Chapter 7: A New Game, a New Player

After the party, Master Qiao called Wanzhao into his study alone. He looked at his daughter for a long time, his expression complicated.

“You’ve changed,” he said. It wasn’t a question.

“I’m just learning to see more clearly,” Wanzhao replied. “The things I should have seen long ago.”

She set before her father a plan to restructure the textile company, separating it from the group’s shared management system and placing it under her direct control. It was legal, and no one could take it from her with petty lies anymore.

Master Qiao read every page in silence and finally signed. Not out of pity, but because, as a seasoned businessman, he understood the value of someone who could stand on her own through real ability.

Outside the study, Shen Yifeng was waiting with a proposal for a partnership between the two companies. Not in the name of an arranged engagement, as in the original story, but as a meeting between equal partners.

“Last time, Miss,” he began, “you said not everyone wants to sit quietly while others decide their fate. So today I’ve come not as anyone’s fiancé, but to ask you directly: would the Second Miss like to work with me to turn those strange coincidences in the textile business into a deal that benefits us both?”

Wanzhao looked at him, a confident smile curling her lips, the smile of someone who had learned to rewrite her fate with her own hands.

“Yes,” she said. “But this time, let me read the contract before I sign. Not because I don’t trust you, but because I’ve learned a valuable lesson: the one who knows the rules best is the one who never becomes a pawn.”

Outside, the city of Jiangshi glowed as it did every night. But in the Qiao mansion, from this day on, the game had a brand-new player.

— THE END —