Xiao Jin: "..."
The vein on her forehead throbbed violently, and a layer of visible black lines appeared on her perpetually icy face—a rare occurrence.
Those bastards...
She took a deep breath, suppressing the urge to pack up and send these troublemakers away, and turned her gaze back to Wen Baiqiu with a hint of helplessness and composure.
“That’s right.” Xiao Jin’s voice was still cold, but it had a hint of deepness that was hard to detect.
“After your accident… it was Mom… it was Mom…” She seemed very unaccustomed to this title, and her tone was slightly awkward.
"She realized that Xiao Chengzhi was no longer trustworthy, so she used her connections to secretly change my birth record and gender registration after I was born."
Xiao Jin paused, then added, "It's to protect me, and also to leave behind a trump card that Xiao Chengzhi doesn't know about."
Dead silence.
Absolute silence.
The melon seeds fell out of Chu Yuan's wide-open mouth and landed on the ground.
Zhan Wenchen's hand, which was pushing up his glasses, froze in mid-air.
Lu Jing's grin widened, and he silently mouthed "Wow!"
Wen Baiqiu was completely petrified. His image as a gentle and refined young nobleman shattered into pieces. His mouth was slightly open, enough to fit an egg.
What...what does she mean by that?!
Is it admitting that she is... a woman?
Xiao Jin, who ranks first on the combat power list, is ruthless and decisive, and can cut people down with a long sword as easily as slicing melons and vegetables, and is infamous in the survival game... is she a woman?
Even though Wen Baiqiu didn't know Xiao Jin, after considering the strange attitudes of Chu Yuan, Lu Jing, and others, he had enough guesses about this person named 'Wen Jin'.
However, Xiao Jin did not want to reveal his identity, nor was he interested in playing the villain.
But to his surprise, this person gave him a huge surprise.
Upon hearing these words, Wen Baiqiu was first shocked, then overjoyed.
His sister's child is still alive, and he still has relatives living...
However, for others, this scene was quite shocking!
Chu Yuan's gaze involuntarily swept back and forth across Xiao Jin's stunningly beautiful face, and his mind began to uncontrollably conjure up images of her.
That height...that figure...if she wore women's clothes...with long hair flowing down her shoulders and her eyes sparkling...what breathtaking charm that would be!
As he thought about it, his rugged, tough-guy face turned red at a visible speed, from the base of his neck all the way to the tips of his ears, and his eyes began to wander.
"Hahaha...hahaha!" The dying Liu Man on the ground suddenly burst into a maniacal laugh, mixed with coughing blood and foam.
"Wen Lan! What a fine Wen Lan... What a wonderful daughter you've given birth to! Hahahaha! Patricide! You killed your own father! Xiao Jin, you're worse than an animal! You deserve to die a horrible death!"
Wen Baiqiu's face, which had been full of excitement just moments before, suddenly darkened.
Xiao Jin's gaze, like a poisoned icicle, instantly pierced Liu Man's distorted face.
Then, a chilling smile curved her lips, and her voice, though not loud, clearly drowned out Liu Man's maniacal laughter: "I didn't just kill Xiao Chengzhi..."
She spoke each word slowly and deliberately, as if delivering a verdict: "And you personally sent your two children, whom you were so proud of and cherished, to the Yellow Springs... to join him."
Xiao Jin leaned down slightly: "Don't worry, their deaths... were far more painful than you can imagine."
The maniacal laughter on Liu Man's face seemed to be paused, freezing completely. Her eyes, which had turned ashen from blood loss, suddenly erupted with an extreme, indescribable resentment and madness.
All the scheming, all the pretense, all the fear, were utterly crushed by the deepest despair at this moment!
"Ah—!!! Xiao Jin! You slut! You beast! I curse you! I curse you to die a horrible death! I curse you to be condemned to eternal hell! I curse the Wen family to be childless! Ahhh—!!!"
She screamed like a dying beast, her body convulsing and rolling violently in the pool of blood, her fingernails digging deep into the ground, leaving streaks of blood.
Curses, cries, and meaningless screams mingled together, plunging them into a complete hysterical frenzy!
Finally, after exhausting her last bit of life force, her body suddenly stiffened, a strange hoarse sound came from her throat, and she became completely still.
Only those eyes, wide open and almost bursting, were fixed on Xiao Jin's direction, filled with endless resentment.
Only the echoes of Liu Man's dying curse and the heavy smell of blood remained in the study.
Xiao Jin withdrew his gaze, as if he had merely crushed a noisy fly.
She looked at Wen Baiqiu, whose shock had gradually been replaced by a complex mix of immense grief and a warmth of having regained what was lost.
"Let's talk outside?" Xiao Jin's voice softened slightly.
Wen Baiqiu took a deep breath, suppressed her turbulent emotions, and nodded.
Ignoring the mess on the ground and the several onlookers with interesting expressions, the two walked out of the blood-stained room one after the other.
In a secluded corner of the corridor, the light from the lanterns was dim.
Xiao Jin succinctly and coldly recounted the original owner's experiences: how that timid little girl struggled to survive under the Xiao family and Liu Man's control, and how she was ultimately framed and "accidentally" killed.
Also mentioned was the early departure of Wen Lan.
Her tone was calm, but it made Wen Baiqiu's heart ache, and his knuckles turned white from clenching them.
"I didn't mean to complain to you, I just felt you should know all this!" as the original owner's only relative.
After Xiao Jin finished speaking, he leaned against the wall and gazed into the distance at the flickering flame inside the lantern.
Wen Baiqiu remained silent for a long time. When she looked up again, her eyes were moist, but more than that, they were filled with determination and warmth.
He reached out, hesitated for a moment, but finally gently patted Xiao Jin's shoulder: "Ah Jin... you've worked hard. From now on... you'll have your uncle here."
That "A-Jin" carried a clumsy yet incredibly sincere tenderness that came twenty years late.
Xiao Jin's body stiffened slightly, but she did not dodge.
This unfamiliar intimacy made her somewhat uncomfortable, but the lingering resentment belonging to the original owner deep in her heart seemed to let out a satisfied sigh and quietly dissipated.
"Mmm," she responded softly.
With everything out in the open, and neither of them being overly sentimental, the somber atmosphere of the family reunion gradually eased, and Xiao Jin and Wen Baiqiu turned their attention to the upcoming dungeon.
They quickly exchanged the information they had about the dungeon—including the tragic truth about the ghost bride, the evil plot of the sorcerer, and the heavily sealed core of the shrine.
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