Everyone had secrets and private matters they would never wish others to know, even their closest family or beloved. They still kept secrets of their own.
If a person laid themselves completely bare, if every experience of their life, great and small, every secret, was known by another, it would be even more humiliating than being stripped naked and thrown before them alone.
If such a situation truly arose, there were only two possibilities.
One was to kill the other person, ensuring one's secrets remained secrets, known only to oneself.
As for the other possibility, from then on, one would have no dignity left before that person, threatened and controlled by them like a puppet on strings.
If everything Meng Zhao had said was true, then Shi Jiawen naturally wanted to kill Meng Zhao and destroy this man who had maliciously pried into his memories.
But from a practical standpoint, that was a fantasy, a goal he could almost never accomplish on his own.
Thus, the greater possibility was that he would henceforth be controlled by the other party, becoming a puppet unable to act of his own will.
Beyond that, Shi Jiawen had also noticed Meng Zhao's exceptional regard for him.
For Meng Zhao had stated without reservation that among the four of them, his potential and aptitude for martial arts were the worst. Yet he also possessed some trait that Meng Zhao valued above all else.
In truth, Shi Jiawen had always been caught between inferiority and pride. His noble status gave him pride, but the deficiencies in his physical constitution, martial talent, and innate bone structure made him feel inferior.
Even his father and mother had merely held expectations and offered encouragement; they had never truly acknowledged him from the depths of their hearts.
So he was