Summary: In a room carved by power and cold fury, Chen Yao burns the last remnants of the family that betrayed her. And as the ashes of the past settle, she steps fully into the future she built with her own hands, unafraid, unbreakable, and no longer alone.
Chapter Seventeen
Two weeks before the Championship Finale, the air inside the private conference room of the city's central police department was thick, heavy with tension so sharp it felt almost tangible. The overhead lights buzzed faintly. A long, polished oak table stretched between the two sides, dividing the room not just physically, but irrevocably.
At the head of the table sat the Police Commissioner himself, his uniform crisp, his face set in a hard, unreadable mask.
Along one side of the table, closest to the entrance, sat Yao. She sat between Jinyang and Sicheng, her shoulders squared, her hands clasped lightly in her lap, her face calm but distant. To her right, Jinyang sat with the razor-sharp poise of someone who could—and would—tear apart the world for her sister. To her left, Sicheng leaned back slightly in his chair, arms crossed, his dark eyes half-lidded in that deceptively lazy way he carried himself when he was at his most dangerous.
Next to Jinyang sat Chen Tao, sharp, cold, radiating barely concealed fury and beside Sicheng, the Lu Family Patriarch, Lu Wenhai himself, sat with the weight of a dynasty carved into every line of his presence. Three lawyers flanked them, each with meticulously prepared files, quiet laptops open, pens ready.
None of them spoke yet. None of them needed to. The power on this side of the room was suffocating in its precision.
Across the table, a different kind of tension bled into the air.
Yao's father sat stiffly, his face pinched with bitterness and worn-out arrogance, his posture rigid as if somehow clinging to the last scraps of the control he had once wielded. Next to him, her stepmother perched tensely, fingers clutching the strap of her designer bag so tightly the knuckles were bone-white. And beside her… Yao's half-sister. The cause of all this. She sat back in her chair with a sullen, resentful expression, her arms crossed tightly across her chest, radiating defiance but her eyes flickered nervously toward the assembled wall of power sitting across from them. Their lawyer, a slim man in an expensive but ill-fitting suit, sat between them, shifting uncomfortably under the pressure that radiated from the other side of the room.
The Commissioner cleared his throat, the sound snapping the room to attention. "This meeting," he said firmly, "has been called at the joint request of the Lu and Chen families to address the incident involving Miss Chen Yao." He tapped a file in front of him, photos attached, evidence documented. "The footage gathered from the public cameras at the scene," he continued, "confirms the assault committed by Miss Tong Meilin against Miss Chen Yao."
Yao's half-sister stiffened visibly at the name.
The Commissioner continued, his voice sharp: "Furthermore, evidence indicates that the assault was not provoked by any physical threat or illegal act from Miss Chen Yao. Witness statements confirm verbal harassment preceding physical violence." He paused, letting the weight of the facts settle in the room. Then he glanced up, his eyes cutting like knives toward Yao's father and stepmother. "Given the severity of the incident," he said, "and the public nature of the assault, charges have been formally filed."
The half-sister's lawyer opened his mouth to object, but one of the Lu family's lawyers spoke first, voice clipped and precise, "In addition to the criminal charges," she said, sliding a folder across the table with deliberate precision, "civil charges for emotional distress, defamation, and harassment have been filed in tandem."
"And," Chen Tao added coldly, his voice like ice sliding through the room, "we are moving to sever any remaining legal or financial ties between Miss Chen Yao and the individuals seated across from us."
The father sputtered, half rising from his seat, but Jinyang's hand tapped lightly against the table, drawing all attention. "I suggest," she said sweetly, voice razor-sharp, "you think very carefully before speaking."
The Commissioner leaned back slightly, steepling his hands in front of him. "This matter will be prosecuted fully," he said simply. "Miss Chen Yao has the full backing of both the Chen and Lu families and, given the public interest, the city has an obligation to act swiftly and decisively."
Across the table, Yao's father deflated slightly, sinking back into his chair, his face twisted with impotent rage. Her stepmother said nothing, her lips pressed into a thin, furious line. And Yao's half-sister. For the first time. Looked truly afraid.
Sicheng's hand found Yao's under the table, squeezing it once—steady, silent. Yao squeezed back, her face calm, unmoved. Because they could bluster. They could rage. They could threaten. But it didn't matter anymore. She wasn't standing alone. And they were about to learn exactly what it meant to try and break someone who had a family that would set the world on fire to protect her.
The silence around the table was suffocating, stretched thin and brittle like glass about to shatter.
Yao sat still, her fingers loosely entwined with Sicheng's under the table, her face calm, distant but inside, a small, deep ache twisted through her chest.
Across from her, Tong Meilin sat trembling with rage, her face blotchy, her hands curled into white-knuckled fists on the table.
The Commissioner began to speak again, ready to formally conclude the meeting—
When Meilin snapped and with a harsh scrape of her chair against the floor, she stood abruptly, her face contorted with venomous hatred, her voice slicing through the heavy air like a whip. "You think this makes you better than me, you bastard child?" she hissed, her voice sharp and ugly, the words spat out like poison. "You ruined everything!"
Everyone at the table went still, frozen at the sudden eruption.
"You stole it all from us!" Meilin shrieked, her face twisting into something almost unrecognizable. "Because of you, because of your whore mother and your disgusting blood, we lost everything! No Chen name! No inheritance! No status!" Her eyes blazed as she leaned across the table, pointing a shaking finger directly at Yao, her whole body trembling with fury. "You think you're better than us because you have them protecting you?" she spat, gesturing wildly to Jinyang, to Chen Tao, to Lu Wenhai and Lu Sicheng. "You're nothing! You're still the dirty, unwanted mistake my father never wanted!"
The room seethed with unspoken violence, every person on Yao's side of the table visibly tensing, but no one moved yet. They let her rant. Let her damn herself.
Meilin wasn't finished. "And you know what?" she sneered, her voice dropping to an ugly, taunting lilt. "I enjoyed every second of sleeping with Jian Yang. I laughed knowing it would gut you when you found out."
Sicheng's jaw tightened visibly, his fingers flexing against Yao's hand under the table, his entire body radiating lethal restraint.
"But it's fitting, isn't it?" Meilin pressed on, her voice rising again, shrill with hatred. "Because no matter how much you try to pretend you're one of them," She spat the words like a curse. "you'll never be worthy of someone like him. You'll never be good enough for the Lu Scion with your tainted blood." The final words hung there, heavy and cruel, slicing through the room like a blade.
Yao sat there, utterly still. Unmoving. Her face expressionless, her eyes dark and unreadable. But her hand…. Her hand squeezed Sicheng's once, tightly. Steady. Unbreakable. And when she finally spoke, her voice was low, cold, and devastatingly calm. "You're right about one thing, Meilin." Yao said, her tone cutting like glass. "We're nothing alike."
Meilin froze, her mouth snapping shut at the deadly quiet in Yao's voice.
"You chose to build your worth by tearing others down," Yao said, every word crisp and measured. "I built mine by surviving you." She tilted her head slightly, her gaze unwavering. "You lost everything because you believed cruelty would make you powerful. You thought you could break me." She leaned in just slightly, her voice dipping into something colder. "But I'm still here and you," she finished softly, "have nothing."
The silence after her words was absolute.
Crushing.
Lu Wenhai shifted slightly, his presence radiating a quiet, devastating finality. He placed both palms on the table, leaning forward slightly. His voice, when it came, was low, calm, and absolute. "If you or your family ever attempt to approach her again," he said, his words slicing through the room like a blade, "the Lu and Chen families will ensure you lose what little remains of your miserable existence." He let the words settle, cold and final. "No money. No protection. No future. Nothing." He straightened slowly, smoothing the cuffs of his jacket with casual, bone-deep authority. "You will be erased."
Yao's father opened his mouth, desperate to object but the look Lu Wenhai gave him froze him in place, silencing him with sheer force of will.
Jinyang stood then, smooth and deadly, her smile as sharp as broken glass. "And before you ask," she said sweetly, "yes. That's a promise."
The Commissioner tapped his pen once against the table, hard enough to make everyone jump. "This meeting," he said briskly, "is concluded."
The meeting adjourned with a final, heavy slam of the Commissioner's pen against the table. The tension didn't lift, it only sharpened, tighter and more volatile, the way a storm crackles just before it breaks.
Yao stood calmly, gathering her papers without hurry, her heart steady despite the venom she could still feel lingering in the air across the table.
Jinyang stood smoothly at her side, calm, composed, but every inch of her radiating a cold, silent readiness.
Chen Tao adjusted his cuffs without a word, his body angled just slightly to shield both women if needed.
Sicheng moved too, naturally, instinctively, keeping himself between Yao and any potential threat, his hand brushing lightly, protectively along her lower back.
They had barely turned to leave.
When it happened.
Tong Meilin, her face twisted into a mask of raw, desperate fury, lunged across the room. It was pure instinct. Animal. Rage and humiliation boiling over. She came at Yao like a viper, her hands outstretched, fingers clawed and vicious. But she never reached her.
Jinyang moved faster. Faster than anyone else in the room. Without hesitation, without a flicker of mercy, Jinyang grabbed Meilin's wrist mid-lunge, twisted it hard behind her back in a brutal, controlled movement that made Meilin shriek in pain. Before anyone could even blink, Jinyang slammed her half-sister into the cold tile floor with a hard, vicious thud, driving her knee firmly into Meilin's spine to pin her there. Meilin gasped, thrashing weakly, but Jinyang didn't move, calm, unshakable, her entire body weight pressing down with efficient ruthlessness.
Chen Tao stepped forward instantly, standing at Jinyang's back like a silent wall, his arms crossed, his eyes daring anyone to even think about interfering.
Sicheng shifted Yao behind him smoothly, wrapping an arm low across her waist to keep her out of reach as he stared coldly at the scene unfolding.
The Police Commissioner was on his feet in a flash, voice booming through the room with lethal authority. "Officer!" he barked toward the door. "Take her into custody—now!"
A uniformed officer stormed into the room a heartbeat later, cuffs already in hand.
Yao's father and stepmother immediately surged to their feet, protesting loudly,
"This is a mistake!"
"She didn't mean it!"
But the Commissioner didn't even glance at them. "Assault," he said flatly. "On private property. In front of multiple witnesses, including legal representatives and officers of the court." He leveled a cold, hard look at them. "Save your breath. You'll need it for the sentencing."
The officer hauled Meilin to her feet, none too gently, clamping the cuffs around her wrists as she shrieked and struggled. "You're hurting me!" she cried.
"You hurt yourself," the officer snapped, dragging her toward the exit.
As they passed the table, Meilin twisted her head back, her face contorted in fury, her voice ragged as she screamed: "This isn't over! You think you're safe behind them?! You'll always be nothing, you bastard whore!"
No one answered her. No one even flinched. Because her words had no power anymore. No weight. Not against the wall of loyalty, love, and strength standing around Yao now.
Jinyang dusted her hands off calmly, her face cool and composed as if she hadn't just dismantled someone twice her size in less than a second. Chen Tao gave her a small nod of approval. Sicheng turned slightly, checking Yao over carefully, silently making sure she was truly unharmed, his hand warm and steady at her waist.
The air in the conference room had shifted.
Not just tense.
Not just thick.
It had turned heavy, the kind of heavy that only came before something final, something irreversible.
Yao stood there, still as stone, watching as the officer dragged Meilin away, ignoring her shrieks like swatting away a fly. And when the door finally slammed shut behind them, cutting off the last of the noise, she inhaled deeply, slow and steady, filling her lungs with the air of a woman about to sever something for good. She turned then, her chin lifting slightly, her posture straightening until every inch of her radiated quiet, lethal finality. And she looked directly at her father. For the first time, truly looked at him. Not with the desperate hunger for acknowledgment she used to carry as a child. Not with the fractured hope she'd once buried deep. But with a cold, sharp-eyed clarity that cut deeper than any blade.
"You," she said, her voice low, calm, devastating, "are the worst disgrace I've ever laid eyes on."
The words snapped across the room like a whip crack.
Her father flinched, but Yao didn't stop.
She didn't give him room to breathe. "My mother," she continued, her voice tightening, trembling not with fear, but with fury so sharp it trembled just under her skin, "must have been drunk, must have been blind, to ever even think about sleeping with you."
The man's mouth opened slightly, but no words came out.
Yao pressed forward, her voice slicing through him like a scalpel. "You let the blame for your own filthy, pathetic mistakes fall onto a child," she said, her tone cold enough to burn. "You let your wife and your daughter spit on me, tear at me, and you stood there and did nothing." She took a step closer, her eyes burning into his with a fury so deep it felt sacred. "And you know what?" Her mouth curled into a smile, small, sharp, brutal. "I thank God every day that he took my mother when I was fourteen." Her father recoiled as if struck. "Because if she had lived," Yao said, her voice dropping to a deadly whisper, "she would have been disgusted by the man she once loved."
Absolute silence.
Even the Commissioner didn't move.
No one breathed.
Yao stared at the man who had once held the power to destroy her. And saw only a hollow, crumbling thing wearing the shell of a human being. "This," she said, her voice strong and unwavering now, "is the end. You are nothing to me. Nothing." She took one final step closer, standing so straight, so steady, it was as if the room itself bowed under the weight of her will. "If you ever come near me again," she said, her voice so quiet and full of promise it made the hair rise on every man in the room, "or my future children," She let the threat hang there, cold and final. "I will become a thing of nightmares for you." She turned her burning gaze briefly onto her stepmother, who shrank back in her chair, and then back to him, making sure he understood. "You and your pathetic wife can rot. And Meilin?" She smiled, sharp, pitiless. "I don't think she's getting out of prison anytime soon."
The silence that followed cracked something inside the room.
It was the sound of finality.
Of a door slammed so hard it would never be opened again.
From the head of the table, the Police Commissioner, who had sat rigid and silent through the entire tirade, slowly leaned back in his chair, clearing his throat with a dry, pointed cough. "I," he said gravely, "have suddenly gone very deaf."
One of the officers near the door snorted so hard he had to cover it with a fake cough, hiding his grin poorly.
Yao didn't wait for anyone's permission. She turned sharply on her heel, feeling Jinyang fall smoothly into step at her side, Chen Tao just behind her, Sicheng flanking her left, solid and unwavering. They walked out of that room together, heads high, backs straight. Leaving behind nothing but broken ghosts and shattered illusions. And for the first time, truly, fully, completely, Yao walked into her future free.
The moment they stepped outside into the crisp afternoon air, the tension of the meeting room seemed to fall away.
But inside Sicheng's mind?
It was chaos. He wasn't thinking about the bastard family they had just left behind. He wasn't even thinking about the lawsuit or the media fallout.
No—
His mind was caught, fully and helplessly, on one thing.
Future children.
Her words.
Spoken so naturally.
So fiercely.
So certainly.
Sicheng stared at the small figure walking just ahead of him, at the stubborn set of her jaw, the quiet pride in her shoulders and something primal surged inside him, swift and irreversible. Before he could stop himself. Before he could even think. The words exploded out of his mouth, "Marry me."
The group came to a screeching halt on the steps of the station.
Yao whirled around, her eyes wide as saucers, her mouth dropping open in shock. "I—what—?!" She sputtered, flushing brilliantly, her hands flailing a little as if trying to physically bat away the suddenness of it. Before she could form a coherent response….
Chen Tao moved. Fast. Silent. Deadly. He reached out casually, hooked two fingers through the back of Yao's jacket like picking up a stubborn kitten, and lifted her bodily back two steps, out of Sicheng's immediate reach. Yao squawked indignantly, her feet barely scraping against the pavement, but Tao ignored her protests completely, setting her gently behind him like securing precious cargo. He turned then, facing Sicheng with a look so cold, so stingy, it could have frozen magma. "Not happening, Lu." Tao said flatly, his voice calm but edged with steel.
Sicheng blinked, visibly thrown off for a half second.
Tao continued, unimpressed and utterly unmovable, "You haven't even presented her with your family crest yet."
There was a beat of stunned silence.
From behind them, Lu Wenhai sighed heavily, rubbing his temple like he was already composing a lecture he hadn't planned to give for another year. And he never thought it would be for this grandson…..but it appears he was wrong.
The three lawyers trailing behind them looked like they were trying very hard not to laugh, one of them coughing suspiciously into her sleeve.
Jinyang cackled. Loud. Unapologetically. Doubling over and slapping her thigh like she had just witnessed the greatest spectacle of her entire life. "I told you," she gasped between peals of laughter. "I told you! You can't just declare it like a damn conqueror, Lu Sicheng! There's protocol! And since you are the Lu Scion? You know better!"
Sicheng scowled, his mouth tightening into a stubborn line. He turned his burning gaze on Tao. "I was going to." he growled, low and dangerous.
Tao arched one unimpressed eyebrow, his arms folding across his chest like a fortress. "Not good enough." he said smoothly. "Present the crest. Make it formal."
Yao, peeking out from behind her brother's broad frame, was still bright red, her mouth opening and closing without a single word managing to escape.
Sicheng shifted slightly, clearly calculating the fastest way to get around Tao without starting a public brawl that would end up on the front page of every gossip outlet in China.
Jinyang snorted again, tossing her hair back with an infuriatingly smug grin. "Rules are rules, Chessman." she teased sweetly.
The sound Sicheng made in his throat was half a growl, half a promise. Because one thing was now carved in stone. She had said future children. She had already placed herself in the future with him without even thinking. And he would move heaven and earth, burn every outdated protocol, if that's what it took. But he was claiming her. Properly. Permanently. Soon. Very, very soon. And judging by the way Yao was still wide-eyed and frozen, cheeks flaming, heart pounding against her ribs like a trapped bird. She knew it too.
Later that night, the base buzzed with the chaotic, barely contained energy of a camp after a siege. Dinner had been a noisy, messy disaster, no one able to look at Yao and Sicheng without snickering or whispering behind their hands.
And it was entirely Jinyang's fault. Because, true to her nature, the moment they returned to the base, she had flounced into the main lounge, dropped onto the couch like a queen returning from battle, and loudly announced: "Guess who blurted out a marriage proposal like a love-drunk idiot the second we got outside the police station?"
The boys had frozen mid-bite.
Yue had choked on his drink, pounding his chest as Pang howled with laughter.
Lao Mao just sat back, covering his mouth to hide the rare grin breaking across his face.
Lao K did not look surprised as he just sighed.
Rui, standing behind the counter with his tablet, calmly adjusted his glasses and said without looking up, "Knew it."
And Tao, calm, terrifying Tao…. Had gone into full-blown Papa Bear mode. He had taken up residence next to Yao for the entire evening, one arm thrown casually over the back of her chair, posture loose but eyes sharp, tracking every move Sicheng made with the kind of silent, heavy disapproval usually reserved for men caught trying to steal sacred treasures. At one point, when Sicheng merely glanced in Yao's direction, Tao had very calmly leaned forward, rested his chin on his hand, and asked, "Presented the family crest yet?"
Sicheng's answering glare could have set water on fire.
Yao, mortified beyond reason, had buried her burning face in her hands and refused to participate in the evening any further.
Sicheng endured it. Endured the teasing. Endured the ridiculous, gleeful chaos swirling around them. Because he knew. It didn't matter. The teasing would pass. The chaos would fade. But what mattered. What lasted. Was sitting right across the room, curled up with Da Bing and looking at him with a soft, shy sort of wonder that told him she hadn't run. Wouldn't run. Not from him. Not from them . Still, he wasn't leaving it to chance. Not again. Not ever.
That's how he found himself later that night, locked away in his office with only the dim golden glow of the desk lamp illuminating the room. He sat there, silent and focused, the soft creak of the leather chair the only sound. In front of him, a small velvet box sat on the desk. He reached out, slow and deliberate, and flipped it open.
Inside, nestled in dark velvet, gleamed the Lu Family crest, handcrafted in pure silver and accented with deep, rich platinum threads, carved into the shape of a roaring dragon intertwined with a single blooming lotus.
Power and resilience.
Legacy and rebirth.
It wasn't just jewelry.
It wasn't just a token.
It was everything.
The box had been prepared months ago, long before either of them had admitted aloud what had been growing between them.
Because Sicheng knew. He had always known. And now, with the memory of her voice still ringing in his head— future children —he knew it was time. He reached out and brushed his thumb lightly over the crest, feeling the cool, heavy weight of it beneath his fingertips. His mouth tilted into a small, rare smile—sharp and certain. Soon. Not today. Not rushed. Not as a demand shouted in the heat of protective fury. But as something steady. Something sacred. Soon, he would give her this.
He would place it into her hands, place it around her neck, and she would know. Truly, irrevocably. That she belonged. That she was loved. That she was his. And that nothing—nothing—would ever break what they had built. Not blood. Not past wounds. Not the world. Only them. Forever.