The open-air zoo rustled gently as the breeze passed through the green leaves lining the path.
The girl’s naturally sweet voice, like a delicately aged wine, lingered in Su Liumeng’s ears, replaying again and again.
She was quietly savoring the moment, even secretly giggling in her heart—until an abrupt and utterly unwelcome voice shattered the ambiguous mood between the two of us.
“Young Miss, is there anything you require?”
The zoo director, a man in his forties or fifties with a visibly weathered appearance, bowed repeatedly in front of Su Liumeng, his tone full of deference.
He was someone trained and raised by the Su family.
Within the Su family’s rigid hierarchical system, if you benefited from the privileges that came with the Su name and still held a position provided by them, then you were expected to follow certain unspoken rules without question.
The conversation came to a screeching halt.
I hurriedly stepped back to put some distance between Su Liumeng and myself.
Su Liumeng, on the other hand, was fuming on the inside.
She wished she could march right over and give that damn fool a good kicking.
Seriously—was he here to ruin things?
Of all the times he could’ve shown up, he picked the exact moment when something was just about to happen between us.
Was that deliberate?
She had been this close to leaning in and sealing my lips with hers.
So close—only for it all to fall apart.
Now that I was already feeling a bit shy, I obviously wasn’t going to continue the previous topic.
The worst part was, the oblivious idiot stood there like some kind of broken record, repeating over and over like a parrot:
“Young Miss, do you have any instructions?”
The Su family’s personnel were trained to carry out their duties with robotic precision.
Most of the time, they were like emotionless machines.
“Get lost,” Su Liumeng snapped.
She was never the type to hold back and cursed right on the spot.
“As you command, Young Miss.”
The director bowed again, expressionless, and quickly vacated the area.
Watching the exchange, I couldn’t help it—a laugh burst out of me with a soft pfft.
Amusing.
Way too amusing.
It wasn’t like I had never been a part of the Su family myself.
I understood better than anyone just how stifling that atmosphere could be.
And maybe because I understood it so well, now that I stood as an outsider, I just couldn’t help but laugh out loud.
Su Liumeng had been sulking a moment ago, but when she saw me bending forward, covering my lips, practically shaking with laughter, she couldn’t hold it in either.
She cracked a genuine smile.
“Fun, isn’t it?”
“Of course.”
I wiped away the tears that had come from laughing.
“The Su family is like a giant furnace—you throw anyone into it and they stop being human.”
Looking back on more than a decade of my life there, it was all fighting or getting ready to fight.
Every day was lived inside a rigid structure someone else designed.
There was no room left for normal emotions like joy or sorrow.
“I managed to jump out of it. Alone, finally free.”
“You… when did you leave the Su family?”
I suddenly remembered something and quickly corrected myself, “Ah—right. I almost forgot you’re Su Tianji’s biological daughter.”
“Heh.”
Su Liumeng looked at me and smiled softly.
“I’ll never leave the Su family. Whether I’m his daughter or not…”
“Huh?” I blinked in surprise.
“Why not?”
Su Liumeng’s gaze lingered on my face for a long moment.
The answer was right in front of me.
“I’m not telling you yet.”
She didn’t want to spell it out.
At least not before she had actually done anything.
She didn’t want to make big promises in front of me without backing them up.
She tugged my arm and smiled sweetly.
“Let’s go. Didn’t you say you wanted to feed the tiger? Just follow me.”
It was a newly arrived Siberian tiger, still adjusting to the zoo.
The moment it saw us, it began drooling excessively.
I tried to explain to Su Liumeng, saying it was drooling at the food in my hand.
“You really think I don’t know what that beast is thinking?”
Su Liumeng snapped, “Animal!!”
She gave a cold snort, and for a brief second, it felt like a golden light flashed through her eyes.
The entire zoo echoed with a faint yet chilling dragon’s roar.
The tiger suddenly began trembling uncontrollably, crouching down with its front paws flattened to the ground.
Su Liumeng picked up a slab of meat and tossed it in front of the tiger, barking again, “Eat when you’re told! What are you making all those ridiculous expressions for?”
This was classic Su Liumeng—her way of solving problems was always direct and forceful.
Even if her intentions were good, her methods could still leave you with a stomach full of frustration.
I, however, was long used to this. I just crouched down gently, patting the big tiger’s head.
“Eat up, eat up. Everything’s okay.”
Upon hearing my voice, it finally lifted its head just a little, then clamped its jaws around the chicken and swallowed it down.
Ever since I got pregnant with this little ghost fetus, I’ve been overflowing with maternal instincts.
Whenever I see a cute little animal, I get this uncontrollable urge to feed it by hand.
The girl crouched down, gently murmuring sweet nothings to the tiger.
In Su Liumeng’s eyes, it was a moment of perfect serenity—so peaceful it felt almost wrong to disturb it.
Ding-a-ling-ling.
The phone in Su Liumeng’s bag began to ring.
She glanced at the screen, and her expression subtly changed.
“I’m going to take this call,” she said.
In a secluded corner of the zoo, away from prying eyes, Su Liumeng stared at the message from an unknown sender, her face growing darker by the second.
【Si Xinyan. That name sounds familiar. Is she related to your brother?】
【I’m guessing—not a stranger, right?】
【Pretty sure the Su family has no idea about this.】
She nearly crushed the phone in her hand.
It wasn’t surprising that someone could figure this out.
In fact, it was almost inevitable.
There were only two things you’d need to make the connection:
First, you’d have to be familiar with her North Qing classmates.
Second, you’d need to have in-depth knowledge of the Su family’s internal affairs.
The number of people who fit both criteria was vanishingly small.
Only one person came to her mind.
Meanwhile, I left the feeding area and, as I turned a corner, unexpectedly ran into someone I didn’t expect to see.
Su Yi.
She was still dressed in plain clothes, her face wearing that same peaceful, detached-from-the-world smile.
I instinctively stepped back—just two paces and my back was against the cold stone wall.
“What are you doing here?”
Su Yi clearly noticed the wariness in my eyes.
Her expression flickered—was that a hint of hurt?
“Let me guess,” she said softly, “Su Liumeng told you to stay away from me, didn’t she?”
“Ask yourself honestly. Have I ever harmed you? Haven’t I helped you more than once?”
“The one who tried to hurt you—Qing Yi—I’ve already locked her away in the Kunlun prison.”
I had never told anyone the real reason she frightened me.
It wasn’t anything she’d done—no overt threat, no cruelty.
It was a deep, instinctual sense, a sixth sense that whispered she was dangerous—inherently dangerous, the way a beast might be.
“Thank you.” I clutched the hem of my dress tightly.
At least in this moment, my tone was sincere.
Suddenly, Su Yi clutched her head as if in intense pain.
She stumbled away from me, her steps unsteady and disoriented.
“Beware of Li Mei.”
And just like that, Su Yi disappeared again—swift as a shadow.
I stood there, her final words echoing in my mind.
Li Mei.
“Is there something I should be careful about with her?”
Su Liumeng was standing right behind me, silently staring.
When I turned around abruptly and saw her, I nearly jumped out of my skin. Annoyed, I snapped, “What are you, a ghost now?”
She was sniffing the air—picking up the lingering scent of a third person.
Someone had been here.
Someone who had been alone with Si Xinyan for at least three minutes.
Her gaze darkened. “Who were you talking to just now?”
The content of the text message still weighed heavily on her mind.
I remembered how she had warned me to stay away from Su Yi.
If she found out I had just spoken with her, it would definitely cause unnecessary misunderstanding.
Since I didn’t have a bad impression of Su Yi, I decided to tell a harmless lie.
“Just a passing tourist.”
“Is that so?” Su Liumeng suddenly smiled.
“What a coincidence.”
What I said made her almost want to tell me directly: to visit the zoo today, she had arranged in advance to close the entire park—there shouldn’t have been a single random visitor.
Her fist slowly clenched.
“Mm, probably just a passerby,” she said with a calm smile, helping me cover the lie.
She didn’t push further, and I quietly let out a breath of relief.
We walked side by side down the path between two sections of the zoo.
“Xiaoyan,” she broke the tense silence that had settled between us, “do you want to change your name?”
“If you change it, it’ll sever all ties with your past. No more flaws, no more risks.”
“Change… my name?” I stopped walking.
“Sure. Honestly, I should’ve done it from the start.”
“So… what should I change it to?”
“Anything,” Su Liumeng replied.
“It’s just for paperwork. A name to register on your ID. Privately, we’ll still call you the same.”
“Alright.” I agreed without hesitation.
She nodded and excused herself, heading in the direction of the restrooms.
But once she was out of my sight, she turned into the monitoring room of the zoo.
Taking a deep breath, she forcibly calmed her emotions and opened the surveillance footage.
On the screen, a familiar figure in plain clothes appeared—standing beside Si Xinyan.
“Su Yi!” Su Liumeng’s heart filled with fury.
Her lips moved as she softly muttered the name.
Then she closed her eyes.
No words could describe what she felt in that moment.
Bang—
Suddenly, she exploded in rage and smashed the screen in front of her with a punch.
Should she be angry?
Should she confront Si Xinyan face-to-face and demand an explanation—ask her why she lied, why she had agreed to be with her and still met with Su Yi in secret?
But in the end, all the fury and heartbreak swirling in her chest condensed into the sound of her deepening breaths.
She needed to stay rational.
No matter what, as long as it involved Si Xinyan, she had to stay clear-headed.
Their fragile relationship couldn’t withstand even the lightest storm.
She was an adult now.
She wouldn’t behave like a mad dog, biting and lashing out blindly.
Staring at the bloodstains on her knuckles, her lips slowly curved upward into a chilling, unnatural smile.
“You really… almost got me there.”
“Well done, Su Yi. Bravo.”
Given Su Yi’s cautious nature, if she really wanted to meet Si Xinyan in secret, she would never have let herself appear on a camera.
Once she realized this, everything made perfect sense.
Su Yi did it on purpose.
She wanted her to see.
She wanted to drive a wedge between them.
“Trying to trap me?”
As the saying goes: ‘When the Tao grows a foot taller, the demon grows ten feet stronger.’
Su Liumeng sneered coldly.
“Fine, I’ll remember this grudge.”
How had she survived all these years?
If not for her razor-sharp instincts and thinking sharper than a blade, she would’ve been devoured by those people long ago—down to the bones.
She calmly calculated how long she had been gone and began wiping the blood off her hand with a composed expression.
Right now, she didn’t blame Si Xinyan in the slightest.
She understood the enemy’s game.
If she let her anger turn toward Si Xinyan, wouldn’t that mean she fell right into their trap?
When it came down to it, whatever had been said between the two must’ve been part of Su Yi’s scheming.
It wasn’t Si Xinyan’s fault.
The enemy was simply too cunning.
And besides—Xinyan was just a girl, only eighteen.
Getting fooled occasionally was perfectly understandable.
Su Liumeng soothed herself quickly.
Though…
When she remembered how Si Xinyan had lied to her just moments ago, saying it was “just a passerby,” there was still a sour ache in her heart.
As if Si Xinyan still saw her as someone to guard against—as someone unworthy of being trusted.