Chapter 22
Chapter 22: The Mysterious Contact
It was something from a long time ago—something Jiang Xu Lin never spoke of. Not to anyone. Not even his sister.
Five years had passed, and he still couldn’t forget.
“Xu Lin,” his mother’s voice had said over the phone, urgent and shaking, “take Zheng Xue and leave South City immediately. Something happened. We—”
Bang.
The sentence was swallowed by a massive crash, like the world itself had roared.
That day, the police called.
A car with the license plate Nan A7451U had flipped off a cliff. The driver and passenger died on the spot. The police were still working on recovery.
That day was Jiang Xu Lin’s twenty-first birthday.
There had been an ornate cake in front of him. Candles. His sister singing the birthday song, cheerful and off-key.
And then, in the span of one call, he no longer had parents.
Three days later, the police returned a phone. It was the only thing his parents left behind.
There was one message inside—unsent, failed to send.
“No matter what happens, please remember: Mom and Dad love you.”
The deepest grief in the world wasn’t sobbing.
It was when you couldn’t even cry.
He lied to his middle-school sister. He told her their parents had been invited by a professor at the World Non-Tangible Heritage Center to work on a huge project, and they’d be gone for a long time.
His sister believed him.
He forced himself to believe it too, because the alternative would have crushed him.
But when he graduated and received his first paycheck, he wanted to buy a cake to celebrate.
And in that moment, he realized—
Mom and Dad weren’t coming back.
You could want to repay them, but they wouldn’t be there to receive it.
The world was that cruel.
Back in the present, Jiang Xu Lin jerked his head up. He spoke slowly, each word hard. “How do you know all of this?!”
Ye Wan Lan looked at him. “From you.”
“In the Time Loop,” she continued evenly, “events are fixed. But I can choose where I go, who I meet, what I investigate. I can take different roads and pull out different truths.”
The words struck like a match to gasoline.
Rage surged through Jiang Xu Lin. He lunged, fist slicing through the air, sharp and lethal as a tiger’s claw.
Ye Wan Lan shifted slightly and avoided the blow with ease.
He threw another punch, then another.
Ye Wan Lan didn’t retreat. She stayed steady as a mountain. With only one hand, she blocked every attack, calm and controlled, as if she’d seen all of it before.
Thud.
She pinned him to the wall, one palm pressing his chest. Her voice was flat. “Are you calm now?”
“You don’t understand what I’m dealing with!” Jiang Xu Lin’s breath came fast, his nerves screaming. “How can you say that so casually?”
His fist clenched, knuckles whitening. “I’m telling you—even if you had a hundred lives, it wouldn’t be enough. You’ll die!”
The darkness behind that crash was deep enough to swallow a person whole. Alone, he couldn’t fight it.
Yes, the trail had broken in River City—but the real problem was that he didn’t dare dig deeper.
He could risk his own life.
But he still had to protect his sister.
Ye Wan Lan didn’t get angry. Her expression remained quiet, almost gentle.
“No,” she said. “You’re wrong.”
She looked straight into his eyes.
“The ones who die will be them.”
The words were calm, but they carried a force that made his breath catch.
Jiang Xu Lin stared at her, shaken despite himself. “Who… what are you?!”
“An ordinary person,” Ye Wan Lan said, and for the first time she smiled a little, “here to do business with you.”
“Ordinary?” Jiang Xu Lin watched her for a long three seconds, then gave a low, humorless chuckle. “Fine. But you have to agree to one more thing.”
He inhaled hard. “My sister is entering her final year of high school. You make sure she gets into a top university.”
Ye Wan Lan nodded once. “No problem. I’ll get her into Yun Jing University.”
Yun Jing University—the top-ranked school in Shen Zhou.
Jiang Xu Lin ground his teeth. “Worry about yourself first.”
As if he didn’t know she’d dropped out in tenth grade. Middle school education, and she was talking about Yun Jing University?
She was dreaming.
He wiped sweat from his forehead and forced himself to focus. “Talk. What else do you want?”
“I like working with smart people,” Ye Wan Lan said lightly.
Then, as if stating a fact everyone already knew, she added, “Your aunt is Quan Zhao Ning. Director of Zhao Yan Group. I need you to take me to see her.”
Jiang Xu Lin’s expression froze. “How do you know that?”
He had never exposed his relationship with Quan Zhao Ning to the outside world.
“You told me yourself,” Ye Wan Lan replied, unhurried.
Jiang Xu Lin fell silent.
For a second, he honestly wondered if he’d met a lunatic who had escaped from a psychiatric ward.
In the end, he forced the words out. “Fine. I’ll contact her. But whether she’s willing to work with you isn’t up to me.”
Ye Wan Lan looked out the window, voice unexpectedly soft. “I should have found you four years ago.”
Jiang Xu Lin lifted a brow. “Then why didn’t you? How old were you four years ago?”
He snorted. “A kid. You think I would’ve met you?”
For once, Ye Wan Lan didn’t answer.
She stared into the dark beyond Little Gold Mountain, eyes reflecting something older than her face.
Jiang Xu Lin raked a hand through his hair, frustrated. “Fine. Don’t tell me.”
She was a mystery. And now, more than ever, he needed to find out exactly who Ye Wan Lan was.
The wind stirred. Leaves rustled down.
The night had no stars. Even the moon was hidden.
Little Gold Mountain looked more sinister than ever. The racers had all gone, leaving the mountain to its silence—
Except for Yan Ting Feng, still leaning beneath a tree.
“Young Lord,” Bing He said quietly as he appeared at his side, nearly soundless, “more than one group is investigating Miss Ye’s information. Do we need to interfere?”
“No,” Yan Ting Feng replied.
It almost sounded like he smiled. “She can handle it.”
Bing He blinked. “By herself? Can she really—”
“Shh.” Yan Ting Feng lifted a finger to his lips, his tone turning lazy and cold at once. “You’re blocking my moonlight.”
A chill crawled up Bing He’s spine. He stepped back without another word.
After years at Yan Ting Feng’s side, Bing He still couldn’t read him.
One moment the man could be calmly watching petals fall. The next, he could be drinking alone in the rain.
A madman, through and through.
Bing He worried about Ye Wan Lan. The people digging into her weren’t gentle. They were coming hard.
But maybe… maybe she really could handle it.
What was she?
Bing He couldn’t make sense of it. In the end, he crouched down and distracted himself by poking at ants.
—
On her way home, Ye Wan Lan’s phone lit up with a new chat.
Neptune: More than one person is investigating you.
The avatar was Neptune’s symbol—a trident.
Ye Wan Lan’s expression didn’t change.
YN: I know.
Neptune: I cut off your important information.
YN: Let them investigate.
Neptune: What happened these past four years? Why didn’t you contact us?
Ye Wan Lan lowered her lashes.
YN: Something happened.
Neptune: Need help?
YN: Not for now.
Neptune: If anything happens, contact me.
The icon went dark—offline, or invisible.
At 2:30 a.m., Ye Wan Lan returned to the Lin Family without a sound.
The lights switched on.
Someone was sitting on the sofa, waiting.
Ye Wan Lan stopped.
Xu Pei Qing looked like she’d been there for a long time. Her voice was calm, her eyes cold. “Why are you back so late?”
Ye Wan Lan closed the door behind her. “Aunt, you’re still awake?”
Xu Pei Qing’s gaze sharpened. “You went to see Zhou He Chen again, didn’t you?”