Chapter 40: New Year

Fu Yanzong left the hospital early. Though Ji Cheng and Xiao Sun both tried to convince him to stay a little longer, hanging around in the hospital room all day was boring enough.

If he had to name the highlights of his hospital stay, they were playing a few rounds of games or occasionally reading the explanations Song Linyu had sent over, along with listening to a few of his stammering voice messages.

Song Linyu’s recent confessions all revolved around his family background—something Fu Yanzong had already investigated pretty thoroughly. These just filled in a few gaps.

Song Linyu’s mother, Song Lingyi, was the daughter his stepmother had brought into the family upon remarriage. On paper, she was Song Wen’s younger sister, but they shared no direct blood relation.

The trouble started with an accident one day. Blinded by lust, Song Wen had forced himself on Song Lingyi—half out of a foggy mind, half deliberately—and their father had “happened” to walk in on them.

To protect himself, Song Wen naturally pinned all the blame on Song Lingyi. But everyone involved was no fool; how could they not see the truth? Still, compared to her, Song Wen—the legitimate son—was always more important. In the end, the one exiled was Song Lingyi, the sacrificial lamb in a power struggle.

Even more heartbreaking, during the months she was locked away awaiting judgment, Song Lingyi discovered she was pregnant.

She suffered from a severe heart condition. Pregnancy alone placed an enormous burden on her heart, and the stress, bleeding, and other risks of an abortion could easily trigger heart failure or other life-threatening complications.

So she had no choice but to give birth to the child.

But if she did, was she supposed to just sit back and watch Song Wen erase this stain on his life?

This was a life, too.

Song Lingyi agonized over it for a long time. On the day Song Linyu was born, she simply couldn’t bring herself to go through with it. Instead, she begged her younger brother to help her escape the Song family’s surveillance. She then vanished, raising Song Linyu on her own in hiding.

And then, just as her brother Song Lingze fell gravely ill and wanted to see her—when she could finally reconnect with family—Song Wen tracked her down.

…

Fu Yanzong pieced together the information, but his expression showed no shock. Logically, he should have acted stunned.

After all, Song Wen’s public image had always been that of a philanthropist with friends in high places—diligent and kind-hearted. Otherwise, Fu Yanzong’s parents wouldn’t have entrusted him to Song Wen after their accident.

But his parents had been cautious. The 10% stake in Dongyu Group that Fu Yanzong held while underage—along with Serenity Moon Misty Court and various other minor assets—couldn’t be controlled by his guardian, Song Wen. Instead, they were placed in a trusted trust fund.

In hindsight, that precaution had been essential. Song Wen had always treated Fu Yanzong kindly on the surface back then, but Fu Yanzong wasn’t naive. He knew Song Wen cared far more about the assets in his control than about Fu Yanzong himself.

So Fu Yanzong avoided Song Wen unless necessary. At first, he despised the agent Ji Cheng whom Song Wen had assigned to him.

Ji Cheng was smart, though. He knew high risk meant high reward. Rather than remain Song Wen’s lapdog forever, partnering with Fu Yanzong made more sense—the latter was at least easier to negotiate with.

Their secret alliance formed quickly. On the surface, they still acted like they couldn’t stand each other… Well, truthfully, they still couldn’t. But at least business ran smoothly now.

With that in mind, Fu Yanzong sent Ji Cheng a message, asking if the people behind those companies investing in the dating show—the ones they’d uncovered last time—were truly connected to Song Wen.

When Song Linyu had seized power, Song Wen’s faction had retreated in disarray but hadn’t been completely eradicated. Song Linyu had been too busy to stamp out every last weed these past few years, giving them a chance to resurgence.

Fu Yanzong knew Song Linyu hadn’t used the equity transfer agreement he’d signed. Otherwise, he could have cleaned house more thoroughly.

During his years in Berlin, Fu Yanzong’s unused email inbox always received Dongyu’s annual financial report right on schedule at year-end.

His other ventures had cut ties with Dongyu long ago, but he still got the reports because he remained a shareholder.

Song Linyu’s early days as Dongyu’s chairman must have been rough. The first year in Berlin, when Yang Wan visited, she’d casually mentioned that he should sell off his stocks—praising Fu Yanzong’s foresight in holding on.

It was New Year’s then. She rounded up a crowd to his villa for a dumpling-making party. In the end, only Jiang Ming—who actually knew his way around a kitchen—patiently rolled out the dough, while Fu Yanzong, the young master who had never lifted a finger in the kitchen, lounged in the living room playing Monopoly with the others.

Halfway through the first game, Yang Wan went bankrupt. She pointed at Fu Yanzong in disbelief. “You’re not targeting me, are you?”

Fu Yanzong chuckled and kicked all her properties off the board, planting his flag on them with smug satisfaction.

Yang Wan clutched her head and wailed that she’d lost enough lately—how was she even losing at this stupid game?

Someone nearby asked curiously, “What have you been losing on, Teacher Yang?”

“Dongyu stock,” Yang Wan sighed, shaking her head. She glanced toward Jiang Ming, who was still wrapping dumplings, and headed to the kitchen to help out.

“Oh…? Didn’t Dongyu get taken over by some illegitimate son? Song Wen really let his own empire get usurped by his boy. What was the guy’s name again…?”

“Song Linyu.”

Yang Wan, on her way to the kitchen, turned back with a shrug. “I’d suggest selling off if you can. I’m not optimistic about him right now.”

“As if any of us are…” one said. “I heard his mom wasn’t just some simple mistress. Do you know—”

Their whispers were cut short by the clatter of dice hitting the board. Everyone fell silent.

The speaker glanced away instinctively and saw Fu Yanzong casually tossing the dice across the Monopoly board, wineglass in hand.

The dice rolled to a stop: three sixes facing up, a critical success on the random event. Fu Yanzong’s funds tripled—practically bankrupting the in-game banks.

Everyone’s attention snapped to his unbelievable luck, the earlier gossip instantly forgotten. They rolled up their sleeves, eager to knock this capitalist off his throne.

A few turns later, Capitalist Fu Yanzong seemed to have a change of heart. He generously gave away his fortune, paving the way for others and bowing out humbly with a good reputation.

He leaned back against the sofa with a smile, but his expression suddenly grew somber. As if losing interest in the game, he rose amid the chatter and TV noise, stretched, and carried his wineglass to the floor-to-ceiling window to watch the snow.

When someone asked, he said his eyes hurt from playing too long and that he wanted to be alone for a bit.

Through the glass, he watched the snow in the courtyard slowly piling up, gradually burying the ornate arms of the cast-iron bench. Pedestrians passing the front gate had no idea it was Lunar New Year—though some would glance at the spring couplets pasted on the villa’s exterior.

He was surrounded by people that day, but aside from Yang Wan and Jiang Ming, the rest were mere acquaintances.

Even Yang Wan and Jiang Ming were different—they’d catch a late flight home to reunite with family, then spend the next New Year together.

That had nothing to do with Fu Yanzong.

Yang Wan had asked if he wanted to come back with them, but to him, New Year in Berlin felt no different from New Year in Shenlan.

The wine swirled gently in his warm palm. His pocket phone chimed softly.

Fu Yanzong lifted his hand, the gray cashmere sweater sleeve slipping down half an inch to reveal the faint blue veins on his wrist.

He unlocked the screen and cleared the notification bar first. No messages from strangers. He scrolled around but couldn’t spot any new ones.

It wasn’t until Jiang Ming and Yang Wan came out with plates of dumplings, calling him to eat, that Fu Yanzong checked his email and switched his main inbox to the domestic server.

He had received Dongyu’s financial annual report.

It opened with: “Dear Shareholder Fu Yanzong, we sincerely thank you for your continued trust and support of Dongyu Group.”

Then it detailed the year’s profits and losses with exhaustive precision, capping it off with a concise outlook for the future. The tone was impeccably official, the content masterfully crafted.

Dongyu usually sent these reports in early March—things got too hectic before the New Year. This one had come early.

Fu Yanzong scrolled through twice and lost interest. Muttering to himself that Song Linyu was squeezing his employees hard since taking over, he copied the future development section and forwarded it to Yang Wan.

She checked her phone, then looked up at him puzzled. “Why send this to me? Trying to soothe my fragile soul?”

Fu Yanzong pulled out a chair and sat at the table, grabbing chopsticks. He picked up a dumpling, chewing slowly with a grin. “Hinting you should buy more next year.”

“I have PTSD.” As Yang Wan spoke, her phone pinged with a bank transfer notification. She turned to him in shock. “Young Master Fu, this New Year’s red envelope is huge! You get too into Monopoly? …Wait, you’re just trying to mooch off me and Jiang Ming, aren’t you?”

Fu Yanzong flipped his phone face down and drawled lazily, “Go ahead and buy it. It’ll make money. When it does, you two lovebirds remember to come back and acknowledge me as your godfather.”

Yang Wan snorted a laugh, then scrutinized the message Fu Yanzong had forwarded with meticulous care. Muttering half in belief and half in doubt, she said, “Really? They’re painting such a rosy picture…? Whatever, let’s eat first.”

The dinner party buzzed with clinking glasses and lively conversation. That little matter concerning Dongyu was merely a brief interlude, occupying just a few minutes of their time—utterly inconsequential to Fu Yanzong.

After that, Dongyu’s fortunes indeed improved steadily, and Yang Wan never brought it up again. As for the perfunctory financial reports Dongyu sent over the following years, Fu Yanzong simply dragged them straight into his spam folder.

…

Through the matter with Song Wen, Fu Yanzong inexplicably drifted into this recollection.

Then he suddenly remembered that the annual meeting for Dongyu he had seen at Serenity Moon Misty Court hadn’t been moved up at all; it was still after the Spring Festival.

A financial report issued at the same time couldn’t possibly have reached him early on New Year’s.

Fu Yanzong fell silent for a moment. He opened his phone and fished those few spam-marked financial reports out from the vast sea of emails, poring over them carefully from start to finish.

—Every item was listed with crystal clarity, professional to an excessive degree.

Rather than saying Dongyu had been this transparent with every shareholder, it was more like the group’s helmsman possessed an absolute command of the assets and simply wanted to lay them out for Fu Yanzong alone.

…Something Song Linyu would do.

Fu Yanzong thought, gazing at the screen.

Whether it was the text messages and greetings from an unfamiliar number or the emails sent in the company’s name—ones penned alone in an office every Spring Festival, heaven knew with what emotions—they were all his handiwork.