Afraid of waking her, Yan Yincheng froze in place, body suddenly rigid. He sat there, motionless, until his shoulder went numb and lost all feeling. Still she slept on, breathing deep and even—as if in the midst of some untroubled dream.
Gradually his muscles loosened. He leaned against her and, before he knew it, drifted into sleep as well.
Maybe it was the comfort of having her beside him, but this time he dreamed again.
There were no clear images in the dream—only voices, muffled as if heard through glass.
“Xiao Xi, when we get to the Yan house, you must apologize properly to Old Master Yan and Yan Zhen. Beg their forgiveness, do you understand?”
A faint reply followed—weak, but unmistakably the voice of the woman sleeping on his shoulder. He felt like a ghost clinging to her, a spirit tracing her footsteps as she walked slowly toward some uncertain fate.
They entered a room and were met by a chorus of congratulatory voices. Only then did he realize the scene was from four years ago—the third day after the hotel incident, the day his nephew Yan Zhen held his birthday banquet.
She had gone straight to Old Master Yan’s study. Following her father’s instructions, she humbled herself and asked for forgiveness. The old man, to his surprise, was reasonable.
“You’re the girl I’ve watched grow up,” Old Master Yan said. “I don’t believe you’d betray Yan Zhen carelessly. As long as Yan Zhen still cares, you’ll remain part of the Yan family in my eyes.”
Yan Yincheng heard the words and curled his lip—Old Master Yan wasn’t as cruel as he’d expected. She was moved and began to cry. After thanking him she went to find Yan Zhen.
When she appeared in the banquet hall, everything went quiet for a beat before whispers started to ripple through the crowd.
“Isn’t that Yuan Xi—the one in the papers who supposedly cheated on Yan Zhen? She actually had the nerve to show up here.”
“She’s shameless. One minute she’s dangling Yan Zhen, the next she’s caught in a hotel with another man. How could the Yuan family raise such a loose woman?”
“Did you hear? She’s not even the Yuan’s real daughter—there was a mix-up at the hospital. Her biological parents were ordinary people…”
“That explains it. Ordinary blood shows through; no matter how the Yuan family raised her, she’ll never have the right breeding.”
She pushed through the barbs and found Yan Zhen, who was surrounded like a prince at court. He had just spoken with Yuan Ya’er—Yuan’s biological daughter—and when he saw her his expression hardened. Remembering Old Master Yan’s words, she handed him a present and wished him a happy birthday.
Their birthdays were only days apart. She thought that meant something.
Yan Zhen took the gift openly, and for a moment she dared to hope. She reached out the way she always would to loop her arm through his, but the instant her fingers brushed his hand he yanked away and she tumbled to the floor.
In front of a roomful of business, political, and military elite, he said without mercy, “Yuan Xi, I’ve made up my mind. You’re not the Yuan family’s blood. Our engagement is invalid. We’re different in temperament and in values—this is over. Don’t come to me again.”
Laughter erupted. The whispers hardened into cruel, specific accusations: slut, disgrace, shameless—words so nasty they made even Yan Yincheng frown.
Yan remembered not being in Fengcheng that day; he came back later to find out Yan Zhen had publicly broken the engagement, and that the woman who had spent a night at a hotel with an unknown man was his nephew’s former fiancée.
So that’s what she faced that day—an ocean of malice.
After being jilted, she returned to the Yuan household empty and shattered, carrying with her the engagement gifts that had been returned by the Yan family. There she, too, became the target of scorn from her own parents.
He heard Yuan Ya’er, the newly retrieved biological daughter, say, “Mom, Dad—the news about her being dumped by Yan Zhen is everywhere. If this goes on it could hurt the Yuan family business. Why don’t we have her marry the man from the hotel? That would quiet the rumors and save our face.”
Yan Yincheng was stunned. The “man from the hotel”? Did the Yuans know it had been him that night? He wanted to deny it, but in the dream he couldn’t speak.
Under relentless pressure she finally agreed to meet “the hotel man” about an engagement. Dressed up by her parents, she was taken to a restaurant. The man opposite her described the night at the hotel in obscene, precise detail—painting her as wanton and himself as helpless. His voice was oily and vulgar. He frightened her until she cried.
He wanted to shout then, to tell her that it wasn’t that man—that night it had been him—but he had become nothing more than a ghost attached to her. She could not hear him.
She despised that man and didn’t want the marriage, but her household registration—her papers—had been hidden by the Yuans. Cornered, she consented. On the eve of getting the marriage certificate she did some digging and discovered he’d had two previous wives who’d died from domestic violence. Terrified, she fled the Yuan home in the middle of the night and boarded a long-distance bus to find her biological parents.
They rejected her. “Your behavior is a disgrace to us,” they told her, and shut the door in her face.
Homeless and alone, she discovered she was pregnant—carrying twins. Panic set in. He followed her countless times outside private hospitals. Once she actually lay on an operating table, but fear won out and she ran.
She vanished to a place called Haicheng where nobody knew her. By sheer will she birthed the two babies and adopted a new name, living in obscurity. But the blows had changed her: she slipped into deep depression. At times she hurt the children in moments of overwhelming pain, only to fall apart and cradle them in remorse afterward.
At last she could not endure the anguish any longer. She swallowed an entire bottle of sleeping pills and died in front of her two children.
He was horrified. In the dream he called her name, reaching for her as she lay there—but he could not touch her. He heard her breath grow faint, then fainter, and finally stop altogether.
Just like in the other dream, he had listened as a woman’s cries were extinguished.
Yan Yincheng jerked awake, heart pounding. He groped blindly and found—her warm hand. He gripped it hard; his whole body trembled.
“Yuan Xi? Yuan Xi? Zixi?” he repeated, as if to make sure she was still alive, listening intently for the steady cadence of her breathing.
She mumbled, “What’s wrong?”
Her lashes fluttered. Xu Zixi opened her eyes and the first thing she saw was his pale, drawn face. She rubbed her eyes and, still groggy, asked, “Cheng—what’s wrong?”
Relief and a sense of salvaged loss washed over him so strongly he wanted to pull her into his arms and never let go. Reason, though, kept him from doing anything rash.
He only shook his head in silence.
She blinked, puzzled, and turned her gaze to the sea. Dawn had come. A blazing red sun climbed slowly from the horizon, setting the water and sky ablaze with color.
She sat up at once and squeezed Yan Yincheng’s hand back, eyes bright. “Cheng—look! The sun’s up! It’s beautiful!”