"Zeng Xiaoxian! Open this door right now, I need to talk to you!" Hu Yifei slammed her fist against the door of Suite 3602, the wood rattling violently in its frame.
Instead of the cowardly radio host answering, the door of Suite 3601 across the hall creaked open. Lu Zhanbo stumbled out, rubbing his bloodshot, exhausted eyes. "Sis... what are you yelling at Teacher Zeng's door for?"
"Where is he?" Yifei demanded, crossing her arms. "He hasn't answered his calls all morning."
"Teacher Zeng left the day before yesterday," Zhanbo replied with a blank yawn. "Didn't you know?"
"What?!" Yifei froze, her breath catching in her throat. Stepping forward, she seized Zhanbo by his collar, hoisting him onto his tiptoes. "He left? Without saying a single word to me?! What kind of stunt is that coward pulling?!"
"He... he came looking for you!" Zhanbo stammered, raising his hands in panic. "He agonized over it all afternoon! But you were locked away in that private gym with your phone switched off. He begged me to pass the message to you, but with Wanyu leaving for Milan, I was so miserable... I met a couple of guys at the bar, drank for two days straight, and completely blacked out! I forgot all about it until this second!"
"You absolute waste!" Yifei shoved him back in sheer fury. Pulling out her smartphone, she redialed Zeng Xiaoxian's personal line, only for a detached, automated voice to inform her that the number was permanently out of service. "Did he say anything else?! Where the hell did he go?!"
"The broadcast network leadership selected him for an international exchange," Zhanbo recalled, grimacing. "He said it was a massive promotion to Central Asia, but he couldn't make up his mind without your advice. He waited around for an entire day, but when you didn't show up, he signed the dispatch papers and boarded the flight."
A frantic call to Shanghai Television confirmed the bitter reality. Under a bilateral cultural initiative, the network had dispatched a foreign correspondent to Turkmenistan for a three-year diplomatic broadcast exchange. For Zeng Xiaoxian, accepting a hardship post in an unstable desert territory with scarce communications meant a guaranteed executive leap upon his return. Torn between his unspoken feelings and career ambition, her absence had tipped the scale. He had signed the agreement and vanished beyond the reach of standard cellular networks.
"They're gone... every single one of them is gone," Yifei whispered, the phone slipping from her fingers as her knees buckled, slumping against the cold corridor wall. In less than six months, the lively warmth of the apartment had completely vanished.
"Sis... please don't be sad..." Zhanbo ventured awkwardly.
"Sad? Who the hell is sad?!" Yifei snapped, leaping back to her feet. She swiped a sleeve across her face to conceal the stray tears before her brother could register them. "Good riddance! It's finally peaceful around here! Go back to sleep, you drunken idiot!"
She kicked Zhanbo back into Suite 3601 and slammed the door shut. Standing alone in the hollow hallway, staring at the darkened threshold of 3602, a cold finality settled into her chest. 'Humans only stay where warmth remains,' she realized bitterly. 'Without them, this place is nothing more than a lifeless concrete box.' Adrian Li's offer of the vacant luxury flat near her university suddenly felt like her only path forward.
Across the city in the subterranean lounge of Mansion No. 1, Adrian leaned back on a leather armchair, taking a slow sip of vintage wine as his eyes appraised the newly delivered pair standing under guard.
"Zhuge Dasheng... and little Zhuge Dali, I presume?"
Zhuge Dasheng immediately shifted her posture, pulling her young daughter behind her back. Her sharp, analytical gaze swept across the opulent room before locking onto Adrian with fierce professional defiance. "Who authorized this abduction? Do you realize that unlawful detention constitutes an aggravated felony under state law—especially when perpetrated against a licensed officer of the judicial court?!"
"A licensed officer of the court?" Adrian chuckled softly, waving two fingers toward Nan Xiang.
Nan Xiang stepped forward, presenting a slim digital tablet displaying the morning's leading entertainment headlines:
Prominent Defense Attorney Zhuge Dasheng Implicated in Judicial Treason: Suborning Perjury to Shield Foreign National Against Domestic Child Star Xiao Lei Ge.
"No... this is impossible!" Zhuge Dasheng's face drained of color as she scanned the fabricated public outrage.
As a divorced mother struggling against systemic prejudice in Shanghai's legal arena, she had staked her reputation on defending Sekiya and Tang Youyou against the extortion schemes of child star Xiao Lei Ge. She had gathered clear forensic evidence proving the child's alleged injuries were staged. Yet during yesterday's private hearing, every single defense witness had abruptly recanted on the stand, falsely testifying under oath that Zhuge Dasheng had bribed, blackmailed, and coerced them to protect an overseas client.
Before she could file an emergency appeal, the bar association had suspended her credentials, state-aligned media had branded her a pariah, and plainclothes operatives had intercepted her outside the courthouse. Looking down at her trembling daughter, Zhuge Dasheng felt an icy realization take hold: the legal system hadn't suffered an error—a hidden power had rewritten reality entirely.