Cen Lingqiu had said she would take her away, but the weather these past few days had been truly awful. The downpour was nearly ceaseless, and due to the high altitude, there were occasional thick, dense fogs.
Because of the terrible weather, a mudslide had occurred on the mountainside. Although it wasn’t serious, Cen Lingqiu decided it was best to wait for the rain to stabilize before making any moves, just to be safe.
For the past few days, Yu Mingjiao had barely left her room. Cen Lingqiu would bring her meals to her room and then leave, returning to take the dishes downstairs when she was likely finished.
As always, Yu Mingjiao ate very little.
Perhaps Cen Lingqiu’s words last time had made her believe a little. She had been eating properly these past few days and hadn’t made any more crazy, self-destructive moves.
She just spent her days quietly painting in her room.
Sometimes, when Cen Lingqiu brought her some afternoon tea, she would see her sitting silently in her wheelchair, painting.
Her long, raven hair cascaded like seaweed over her gaunt back. Her side profile was delicate and serene, yet her perfect, stunning features were perpetually steeped in a heavy layer of gloom. The way she painted was numb, as if she were devoid of life.
Cen Lingqiu noticed that she painted many sunsets, sunsets by the sea.
This huge villa was too dull, and out of boredom, she casually asked, “Do you like sunsets?”
Yu Mingjiao was silent, not saying a word.
Sometimes, Cen Lingqiu felt that Yu Mingjiao lived without any real vitality. She didn’t speak, ate very little, rarely smiled, and even her physical movements were minimal.
From a distance, she looked like a doll whose inner mechanism had jammed.
She asked the System for Yu Mingjiao’s self-destruction level. The System said it was still between eighty and ninety percent, which remained a high-risk zone.
Cen Lingqiu just assumed her spirit was broken because she hated this manor.
Yu Mingjiao had a withdrawn and gloomy personality, while Cen Lingqiu was also a reserved and indifferent person. Neither of them was particularly fond of lively atmospheres, so they had barely spoken to each other these past few days.
It was as if two strangers were cohabiting in this damp manor.
Today, the rain finally lightened, and the fog dissipated.
The sky brightened up.
Yu Mingjiao was painting again today.
Ever since that day Lin Qiu said she would take her away when the rain stopped, she had rarely come to this room. Her torment seemed to have ceased, and her arrogant, domineering tone of questioning was gone.
Although she didn’t know what madness had possessed Lin Qiu, these past few days had been the quietest she had experienced since arriving at this manor.
Yu Mingjiao didn’t really believe that Cen Lingqiu would actually take her away from here. She didn’t trust this woman’s words one bit; she was just waiting for Cen Lingqiu to reveal her true colors.
If this woman was truly just making a false promise, Yu Mingjiao would drag her down to die with her.
Since she had nothing left, she had nothing to fear.
Right now, it felt like she was playing a game with Cen Lingqiu. Once the game ended, everything else would stop too.
Just the thought of that scene, the thought of Lin Qiu’s pained and terrified expression, filled Yu Mingjiao with great anticipation.
She was in the middle of painting when she ran out of blue paint.
The paint box was on the wall cabinet nearby. Yu Mingjiao moved her wheelchair toward the cabinet, glanced up, and remembered that Lin Qiu had deliberately placed her paint box on the third shelf, a place she couldn’t reach.
Yu Mingjiao stared coldly at the corner of the paint box peeking out from the third shelf. She knew this was Lin Qiu’s way of humiliating her.
An able-bodied person could reach it just by standing up, but she couldn’t stand up.
It was very difficult for her to stand up.
As if fighting a battle with her own legs, Yu Mingjiao gripped the handrims of her wheelchair, trying to stand.
Her legs had been ruined when her stepmother pushed her down the stairs at seventeen. She had once tried to stand up, but every time, she would fall to the ground after less than a second.
Again and again, she didn’t know how many times she had tried, until she finally gave up all hope.
Perhaps because her spirit had been so tormented and suppressed recently, she recklessly tried to stand up again.
The result was the same.
Her upper body had just left the wheelchair, her hand had just barely touched the edge of the paint box on the third shelf, when in the next second, her entire body fell back as if it had lost all sensation.
Her hand swept out, knocking the paint box down. Yu Mingjiao subconsciously tried to dodge, rapidly moving her wheelchair. Because it all happened so fast, her movements were frantic. The wheelchair shot backward and slammed into the desk behind her. She wasn’t sitting securely, and with the inertia, her body pitched forward, and she fell to the floor.
The lid of the paint box flew open, and a jumble of colors spilled onto the floor. Yu Mingjiao fell right on top of the paint box.
Instantly, her pale, slender wrists were covered in paint.
She was wearing a white knit shirt and a short skirt today. In a flash, her white shirt and legs were splattered with a kaleidoscope of colors. Even her hair and cheeks were stained.
Although Yu Mingjiao was an art major and naturally couldn’t stay pristine while painting, she had a fixation on cleanliness and couldn’t stand having paint on her body.
The feeling was thick and damp, making her extremely uncomfortable.
So she tried to climb back into her wheelchair to go to the bathroom and take a shower.
But she couldn’t even do something so simple. Her waist had just hit the corner of the desk, and now it hurt with every movement. She couldn’t even crawl.
She had fallen into a pool of thick, sticky paint, her body covered in an uncomfortable sensation, as if a snail had crawled over her. She herself felt that her current state was too wretched, truly too ugly.
It was such a small, insignificant thing, yet she couldn’t do it. Even a simple action like crawling to the bathroom was now difficult for her.
She could only lie there like a dead person, unable to do anything.
Yu Mingjiao truly—
—loathed herself like this.
She loathed her disability, loathed the despair of being so easily destroyed by what was just a trivial matter in others’ eyes.
She loathed everything.
She really wanted to be like a normal person.
But why was she the only one with a broken, incomplete body? Why was everything about her so terrible?
Why.
She bit her lip hard, her eyes red and welling with moisture.
It was so painful.
Her body felt so disgusting.
Just then, the door was suddenly pushed open, and Cen Lingqiu walked in. “What was that noise just now—”
She saw Yu Mingjiao lying on the floor, covered in all sorts of paint. Cen Lingqiu strode forward, intending to help her up.
Yu Mingjiao didn’t push her away. She had to admit that because she was so useless, she could only rely on Lin Qiu now.
A heavy sense of self-loathing and shame enveloped Yu Mingjiao.
Cen Lingqiu didn’t ask her why she had fallen. With a calm and distant expression, she simply helped her up, then took a wet wipe to clean the paint from her skin and hair.
Yu Mingjiao was as quiet as death, completely still.
Between the two of them, there was a strange and absurd harmony.
But beneath the harmony was still an iceberg.
“It’s not easy to wipe clean,” Cen Lingqiu said. “Want to take a shower?”
Yu Mingjiao slowly nodded.
Cen Lingqiu drew a bath, carried her into the tub, and asked, “You can wash yourself, right?”
Yu Mingjiao nodded silently.
Cen Lingqiu was used to her coldness and didn’t mind. “Then take your time. Call me if you need anything.”
She wasn’t fond of helping people bathe, so after getting Yu Mingjiao’s answer, she went out.
Cen Lingqiu cleaned up the messy floor. After all, the female lead was disabled, so bathing was certainly a bit difficult for her. She sat in the room, waiting for the female lead to finish.
She waited for a long time. More than half an hour passed, and Yu Mingjiao still wasn’t done. Cen Lingqiu walked to the bathroom door and called her name. There was no answer, and no sound from inside.
Fearing she might be having another episode, Cen Lingqiu quickly opened the bathroom door.
Yu Mingjiao gave her a cool glance before looking away, her entire body submerged in the bathtub, without expression or movement.
Cen Lingqiu let out a sigh of relief.
“Why didn’t you call me when you were done?” Cen Lingqiu walked over and touched the water. It was no longer very warm.
“The water’s not even warm anymore, why didn’t you change it?”
“…”
Yu Mingjiao didn’t want to talk to her. The sight of Lin Qiu reminded her of her wretched state of having to rely on her, and her current miserable condition was all due to Lin Qiu’s malice.
Cen Lingqiu sighed, unable to understand the thoughts of young people. She wanted to help Yu Mingjiao dry off, but the girl seemed ashamed, shrinking away and refusing to let her touch her.
“What are you shy about?” Cen Lingqiu said. “We’re both women, there’s no need to be afraid. I was the one who changed your clothes last time. I’ve already seen everything there is to see.”
To be honest, the female lead’s body was too thin, all ribs, and had a pallor from never seeing the sun. It wasn’t very attractive, just too skinny.
But she didn’t say this to Yu Mingjiao.
Yu Mingjiao still shrank away, her long, wet hair covering her shoulders and chest. She turned to the side, refusing to look at Cen Lingqiu.
Hearing Cen Lingqiu’s words, her eyelashes trembled.
She had always thought it was the maid who had changed her clothes that day. It was her?
This didn’t seem like something Lin Qiu would do.
Seeing her silence, Cen Lingqiu took it as tacit agreement. She picked up a dry towel, intending to dry her body, but Yu Mingjiao took the towel from her and said coldly, “I’ll do it myself. You can leave.”
“…”
So much trouble.
She left. After waiting a few minutes, she heard it go quiet inside and knew she had changed her clothes. She went in and carried her out.
Yu Mingjiao was very light, so carrying her was no problem for Cen Lingqiu.
This was the first time she had been carried by her. Feeling the warmth of the woman’s body against her skin, she couldn’t help but feel repulsed and disgusted.
If she could, she wouldn’t want any contact with this woman, Lin Qiu. But many things were beyond her control. Who was to blame for her immobility? She couldn’t even hate someone with conviction, because she had to depend on this woman.
Cen Lingqiu placed Yu Mingjiao on the bed. Seeing her dripping wet hair, not dried at all, she twirled a strand with her fingers. “You didn’t dry your hair? Why is it so wet?”
Yu Mingjiao’s expression was listless, as if she were utterly exhausted.
“It’s none of your business. Get out, I want to sleep.”
“You’re going to sleep just like this?” Cen Lingqiu raised an eyebrow. “It’ll be cold, and you’ll get sick.”
Yu Mingjiao couldn’t understand how this young miss, Lin Qiu, had suddenly transformed into a nagging, caring older sister figure. What screw had come loose in her head?
Was it so important whether she got sick or not? No one cared anyway. She wished she would get sick and die.
She wanted to laugh, but couldn’t.
“Get out.”
Yu Mingjiao already felt humiliated enough. Her wretched state of falling and being unable to get up was witnessed by her tormentor, and even bathing required the help of the person she detested most.
She was, by nature, a pitiful person with immense pride, yet reality repeatedly trampled her fragile self-esteem under the feet of the person she loathed most.
Besides frantically loathing herself internally, there was nothing else she could do.
Beneath Yu Mingjiao’s calm exterior hid a vast despair.
Cen Lingqiu watched her quietly.
In these few short days together, she could vaguely sense that the female lead was a girl who didn’t take good care of herself. She was always closed off, extremely resistant to outsiders.
To think, she was only twenty years old.
Such a beautiful age.
She was twenty, still alive in this world. That in itself was already very good.
But Yu Mingjiao seemed to be dying, second by second.
A faint, dazed ripple stirred in Cen Lingqiu’s heart. For the first time, she felt a strange sense of pity for her mission target.
This faint feeling of pity made her ignore Yu Mingjiao’s words. There was no hairdryer in this room, so she went to the room next door.
Yu Mingjiao watched her leave, her face devoid of emotion.
Cen Lingqiu was gone. It was to be expected. How could she possibly care whether she lived or died?
In this world, not a single person cared about her, not even herself.
This was a very normal thing.
Yu Mingjiao found it hard to breathe. The room was too quiet, and water dripped from her wet hair onto the floor.
Drip, drip.
She remained sitting on the bed, motionless. The room was deathly silent.
In this silence, the sound of the door opening was jarring.
Yu Mingjiao looked up.
Cen Lingqiu walked over with a hairdryer. “Dry your hair before you sleep.”
She plugged it in and said calmly, “Even if you’re annoyed with me, just bear with it. I’ll leave once I’m done. Be good.”
Yu Mingjiao stared at her, as if she couldn’t process why she hadn’t left.
The hum of the hairdryer filled the quiet room. Cen Lingqiu silently dried her hair, and Yu Mingjiao didn’t resist her like a porcupine.
She lowered her head, obediently letting her dry her hair.
Cen Lingqiu’s fingers occasionally massaged her scalp. Being so close, Yu Mingjiao could smell her scent.
It was like a very faint cherry blossom fragrance.
She remembered that Lin Qiu used to reek of heavy perfume.
This was the first time someone had ever dried Yu Mingjiao’s hair.
It was a strange feeling.
When her hair was almost dry, Cen Lingqiu touched her soft, raven-black hair and couldn’t help but say, “Your hair… it’s so beautiful.”
Yu Mingjiao’s hair was black and straight, without a single split or discolored end, like black silk. It was exceptionally beautiful.
Cen Lingqiu was quite envious of the female lead’s hair.
When she was alive, due to malnutrition, her hair was short and yellow, the ends full of splits, like a frayed broom. It was very ugly.
So she had always particularly liked and envied people with beautiful hair.
Yu Mingjiao paid no mind to her compliment.
Cen Lingqiu wanted to play with her hair a little longer, but the phone on the bed rang. She glanced at it and immediately picked it up.
She swiped her finger, tossed it on the desk without a second thought, but the next second, the phone rang again. A trace of impatience appeared on Cen Lingqiu’s face.
“I’m going out to take a call,” she said to Yu Mingjiao. “Dry the ends yourself, they’re still a bit damp.”
With that, she took her phone and went out.
She left so quickly that she didn’t notice the change in Yu Mingjiao’s expression.
Although Cen Lingqiu had grabbed the phone quickly, Yu Mingjiao’s sharp eyes had caught the name on the screen.
“Younger Brother.”
Lin Qiu’s younger brother, Lin Dong.
The man who had knocked her out and locked her in this manor, treating her like an animal, a piece of scum to be toyed with at will.
The ultimate source of all her suffering.
Why was he calling Lin Qiu?
Was it to persuade Lin Qiu to continue imprisoning her?
Or had he thought of some new, disgusting method for Lin Qiu to inflict upon her?
Why on earth was he calling Lin Qiu!
Lin Qiu had finally, by some madness, started acting like a normal person, and she had even said she would take her away.
But Lin Qiu doted on her younger brother so much. What if he persuaded her and she went back on her word?
Yu Mingjiao nervously bit her fingers.
Would she go back to that kind of life again?
No.
No.
Yu Mingjiao’s eyes turned sinister. Her tender fingertips were already bitten and bleeding, but she was completely unaware.
Why would she ever believe that Lin Qiu’s personality would change, that she would even let her leave this manor?
It made no sense.
That woman had absolutely no reason to do so. She hated and rejected her, deriving pleasure from tormenting her.
She was a thoroughly bad woman.
It was impossible for her to become a kind and understanding person overnight.
And yet, she had actually believed this woman’s words.
This was probably just a new form of torture devised by the siblings.
Yu Mingjiao sat in her wheelchair and, very carefully, pushed open the door. She heard voices from the next room and moved extremely slowly to stop outside Cen Lingqiu’s door.
Cen Lingqiu’s door wasn’t fully closed, and the house was quiet. Yu Mingjiao’s hearing was excellent, so besides Cen Lingqiu’s voice, she could also hear a little of the voice on the other end of the phone.
Cen Lingqiu was very annoyed by the male lead’s calls. Every time he called, it was to ask if Yu Mingjiao was being obedient and to tell her to bully Yu Mingjiao more, so that her stubborn and obstinate nature would be worn down.
These words were both malicious and annoying. She always just gave a perfunctory response to get it over with.
“Sis, is recording a video really that hard? Why do you keep refusing?”
The male lead on the other end of the line kept asking the original owner to record a video of the female lead being bullied for him. Cen Lingqiu really couldn’t understand his perverted psychology.
“I’ve been busy with work lately, no time,” she prevaricated.
“You’re putting me off again.” The male voice on the other end was cold. “What are you thinking, Sis? Ever since you inexplicably fired that mute maid, you haven’t sent me any news about Yu Mingjiao.”
Cen Lingqiu sat on the sofa, rubbing her forehead, wondering if the male lead would go crazy if she just hung up.
The voice on the other end continued, “Sis, I know you hate Yu Mingjiao very much. Do you think I don’t like Ning Jia anymore? That’s not it. I still love Ning Jia. Yu Mingjiao is just a toy to me. You know, toys are always meant to be thrown away. I like seeing her rely on me like a useless piece of trash. A toy just needs to be obedient.”
The man’s voice was low and cold, every word chillingly cruel.
Cen Lingqiu felt disgusted. It wasn’t that she hadn’t encountered scummy male leads in her past missions, but someone like Lin Dong was rare.
It was a miracle that such a person could be a male lead, and truly unfortunate for Yu Mingjiao to be the female lead.
Cen Lingqiu couldn’t lecture the male lead, fearing it would severely break character, as the original owner was someone who obeyed her younger brother’s every word.
She was too lazy to talk to him, so she just hummed a few times. “Got it. Hanging up.”
“Wait—” Lin Dong stopped her. “Sis, I’m coming back to the country in a few days. Help me with something.”
Cen Lingqiu’s expression was bland. “Help with what?”
“Help me discipline Yu Mingjiao’s personality. I really don’t like the way she looks at me like an enemy. I heard from the maid that you even treated Yu Mingjiao’s wounds. Sis, I trust that you’re on my side. You couldn’t have suddenly gone soft. I trust you’ll help me.”
Oh, so he wanted her to help him torture the female lead.
Lin Dong lowered his voice. “Sis, answer me.”
Cen Lingqiu didn’t want to talk for another second. Fearing he would keep asking questions, she gave a very impatient, perfunctory reply, “Got it. Really hanging up now.”
Fearing he would say something else, Cen Lingqiu immediately pressed the end call button and tossed the phone aside.
What an irritating man.
Next time, she’d have to find an excuse to decline his calls.
But outside the door, Yu Mingjiao’s face was already deathly pale and cold.
Although she hadn’t heard everything, only the gist of it, connecting it with reality made it easy enough to guess the rest.
She heard Lin Dong say she was a toy that could be thrown away at any time.
She was a substitute toy for someone else.
She heard Lin Dong ask Lin Qiu to continue tormenting her, and Lin Qiu agreed.
Ah.
So Lin Qiu was still the same as before.
She hadn’t changed.
She had just come up with another way to humiliate her.
As for what she really wanted, Yu Mingjiao no longer wanted to know. It wouldn’t be anything good, anyway.
She really wanted to laugh.
She had always been a toy for these siblings.
Constantly being played with, played with.
The most tragic part was that she knew the outcome of everything, yet could do nothing.
Lin Dong was coming back.
She didn’t know what he was going to do this time.
Whether it was punishment or a hypocritical gift, it all disgusted Yu Mingjiao to no end.
She could never leave this cage.
And a new kind of pain was about to begin.
Yu Mingjiao wasn’t particularly disappointed; instead, she accepted this disgusting reality with a sense of peace.
Her heart was a damp, black lake. The only patch of clear water had already been submerged by the blackness. Now, her empty heart held not a single speck of bright color.
She quietly wheeled herself back to her room.
That night, she had a dream again.
She dreamt that when she was very young, she took a little extra food at the dinner table. Her stepmother became unhappy and scolded her, and her father grabbed her head and slammed it against the table, cursing at her.
“Why are you eating so much, are you a pig? You useless thing who only knows how to eat!”
“Your mom worked so hard to cook, and she barely ate anything. Your little sister only had a little. Why are you the only one just eating and eating!”
Her nose bled profusely, and she quietly begged for mercy.
“I’m sorry, Dad, I won’t eat so much anymore…”
“I’ll eat very little from now on, I’m sorry…”
Then she dreamt of when she was seventeen. Her stepsister snatched the necklace her mother had left her. She tried to get it back, but her stepsister wouldn’t give it up. Her stepmother came over, took the necklace, and was about to give it to her stepsister. She tried to snatch it from her stepmother, and during the struggle, her stepmother pushed her from the third floor. She didn’t die, but her legs were crippled.
She lay in the hospital, and not a single person came to visit her.
They all thought she deserved it.
Then she dreamt of her freshman year of university. Lin Dong told her to be with him. She refused, so he drove her to a deserted road in the dead of winter, abandoned her there, and tried to force her to agree.
She was all alone in the wilderness, moving her wheelchair aimlessly. She was afraid of the dark and couldn’t see the road.
A stray dog appeared from nowhere and ran toward her. She was terrified. Her wheelchair hit a rock, and she fell to the ground.
The dog bit her waist. She screamed in pain, struggling desperately.
Finally, Lin Dong rushed back and saved her.
A scar was left on her waist, difficult to remove.
“…”
Yu Mingjiao woke with a start from the dream.
The various pains from the dream seemed to linger on her body.
She felt like her whole body ached.
Father, stepmother, stepsister, Lin Dong, Lin Qiu.
Every single one of them was a source of her disgust and pain.
Yu Mingjiao truly didn’t know why she was still alive. The humiliation of the day, the malice of Lin Qiu and Lin Dong, the continued lack of freedom—it all made her feel utterly exhausted.
How could she be so tired?
Why was it so hard to breathe?
She didn’t want to continue this awful life anymore.
She was so very tired.
She was so afraid of pain.
“Slice—”
The sound of a blade cutting through skin was extremely piercing.
Yu Mingjiao curled up on the bed, quietly feeling the blood flow from her wrist.
Her expression was frighteningly calm, her eyes fixed unblinkingly on the dark window.
Tonight was a moonless night.
“Yu Mingjiao! Don’t you know your mother committed suicide because of postpartum depression after giving birth to you! You’re a jinx who caused your mother’s death!”
“Yu Mingjiao, what do you think you are, daring to touch my younger brother, you disabled piece of trash. What right do you have!”
“Yu Mingjiao, you dare to give me attitude? If you didn’t look a bit like Ning Jia, do you think anyone would bother with a waste like you—”
There were many voices in her ears: her stepmother’s, Lin Qiu’s, Lin Dong’s.
So noisy, so noisy.
She found it annoying, not understanding why these people always had to repeat the fact that she was useless in her ears.
As if her being alive was such a disgraceful thing.
“Sis, Mom is dead, and Dad has left us too. Are you really a jinx, Sis? Why has all our family gone? Sis, will you jinx me to death too?”
Her stepsister’s young voice suddenly rang out, like a ghost.
Ahhhhhh!
So noisy.
It’s so noisy.
Yu Mingjiao pressed her hands tightly against her ears.
Why won’t they stop talking?
She was going to die soon, why did they still have to bother her?
The pain in her wrist grew more and more distinct. The bedsheet was quickly soaked with blood. Yu Mingjiao felt as if she were sleeping in a cold grave.
Her consciousness grew increasingly blurry, her body colder and colder.
She suddenly recalled her twenty years of life.
Loneliness, abandonment, imprisonment, being unloved.
An endless stream of pain.
Nothing worth being happy about.
If only…
Forget it.