marry the same man. With her coming back, I have no choice but to give up my position. Your attitude is insulting both me and her."
Yu Yin's words of praise followed by criticism left Zhao Jinian speechless. She did not want to fight any longer and wanted to leave after winning.
Zhao Jinian looked at Yu Yin's back. He just wanted to watch the show, to see how Yu Yin would react and whether she would quarrel with Zhao Shunian. To put it bluntly, he wanted to watch Zhao Shunian's show.
From childhood to adulthood, Zhao Shunian was the positive example in the family, and Zhao Jinian was the negative example. He did not feel ashamed of this. He felt that Zhao Shunian was a poor puppet, who had to move forward according to his grandfather's will every step of the way, while he was free and no one could control him.
Several years ago, his father and uncle started a power struggle. His grandfather was the referee and the manipulator. He was very tired of this phenomenon. Everyone was dominated by interests. They all thought he was useless and no one wanted him to get involved. Zhao Shunian was a participant.
He thought it was good that he was a bystander and was unharmed. He felt that it was pathetic that Zhao Shunian was caught between his uncle and grandfather and suffered all kinds of oppression.
To Zhao Jinian's surprise, the puppet Zhao Shunian suddenly developed his own ideas. He retreated to advance and left the group, disrupting the balance of power and catching everyone off guard. He was not an insignificant participant, but a hidden manipulator.
The group and Zhao Xinzhi couldn't do without Zhao Shunian. It wasn't that he couldn't do without anything or anyone; he was irreplaceable. It was impossible for Zhao Xinzhi to cultivate another puppet identical to him. Zhao Xinzhi was already old, lacking time and energy, and Zhao Shunian wasn't a puppet who would sit still. He would strike back with an unstoppable force.
For the first time, Zhao Jinian looked Zhao Shunian in the eye instead of looking down on him or laughing at him. He wore the mask too tightly, making it impossible to see the slightest fluctuation in his heart.
Zhao Jinian felt that when he put forward his ideas, everyone's first reaction was that he was messing around again. But when Zhao Shunian raised his opinions, they took a completely different attitude and took them very seriously. Zhao Shunian gained the right to speak in his own way.
Zhao Jinian was laughing at this family, but except for his closest relatives, everyone else in the family was also laughing at him. He wondered when Zhao Shunian's mask would be torn off. He was tired of others laughing at him, and he really wanted to see a good show that truly belonged to Zhao Shunian.
………
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