The filming for "The Path to the Peak" concluded in a blur of confetti and manufactured cheers. For the world, it was a success. For Su Qing, it was the end of a temporary sanctuary. The protection Lin Yan had inadvertently provided during the show was a bubble, and now, the needle was coming.
Lin Yan sat in her dressing room, staring at a velvet box on her vanity. Inside was a diamond ring—a "gift" from the Zhao family heir. Her father's message had been clear: "The merger is the priority. Love is for people who don't have empires to run."
But every time she closed her eyes, she didn't see the gold of the ring; she saw the desperate, haunting brown of Su Qing's eyes. She saw a girl who had nothing but a voice that could make the gods weep, being sold piece by piece to men who didn't deserve to hear her speak.
"I can't do it," Yan whispered to her reflection. "I can't marry a ghost while a living soul is drowning right in front of me."
Su Qing was packing her meager belongings in the communal hallway when a shadow fell over her. She looked up, expecting Director Wang or another predator. Instead, she saw Lin Yan.
The CEO looked different. The "Ice Queen" mask was cracked. Her breathing was slightly uneven, as if she had run to get here before the courage left her.
"President Lin?" Su Qing stood up, clutching her old coat. "I... I was just leaving. Thank you again for the handkerchief. I'll wash it and—"
"Keep it," Yan interrupted, stepping closer. The scent of sandalwood enveloped Su Qing. "Su Qing, I don't have much time. My family is pushing a marriage I do not want. They say I don't believe in love, and perhaps I didn't. Until I heard you sing."
Su Qing froze. The air in the hallway turned cold.
"I have spent my life calculating risks," Yan continued, her voice trembling with a rare, raw honesty. "But seeing you... seeing how they treat you... it makes me want to burn everything I own just to give you a place to breathe. Su Qing, I think... I am in love with you."
The silence that followed was deafening.
To Su Qing, those words weren't a lifeline; they were a death sentence. Her heart screamed Yes!, but her mind showed her the reality. She thought of the CEO who had forced himself on her last month. She thought of the "unspoken rules" she had already endured just to keep her mother's oxygen flowing. She thought of the bruises hidden under her stage makeup.
If I say yes, I will drag her into the mud with me, Su Qing thought. She is pure. She is the sun. If she touches me, the scandals will destroy her. Her family will strip her of everything because of a 'dirty' girl like me.
She had to kill the light to save the sun.
Su Qing forced her face into a sneer—a mask of cold, mercenary indifference she had learned from the very people she hated.
"Love?" Su Qing laughed, the sound jagged and fake. "President Lin, you've watched too many dramas. You're a woman. I don't love women. And even if I did... look at you."
Yan flinched as if struck.
"You're a 'second generation rich' who thinks she can buy a heart because she's bored," Su Qing spat, her own heart breaking with every word. "I don't love you. I don't even like you. You're just another person with power trying to play with a toy. Leave me alone."
Lin Yan stepped back, the light in her eyes extinguishing instantly. The vulnerability she had dared to show was replaced by a frost so deep it seemed to freeze the very air.
"I see," Yan said, her voice returning to that silk-over-glass chill. "I apologize for the... misunderstanding."
She turned and walked away, her back rigid. Su Qing watched her go, then collapsed against the wall, sobbing silently into the silk handkerchief.
"I love you so much that I have to make you hate me," she whispered into the fabric. "Because I am already dead inside, Yan. Don't let me kill you too."
"One heart broke because it was rejected; the other broke because it had to do the rejecting."