Chapter 69: She’s Your Sister?
In the “shipping group chat.”
Class Monitor: [@Everyone, there’s sugar to ship!]
[Just witnessed it live, it was so sweet!]
[That “little milk cat” nickname is way too sweet and pampering! I’m in love!]
[I mean, just hearing it makes me squeal.]
[So basically, did my “Nianshen–Yuejiu CP” go public today? Yes, it did!]
Chen Qianxi read the group messages and almost cried for real—she hadn’t been there to witness the sugar drop in person!
When Lin Yuejiu noticed how upset she looked, she even asked her what was wrong.
That only made Chen Qianxi even sadder.
Lin Yuejiu: “???”
At that moment, Du Zhuo quickly held a book up to cover Chen Qianxi’s face. “Goddess Lin, she’s just upset because she couldn’t solve a question. No need to worry about her.”
“Ah, I see. Then… do you need me to teach you guys? Or maybe ask Xu Nianshen to help you?”
“No, no, that won’t be necessary. We can figure it out ourselves after looking at it a bit more. Thank you, Goddess Lin.”
“Ah, okay.”
Lin Yuejiu watched Du Zhuo drag Chen Qianxi away, completely puzzled.
In a certain small town, Lin Yimo arrived, checking the map for the marked spot before heading toward it.
Today, he came here to investigate. He had requested leave from the company board, telling Father Lin and Mother Lin it was a business trip. Soon, he stopped in front of a two-story house—a fairly typical middle-class home. He knocked on the door.
“Who is it?” Someone opened the door slightly. It was a teenage boy, phone in hand, game noises still coming from it.
The boy eyed him, narrowing the gap of the door even more, a bit wary. “Who are you?”
Lin Yimo gave him a friendly smile. “Hello, I mean no harm. I’m just here to look into something.”
“Look into something? Are you a reporter?”
Lin Yimo thought for a second. “Something like that.”
“Then you’ve got the wrong place. Nobody famous lives here.”
The boy started to shut the door, but Lin Yimo quickly reached out and stopped it. “I’m here to ask about Lin Rumeng.”
The boy froze. “You’re here to ask about my sis—about Lin Rumeng?”
“…Your sister? She’s your sister?”
“…She used to be.”
“Sorry, but… could you ask your mother to come out for a moment?”
“Wait here.” The boy turned and shouted into the house, “Mom! Someone’s here to see you!”
A middle-aged woman wearing an apron walked out from the kitchen, drying her damp hands on both sides of it as she approached. “Who is it?”
“Mom, he says he wants to ask about her.”
The woman froze. “Your sister?” Then she looked at Lin Yimo at the door. “Are you from the Lin family?”
Fearing she might reject him outright, Lin Yimo quickly explained, “I was sent by our chairman to learn more about Miss Lin Rumeng. The chairman wishes to know more details about her past life, so I was asked to come to her old home and gather some information.”
“I see.” The woman’s guarded posture eased immediately. “Then please, come in.”
“Thank you.” Lin Yimo bowed politely. “Should I take off my shoes?”
“No need, no need. This isn’t some fancy place. Please, have a seat.”
“Alright then, I’ll sit.”
Lin Yimo sat down on a small sofa. The middle-aged woman handed him a plastic cup filled with hot water.
“Sorry, we don’t really get guests around here these days, so I haven’t bought any tea. You’ll have to make do with this.”
Lin Yimo smiled. “That’s perfectly fine.”
The woman sat down across from him. “So… what would you like to know about Rumeng?”
Lin Yimo took a sip of hot water, set the cup down, and asked, “I’d like to know, what was her personality like when she lived here? Was she more well-behaved or mischievous?”
Just then, the teenage boy walked by with his phone in hand. He seemed to have overheard something ridiculous and let out a laugh. “Well-behaved? Those words have nothing to do with her.”
Lin Yimo quickly asked, “What do you mean?”
The boy grabbed a fresh apple from the coffee table, bit into it with a crisp crunch, and said, “She was definitely not well-behaved when she was living here. She only looked well-behaved on the surface.”
“And in reality?”
“In reality, she had a pretty bad temper. She often threw tantrums at us. The only time she’d act cute toward my parents was when she wanted something. Most of the time, she either looked expressionless or impatient.”
Lin Yimo froze. “She was like that often?”
The boy took another bite of the apple. “Yeah, that’s just how she was. She also liked to buy really expensive stuff. Sometimes it was way beyond her allowance, so she’d ask my parents for money. If you check her room, there are still some of those things left.”
Lin Yimo turned to the woman. “Was she really like that?”
The woman nodded.
“Sorry, but… would it be possible for you to take me to her room to have a look?”
“Sure, follow me.”
The woman stood up and led him upstairs, stopping at a door before opening it. Inside, the room was pink. Although the decorations had aged, it still looked very much like a princess’s room. There was even a vanity, with lots of cosmetics left untouched on top. The room was only half the size of her current one in the Lin household, but in this house, aside from the living room, it was the largest.
“May I go in and take a look?”
“Of course.”
Lin Yimo stepped in and opened the wardrobe. Inside were bright, fashionable clothes.
No wonder her eyes always lit up whenever Mother Lin bought her new clothes, he thought unconsciously.
“This was the biggest room in our house,” the boy said, leaning against the doorway. “And she still complained it was too small.”
Lin Yimo pointed to the cosmetics. “Those must have been bought with money she asked from you, right? Why didn’t she take them with her?”
At that, the boy sneered, his face full of scorn. “When she left, I asked her the same thing. She said, ‘I’m the Lin family’s daughter now. Once I’ve fully settled in with them, I can buy any cosmetics I want. These are just cheap junk compared to what I’ll have. Why would I bother taking them?’ That’s what she said.”
Lin Yimo understood. No wonder she hadn’t taken the clothes from the wardrobe either. No wonder calling that family ‘Mom, Dad, Brother’ came so naturally to her.
He thought of something and asked the woman, “Since she already left, why did you keep this room as it is?”
The woman looked slightly embarrassed.
The boy cut in directly, “My mom was worried she might come back one day and wouldn’t have a place to stay, so she kept it for her.”
Lin Yimo felt a tug in his heart.
“That’s what she thought at first,” the boy went on. “Later, I talked her out of it. She wanted me to move into this room, but I didn’t want to. I had no desire to live in a space she’d used. My parents were already used to their own room and didn’t want to switch either. So, this room just stayed empty. My mom still cleans it sometimes, and now it’s partly used for storage.”
The boy tilted his chin toward the corner. Following his gaze, Lin Yimo noticed several large boxes stacked there.
When the three of them went back downstairs, Lin Yimo asked the boy, “Just now, you almost naturally called her your sister. Did you like her a lot?”
The boy fell silent for a moment. “…Not exactly. At least, I once treated her as my sister. But that changed on one particular day. From that day on, I started to hate her.”
“Which day?”
“The day someone came to take her away.”
