Shang Mengzhu looked at the man in front of her with suspicion. She secretly searched online to see if any patients from nearby mental hospitals had escaped.
The man claimed to be a classmate of her older sister, Shang Yechu.
Ever since my eldest sister ran away from home, her name became a taboo subject in the family. My father was furious, and my mother went out to look for her several times. Forty-eight hours later, she called the police, who said that my eldest sister had left by train on her own. From then on, my father ignored her completely, as if she were dead. My mother gradually stopped caring about her either.
Now, a random classmate suddenly showed up at the door, and naturally, the mother wanted to know about the eldest sister's situation. The father, uninterested, was about to go back to his room to sleep. Just then, the man suddenly said:
Do you want money?
Upon hearing this, Shang Mengzhu's heart skipped a beat. She felt that the other person seemed somewhat mentally unstable. Her mother almost called the police as well. But after listening to the other person say a few words, her mother put down her phone, and her father stopped walking back to his room.
"You mean, Ye Chu, who acted in 'Half of Heaven,' is my eldest son?"
A look of suspicion mixed with anticipation flickered in Shang Hongxuan's eyes. He was a lean man with a refined appearance, though his eyes were somewhat cloudy.
“Xiao Sheng,” Ji Ya said, rubbing her hands together, “How could that be? Don’t I know what my own daughter is like?”
Xiao Sheng laughed upon hearing this.
He emptied a large bag from his shoulder, revealing magazines, large posters, a pair of scissors, several notebooks, and a few novels. He swept the rest aside, picked up the magazine, opened it to a page, and tossed it in front of Ji Ya.
"She has two scars on her left arm that form an X shape. Shang Jiayu drew them with a sharpened pencil. You can also see them on the posters for these Renxing phones."
The Muse magazine thought that Shang Yechu's scar looked exactly like a cross, which fit the theme of the issue, so instead of photoshopping it out, they carefully highlighted and modified it.
Ji Ya said with difficulty, "Well, I don't remember if she had any scars on her hands..."
Shang Hongxuan glared at Ji Ya, then took the magazine and examined the scar, stroking it. Unfortunately, he didn't know if his daughter had a scar on her arm; he couldn't tell anything.
Shang Jiayu couldn't help but ask, "How do you know my name?"
Sheng Wenzhi didn't even look at him: "She told me your name. Your parents hope you will be successful and live in a nice house. That's why your name is Jiayu."
"Did Ye Chu tell you this? Are you two still in contact?" Shang Hongxuan pricked up his ears.
“We are indeed in contact. But it wasn’t Ye Chu who told me; it was Shang Ye Chu who told me. Back in junior high.” Sheng Wenzhi glanced at him.
Shang Jiayu's name actually means "virtuous words and deeds," "magnificent palaces," and also carries the auspicious meaning of the harmonious combination of earth and metal. Unfortunately, Shang Yechu, who was in junior high school, lacked education and could only summarize it as "a good house."
"Didn't you just say Ye Chu is Shang Ye Chu?" Shang Hongxuan muttered to himself, puzzled. But Shang Jiayu spoke up before he could: "Junior high? That must have been seven or eight years ago! You still remember?"
“Of course I remember.” Sheng Wenzhi’s face showed a strange smile.
He remembered. He remembered everything.
Those memories he considered mental garbage had long been forcibly sealed away. It was as if discarding them would erase the humiliation and hurt. Until yesterday, Ye Chu broke that seal.
Memories flooded back like a burst dam. Sheng Wenzhi suddenly realized that he remembered every detail of his time with Shang Yechu so clearly—not Yechu, Yechu was a blurry, ghostly figure; but Shang Yechu was his friend, his…
Sheng Wenzhi gave a bitter laugh, his handsome face suddenly turning ferocious.
He shouted, "Do you know? Her stage name is Ye Chu because she hates her surname. If you ask her, that's what she'll tell you."
"You know what? She's allergic to shrimp. But if you offer her a plate of shrimp, she'll eat it. Just to prove she's not your daughter."
"Did you know? She actually started imitating her parents back in junior high, signing her failing test papers. She was imitating your mother's name because Shang Hongxuan's handwriting was more beautiful, and she couldn't imitate it. It wasn't until she met me that Shang Hongxuan's name started appearing on her test papers, because I helped her imitate it."
"Do you know? She skipped class and brought me to your house because I had a fight with the person who raised me. So she took me to the kitchen and heated up some steamed buns for me. Shang Hongxuan was at work then, and Ji Ya was visiting other people's homes. Your family puts a lot of fatty meat in your steamed buns; they taste awful, so disgusting I felt like throwing up. I left that very day."
"Did you know what? She couldn't write an essay on the topic of 'My Father' or 'My Mother,' so she started copying mine. And because both my parents are dead, she accidentally copied you all to death too!"
"Do you know what? I prepared a gift for her, but I still haven't given it to her."
"Do you know what? She's become incredibly rich! So rich that she's willing to turn her back on even her closest relatives! You can go ahead and try to rip her off, she'll give you whatever you want. Even if you ask for a hundred million, she'll give it to you! As long as she can sever all ties with you!"
Shang Jiayu was so frightened that he hid behind Ji Ya. The man in front of him looked almost insane, acting like a madman.
Shang Hongxuan's face darkened. He considered himself a cultured man, and naturally, he was displeased by Sheng Wenzhi's harsh words. However, he didn't refute them; who would argue with a madman?
“A scar, a name,” Shang Hongxuan said cautiously, “does that prove she’s our daughter?”
Sheng Wenzhi snapped out of his dazed memories and glanced at Shang Hongxuan with an almost contemptuous look. This infuriated Shang Hongxuan.
Sheng Wenzhi took out his phone from his pocket and pressed a few buttons. However, after a long day and night of travel, it had run out of battery and crashed. Sheng Wenzhi chuckled, casually tossed it back into his pocket, and looked at the family in front of him.
Shang Mengzhu was searching for mental hospitals in Wencheng when suddenly a hand reached out and snatched her phone away.
Shang Mengzhu was startled and was about to snatch it when she heard Shang Hongxuan say, "Don't move, let's see what he's up to."
Sheng Wenzhi fiddled with Shang Mengzhu's phone for a while, then threw the screen in front of Shang's family: "Watch this video, watch it all."
The phone screen displays the Weibo interface, and the video on the screen is a Weibo post that has already been shared over 300,000 times and received millions of likes.
Shang Hongxuan and Ji Ya picked up their phones and looked at them suspiciously.
Shang Hongxuan and Ji Ya, being middle-aged and elderly, rarely use Weibo and didn't know how to use it for a long time. It was Shang Jiayu who came forward with great interest and helped them click to play.
Shang Mengzhu and Shang Lingqiu exchanged a glance, their expressions somewhat tense.
After ten minutes that felt like an eternity, Shang Hongxuan looked up, his face covered in sweat: "This...this...this..."
This video fully presents the changes in Shang Yechu's appearance. With the detailed date annotations, and after comparing them with the date Shang Yechu ran away from home, Shang Hongxuan's initial belief of her had increased to seven-tenths.
Ji Ya murmured, "How is that possible? She's only been away from home for half a month, and she's already lost so much weight..."
Shang Jiayu fiddled with Shang Mengzhu's phone for a while, then suddenly exclaimed excitedly, "Second Sister, so you still follow Ye Chu on Weibo! You even liked this video! How come you didn't notice? Even I could tell that the first few people looked like Big Sister."
Shang Mengzhu glared at Shang Jiayu and scratched her forehead: "I don't use Weibo much. I guess someone bought some fake followers for my account? I haven't seen that video you mentioned."
Shang Lingqiu chimed in, "These days, Weibo really likes to hire online trolls for these celebrities. My account has only liked a post by an actor named Shi Shan, whom I don't even know!"
The merchant couple were completely oblivious to their children's petty squabbles, their minds preoccupied with Ye Chu and Sheng Wenzhi.
Shang Hongxuan said, "It's impossible for her to have become this thin in just half a month. Are you sure you're not mistaken?"
"I don't care how she became like this," Sheng Wenzhi said indifferently, staring at the couple before him. "Do you want money?"
Although he didn't know how the topic had shifted back to this, Shang Hongxuan wasn't stupid. He gave Ji Ya a wink.
Ji Ya hurriedly said, "Things at home are indeed getting harder and harder, and Xiao Yu will need to buy a house in the future..."
“I’ll give you the money,” Sheng Wenzhi interrupted Ji Ya.
"What?" the merchant couple exclaimed in unison.
“I’ll give you the money,” Sheng Wenzhi said sarcastically but firmly. “I’ll cover your travel expenses, food and lodging, and all sorts of other miscellaneous costs. I’ll take you to her company, just like she took me to your house back then.”
Shang Hongxuan and Ji Ya were stunned.
"In this way, even if she isn't your daughter, you won't lose anything; just consider it a long trip. If she is your daughter, then you'll never have to worry about the rest of your lives. In addition, I will give you 500,000 yuan as compensation for Shang Hongxuan's absence from work during this period."
The merchant's entire family was dumbfounded, as if they couldn't believe that there could be such a foolish and rich lunatic in the world.
It took Shang Hongxuan a while to regain his senses and speak: "You, what... what do you want us to do?"
“I only have one request.” Sheng Wenzhi laughed, but the laughter was so hoarse and rough that it almost didn’t sound like it came from him.
"No matter how much money she offers you, you cannot agree to sever ties with her. She will become a big star, making countless films; she'll be a gold mine. A one-time buyout is nowhere near as secure as a lifetime of withdrawals."
Shang Mengzhu's face turned ashen; she couldn't understand how such self-destructive people could exist in the world. Shang Lingqiu, younger than her, couldn't keep anything to herself and bluntly asked, "There's no such thing as a free lunch. Why did you do this?"
Sheng Wenzhi glanced at Shang Lingqiu.
For some reason, Shang Lingqiu felt that although he was looking at her, his eyes seemed to not reflect her at all, but rather he was looking at someone else.
Sheng Wenzhi said, "I want her to live in reality forever."
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
