Lin Yue watched the dress in her hand and without a hint of hesitation, her thumb found the small, delicate teeth of the zip.
A swift, decisive yank, executed with just the right amount of force and angle, ensured the zipper caught, snagged, and tore off the track entirely.
It was the perfect picture of 'accidental' damage. She sighed dramatically, placing the now useless garment on her bed before settling down to wait.
It wasn't long before Lin Yue heard the distinct, high-pitched chatter and the click of expensive heels announcing the departure of the mother-daughter pair for their hair and makeup session. The house settled into a deep, deceptive silence.
Lin Yue slipped quietly out of her room, heading down the hallway toward Bai Lian's lavish, overly feminine bedroom.
She paused at the slightly ajar door and saw Nanny Wang inside, meticulously polishing the silver detailing on a dressing table mirror, her back to the door.
Inside, Nanny Wang was not merely cleaning. She was standing at the vanity, her hands running greedily over a velvet jewelry box. Lin Yue could hear her muttering to herself, a low, coarse sound.
"Such fine things… that brat gets everything that she put her hand on" Nanny Wang whispered, her eyes alight with covetousness.
She shifted, and Lin Yue could hear the sound of metal against velvet. "A small piece… who would notice? And if they do… it will be Lin Yue, who's always around."
Nanny Wang caress Bai Lian's bracelet with her wrinkled hand and greedy eyes and continue talking to herself "I will simply say that I saw that wretched girl near the dressing table this morning. It'll be her word against mine, and with the mistress's temper, she'll be blamed immediately."
Lin Yue watched in silence as the Nanny slipped something small and glittering into the pocket of her apron, smoothed the dress on the mannequin, and hurried out of the room.
Lin Yue's eyes narrowed, cold and hard. She recalls that in her previous life, this exact scenario had unfolded. Bai Lian had "discovered" the missing item later that week.
Nanny Wang, fueled by greed and loyalty to Bai Mei Ling, had framed Lin Yue for the theft. Lin Aiguo, quick to believe the worst of his daughter and unwilling to cause a fuss, had punished Lin Yue harshly, solidifying the narrative of her being a spiteful thief.
Lin Yue also remembered vividly that Nanny Wang was often pilfering small items, hiding them in her servant quarters. She only escaped firing once when caught by Bai Mei Ling because Bai Lian intervened, reminding her mother how useful Nanny Wang was in keeping Lin Yue miserable.
A lesson needs to be taught, Lin Yue decided. A brilliant idea formed in Lin Yue's mind to kill two birds with one stone, a calculating glint entering her eyes.
Nanny's fate was sealed, she would deal with the theft together, ensuring the evidence landed where it counted. For now, the priority was the banquet.
Lin Yue slipped into Bai Lian's room. Bai Lian's pristine, pearl-white sheath hung proudly. Lin Yue approached it, her movements economical and silent.
Lin Yue quickly took the dress. She needed the sabotage to be spectacular, undeniable, and impossible to pin on herself without overwhelming evidence—which she was about to provide a distraction for.
Lin Yue pulled out a small, sharp pair of embroidery scissors from her room, focusing on the main structural components of the dress.
Lin Yue didn't damage the fabric visibly; that would be amateur. Instead, she performed a surgical alteration, targeting a few crucial internal seams and the delicate lining near the shoulder strap, weakening the stitching just enough to fail under moderate stress.
To secure her secondary goal, Lin Yue secretly took the cleaning solution, that Nanny Wang forgot to take with her before she leave the room.
Lin Yue put a faint smear of the cleaning sloution onto the inner silk lining and then tucked a single, specific fiber from Nanny Wang's cleaning cloth into the compromised seam.
It suggested carelessness, a distracted Nanny Wang handling delicate items near the dress, causing accidental damage—the perfect internal scandal for the Bai duo to discover. She smoothed the skirt, hanging it back exactly as she had found it.
Then Lin Yue also smear that cleaning solution on Bai Lian's jewelry box and took another bracelet from it, then put away that box where it was.
If anyone looked closely later, the suspicion would naturally fall on Nanny Wang's proximity, or the immediate chaos of the aftermath, rather than Lin Yue's calculated plot.
Returning to her room, Lin Yue discarded the compromised emerald gown. Instead, she opened the plain mahogany wardrobe that housed her late mother's collection.
Lin Yue she retrieved a dress that had belonged to her late mother—a simple, floor-length sapphire dress, perfectly tailored and radiating a timeless, quiet elegance. She didn't bother with makeup; the Spiritual Water had given her skin a flawless, ethereal quality that needed no enhancement.
Meanwhile, Bai Mei Ling and Bai Lian returned home and rushed to prepare. Confident in their sabotage. Lin Aiguo was already at the venue.
Back to Lin Yue, she looked at her reflection. The Spiritual Spring water had worked wonders; her skin was porcelain, her lips natural rose red, and her eyes were clear and sparkling.
Lin Yue didn't bother with makeup. Her natural, undeniable beauty, unadorned, would be her truest form tonight.
As she finished fastening the clasp of a simple jade pendant, the sound of the Bai Mei Ling and Bai Lian returning echoed through the hall.
"Lian'er, you look absolutely radiant! The lighting in the hall will adore that pearl white," Bai Mei Ling gushed, her voice dripping with saccharine pride. "You will undoubtedly be the limelight tonight."
With calculated haste, they left, the roar of their expensive sedan pulling away, leaving Lin Yue to arrange her own transportation. They hadn't spared a thought for her, and she hadn't expected them to.