When Will My Childhood Sweetheart Marry Me?-Chapter 243: Five-Year Chip

Pei Yan appeared later than he had expected.

Faced with the furious man, Lu Chen was almost entirely defenseless, nor did he plan to fight back.

He knew that Pei Yan had a temper, and if he lost control tonight, he might die at the man’s hands.

But he wanted to take a gamble.

He was betting that Pei Yan wouldn’t be willing to give everything up and send himself to prison at such a young age.

He, having been drugged, was also a victim and would not be punished by the law.

Pei Yan, on the other hand, would be facing premeditated murder charges, which could have him spending his life in prison.

In the end, he won the bet. The irrational Pei Yan merely broke one of his fingers. The pain was so intense he almost passed out, yet he held his breath and watched Pei Yan pick up the disheveled girl from the bed and then storm out, slamming the door behind him.

Lu Chen did not bother to explain. Since Pei Yan had misunderstood, let him fall deeper into his misbelief.

The intense pain completely overpowered the effects of the drug.

At that moment, Lu Chen was more lucid than ever.

He knew that because of this misunderstanding, the chips he could gather would be more valuable than a broken finger.

As expected, the next day Pei Yan found his way to the hospital.

But what Lu Chen hadn’t expected was that the first thing Pei Yan asked was who was behind all this.

At that time, he didn’t understand, not until this morning when he heard the news of the Zhizhen CEO’s ex-wife’s suicide, did he suddenly come to his senses.

Connecting the two incidents, one leading to the other, it was hard not to suspect a linkage.

The person behind the scenes had used him as a pawn in a carefully orchestrated plan.

Without a doubt, the target was Pei Yan, and possibly even the entire Pei Family.

Hence that night, regardless of the choice Pei Yan made, he was fated to lose the two most important women in his life.

One was the love of his life, the other his flesh and blood.

Lu Chen closed his eyes, gulping down the water in his hand. The cold liquid flowed down his throat into his stomach, making it feel as if a large part of his chest had collapsed.

In the darkness, had he already become entangled in someone else’s game, with no way to turn back?

Now that there was no turning back, the only choice was to move forward, even if it meant a bloody struggle.

Last night in the hospital, he had made Pei Yan promise not to enter the IT industry for five years, to swallow the night’s events for a lifetime, never letting Jiang Shuyao know.

No one knew her temperament better than Pei Yan.

He couldn’t bear to see her in pain; even if it meant hiding the truth for a lifetime, Pei Yan, with all his efforts, would agree to any condition to make it happen.

Five years was enough time for Lu Chen to do a lot.

In this ever-changing industry, it would be a ridiculous dream for Pei Yan to think he could win against him in five years’ time.

In fact, Jiang Shuyao was quite perceptive.

The matter of the encryption system had already sown seeds of resentment in Lu Chen’s heart, making it impossible for him to see reason.

Yet, by a bizarre twist of fate, heaven gave his opponent another chance to strike back hard.

Of course, Jiang Shuyao was unaware of all these truths.

After returning from the funeral parlor, she fell seriously ill.

Her whole body was weak and sweaty, her breathing difficult, and her temperature soared to forty degrees.

In these special times, her mother took her to Huaren late at night for a nucleic acid test and lung CT. Fortunately, it was a false alarm; it was just a common lung infection caused by a cold.

The day before the end of the National Day holidays, Jiang Shuyao was discharged from the hospital. During this period, Pei Yan had not appeared even once.

Seeing through her daughter’s mind, Zhu Yun sat by the bed and comforted her, "Yan doesn’t know you’re sick. He has locked himself in his room and hasn’t eaten or drunk anything for three full days. Even your Uncle Pei’s efforts have been useless. Yaoyao, you should go to see him."

After listening to her mother’s words, Jiang Shuyao snapped back to reality.

Three days without eating or drinking.

Why do this to himself when his godmother won’t come back either?

Jiang Shuyao felt unbearable heartache and, with red eyes, she threw back the covers and got out of bed.

Her mother advised from behind, "It’s chilly outside; wear more clothes, and don’t hurry, your dad will take you there."

When she arrived at the villa, it was lunchtime.

The servants, seeing her get out of the car, breathed a sigh of relief as though a weight had been lifted.

The last time young master had acted this way was five years ago when the lady of the house had just gone abroad. He had locked himself in the piano room, refused to eat or drink, and smashed everything in sight— he seemed to have gone mad.

Back then, no one dared to approach him because he would get angry at the slightest provocation.

But this time, things were different.

From the moment Pei Yan entered that piano room, he had been completely silent, sitting in front of the window. The food would get cold, then be reheated—repeatedly prepared over and over again, and yet, he refused to eat a single bite.

They knew that compared to the past, the young master had matured, learned to control his emotions, and no longer allowed his personal grief to harm those around him.

Still, the servants couldn’t help feeling distressed.

After all, many had been with the Pei Family for years and had watched the young master grow up. They truly couldn’t bear to see the child suffer like this.

The piano room had been empty since the godmother’s departure.

After many years, Jiang Shuyao stepped into the room once more, and looking around the empty space, she felt a poignant sense of change.

The piano Pei Yan had destroyed had not been discarded by Uncle Pei; it was still carefully covered with a white cloth and remained in its original spot, exactly as it had been left.

She walked past the piano and took the stairs up to the rooftop garden.

As the car drove through the villa gates, she knew Pei Yan wouldn’t be waiting for her in the piano room.

There were too many memories of the past there, and he didn’t want to pull her into that dark world deep within his heart.

The weather was turning cooler. Pei Yan sat on the terrace in a thin shirt, quietly smoking, his gaze fixed on the distance.

Jiang Shuyao placed her jacket over his shoulders without a word and sat down beside him.

The noon sun should have been bright and splendid, but for the last few days, Rong City had been overcast, with little signs of clear weather.

She turned to look at the person beside her and noticed how he had lost a considerable amount of weight in just three days. His profile seemed even more chiseled and cold, like a blade that had been honed and refined over countless days and nights.

At that moment, she couldn’t help but feel a twinge in her nose; just one glance and tears began to well up in her eyes.

It must have been the slight inhalation that caught Pei Yan’s attention.

He extinguished his cigarette and slowly turned his head.

Seeing her trying to hold back her tears, her nose red from the effort, Pei Yan chuckled softly and caressed her face with his fingertip, "Skipping a few meals won’t kill you, don’t cry."

He might’ve been better off not speaking, for as soon as he did, some pent-up emotion found an outlet and poured out all at once.

Jiang Shuyao turned into a teary mess, clinging tightly to him, resting her head on his shoulder. Tears streamed down her cheeks, soaking into the fabric, seeping into his shoulder with bouts of penetrating heat. 𝓯𝓻𝒆𝙚𝒘𝓮𝙗𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝒍.𝙘𝓸𝙢

"Princess," Pei Yan said hoarsely, his voice gravelly as if laden with lead, as he turned to kiss the hair by her temple, "Do you think there really is an afterlife?"

She sobbed inaudibly, her words intermittent, "Whether there is an afterlife or not, we still need to live this life to the fullest."

Live this life to the fullest...

A faint curve formed at the corner of Pei Yan’s lips.

If there really was a next life, he hoped that woman wouldn’t be his mother again.

She always had a way of making people miserable.

In life, she was willful and selfish, and in death, she departed cleanly and thoroughly.

Lin Zhen, you are truly cruel.