novelraw Chapter 239 Puzzle
Chapter 239 Puzzle
"She kept stopping me from going to see you." Jin Qiqi looked at Lu Xiran, her eyes filled with a slow, belated pain. "From that time on, I just felt that she might be too controlling—using concern as an excuse to control. I told myself, 'Mothers-in-law are all like that.'"
She paused, her fingers unconsciously clenching tightly on her knees.
"Looking back now..." Jin Qiqi's voice trembled slightly, "She kept stopping me from going to see you. Was it because she felt guilty, afraid that the evil she had done would be punished on her descendants?"
Self-blame felt like a needle, slowly piercing her heart. She thought, if only she had thought one step further back, if only she hadn't taken all of Lian Bichen's unusual behavior as "perfectly normal," if only she hadn't repeatedly convinced herself that "she's an elder, she's doing this for your own good"—would she have discovered the face beneath that mask sooner? Would she have been able to avoid all that happened later?
"Qiqi." Lu Xiran noticed her downcast mood and immediately reached out to place her hand on the back of her hand, pressing it firmly. "What she did has nothing to do with you. You are you, and she is she. You can't take her sins upon yourself."
Jin Qiqi didn't look up, but gently grasped Lu Xiran's hand in return.
Lin Chen frowned and steered the conversation back on track: "Why would she hurt Grandma after knowing the contents of the will? The will's contents haven't changed—even if she knew beforehand, what benefit would it have brought her?"
Gu Yanshen did not answer immediately. He leaned back on the sofa, his fingers pressed against his brow, as if trying to piece all the scattered fragments back into place.
"Changing the will," he began slowly, his voice low and calm, "means splitting the shares into three parts, one for my father and one for Uncle Qiran. But if the will remains unchanged—with Grandma leaving most of the shares and jewelry to me and Ranran—then things will turn out differently."
He looked up, his gaze piercing through the steam in the cup and landing on something unseen in the distance.
"As long as Gu Yanxu remains in the company, as long as she can find a way... to harm me and my descendants, then who will ultimately get everything I have?"
Lin Chen almost blurted out, "Ranran."
"Yes." Gu Yanshen nodded, but there was no smile on his lips. "But during those years, she thought I no longer loved Ranran."
His voice softened, like a knife being sheathed, leaving behind an invisible wound.
"After all... I went too far."
A moment of silence fell over the living room. Everyone knew what he was talking about—the deliberate distancing, the cold back view, the days and nights he had personally pushed Lu Xiran away.
Lu Xiran suddenly raised her head, a glint of light flashing in her eyes.
"I remember now." She looked at Jin Qiqi, her voice slightly trembling with excitement. "Three years ago, she asked me to help deliver the wedding gift to Uncle and Song Zhihe. It was because I went to deliver that gift that I was kidnapped by Su Lanzhi."
Memory is like a ripped hole, and all the details come rushing out.
Her gaze slowly shifted to Gu Yanshen, and her voice suddenly softened.
"I heard...you say that."
Gu Yanshen's pupils trembled slightly.
Help me solve a problem.
These seven words, like a rusty knife, have been repeatedly and dullily cutting into her heart for the past three years. She tried to tell herself it was fake, tried to find a hundred reasons to deny it, but every time she closed her eyes, that voice would sound on time—cold, indifferent, as if talking about something insignificant.
Even now that she knows the truth, that it was just a show for others, the wound left by those words still aches faintly on some late nights.
Gu Yanshen could sense her sadness. It wasn't anger, nor was it questioning; rather, it was a silent, submerged grievance. He reached out and put his arm around her shoulder, tightening his grip. His lips moved, but he didn't know where to begin his explanation.
He only realized now that she had heard those words.
"That's because..." Lin Chen broke the silence, "I told him that Su Lanzhi had kidnapped you. He said that to make them believe that he no longer loved you."
The explanation was weak. As weak as a sheet of paper, unable to withstand the erosion of three years of trials and tribulations.
Lu Xiran looked at Gu Yanshen with a complicated expression.
"Perhaps even Bichen was there at the time. She must have heard those words." Jin Qiqi's voice calmed down, carrying a cold certainty. "That's why she truly believed that you no longer loved Ranran."
She paused for a moment, as if considering her words.
"Although... I still can't forgive you for what you did back then. But I have to say, it was precisely because of your ruthlessness that Lian Bichen was able to completely relax. In her mind, no one in this world would go to such lengths for another person—she didn't believe you loved Ranran that much. That's why she dared to go all out in her schemes and didn't send anyone to Switzerland to eliminate her completely."
Lin Chen turned to look at Lu Xiran: "Ranran, perhaps your uncle also bears some responsibility for this. I've always said... it was his love that brought you danger..."
"I'm fine." Lu Xiran shook her head, her voice hoarse but with a clear and resolute quality. She raised her head, her gaze sweeping over everyone's faces, a very faint smile curving her lips.
"You've all gone astray. I just wanted to say that many things that I couldn't understand before have suddenly become clear."
The emotion in Gu Yanshen's eyes darkened, and his voice also became somber.
"So, even Bichen was there three years ago."
This is not a question, it is a conclusion.
"Lian Bichen, Su Lanzhi, and others with undisclosed crimes." His voice was like a blade cutting through ice. "Kidnapping."
"Lin Chen, go and find the surveillance footage from that time immediately."
Lin Chen hesitated for a moment: "After so many years, can the surveillance footage still be preserved?"
Gu Yanshen did not answer, but just looked at him.
Lin Chen suddenly realized something. He straightened up from the sofa, his tone changing: "This record was already copied three years ago." He glanced at Lu Xiran, a smile that was half regretful and half helpless appearing on his lips. "He has a record of every single moment you've been on."
Jin Qiqi's gaze darted back and forth between Lu Xiran and Gu Yanshen for a moment, then she tactfully stood up, stretched, and deliberately put on a relaxed tone: "I'm sleepy too, I'll go rest first. You two can chat."
Lu Xiran and Gu Yanshen also returned to their room.
The moment the door closed behind me, the whole world suddenly shrank, shrinking to just two people, a lamp, and a room full of unfinished words.