Family?
To be honest.
When Ling Wuyuan heard that question from Su Qingyue's lips,
he fell silent at once.
Because, across both his past and present lives, Pei Yiman was truly the only one who had let him experience what a so-called family felt like...
In his previous life,
as someone picked up from a garbage dump and brought back to an orphanage, the orphanage director had not exactly treated him well. But no matter what, he had food to eat every day, old clothes to wear, and an Nth-hand steel-framed bed to sleep in.
As for why the other party had adopted him, it was exactly as Ling Wuyuan had said before.
They had ulterior motives.
The main reason was that local policies at the time provided corresponding subsidies for adopting infants...
Mm~
It was a simple, unadorned reason.
And on top of that,
adopting infants could be used as a pretext for publicity, thereby bringing in more donations.
At heart,
that orphanage director had merely treated adoption as a business. It was not some genuine act of charity.
Moreover,
once Ling Wuyuan grew a little older, the other party had even treated him as free child labor...
Of course,
even so,
no matter what,
he had at least eaten every day, worn Nth-hand old clothes, and slept in an Nth-hand steel-framed bed, hadn't he?
Even if life had not been good,
it was still better than being gnawed alive as a snack by stray cats and dogs!
Thus, Ling Wuyuan had always held sincere gratitude toward them.
Even though their actions had not been so pure, and even though he had left that place at fifteen to strike out into society alone, that remained the case.
A favor was a favor.
A grudge was a grudge.
He had