Chapter 45
“The last time we met, she told me that her parents happened to be away on a business trip and only she and Liu Sheng were at home.”
Xu Chengxuan explained his concerns to Gu Xiyu, who had just changed into the clothes Lu Ziqing had brought him and was now sitting by his bed, packing his things. He had been lying in the hospital bed for a few days, and his health was basically fine, so he planned to be discharged.
Xu Chengxuan added: “But this kind of situation is actually very common. Mianmian’s parents are busy office workers, and I didn’t see anything special happen during the week, so I didn’t think much about it at first.”
Moreover, she had asked for leave, so he thought Lin Mianmian was just sick. He didn’t visit her directly and only sent a few messages because he knew that Liu Sheng did not like him. He also did not like the older brother, who seemed to have some thoughts about Mianmian, and the two knew that they were love rivals.
Liu Sheng’s outward image gave off the impression that he was a gentle person, not like a dangerous person who would do something ridiculous, so Xu Chengxuan wasn’t worried at first. When he sent a message to Mianmian, she would send him back a few emojis, but then he suddenly stopped hearing from her.
The more he thought about it, the more uneasy he felt, so he couldn’t resist asking Gu Xiyu this question.
“Then let’s go to Mianmian’s house and take a look before we go home.” Gu Xiyu had also sent several messages to Lin Mianmian but received no reply.
On the way to Lin Mianmian’s house by car, Gu Xiyu asked his system, [Do you have any way to detect the heroine’s movements?]
[Like what?]
He paused and said helplessly, “Her location, safety, and so on?”
[I don’t think so.]
“Then what exactly do I need you for?”
The system explained calmly, [Assisting you with your mission doesn’t mean giving you direct assistance. Think about it: if I could help you with everything, then your boss would have just sent me over; why would they need to use you?]
After listening to this, Gu Xiyu actually felt that it made sense and could not refute it.
The intelligent system was probably a mascot to relieve worries and boredom.
They soon arrived at Lin Mianmian’s place. As they passed Xie Chunhua’s door, he took a moment to check on her, but she wasn’t home. She had recently found her life too leisurely and couldn’t stay idle, so she planned to go back to running her little stall. Gu Xiyu couldn’t stop her, so he agreed, telling her not to work as hard as before and to just pass the time.
Gu Xiyu rang the doorbell of Lin Mianmian’s house.
He remembered that Liu Sheng had no class at this hour, but he might not be home.
Sure enough, no one answered, no matter how long he rang the doorbell. But even if Liu Sheng had stayed at the school library or gone elsewhere, Mianmian, who had taken a leave of absence, would still be home, so it was unlikely that no one would come to the door.
They couldn’t just barge in without permission, so Gu Xiyu took out his phone: “I’ll send a message to Liu Sheng or call him and ask where he is now.” He wanted to inform the latter that they were worried about Lin Mianmian’s condition and had come to visit.
There was no immediate response after the message was sent, and although Xu Chengxuan was worried, he could only go home first and wait. Gu Xiyu was about to go back to Xie Chunhua’s house with Lu Ziqing to have a seat when he suddenly heard the sound of something falling to the ground from inside Liu Sheng’s house.
Xu Chengxuan and Lu Ziqing seemed unable to detect the sound coming from the room given that the doors and windows were closed. He glanced at their reactions and realized that he seemed to be the only one who heard the movement.
“Wait.”
Gu Xiyu paused for a moment, and when he opened his mouth again, he sang a melody in a low whisper and asked Xu Chengxuan, “Do you hear it?”
Not long after something fell over, he heard this very soft music coming from inside. It was certain that there was someone inside.
The phone held in his hand vibrated, and it was Liu Sheng’s reply.
Liu Sheng: [I’m not home yet, I’ll talk to you when I get home [smile].]
He pursed his lips, meaning that the person at home was not Liu Sheng.
Xu Chengxuan suddenly said, “…… I’ve heard it before, it’s from a music box I gave Mianmian for her birthday a few months ago.”
Their first thought was not what Liu Sheng had done to Lin Mianmian, but rather that she might be too sick, and it just so happened that her brother Liu Sheng was not at home and an accident happened.
The moment Xu Chengxuan thought of this possibility, he immediately started kicking the door. Gu Xiyu and Lu Ziqing had no choice but to help him. With Gu Xiyu’s strength, the sturdy door was soon kicked open. They soon found Lin Mianmian leaning against the door of some room. She was wearing a pale yellow nightgown and was uninjured; it was just that she looked weak and didn’t even have the strength to speak.
They eventually took Lin Mianmian to the hospital.
“She’s in good health; she has no symptoms of fever, cold, or cough; she’s just a bit weak and not very stable emotionally. She probably hasn’t eaten much in the past few days. I gave her some glucose, and an IV, let her rest for a while, and then she can be picked up and taken home.”
Gu Xiyu saw off the doctor before returning to the ward with the silent Lu Ziqing.
Xu Chengxuan was standing by the bedside, and buried in his arms was a crying Lin Mianmian with her arms wrapped around his waist. She was weeping and trembling.
Lin Mianmian raised her head when she heard the movement, and as if she saw a lifeline, she begged him with red eyes, “Xixi, I ……I don’t want to go home; can you help me?”
Gu Xiyu: “You have to first tell us what happened.”
Then they learned that Lin Mianmian was not sick at all, Liu Sheng had gotten the leave for her, and then she was locked in the house and forbidden to go out.
Lin Mianmian sat on the bed with her legs folded and buried her face in her knees, crying, “That night, when Xixi fell unconscious and was sent to the doctor, my brother discovered I had sneaked out in the middle of the night to look for you, and that I had come back home with Chengxuan. He got angry and locked me in my room, not letting me go out, saying that you would only affect me and that he didn’t want me to have any more contact with you.”
The bigger trigger was when Liu Sheng was arguing with her and he accidentally found a subtle mention of her small thoughts about Xu Chengxuan in her diary. He became completely furious, and then he did something irrational. Lin Mianmian was forcibly placed under house arrest, and it was only after arguing with him that she learned that her brother, whom she has adored for years, actually has other thoughts about her.
All she could remember was the horrible look on Liu Sheng’s face that night; he was like a sick villain.
He still spoke in the same gentle voice and tone as she remembered: “Mianmian, don’t be fooled by the men out there.”
“They all have ulterior motives for you. Guys as filthy as them will only defile you.”
“Brother loves you and only wants to protect you. If you still insist on hanging out with them, don’t blame brother for taking it upon himself to get rid of all those eyesores and scum.” Liu Sheng whispered those words as he played with the pen knife in his hand, scaring her so much that her mind went blank at that time.
Liu Sheng confiscated her phone and computer and took away all the tools she had to reach the outside world. He would bring her food regularly at first, but when she took advantage of the time he came to deliver food to push him down and try to escape, he cut the daily portion of food and said angrily: “It seems you shouldn’t be allowed to get too strong.”
It was only then that Lin Mianmian reacquainted herself with the true nature of her half-brother, whom she had spent so many years with. Seeing that she was getting weaker by the day, Liu Sheng no longer worried and was quite in the mood to calculate the day when their parents would return.
“Xu Chengxuan sends you messages every day and always looks at me with a strange, annoying look.” The expression on Liu Sheng’s face was always one of disgust when he mentioned Xu Chengxuan.
It was probably because Xu Chengxuan’s questioning made him feel uneasy, so the morbid Liu Sheng changed his mind.
He wanted to die with Lin Mianmian.
“If living is an obstacle to us being together, then perhaps we can reach that goal through another form.” Liu Sheng always caressed her face and said to her in a gentle tone, “I have the drugs ready. As soon as Mianmian leaves, Brother will follow.”
“Mom and Dad will be happy when they come back and see the two of us finally together.”
Lin Mianmian wiped the tears that kept welling up at the corners of her eyes as she reminisced, devastated and aggrieved, “Every time I discussed sick and handsome villains with my friends, I would think such characters were actually cool, only to realize that it’s a horror story when it happens in reality!”
What made her even more devastated was, “Brother Liu Sheng was particularly gentle before; he was as warm as the wind, why did he turn out to be like this ……”
Gu Xiyu was just as shocked as she was, after all, he didn’t suspect that Liu Sheng would have such a side either.
If everything was really as Lin Mianmian said, then the problem was much more serious. Apart from taking care of Lin Mianmian’s health, they also had to consider her safety. Liu Sheng was now an unstable and dangerous person, and it was likely that even Xu Chengxuan and his family, including Gu Xiyu and Xie Chunhua, with whom he had come into contact, were in danger.
The best way to deal with this at the moment was to naturally seek help from the police. They made a case based on Lin Mianmian’s story and some evidence she could provide. Liu Sheng came to the police station himself, but after that day, he suddenly disappeared.
This made everyone feel even more uneasy.
Lin Mianmian’s parents returned home early after receiving the news, and Liu Sheng’s biological mother, who was Lin Mianmian’s stepmother, blamed herself for not noticing he was growing up psychologically distorted because of her and Liu Sheng’s father’s negligence.
To prevent Lin Mianmian from being hurt, they temporarily took her back to Father Lin’s hometown. Xie Chunhua, who lived alone, temporarily took up residence in the Lu family home after obtaining permission from Lu Mingren.
Gu Xiyu gave up the room he was sleeping in: “It’s okay, Ziqing and I are both boys, and the bed in his room is quite big, so I can squeeze in with him.”
Xie Chunhua was still hesitating, “How can that be okay? ”
Lu Ziqing nodded earnestly, saying, “Brother is very thin; he won’t squeeze me. It’s no trouble.”
Lu Ziqing, who hadn’t been able to play much of a role and had only watched from the sidelines as they dealt with things, hadn’t expected that, in a roundabout way, he would become the biggest profiteer of the whole matter.