Chapter 152
Chapter 152
Ning Mingyue left the backstage area almost trembling from head to toe.
She had to find out. She absolutely had to find someone and ask what was going on!
“Are you blind- Is there something wrong with your eyes?” Fu Zhi blurted out after Ning Mingyue, dazed and unsteady, bumped into him. The words “Are you blind?” had already reached the tip of his tongue.
But out of the corner of his eye, he caught sight of Xie Lanchen and swiftly changed it into the more refined, “Is there something wrong with your eyes?”
Not cursing people out was impossible. Turning into that prim and proper, nauseating version of Xie Lanchen was even more impossible.
But in order to keep getting along well with Ning Xi, Fu Zhi decided that from now on, he would curse people with a little more class, inching bit by bit toward the type Ning Xi might like!
Even after being scolded, Ning Mingyue merely lifted her head and glanced at Fu Zhi on instinct. Then, like a wandering ghost, she continued walking outside.
No one else paid it much mind.
Only Fu Zhi watched Ning Mingyue with a suspicious look.
Not far away,
Ning Mingyue called Father Ning with trembling hands, but no one picked up.
She then called Father Ning’s assistant, stressing that she had something extremely important to discuss.
Only after quite a while did Father Ning call her back.
Because of their earlier argument, Father Ning was rather displeased with Ning Mingyue.
He had always known his daughter was cold and ungrateful.
Back then, after Shen Yibai’s biological mother passed away and his inheritance rights became uncertain, Father Ning had still been considering whether to continue the marriage agreement with the Shen Family. But nine-year-old Ning Mingyue had already come to him and said in her clear, childish voice,
“I don’t want to marry Shen Yibai! If he can’t become the heir of the Shen Family, he’ll just be a pauper in the future. I don’t want to marry a pauper! Whoever wants this engagement can have it. I don’t want it anymore!”
“Nonsense!” Father Ning had reprimanded Ning Mingyue, but at the same time, he had gained a new understanding of his daughter.
How could a nine-year-old child, who should have been innocent and carefree, say something like that?
She was selfish and cold to the extreme.
In the end, however, Father Ning still agreed. Using Ning Mingyue’s poor health as an excuse, he sent his only daughter overseas.
His thoughts pulled away from the memory.
Father Ning’s voice over the phone was authoritative and distant. “What is it?”
Ning Mingyue no longer had the energy to care about Father Ning’s cold attitude. Her voice was somewhat dry.
“Dad, has anyone in the Shen Family ever died from some kind of genetic disease?”
Father Ning frowned. “Why are you asking that?”
Ning Mingyue asked again, “Then have you heard anything about Shen Yibai’s company investing in some genetic disease project?”
“How would I possibly know anything about Shen Yibai’s company?”
At the mention of this, Father Ning felt no small amount of dissatisfaction.
When Ning Xi and Shen Yibai had been engaged, Shen Corporation’s relationship with the Ning Family had been very close.
However, after Ning Mingyue interfered in their relationship, Shen Corporation had clearly become more distant from them.
Looking at it that way, it might have been better to let their adopted daughter, Ning Xi, marry Shen Yibai in place of their biological daughter.
“Dad.” Even swallowing and speaking were difficult for Ning Mingyue. “Can you help me look into whether Shen Yi… whether the Shen Family has any history of genetic illness?”
“…”
After hanging up, Ning Mingyue walked back in a daze, utterly lost.
If the Shen Family had a history of genetic disease among their ancestors, then in her previous life, had Shen Yibai died young because of some genetic illness?
Was that why he had been reborn around the same time as her?
Ning Mingyue’s lips turned pale. It was as if a bucket of cold water had been dumped over her head, leaving her wretched and disheveled.
If that was really the case, didn’t it mean she had still lost to Ning Xi in this life?
How laughable. Shen Yibai hadn’t wanted Ning Xi to know he had a genetic illness, so he had deliberately used Ning Mingyue to make Ning Xi give up on him?
No.
All of this was only her speculation.
Maybe she was overthinking it. Maybe Shen Yibai hadn’t been reborn at all. Maybe that so-called genetic disease was merely one of Shen Corporation’s medical investment projects. Maybe Shen Yibai truly had once wanted to be with her…
Ning Mingyue’s mind was in utter chaos.
She didn’t notice and bumped into someone standing not far behind her.
“Fu Zhi?”
Ning Mingyue was startled. Her first reaction was, “What are you doing here?! Are you following me?”
Fu Zhi let out a cold laugh. “What, is your name written on this piece of land? You’re the only one allowed to come here?”
Ning Mingyue was rendered speechless.
She carefully studied Fu Zhi’s expression. He looked the same as usual-arrogant, overbearing, and extremely hard to mess with. It didn’t seem as if he’d heard anything, so she merely took a deep breath and left in a huff.
…
Meanwhile.
After Shen Yibai finished his shadow puppet performance, he received twenty votes from the audience.
The Program Team had only invited two hundred audience members. As the first of the guests to appear onstage, Shen Yibai had already achieved a very high number of votes.
Ning Xi looked like she’d eaten shit.
Who on earth had voted for that completely made-up nonsense plot?!
Step forward, every last one of you!!!
With her explosive temper, she would definitely make sure they could just act like nothing had happened and let the matter pass just like that!!!
Ning Xi fumed in a tiny rage.
Watching Ning Xi puff up with anger, Shen Yibai suddenly flashed back to middle-aged Ning Xi’s speechless, stifled expression when she heard Innocent Childhood.
It was exactly the same as the Ning Xi before him now.
That was his Ah Ning. The Ah Ning who had gone from being his young bride to accompanying him all the way to the final end of his life…
Shen Yibai didn’t dare think any further.
He forced himself to look away and thought of Dr. Musk’s call from earlier.
“Mr. Shen, the genetic disease you mentioned is indeed quite rare. There are no cases of a complete cure anywhere in the world.
“There is good news: as it happens, my teacher’s team has been researching a new gene therapy technology. If it succeeds, it could cure this rare disease.
“The bad news is that the technology is not yet mature. The success rate is only ten percent.
“Can you accept that?”
Ten percent!
That meant he had a ten percent chance of surviving!
Shen Yibai’s heart, which had been like stagnant water, rippled once more.
His long-parched, lifeless soul seemed to sprout a tiny green bud.
It brought the slightest sweetness to his bitter, despairing heart.
A tiny hope of life.
After being reborn, he had done everything he could to avoid the path from his previous life and keep his distance from Ning Xi, all because he didn’t want the tragedy of that life to repeat itself.
If heaven had decreed that they were destined to part, then in this life, rather than have her love him, it would be better for her to hate him.
After all, hatred was always easier to let go of than love.
Even if he died in the future, Ning Xi wouldn’t feel too much. At most, she would be sad for a while.
She wouldn’t have to be like she had been in their previous life, giving up her entire career to accompany him through treatment after treatment, knowing full well it was terminal yet still encouraging him again and again that he could be cured, only to end up watching helplessly as her young lover died right in front of her…
A heartache, sharp and bitter, instantly drowned Shen Yibai’s heart.
He closed his eyes. When he opened them again, he was once more that calm, indifferent Shen Yibai, without much emotion to speak of.
The second to go onstage was Jiang Sheshe.
Although the young miss was usually a bit dramatic, a bit stupid, and a bit brainless…
She really did sing beautifully.
As Ning Xi listened to the little tune, her mood turned cheerful again.
Until Jiang Sheshe finished performing and came offstage. She walked up to Ning Xi all mysteriously and revealed the lines written in black pen on her palm.
“Look, I was worried I’d forget my lines during the skit later, so I specially made a cheat sheet! Leave it to me, and don’t worry!”
Ning Xi: …
Forget it. If she spoke too loudly, she might scare the lines Jiang Sheshe had finally managed to memorize right out of her head.