Atlas Studios

  Atlas Studios

  What had happened five years ago?

  Zhuang Nainai was stunned, but she also knew clearly that if she didn’t remove that thorn in her heart, her wound would never heal.

  Now calm, she quietly looked at Si Zhengting and nodded her head.

  Si Zhengting began slowly. “With regards to the university application form, I never once thought that I would have to go overseas.”


  Zhuang Nainai, puzzled, raised her head to look at him. He explained, “At that point in time, I was ill……”


  When he spoke up to here, he paused, his expression showing that he’d become upset.

  After taking the college entrance examinations, he had a disagreement with Ding Mengya over whether to study at a local university or an overseas institution.

  Ding Mengya had told him not to ruin his studies over a woman and that, if he was really unable to let Zhuang Nainai go, he could bring her overseas as well.

  In fact, going overseas together would have been the best option, but Zhuang Nainai had Mother Zhuang to take care of. How would she possibly agree to going overseas with him?

  Seeing his lack of confidence in the relationship, Ding Mengya had spoken further to agitate him. “If she really likes you enough, why wouldn’t she be willing leave the country for your sake?”


  That had made Si Zhengting waver.

  Going overseas was something every successor to the Imperial Group had to go through, and he had enjoyed every bit of the superior life that the Imperial Group had given him. Hence, he had to take up this responsibility.

  With that, on one of the times he had spoken to Zhuang Nainai over the phone, he had gently brought up the topic.

  The two of them had fought bitterly over it, and it had been the worst fight they had. Possibly due to their young age at the time, unsure of their futures and full of emotion, Zhuang Nainai had simply slammed down the phone while crying.

  That had been the first time she had not picked up his phone call. Anxious, he had run to the street in front of her dingy little house; his haughty personality had made him unwilling to apologize to her, but he had also been equally unwilling for them to continue fighting.

  So he had stood in the street, waiting for her like how it had been in the past. Every time they had fought, less than half an hour would pass before she would start talking to him again. He had imagined how, this time, he could surprise her by telling her that he was at her door.

  But an hour passed, and she still had not called back.

  Two hours passed, and there had still been no call from her.

  It had then begun raining, drenching him from head to toe. Unable to resist any longer, he had walked to her house and knocked on her door, only to realize that she had not been home all along.

  Feeling his head grow dizzy, he had collapsed on the bed upon reaching home.

  The moment he — he who had been healthy his entire life — had fallen ill, the illness had been serious.

  It hadn’t been a grave illness, but he had a high fever that had refused to subside, as well as a lung infection. That had made him sleep groggily in the hospital for a few days.

  It was only much later on that he realized that he had not paid his cell phone charges, and his cell phone services had stopped.

  He had then realized that Ding Mengya had softened after seeing the state he had been in.

  She had then called Zhuang Nainai to test her and to see if Zhuang Nainai had been really someone worth changing his life for.

  If he were to stay and study in a local university, he would have had to work harder to gain the recognition of the elders in the Imperial Group. Without the halo of having studied overseas, he would probably not be respected by them; this education issue would forever be his weakness in front of them.

  The pain of seeing the state her son had been in had made her do the only thing against her conscience: she had gone to test Zhuang Nainai.

  She had failed the first time, so she had tried a second time.

  Unexpectedly, Zhuang Nainai had taken the money on the second attempt.