Incurable Chapter 41 Part 1

Chapter 41 (1/2)

The atmosphere in the main hall fell into silence.

Holding Mu Wan’s hand, Liu Qianxiu withdrew his gaze as if it meant nothing. He glanced once at the suddenly quiet Shen Cheng, then at Mu Qing, who was frowning as she stared at him and Mu Wan. His lips pressed into a thin line.

“If nothing else can threaten the two of you,” he said, “then I’ll use the future of both your families as leverage.”

His tone was calm. Standing there with that faint, indifferent expression, he looked as though he were merely making idle conversation.

Shen Cheng had no idea how much Liu Qianxiu had heard. The moment those words fell, cold sweat broke across his back. Mu Qing was still clutching his arm, but Shen Cheng loosened her grip and forced a smile, his eyes unsteady.

“Mr. Liu, that isn’t what we meant.”

“It makes no difference whether you meant it or not,” Liu Qianxiu said. “Keeping the Shen family intact or wiping it out would only take a word from me. It isn’t troublesome.”

The instant he said it, the expressions on the other three people in the hall changed.

Yan Mei had never seen a scene like this before.

The circles she knew were made up of decaying little families, much like the Mu family itself. Only after Mu Qing got together with Shen Cheng did the Mu family finally manage to cling to a higher branch. Over the past few years, the Shen family had been counted as an upper-class family in Xiacheng. At the very least, now that she could mention Shen Cheng as her future son-in-law, people let her win at mahjong and held goods back for her when she went shopping. Those were all privileges of status she had never enjoyed before.

In the end, once people had food, clothes, and comfort, what they fought for was face.

She had thought she had finally entered high society. Thought she had finally held her head high.

But the Shen family, which she had always thought powerful, was nothing before a truly powerful family—their rise or fall could be decided with a single sentence.

That world was beyond her reach. It was so far above her that even looking up at it felt audacious.

And Mu Wan had somehow entered it.t

Fear rose in Yan Mei first. Then resentment. But when she looked toward Mu Qing, what showed on her face in the end was surrender.

The struggle between Mu Qing and Mu Wan—or rather, Mu Qing’s one-sided struggle against Mu Wan—had already reached its conclusion.

She had lost.

And there was no chance left to turn things around.

Mu Qing stared at Liu Qianxiu, standing there stiffly, the arrogance she had worn moments ago gone without a trace. Even now, she still could not quite believe that what she was seeing was real.

After the brief storm of changing expressions, everyone settled into stillness again.

Liu Qianxiu finished speaking, turned back to Mu Wan, and said in that same calm voice, “Come on. Weren’t you going to introduce me to your mother?”

“Oh,” Mu Wan said softly.

She withdrew her gaze, her fingers winding around his, and did not spare another glance for the people still standing in the main hall. The fear that had knotted her heart only moments before—fear that they would move her mother’s grave—had already ebbed away. Holding Liu Qianxiu’s hand, she left the Mu residence with him.

The sky, clear for most of the day, gathered clouds again toward evening. The dark mass of them hung low, heavy and oppressive, until finally they could no longer hold and rain began to fall. It came down hard, crackling like something breaking inside a dream.

Inside the main hall, the atmosphere remained dead and still.

The three of them stood where they were. Yan Mei looked from Mu Qing to Shen Cheng. Shen Cheng sat in his chair, staring out at the rain pouring off the eaves, every line of his face tight. Mu Qing, meanwhile, looked as if her body had been hollowed out. She stood rigidly upright, eyes empty.

No one knew how long had passed.

The rain did not stop. The ground darkened and soaked through.

Mu Qing stared at the moss clinging to the white wall and said, “I’m going to destroy her even if I have to destroy myself.”

Bloodshot veins spread through her eyes. Her voice, when she spoke, sounded almost beautiful in a chilling way.

“I’m moving that grave, no matter what. If she ruins me, I won’t let her live well either.”

If it meant living under Mu Wan’s shadow for the rest of her life, then she would rather burn the whole thing down.

Her tone was almost peaceful, her face eerily composed. There was no trace of a joke in it.

Alarm flashed through Yan Mei’s eyes. She looked at Mu Qing, about to persuade her—but Shen Cheng’s reaction startled her before she could speak.

“Have you lost your mind?” Shen Cheng asked with a cold laugh, one arm braced on the chair arm.

Mu Qing’s jaw tightened. She turned toward him, her eyes vicious and absolute. “Then let me be insane. In what way am I inferior to that little bastard? In what way? Why, why—”

“Mu Qing!” Yan Mei cut in sharply.

But Shen Cheng had already understood her meaning.

Pain passed through him. Looking at her, he laughed once and said, “What? You think I’m not as good as Liu Qianxiu? You think I’m beneath you now?”

The smile on his face was cold and terribly sincere.

A chill ran through Mu Qing’s back, and she froze.

She had nothing left anymore. If Shen Cheng broke with her too, then she would truly be finished.

“I didn’t mean that,” Mu Qing said weakly. Then, looking at him, her eyes dry and brittle, she asked, “Then are you really willing to just let him crush you like this?”

“What does it matter whether I’m willing or not?” Shen Cheng snapped, the first real violence in his tone since he had known her. “He’s the head of the Liu family. Liu Corporation is only one small part of what he controls. Our Shen family only grew this big by relying on Liu Corporation in the first place. Forget me—even my brother, my aunt, my uncle, all of us live or die at his word.”

Compared to ordinary people, their lives already stood worlds apart.

If they had stayed quietly in their own corner and learned contentment, their lot would still have been enviable. But the problem was that they had seen a larger world. Beyond every sky there was another sky. Compared to the lives of those people, they were nothing.

Mu Qing had lived her whole life with her pride held high. In every circle she moved in, she was the center because her status outstripped theirs. She enjoyed being looked up to. She wanted to trample Mu Wan’s humble little pride into mud.

But Mu Wan had not remained mud.

Through one man, she had climbed to a branch above them all and become a phoenix, looking down.

Mu Qing could endure being looked down on by anyone else.

But not Mu Wan.

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