“Child, what are you talking about? What do you mean by being against or not against…”
The farmer’s wife looked flustered, as if she wanted to say more, but the middle-aged man beside her quickly covered her mouth.
“Child, we never intended to disturb you. We just wanted to see how you’re doing. Now that we see you’re well, we can rest easy.” The middle-aged man spoke, his gaze toward Liu Anran filled with nostalgia.
Liu Anran couldn’t shake off a sense of wrongness.
If they were acting, it was a little too intense—almost as if they’d forgotten it was just an act.
“I’ll ask again—how did you two learn anything about me?”
“It was the director of that old orphanage who told us. Back then, we had to leave you behind, but now that things have settled down at home, we wanted to bring you back. We just didn’t expect you would be so…”
The man couldn’t even find the words to describe Liu Anran now.
“The old director?” Liu Anran paused. “So he told you my current location, and you came looking for me?”
After finally settling down, Liu Anran had indeed visited the old director.
But he hadn’t said whether he was in school or working; he only mentioned he was doing well, and didn’t plan to disturb the director’s peaceful life.
He had left his address, and told the director that if there was any trouble, he could come to him anytime.
But it wasn’t the old director who came. Instead, it was this couple who claimed to be his parents.
As for why they were only ‘supposedly’ his parents…
Back then, there were so many children left at the orphanage. The old director, who had never seen the children’s parents, how could he be so sure Liu Anran was their child?
“So tell me—does your child have any birthmarks or something similar?”
The two murmured to each other for a while before finally coming up with an answer: “It’s been too long, but if I remember right, there should be a mole on the inside of the left wrist.”
Liu Anran nodded after hearing this, then pulled up the sleeves of his suit, exposing both wrists.
Fair, strong, with faint veins beneath the skin.
Even after removing his watch from his left wrist and holding it up for them to see, there was no mole to be found.
Visibly, the hope faded from the faces of the middle-aged couple.
“I understand how difficult it must have been for you to gather the courage to search for your child, but things rarely go as one wishes.” Liu Anran had already realized their real story when he heard about the old director.
Most likely, someone gave them the director’s information to find him, but on the way, they ran into someone who wanted to mess with him and decided to send the couple over, waiting to see some drama.
It was normal—if Liu Anran faced a rival, he’d probably do the same.
After all, it was a low-cost gamble. If you won, you’d get quite the advantage. If you lost, at least you’d make the other person miserable.
“Do you remember who sent you on the way here?” Liu Anran looked at the couple in front of him.
“He didn’t tell us his name, just brought us here and told us to dress up as cleaners so we could see our child.”
The couple was clearly more uncomfortable than before.
“Well, since we made a mistake, we won’t disturb—”
“No rush, you can rest here for a bit.” Liu Anran tapped his desk. “I’m a businessman, and I’d like to discuss a deal with you.”
“I’m just an ordinary farmer. I don’t know business.”
“What’s wrong with being a farmer? I respect farmers a lot, so I won’t trick you. You only have to do one thing, and I can guarantee your livelihood for some time, and help you find your real son.”
As Liu Anran spoke, he took a black pen from the holder on his desk.
Then, he raised his left wrist and drew a black dot on it.
He wasn’t looking at his own wrist, nor at the couple in front of him, but at the phone on his desk.
Liu Xie had sent her a new message.
It was a photo of the basketball court, noisy because the basketball game was about to start.
After the photo came Liu Xie’s message.
[If we lose today because you’re not here, you’d better be ready to commit seppuku.]
There was no way he could let Liu Xie know about this, or she’d easily see through him.
He really had to wrong his dear sister a little this time.
Of course, Liu Xie could never find out about this. Even if Liu Anran didn’t hide it, even if it was right in front of her, Liu Xie probably wouldn’t notice.
Right now, Liu Xie was still watching the makeshift basketball team as a new match was about to begin.
“You know, there’s something odd I noticed from the very first game—it keeps getting weirder.” Zhu Niao pointed at the scoreboard and the crude little table by the court. “Didn’t your brother sponsor the event? Why does it still look like this?”
“Maybe the sponsorship went into the prize money,” Liu Xie shrugged.
Ye Qingchang pushed her glasses. “Actually, I think it went into the pockets of the leaders.”
“Hey now, comrade, you shouldn’t say things like that.”
On the court, both teams had gathered together. Gou Yu stepped forward, and the other side sent out their tallest player.
As expected, Gou Yu won the jump ball and tossed it to Xiao Yi’an.
Then, just like in the last game, Xiao Yi’an organized the play through his own movements, while Gou Yu and Xu Nian made sure nothing went wrong on offense.
They were missing Liu Anran, their steady scorer, but fortunately Xiao Yi’an was almost as good as a replacement.
With that, they steadily pulled ahead. As long as Xiao Yi’an could keep up, victory was within reach again.
But this time, the opponents were clearly quicker to react than last time. Realizing Xiao Yi’an was the core, they started relentlessly pressuring him.
Normally, it would have been manageable.
But when Xiao Yi’an went up for a layup by himself again, a huge shadow loomed up from behind—something ominous.
The ball was blocked from behind. The hand hit his own, even struck his face.
Clutching his eye, Xiao Yi’an felt sharp pain, a ringing in his ears, and a blur in his right eye.
The other player feigned concern, apologizing as he tried to help the injured Xiao Yi’an.
He was used to handling pain alone—he always had been.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Gou Yu grabbed the guy who’d fouled Xiao Yi’an. “Can’t win, so you start playing dirty?”
Xu Nian walked over, his usual smile fading as he swept his gaze across the rest of the opposing team.
Oh desr.