Chapter 25 – Confessions in the Storm
Gu Yanzhou reacted with immediate, frightening speed.
He grabbed his keys, bypassed his personal security team with a single sharp command, and dragged Xiao Xi out of the tower.
He didn't take her home; he drove her in his black sedan to a secluded cliff overlooking the city lights—a familiar, silent backdrop to their shared, impossible reality.
The wind whipped violently through the open car windows, heavy with the weight of unsaid words, the scent of rain, and the metallic taste of existential fear.
"You should stay away from me, Gu Yanzhou," she said quietly, her gaze fixed on the endless stream of distant lights below.
"Whoever's behind this is using your company.
They just threatened your financial core. If you get hurt—if your empire collapses—"
He cut her off sharply, twisting in his seat to face her.
"Do you think I care about the market cap right now?"
"You should!" she shouted, the controlled break in her voice finally releasing the torrent of fear and suppressed truth.
"You shouldn't even exist in this world! You're not part of the story—none of this was supposed to happen! I know what the book said! You were supposed to be dead!"
He stared at her, stunned.
The accusation was impossible, yet delivered with a desperate sincerity that transcended logic.
He didn't deny the death; he merely waited, his eyes demanding the impossible truth.
"Then tell me the truth, Xiao Xi," he demanded, his voice low, vibrating with intensity. "What are you hiding? What is this story you keep mentioning?"
For a moment, the System pulsed violently inside her skull, whispering its final, catastrophic warnings:
[Disclosure will result in system collapse. Warning! Fatal error imminent.]
But the warnings no longer mattered.
She met his gaze, tears stinging her eyes—tears not of fear, but of profound relief.
She couldn't fight the hacker, the plot, and the secrecy all at once.
"I'm not from this world," she confessed, the words raw and difficult.
"I came from the one that wrote it.
I read your story, Gu Yanzhou. I read your death."
Silence fell over the cliffside, broken only by the shriek of the wind.
Gu Yanzhou reached out, not with disbelief or anger, but with a strange, fierce tenderness.
He pulled her against his chest, the final barrier between them shattered.
"Then I'll change the story with you, Xiao Xi. Every single bloody chapter."
The System screamed one last time inside her head, the code flashing like lightning, loud and frantic:
[Critical Error! Connection with host compromised. Host Destiny Divergence—100%.]
[System Shutdown Initiated.]
And somewhere in the dark heart of the Gu Corporation network, a hacker smiled at their screen, fingers flying across the console, watching the digital defenses of both Gu Yanzhou's corporation and Xiao Xi's System crumble simultaneously.
Perfect.
Let the story unravel.
The real protagonist has arrived.