She selected a few packs of sanitary pads that were on sale and was about to leave when her phone rang. She hurriedly fumbled for her phone in her bag.

“Hello, is this Miss Jian Shuning?” an unfamiliar female voice asked.

“Yes, it’s me.”

“Miss Jian, this is the emergency room. Your mother was just injured and brought in…”

Her mother was injured? Jian Shuning was shocked and quickly asked, “Which hospital are you from? How did my mother get injured?”

“Taipei Chang Gung Hospital.”

“Taipei Chang Gung?” Jian Shuning was confused. “But my mother should be abroad right now.”

A few days ago, her mother had called to say she and her father were going on a company trip to Macau for three days and two nights. She thought they should have left by now.

“We’re not sure about that. Her injuries are quite serious. We found your number in her phone’s contact list.”

“What about my father? Wasn’t he with my mother?”

“A kind passerby brought her in. We don’t know the details. Please come to the hospital immediately.”

“Okay, I’ll be right there!”

Jian Shuning hung up the phone in a panic. She didn’t understand why her mother had suddenly come to Taipei or how she had gotten injured and sent to the hospital.

She urgently looked for Zheng Yuanxi, but he had disappeared. She went to the kitchen items section and looked around but didn’t see him.

She anxiously called his phone, but it went straight to voicemail. Was his phone off?

Thinking of her mother lying helplessly in the hospital, covered in blood, she couldn’t stay calm any longer. She abandoned the shopping cart and rushed towards the exit of the supermarket.

Zheng Yuanxi ran into Du Qingshuo.

Neither of them expected to bump into each other in such a place, and they both laughed.

“I came to buy some daily necessities,” Du Qingshuo said, pointing to her shopping cart. “What about you?”

“I’m here with that girl, Shuning,” he replied naturally.

“Shuning is here too?” Du Qingshuo smiled brightly. “No wonder! I was thinking, how could a man like you come to a place like this!”

Zheng Yuanxi smiled elegantly, appreciating Du Qingshuo’s graceful figure and confident demeanor—this was the kind of woman he admired, beautiful and ambitious.

“Shuning said she wants to go for ice cream after shopping. Would you like to join us?” he invited.

Du Qingshuo immediately agreed.

The two of them walked back together to find Jian Shuning, but she was nowhere to be seen, leaving behind a half-full shopping cart.

Zheng Yuanxi recognized the shopping cart as theirs. “Where did Shuning go? Why did she leave the cart here?”

“Maybe she went to look for you somewhere else?” Du Qingshuo guessed. “Why don’t you give her a call?”

Zheng Yuanxi frowned and took out his phone, only to find that it was out of battery. He felt frustrated. “Forget it, let’s wait for her here. If she doesn’t show up, we’ll go for ice cream by ourselves.”

Du Qingshuo looked at him with a teasing smile. “You won’t worry about leaving her behind like that?”

“She’s not a child anymore. Do I have to follow her every step of the way?” Zheng Yuanxi said casually.

Du Qingshuo smiled and said nothing more.

Jian Shuning jumped into a taxi and rushed straight to the hospital. Upon arriving at the hospital entrance, she jumped out of the car and hurried inside like a frightened rabbit.

Suddenly, an arm reached out and grabbed her tightly.

She was startled and turned around in shock.

The person who grabbed her was a young man who looked even younger than her, with a clean and youthful appearance, still carrying the innocence of a college student.

“Zhang Zicheng!” she exclaimed.

“I finally found you,” Zhang Zicheng said, staring at her intently, his eyes burning with a strange, intense light.

Jian Shuning was almost breathless under his gaze. “You… how did you get here?”

“I asked a lot of people and secretly followed your mother. I finally overheard her talking to a neighbor about you coming to Taipei and changing your phone number,” he paused, a dark smile playing at the corners of his mouth. “That phone call just now was a setup.”

“What?!”

“Taipei is so big. If I didn’t trick you into coming to the hospital by saying your mother was injured, how else could I find you?”

She had been fooled!

Jian Shuning suddenly realized what had happened. She had found it strange that her mother would come to Taipei out of the blue. Even if she did come, she should have notified her first…

“Let go of me!” she cried, trying to break free from the young man in front of her.

Zhang Zicheng refused to let go and pulled her even tighter, dragging her out of the hospital to a secluded area nearby.

“Zhang Zicheng! What do you want? Let go of me!”

“Don’t be nervous. I just want to talk to you.”

“But I don’t want to talk to you…”

“Why?!” Zhang Zicheng became furious at her rejection, shaking her shoulders violently. “I like you so much and treat you so well. What are you dissatisfied with? Tell me, and I’ll change!”

“It’s not that you’re not good. You don’t need to change anything. It’s just that… we’re not suitable for each other… Zhang Zicheng, please calm down.”

“I am calm. Don’t be afraid. I won’t hurt you. I just like you. Do you know how much I love you?”

As he spoke, Zhang Zicheng leaned in, his hot breath on her face making her skin crawl.

“Don’t do this. Let go of me…”

“I like you,” he said softly, his eyes filled with a twisted affection. “I said I won’t hurt you. Why won’t you listen?”

He tried to kiss her, his intention clear, causing her to scream and struggle desperately.

“Don’t move! Don’t move!” Zhang Zicheng’s arms were like iron locks, holding her tightly.

“Let go of me! Let go of me!” She kicked and punched, biting his arm fiercely until he bled.

Zhang Zicheng’s eyes turned red with rage, and he roared, pinning her to the ground.

But before he could do anything, someone grabbed him by the collar and lifted him up like an eagle snatching a chick, then delivered a series of hard punches, leaving him dazed and disoriented.

He was so stunned that he couldn’t even see who was hitting him, his hands covering his face as he tried to dodge the blows.

“Who… who are you? Why are you hitting me?!”

An icy voice thundered in his ears—

“I am Jian Shuning’s brother! Don’t touch my sister, or I’ll make you regret it!”