CHAPTER 91 — When the World Collapsed in One Breath
The Mu estate had known silence before — the quiet elegance of polished halls, the softness of early mornings, the tranquility of nights spent in warmth.
But this silence was different.
Sharp.
Cold.
Shattered.
Shi Yunxi felt it the moment she stepped out of the kitchen with a plate of sliced fruit. The house was too still. Too quiet. Not the usual chaos of three toddlers chasing each other or squabbling over crayons.
A mother knows.
Her grip tightened on the plate.
"Yichen? Qing'er? Rui?"
Her voice echoed down the hallway.
Two small heads peeked from the playroom.
Yichen.
Qing'er.
Kneeling on the floor with blocks scattered around them.
But no Rui.
Yunxi stepped into the room, forcing calm into her voice. "Where's your brother?"
Yichen blinked. "He went to show his drawing to Daddy."
Qing'er added, "Rui said he was going to surprise Daddy with his house picture!"
A chill slid down Yunxi's spine.
Mu Lingchen had left earlier for a brief emergency meeting — he wasn't home.
"Baby," Yunxi crouched, meeting their eyes, "Rui went alone?"
Both children nodded innocently.
Her heart stopped.
But she didn't panic.
She couldn't.
Not yet.
She stood quickly and moved through the hallway, calling Rui's name. Each unanswered echo pounded against her chest.
She checked the study.
Empty.
The stairs.
Empty.
The backyard.
Empty.
Cold dread pooled in her stomach.
Her phone buzzed.
A message.
Unknown Number.
A video file.
Her hands trembled as she opened it.
Rui.
Her baby.
Her firstborn.
Tied to a chair, a strip of tape across his mouth, his small face streaked with tears — but eyes burning with defiance, brave just like her.
Behind him, a woman's mocking voice purred:
"Shi Yunxi… If you want him back, you know what to do."
Roulan.
That venomous voice was unmistakable.
The plate of fruit slipped from Yunxi's fingers and shattered on the floor.
For a moment, the ground beneath her felt like it collapsed. Her lungs froze. Her pulse vanished. The world narrowed into sharp, suffocating edges.
But then—
Something ancient inside her awakened.
Not fear.
Not despair.
Rage.
Pure, cold, violent rage.
She dialed Lingchen instantly. He answered on the first ring.
"Yunxi?"
"It's Rui."
Her voice was ice. Controlled. Terrifying.
"Roulan took him."
Silence.
Then a sound too low to be human — the growl of a man who had just lost the last line holding back his fury.
"Yunxi. Listen to me. Stay where you are. I'm coming right—"
"No." Her voice cut sharply. "Roulan sent a video. I'm tracking it."
Lingchen's breath hitched.
Because he knew exactly what those words meant.
Shi Yunxi — the woman before him — was not just a mother.
She was Xiolan.
The ghost hacker who could shred entire corporations in minutes.
The phantom that entire underground networks feared.
The legend governments whispered about but could never capture.
And right now—
Xiolan had awakened.
"Send it to me," Lingchen said immediately.
"I already did." Her voice was steady, deadly calm. "And I'm tracing the metadata. I need you to increase internal security. Lock down the estate. Don't let Yichen and Qing'er out of your sight."
"I'm already on it." His tone hardened. "Yunxi… I swear on my life—I will bring him back."
She closed her eyes.
"I know."
The moment the call ended, Yunxi rushed into her private room — the one she kept locked, disguised as a simple storage space. Inside, lights flickered on, illuminating her sleek black equipment, multiple monitors, encrypted drives, and her signature silver keyboard.
Xiolan's sanctuary.
Her real armor.
Her breathing steadied as she sat down. Her fingers hovered briefly over the keys.
Then she began.
Her hands moved like lightning — keystrokes sharp, precise, merciless. Code lines flooded the screens as she tore through encryption layers embedded in the video.
Roulan wasn't subtle.
She thought fear would cloud Yunxi's mind.
She thought wrong.
Yunxi's jaw clenched as she traced the audio distortion.
Roulan was using a cheap voice scrambler.
Rookie mistake.
She isolated the background hum — HVAC noise, distance refrigeration whir, faint car honks. Urban. Close to a busy road.
She magnified the reflection in Rui's teary eyes.
A movement.
A metal rack.
Fluorescent lights.
Grey walls.
A storage facility.
Her pulse steadied.
Almost there.
She fed the video into her custom-made spatial-mapping algorithm. It reconstructed the environment in seconds.
Then—
Ping.
Coordinates.
A small warehouse on the outskirts of the city.
Owned by—
Of course.
The Qin family's dirty subsidiary.
Yunxi's eyes darkened to pure shadow.
"Roulan… you made your last mistake."
She encrypted the location and sent it directly to Lingchen.
His response came in seconds.
[ON MY WAY. POLICE DISPATCHED. DON'T MOVE.]
But Yunxi was already standing.
She pulled open a locked drawer and took out her matte-black jacket — lightweight, flexible, designed for stealth. She tied her hair back tightly.
She didn't need weapons.
She was a weapon.
But when she opened the door, she nearly collided with someone.
Yichen.
His little face was pale.
"Mommy…" his voice trembled, "Rui is gone… isn't he?"
Yunxi knelt and cupped his cheeks gently.
"Yes, baby. But Mommy is going to bring him back."
Qing'er peeked from behind Yichen, crying silently.
"Rui is scared," she whispered. "I can feel it."
Yunxi's heart cracked — but she held firm.
"Listen to me," she said softly, urgently. "I need you two to stay with Daddy. No matter what. Don't wander. Don't open the door for anyone."
Yichen wiped his tears with his sleeve. "Mommy… are you going to fight the bad guy?"
Yunxi hesitated.
Then nodded.
"Yes."
"And will you win?" he whispered.
Yunxi leaned forward and kissed his forehead.
"I will always win for my children."
Footsteps thundered from down the hall — Lingchen had arrived, face carved from stone, fury burning in his eyes like a wildfire ready to consume the world.
He saw the pain in Yunxi's eyes.
She saw the storm in his.
No words were spoken.
None were needed.
Lingchen crouched, gathering Yichen and Qing'er into his arms. "Daddy's here. I won't let anything happen to you."
Then he looked up at Yunxi — not as a lover, not as a man, but as a father.
"Let's bring him home."
Yunxi nodded.
And with that—
Xiolan stepped into the night.
A mother.
A ghost.
A fury the world should have never provoked.
And Roulan had just signed her own destruction.