Shen Nian was dead.
She had died in her own home.
She died on the very day she discovered that her boyfriend, Yin Yang, and her best friend, Qin Xueling, had been having an affair for years, and that all this time, she had merely been a tool for them to exploit.
She died in a blaze of fury, at the very moment she rose up to take them down with her.
As she lay dying, the words of that vile couple echoed in Shen Nian's mind.
"Shen Nian, the person I've loved all these years has always been Xuexlian. As for you, your only use was to be our cash cow. Did you really think I would marry you? Don't be ridiculous!"
"Shen Nian, why did you get to have a family that treated you so well? Why did you get such a good marriage? Why, when you're not as good as me in any way, were you always a step ahead? I just had to make you lose everything."
"I was the one who brainwashed you into thinking Yin Yang was a great guy. I was the one who deliberately goaded you into getting a divorce. I was the one who drove a wedge between you and your family, and I was even the one who brought ruin and death upon the Shen family. That's right, I did it all. So what? It was all possible because you're an idiot!"
"The whole Shen Family is just as stupid as you. You clearly wanted nothing to do with them, yet your parents worried about you until the day they died. For your sake, your brother married *that* kind of woman, throwing the entire household into chaos. And your younger brother, he was even willing to take the fall for someone else's crime, just for you. Tsk, tsk. I can still remember the look of despair in his eyes before he died!"
"I bet you don't know, do you? The man you abandoned... When you two divorced, he shouldered all the blame, and his career suffered greatly because of it. But even so, he never forgot you. He never remarried after all these years. How could someone like you ever be worthy of his love?"
"Shen Nian, what right do you have to resent us? All of this happened because of your own stupidity!"
The moment the truth came out, Shen Nian was consumed by hatred. She hated that vile couple, Yin Yang and Qin Xueling, but she hated herself even more.
'I was so stupid. How could I have ever believed people like Qin Xueling and Yin Yang! My family... I was the one who destroyed them. Even in hell, I won't have the face to see them!'
'And that man... It was all my fault, so why did he have to be the one to bear all the pain in the end?'
Shen Nian loathed herself, and she loathed that vile couple.
As Shen Nian sank into despair, Yin Yang and Qin Xueling seized the opportunity to lunge at her. During the struggle, the gas canister was ignited.
An explosion roared.
In the instant that agony washed over her, Shen Nian thought she heard a choked cry, thick with grief and pain.
"No, don't!"
…
Shen Nian's soul drifted upward, higher and higher. She saw the house still erupting in explosions below, and she saw him—the man running straight toward the heart of the blast.
Even after so many years, Shen Nian recognized him in an instant. It was Lu Cheng, the man she had wronged so deeply.
"Don't come any closer! Go, just go!"
But no one could hear Shen Nian's voice, and no one could see her.
Shen Nian saw the grief and despair etched on Lu Cheng's face, but she was powerless to stop him from rushing into the flames.
Shen Nian watched as Lu Cheng ran out of the inferno, carrying "her" charred body, long since breathless. She watched as he collapsed from his grievous wounds, watched as he coughed up blood in despair.
Shen Nian watched Lu Cheng drag his grievously injured body to arrange her funeral. She watched him keep vigil at her grave, day and night.
She watched his health deteriorate day by day, until she finally watched him close his eyes for the very last time.
He, a man who should have had a boundless future, had his career derailed because of her. In the end, he was even driven to an untimely grave.
'Why! It was all my fault, all of it! This retribution... it should have all fallen on me!'
'Oh, Heavens, why must you be so cruel? Why!'