"Keep eating. I have something to do, so I'll be leaving."
Jiang Yuehan reined in his earlier terrifying expression slightly and softened his tone as much as he could when speaking to his younger sister.
Jiang Jinran pursed her lips discreetly.
Was this brother serious? He wanted me to keep eating? Even a dog wouldn't eat this...
Eating anything and everything will only hurt you!
Jiang Yuehan glanced back at her.
Jiang Jinran widened her eyes innocently.
"If there's anything you like, just tell the servants," Jiang Yuehan added patiently.
Although they were family, he didn't know Jiang Jinran's preferences.
This younger sister was like an invisible person who disliked making a sound. If he hadn't been her older brother, he might never have given her a second glance.
But-
Jiang Yuehan gazed into his sister's clear eyes, his feelings suddenly growing complicated.
Perhaps he had misunderstood his sister.
She simply wasn't good with words or expressing herself.
Completely unaware of Jiang Yuehan's thoughts, Jiang Jinran indulged in her own fantasies.
Anything I want to eat?
Don't just talk big. Send me 50 on WeChat first and show me what you've got! It happens to be Thursday today. I'm going completely crazy!
In the end, Jiang Jinran received a transfer of 100,000 from Jiang Yuehan.
"Big brother, you... why did you... suddenly transfer so much money to me?" Jiang Jinran stared at her phone screen, so astonished that she stammered.
So this was what it meant for a fortune to fall from the sky!
So this was what a windfall felt like!
This was the very scene from her dreams.
Money, come! Money, come! Money, come from every direction!
Seeing Jiang Jinran's wide eyes, their dark pupils shimmering with moisture, Jiang Yuehan had to admit that his sister's expression pleased him.
"If it's not enough, ask me for more."
Leaving her with that exceedingly generous remark, he turned and left the dining room with Cui Yan.
Jiang Jinran sat alone at the dining table, bubbling with delight inside.
Hehe, another 100,000 in the bank.
It seemed her retirement in a psychiatric hospital was looking more and more promising.
Although Jiang Yuehan had told her she could ask him for more if it wasn't enough...
Jiang Jinran wasn't an idiot with no emotional intelligence. This sort of thing required taking it slowly for sustainable development. If she made endless demands right from the start and plucked him bald, the losses would outweigh the gains.
Jiang Yuehan settled into the back seat of the Rolls-Royce and straightened his shirt collar out of habit.
Jiang Jinran's inner voice still seemed to linger in his ears.
Lu Yunxiao...
The man narrowed his eyes, an elusive, dangerous shade rising in their fathomless depths.
"Find out who's been close to Lu Yunxiao at the company lately." Lowering his eyes, he gave the order coldly to Cui Yan in the driver's seat.
Cui Yan's expression remained unchanged, but inwardly, he was badly startled.
Had the CEO discovered something?
He was actually beginning to suspect Mr. Lu...
"Understood." Although Cui Yan had questions, he knew his place and didn't ask further.
It was nearing the end of summer vacation.
After eating a few pieces of handmade cake from the refrigerator, Jiang Jinran left the dining room and returned to her bedroom.
She turned the air conditioning up to full blast.
She flopped comfortably onto the bed.
She didn't know exactly when the female lead, Sang Ning, would come knocking, so until then-
She just wanted to lie flat and enjoy life.
Her arm stretched out instinctively, and her fingertips inadvertently touched something beneath the pillow.
That icy touch...
Her expression briefly froze.
Jiang Jinran hurriedly sat up and flipped the pillow over-
Her eyes widened.
Under the pillow was none other than an unfamiliar metal badge.
Jiang Jinran picked up the badge and examined it closely.
The design on the badge was distinctly three-dimensional. Its overall shape was a six-pointed star, neither large nor small, with an iris stretching across its center...
Eerie and alluring.
As though suddenly recalling something, Jiang Jinran abruptly knitted her brows, and a trace of horror flashed through her eyes.
Clang.
The metal badge slipped from Jiang Jinran's hand and landed on the pillow.
Jiang Jinran took a deep breath, her entire body rigid.
As though an inexplicable chill had crept over her skin, she couldn't help wrapping her arms around herself.
If she remembered correctly-
A six-pointed star, an iris...
This was the emblem of a mysterious organization in the novel.
This was a world divided among rival powers locked in conflict. On the surface, wealthy, powerful families controlled everything, while many formidable organizations also lurked in the shadows.
Divine Sound was one of the powerful, mysterious organizations in the book.
This organization represented evil and bloodshed. It was the strongest antagonist capable of contending with the female lead, and its emblem was-
An iris blooming within a six-pointed star.
Divine Sound!
Jiang Jinran's scalp prickled, as though a ghost had latched onto her.
This badge certainly hadn't appeared out of thin air in the original owner's room...
Then what connection did the original owner have to Divine Sound?
How could a sheltered young heiress possibly have provoked such an entity...
Could Divine Sound have set its sights on the original owner?
And this badge was a warning from Divine Sound.
Or perhaps the female lead had already been reborn and awakened, and this was her handiwork.
Jiang Jinran's mind was a tangled mess.
Although she knew most of the book's plot, there was no way every detail about villainous cannon fodder like the original owner would have been painstakingly described.
The memories the original owner had left in her mind were incomplete as well.
So she knew the broad course of the original owner's life, but none of the details!
This badge struck like an enormous impact, whipping up towering, violent waves in the heart of Jiang Jinran, who had only wanted to lie flat in peace.
After turning it over and over in her mind, all she could do was take things one step at a time.
She didn't want to die, nor did she want to invite trouble.
Over the next few days, Jiang Jinran saw none of her other family members besides her eldest brother, Jiang Yuehan.
Her nominal father and mother had apparently been abroad handling business lately.
As for her other four brothers, each was busy with his own affairs, so busy that they didn't even have time to come home.
There were no further developments concerning the badge, either.
It was as though it had appeared out of thin air and meant nothing at all...
Jiang Jinran spent the last few days of summer vacation in peace, then had no choice but to begin her school life.
On the first day of school.
Jiang Jinran yawned as she approached the car. The Jiang family had assigned a black Bentley to drive her back and forth.
The driver was already in his seat, waiting for Jiang Jinran to get in.
The tall, burly driver wore an indifferent expression. Even though he had noticed Jiang Jinran approaching, he continued staring straight ahead without any change in his expression, as if she were invisible.
Jiang Jinran blinked in displeasure.
She knocked on the driver's window, and only then did he respond. He rolled down the window and called lifelessly, "Young miss."
"Uncle Driver, has our family been withholding your wages?"
Jiang Jinran tilted her head and asked with "wide-eyed innocence."
Caught somewhat off guard, the driver gave an awkward little cough and hurriedly denied it. "Of course not... why would you ask that, young miss..."
"You don't seem very willing to drive me to school."
"That's absolutely not true!"
"If you don't want to, Uncle Driver, I can have my eldest brother arrange for you to kill fish at RT-Mart." Jiang Jinran's sparkling eyes kept darting about.
The driver: ...