"Girl, I made some corn and pumpkin congee, do you want some?" Zhang Meizhen bustled around the kitchen, then poked her head out to ask Gan Qing. She saw that Gan Qing was sitting by the side of her bed, her face expressionless, an opened envelope on her knees. She looked like she wanted to pour a glass of water but when her hand was extended halfway, she suddenly seemed to not want it anymore and drew her hand back into her sleeve. Zhang Meizhen asked curiously, "What is it? Who sent it to you?"

"Boss Meng." Gan Qing's eyes shifted around, like a statue that had just come to life. She casually put the letter away and stood up and stretched her body. After lying down for a day, her joints creaked and popped. "Meizhen-jie, you were saying?"

"I was asking you if you want some corn and pumpkin congee…"

"Sure," Gan Qing readily agreed. "Add some milk and I can eat the entire pot."

Zhang Meizhen was still a little doubtful. "Tianyi? He's just a couple of streets away. If he shouts, we can hear him. Why did he post whatever that is to you for no good reason?"

"It wasn't sent from his place." Gan Qing rummaged through the pile of medicine Yu Lanchuan had bought for her and found a medical face mask. She put it on and said in a muffled voice, "Old Meng secretly took my I.D. and registered me for the gaokao for self-taught students. These are things sent over from the exam center. Ai, Meizhen-jie, just look at how mischievous this precious nephew of yours is. If you have the time, can't you do something about him?"

Zhang Meizhen couldn't help but feel that this little lady was secretly taking advantage of Meng Tianyi. "What did he register you for this time?"

"Still accounting and finance." Gan Qing had her back to her. She pulled on an outer garment. "I don't know if he has a wrong understanding of accounting and finance, or a wrong understanding of me—let me teach you how to make it tasty, don't add water to pumpkin—when I was in senior high, in the maths paper for liberal arts students, my best record was answering up to the second question from the back, and I only managed that once."

"Oh, that's much better than Tianyi." Zhang Meizhen followed her guidance to deal with the pumpkin. "In his first year of primary school, Tianyi scored thirty-two marks in his maths test. From then on, he had always worshipped people who dealt with numbers. Even the counting dogs in circuses were among the list of candidates for the position of his idol."

Gan Qing was clearing her throat and choked on a breath, coughing until she felt like dying. "Such… cough… extraordinary talent."

Even the wonderkid from downstairs, Han Zhou, had supposedly reached Year 3 before he started failing.

"He did start a little young." Zhang Meizhen sighed, her face full of regret. "That kid Tianyi had always been precocious."

The two of them fell silent for a couple of seconds, then laughed in unison.

Zhang Meizhen asked suddenly, "What… did you originally wanted to study?"

If what you had gotten was not "Paper B," if you were the daughter of an ordinary family, if your growing up years had been ordinary, if you had sat for the university entrance exams, if you had graduated and started working…

Gan Qing leaned against the kitchen door. More than half her face was hidden by the mask, revealing no clues.

"I've never thought about it properly." After a while, Gan Qing finally opened her mouth to speak. "I probably belong to the type who comes out of the exams and sees a dark future, then draws lots to choose which universities to try when it's time to apply. I remember that my English was still okay, my maths was pulling me down and the other subjects were just average. I probably would apply for a language-related field of study."

People who studied language-related fields, what did they do after graduating?

She had never had the time to learn about that.

Becoming a translator or an editor, or working for some multinational company or international liaison division to deal with international partners… or perhaps doing something completely unrelated. Becoming like those weary-faced little white collar workers working from nine to five, not really daring to think of buying a house and a car, her only hobbies outside of work being going home and cooking. Hastily changing channels the moment she noticed the television broadcasting a foreign-language program to save the trouble of Wei Xiao asking her again, "Can you understand that? Come, translate for me without looking at the subtitles."

After graduating and starting work, if there was someone who wasn't her colleague pursuing her, she would definitely be very happy. It could satisfy her vanity and was also the best recipe for an ordinary life that followed the normal convention. Even if her boyfriend was busy with work and couldn't go on dates with her, it would be fine. She was a homebody anyway. But that old man Wei Xiao probably wouldn't be happy. Ever since that man got old, even though he wasn't competitive, there was a bit of a rigid obstinacy in his bones. He might not be happy with her finding a young man whose income was a lot higher than hers because he knew that she was lazy and capable of doing nothing but eating and waiting for death, and would probably not make anything of herself in her entire life. He would be afraid that as time went by, the other person would dislike her.

As Gan Qing thought on, she suddenly smiled.

Zhang Meizhen glanced at her.

"Nothing." Gan Qing waved. "I just suddenly had a thought that even if I get accepted to a university, I probably won't be earning much more than I do now… By the way, Meizhen-jie, how's Old Sect Leader Yang?"

Zhang Meizhen paused. "I don't know. He's still in the ICU. Family visiting hours are limited. We have to wait for his doctor to give us concrete information on his condition."

"Those whose emergency treatment takes a long time mostly turn out alright in the end," Gan Qing comforted her with this very unscientific statement. "If..."

"We've been neighbours for so many years now. Of course, I'm hoping for the best for him," Zhang Meizhen cut her off. "If what? Back then, if the two of us had gotten together regardless of everything, we might be sick of each other by now and might not get along as well as we do now as neighbours. When I think about it calmly, I realise that Yang Qing and I were not people of the same path in the first place."

Sect Leader Yang was old-fashioned and introverted. His reputation and his principles were more important to him than anything else and he could not let others find fault with anything he did.

Zhang Meizhen was the exact opposite. Her actions departed from convention, she was wilful and headstrong, and she did everything as her heart pleased.

Even if Old Yang gave up Beggars' Sect for Zhang Meizhen back then or if Zhang Meizhen gave up her dignity entirely and completely betrayed Travellers' Sect, and the two of them had gotten together, they would have not a small amount of fights and disputes in the later decades, and might not necessarily have been happy.

That was indeed true. Love between a man and a woman could not solve all problems, no matter how earnest they were.

"When a person lines up, they would always feel that the other line is faster. When a person remembers the past, they would always feel that if they had picked a different path at certain points, their fortunes would be reversed. That's how people are. In actual fact, we're just consoling ourselves. No matter what you chose, you are still you. How much better could you be than the way you are now?" Zhang Meizhen said in a very carefree tone. "Look, you said so yourself. Even if you followed the flow and went to university, you might not be better off than you are now."

Gan Qing's gaze fell on the pot where the corn and pumpkin congee was bubbling slowly over the low heat. Weighed down by the extra eyelid folds that her cold gave her, her gaze was a little dim.

A warm and sweet smell rose in the air, spreading through the tiny kitchen. The sound of people's voices came from the corridor on the other side of the window on the north side. Those who had gone to work or to school were coming home.

It was a long time before Gan Qing came back to herself. She said, her voice a little hoarse, "The corn is going to be overcooked, Meizhen-jie, you can turn off-"

"But I still regret it."

Gan Qing raised her head in astonishment and looked at Zhang Meizhen's side profile that appeared aged and calm. This carefree old madam faced the wall and murmured, "No matter what my rational mind says, no matter what my experience says, I still regret it."

Every single thing that slipped out of one's hands by mistake because they had not been treasured, because they had not been desperately held on to with all one's might, they would all become distant dreams that remained out of reach for one's entire life. They were like a blackhole, devouring everything yet would never be full.

Even if things changed with the passage of time and one had obtained what they could only dream of having back in the past.

"But you're not the same." Zhang Meizhen indicated that Gan Qing should help herself to the congee, then walked to the balcony to smoke. As she brushed past Gan Qing, she crooked a finger and flicked it against Gan Qing's jaw. "Back then, I was totally alienated by everyone, no one wanted anything good for me. You have much better relations with people than I do, both the living and dead all want you to have a good life. All of them have their necks stretched out eagerly and would love to live the good life on your behalf. Go and make the best of it."

Yang Yifan went from the hospital straight to the police station. Captain Miao, who had a cold face all year round, was already waiting for her.

After the police got Wang Jiake back by sheer luck, they followed her description to launch a surprise attack that very night itself on the little guest house where she had been locked up.

Travellers' Sect could escape today but not forever. There was not enough time to tear down the building and escape at the last minute. That illegal business could not hold up to inspection at all. Once the police checked, they found that the original certification had been revoked long ago and not only was it operating without a license now, it was even sheltering quite a number of vice offenders. The business owner, the employees and the driver who assaulted Wang Jiake were all arrested. Wang Jiusheng intentionally did not let them escape—the more difficult the matter was to unravel, the deeper the police would investigate and the greater the scope of involvement would grow. It would be better to let a few hoodlums shoulder the blame. They would only be jailed for a few years anyway and their families would be "taken care of" by Travellers' Sect.

After those few people were taken away, they spilled the beans on Beggars' Sect Big Horse Monkey, Xiao-Zhai and the rest of that group. They had no other choice—Wang Jiake would definitely have told the police about there being a group who looked like vagrants trying to kidnap her at that time.

Both the righteous and the demonic groups gathered at the police station, both in silent agreement not to drag in their sects. And thus, they all cooked up a load of bullshit.

"Sit." Captain Miao studied Yang Yifan. She had been staying in the hospital for the past few days and did not have the energy to spare for her makeup and her outfit. Her face was colourless, no longer looking as refined but also no longer as forceful as before. She looked rather more pleasing to the eye now and so, for once, Captain Miao said something courteous, "I heard that the old man was hospitalised. How is he now?"

"I don't know," Yang Yifan said, her face full of weariness. "If you have any questions to ask, please hurry up. The hospital might call me back at any time to sign notices of critical illness."

"Wang Jiake testified that after the banquet on that day, you were not among the people suspected of breaking the law." Captain Miao became serious. "As for the other opinions online, regardless of whether they were taken out of context or whether they are true, it is not under the jurisdiction of the police. The suspicion on you should be cleared now."

Yang Yifan raised an eyebrow, as though she was asking, "Then why did you ask me to come here?"

Captain Miao said, "There are a few things that we require your cooperation to investigate. It is regarding Wang Jiake's kidnapping. Firstly, Wu Guosheng, male, forty-six years old. He claimed that he has a boss backing him up who can help Wang Jiake repay her high-interest loan, and used this to lure and kidnap her. In actual fact, he is an unlicensed cab driver. He is the main suspect in this case. Do you know this person?"

Yang Yifan said, "Never heard of him."

Captain Miao nodded. Wu Guosheng—the unlicensed cab driver who kidnapped Wang Jiake—had said the same thing.

He said that he knew some local hoodlums who helped people provide loans and harass debtors for repayments, and had his eye on Wang Jiake since she was naive and sweet. At the start, he only wanted to scam her to satisfy his lust but unexpectedly, he made a surprising discovery in her phone. He picked some of the more sensational ones to show a friend, intending to just make it something to chat about. He didn't think that someone would put it online and that it even started a huge round of heated discourse. Hence, this baddie had some evil thoughts. Using tricks and deceptions, he hid Wang Jiake, planning to use her phone to blackmail those rich people.

Yang Yifan was one of the unfortunate scapegoats he picked.

"Then, this person called Zhai Da'an, do you know him?"

Yang Yifan spread her hands. "Where did he sprout from?"

"Then, what about Yang Ping? You should be familiar with this name, right?"

Yang Yifan's mouth swiftly tensed. "What did you say?"

Captain Miao watched her. "I've investigated your details. After senior high, the emergency contact and family member listed in your records was only Mr. Yang Qing, your grandfather. Your mother has already passed away and your parents did not divorce. All these years, your father, Yang Ping, was essentially missing the whole time but your family has never made a police report. Can you tell us the reason? How is your relationship with him?"

The police had located Zhai Da'an, also known as Beggars' Sect's Xiao-Zhai. Male, thirty-nine years old, the lobby manager of a hotel. He declared himself to be fond of making friends and usually hung out with people who were of the more sketchy type. After she was kidnapped, Wang Jiake tried to escape. Zhai Da'an instructed a few people to grab her in the process but was unsuccessful and even clashed with the original kidnappers.

The Travellers' Sect people wanted to drag Beggars' Sect into the water and insisted that Xiao-Zhai and the others were in the same group as them, and that they had only splitted due to uneven profit distribution.

Beggars' Sect of course refused to acknowledge that. Their explanation was also very comprehensive. Xiao-Zhai said that he was a friend of Yang Ping's. Yang Ping had left his family after falling out with them. Even though he had not gone back for many years, in his heart, he still thought of his family. Yang Yifan was his only daughter. When he heard that his daughter was implicated in this terrible matter, the old father went everywhere in a panic to look for help. Out of loyalty to their friend, they used all sorts of connections to find Wang Jiake. They wanted her to come forward to explain things and clear the negative effects of public opinion. In the end, they accidentally found out that the girl had been kidnapped by that gang of unlicensed cab drivers and illegal guest house operators. And so, they made a plan to rescue her. Those baddies were ashamed and angered, and were throwing all the blame to others. Everything they "confessed" was a deliberate revenge and could not be trusted.

Each side was spinning their own story. It was basically a scene out of Rashomon.

Meanwhile, the whereabouts of the critical person in the matter, Yang Ping, was currently unknown. They had no choice but to summon Yang Yifan there to ask her.

"What did they say? Yang Ping was concerned about me?" The corners of Yang Yifan's mouth turned up in a strange smile. "I thought I was experienced in the ways of the world. I never would have thought that when it comes to being shameless, my imagination is still limited. What a joke."

Her peculiar tone was very striking. Captain Miao's brows furrowed lightly.

"Do you know how much money I spent and how many rounds of aesthetic treatment I did to make this scar fade until the way it is now? Here, there's still a mark now. Captain Meow, do you know how I got this scar?" Yang Yifan reached out and pushed back the long hair on her left temple, revealing a very faint scar on her left cheekbone. "Yang Ping went out and got into a fight with others. He lost and was taught a lesson by the other side. When I was young, I wrote about this matter in my diary. He saw it… he gave me this cut using an iron rod meant for shifting coals in the brazier."

For a moment, Captain Miao could not say anything.

"A young girl, ten years old." Yang Yifan curled her hair around her finger, then swiftly let it go. "When I was sent to the hospital for treatment, the three cuts on my face had to be stitched up, eighteen stitches in total. Half my face was covered in scars, such an thrilling scene."