Chapter 87
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Chapter 87: All My Life I’ve Been Walking On Thin Ice, But With You, I’ve Gone Straight For The Explosion!
“Consider it a treat from me.” Li Mengyue spoke nonchalantly.
Ye Xiao felt a bit overwhelmed by the gesture.
It wasn’t that 100,000 yuan was an astronomical sum, but rather the suddenness of it. Yesterday, Li Mengyue was gnashing her teeth in hatred, even tying Ye Xiao up to give her a beating. And now? Why was she treating her so kindly all of a sudden?
Could it be that after last night, she’d finally decided to keep Ye Xiao as her own?
If this were during the initial days of her transmigration, Ye Xiao might have been quite delighted by the thought of being supported by a rich woman like Li Mengyue.
“Don’t mind it, don’t mind it. It’s just a small amount of money. But later, I have some bad news to share with you.” Li Mengyue smiled.
The group found a private booth and sat across from each other. Soon, a waiter brought in an array of utensils and began setting up the table.
This place lived up to its reputation as a haven for the wealthy, everything here exuded luxury and refinement, opening Ye Xiao’s eyes a little.
Li Mengyue, however, seemed to be observing her reactions, occasionally chuckling lightly.
Last night, though Li Mengyue vented her frustrations by roughing up Ye Xiao, she hadn’t clearly articulated her stance toward her in the end.
But Ye Xiao could sense that Li Mengyue had more or less resigned herself to the situation.
It seemed she had tacitly accepted the ambiguous relationship between herself, Jiang Qingyue, and Ye Xiao. Moreover, in order to ease Jiang Qingyue’s psychological burden, she even put on quite the performance.
Though she pretended not to care and used the excuse of being drunk last night as a cover, she refused to bring up the incident. Yet, her gaze and demeanor toward Ye Xiao betrayed her.
That seemingly indifferent yet unmistakably caring look—she couldn’t hide it.
After a few dishes were served, Li Mengyue finally spoke, “Qingyue, I probably won’t be able to treat you to meals anymore… If you have the time, you can come here by yourself to enjoy.”
“Huh? Why?”
Jiang Qingyue was startled and immediately asked.
Ye Xiao’s heart also skipped a beat.
Though Jiang Qingyue wasn’t aware of her and Li Mengyue’s dual entanglement, Li Mengyue knew full well. Could this be a sign of resentment toward Jiang Qingyue?
Looking around to ensure their privacy, Li Mengyue began explaining, “My family has given me an ultimatum today. If I don’t stop fooling around and do something serious after graduation, they’ll force me into marriage.”
Ye Xiao casually picked up a piece of pickled vegetable with her chopsticks. “Marriage? With who?”
Her eyes immediately fixated on Li Mengyue.
If Li Mengyue still liked men and intended to marry one, that would be one thing. But now, Li Mengyue had clearly developed feelings for Ye Xiao. There was no way Ye Xiao could let some random guy steal her away.
“No idea. But I might have to start blind dating soon. My family has plenty of options since there are quite a few people pursuing me.”
“Hmm, I see. So our ‘small fry’ Miss Li is quite the catch, huh? So many suitors?” Ye Xiao repeated mockingly while chewing on her pickled vegetable.
If this were before yesterday, this might not have had much to do with Ye Xiao. But today? Oh, it definitely mattered.
Li Mengyue was already hers!
“But what can I do? Surely, you’re not just venting to me, are you?”
Ye Xiao took a sip of her drink and looked at her.
“It has a little to do with you—well, maybe not directly, but still…” Li Mengyue admitted.
“Long story short, if I don’t want to be arbitrarily married off, I need to prove my worth within six months.”
“Six months?” Ye Xiao tilted her head.
“Proving your worth in such a short time? That sounds like your family wants you to open a casino or something.”
“Casinos are illegal.”
“I know that. But, Miss Li, don’t drag Ye Xiao into your family disputes, alright?!” Ye Youran interjected coldly.
Her impression of Li Mengyue wasn’t great. She had only met her today, and it seemed like the woman was showing off.
Li Mengyue glanced at Ye Youran a few more times. She didn’t understand why this woman was reacting so strongly when the person involved hadn’t even spoken.
Truth be told, Li Mengyue’s idol wasn’t her own parents but Mrs. Lu of Gaoshan Ventures in Binhai City—someone who lived life on her own terms.
Little did she know, if she found out that Ye Xiao had also managed to entangle herself with Lu Shiqing, her reaction would be quite something.
“So, Ye Xiao, can you really bear to watch me marry a man I might never have even met?” Li Mengyue casually picked up a cherry and held it between her lips. The glossy fruit, combined with her moist lips, made her appear irresistibly enticing.
Ye Xiao glanced at the people around her but said nothing more. Li Mengyue’s demeanor seemed not only to be venting her frustrations but also subtly hinting at a desire for Ye Xiao to publicly acknowledge their relationship.
And she was doing this right in front of a group of familiar older sisters.
Li Mengyue looked as though she had figured it all out, exuding a uniquely charismatic individuality.
“Of course I can’t bear it. Why would I want to see the small fry big sister marry some random guy from outside? But what can I even do?”
From what had just been said, combined with Li Mengyue’s extravagant spending, her identity was already glaringly obvious.
Daughters from all the prominent families in Binhai City had more or less been involved with her at some point. If Li Mengyue weren’t the daughter of the Li family—who stands shoulder-to-shoulder with the Gu and Lu families, forming a tripartite balance of power—then Ye Xiao would livestream herself washing her hair upside down!
Every family has its troubles, and for someone born into a wealthy but not supremely elite family, marriage alliances were an inescapable obstacle.
“No, you can do it. If I’m not mistaken, Ye Xiao, you’re the real person in charge of Yun-Xiao, right?”
Li Mengyue spoke lightly.
This was something that, apart from Ye Youran and Shen Yunchu, only a few people like the president of Binhai University knew.
However, it wasn’t much of a secret—anyone with enough curiosity could easily find out at this stage.
“What about you guys? Are you in or out?”
Li Mengyue nudged the fruit platter in front of her. “These cherries are pretty good, nice and plump!”
From Li Mengyue’s perspective, no outcome seemed particularly promising.
Ye Xiao, this little schemer, was clearly brimming with mischief and bad ideas.
Li Mengyue didn’t expect to be Ye Xiao’s first woman. However, securing a stable position in Ye Xiao’s growing “harem” wouldn’t be easy either.
She needed to ensure that Ye Xiao stayed interested in her at all times.
Compared to marrying a man she had never met, someone who might appear out of nowhere, Li Mengyue was far more inclined to be with Ye Xiao.
At least Ye Xiao was adorable, and by now, they’d gotten to know each other’s true selves.
Li Mengyue continued, “Yun-Xiao has immense growth potential. If Yun-Xiao’s CEO made the case, my family would likely compromise. At the very least, Ye Xiao, you could pretend to elope with me.”
“Stop, stop, stop! Yueyue, what are you even talking about?” Jiang Qingyue quickly interrupted her best friend. The things Li Mengyue was saying were getting stranger and stranger.
“Qingyue, I’ll explain this to you properly later, but for now, if possible, I hope you can support me!” Li Mengyue gave her a meaningful look. If she could get Jiang Qingyue on her side, they’d already have two votes in their favor. Even if they ended up being part of Ye Xiao’s harem, they’d at least have more say in matters, wouldn’t they?
“I’ve heard there have been new breakthroughs in stem cell induction technology recently. Whether it’s from 2 females or 2 males parent, it’s now possible to reproduce.”
Li Mengyue left it at that, not elaborating further.
However, Ye Xiao caught her drift immediately. Saying something like that was practically a declaration: as long as Ye Xiao was willing, Li Mengyue was ready to have her children.
It wasn’t something Ye Xiao had seriously considered before, but the thought of having a child with someone she loved—someone truly hers—did sound like a wonderful possibility.
Now that Yunxiao Group was thriving, the idea of having children out of wedlock was hardly a concern. For capital-driven ventures, registering such children wasn’t even an issue.
“Anyway, it’s all up to you. If you don’t mind, I could work while pregnant to pay off the debt. In a few years, we could have three or five children. Ye Xiao, it’s not like you’re short on money or resources…”
“Well, stem cell induction isn’t about just cuddling and getting pregnant, right? We can’t just do that every day as entertainment.”
Shen Yunchu blurted out, her face flushing for no reason. Her mind was in a bit of a daze, not entirely clear at the moment.
Li Mengyue had been speaking in a half-joking tone all along, but the more she spoke like this, the more Ye Xiao felt that she was serious.
In less than a day, someone’s thoughts could change so drastically. In the morning, Li Mengyue was still trying to keep her relationship with Ye Xiao a secret from her best friend, but by night, she was trying to convince her to team up and go further in winning Ye Xiao over.
Jiang Qingyue felt like her best friend was a riddle—saying strange things that sounded like jokes but at the same time felt like serious statements.
Even though she wanted to brush off what her best friend had just said as a joke, she couldn’t shake the feeling that Li Mengyue wasn’t joking at all.
“Right? Otherwise, what else would we be doing? Ye Xiao, don’t you like this kind of thing? Every night in the dark, I end up tangled in the sheets, making a mess… Ah, we’re so loud, it’s chaos!”
She sounded genuinely desperate, so much so that she let slip some crude jokes without thinking, not caring whether her best friend or Ye Xiao’s sister would misunderstand. The words spilled out uncontrollably, laced with a touch of vengeful release of emotions.
Jiang Qingyue suddenly seemed to have thought of something, staring at her best friend in shock. So, that means last night…
Ye Youran’s expression was even more fluctuating, clearly indicating that her younger sister had indeed done something extraordinary, something that made the young lady from the Li family want to abandon her family and run to her.
In any era, this would be considered elopement— a girl who is willing to give up her previous family and friends to run away with you. Ye Youran didn’t know what to say about it.
All she understood was one thing: her sister liked girls.
Ye Xiao was even more troubled, she was somewhat afraid of this. Everything seemed fine during the day, but suddenly, it felt like someone was aiming for the position of the head wife in her harem.
From being so bold at the start to now sitting upright, not daring to make a move or touch anything, her heart had undergone a huge transformation.
She was afraid that two big, dark-faced men might suddenly pop up, knock her unconscious with a club, and shout, “Always flirting around, haha, we’ve caught you!”
Was Li Mengyue sent by Lu Shiqing to intimidate her?
…
Everyone in the room was taken aback by Li Mengyue’s words. Ye Xiao paused for a moment before speaking, “Mengyue, you have to tell us… What does your family expect from you in order for you to be free?”
Ye Xiao didn’t dare to address the previous topic, only stealing a glance at Ye Youran, as if looking for even a second longer might cause an explosion.
Li Mengyue shook her head, slamming her hand on the table with a loud “bang,” and said angrily, “That’s the problem. My family never intended to discuss things with me. The so-called conditions are just a facade of democracy.”
Ye Xiao had to find another way to approach the situation. Hopefully, everyone would forget everything later.
“You can casually spend hundreds of thousands, save up so much money secretly, and just run away. Why bother listening to your family? Just today, these 400,000 yuan are enough for an average person to save for half a lifetime. And that’s just today! Not to mention you have more, and if you lived frugally, you probably wouldn’t even be able to spend it all in your lifetime.”
Li Mengyue gave a wry smile: “You underestimate the Li family too much. Do you think I can just ignore them?”
“You can accept running away with a girl and having three or five children. Can your family really force you into a worse situation than that?” Ye Xiao said.
The atmosphere in the room dropped to freezing point. It seemed that if Ye Xiao said the wrong thing, everything she had barely managed to hold on to up until now would come crashing down.
After crossing over, Ye Xiao had always lived on thin ice, but she hadn’t expected that with Li Mengyue, everything would come out so directly.
Li Mengyue took a big bite of a cherry.
Well, that’s not it. Having children with someone you love can hardly be called miserable, right? Shouldn’t that be called happiness? I can accept being close every day and using technology to have children, but I can’t accept being poor! I’ve never been poor in my life, never experienced what it feels like, and I never want to know what that’s like.”
She shot Ye Xiao a fierce look, as if saying, “I’ve completely figured you out!”
Ye Xiao spread her hands in frustration. It turned out that the beautiful older sister, who seemed so kind, was a disaster waiting to happen. She thought she had a good personality, but here she was, hitting her with a big bomb.
“So, does your company have any new projects coming up? Or do you have any good ideas you can share with me?” Li Mengyue asked.
“I have a few ways to make a profit in the short term. If you want, I could create a huge value in half a year.” Ye Xiao didn’t know how to respond, but tried to keep her older sister from blowing up.
In the end, she looked at Li Mengyue with curiosity. Wasn’t she planning to work on projects and businesses? She must have something in mind. “Do you have any ideas?”
“How about cryptocurrency?” Li Mengyue said.
For a moment, Ye Xiao thought she was joking, but then she understood what she meant.
“What year is it, and you’re still talking about crypto?” Ye Xiao was speechless. Among unreliable ideas, Li Mengyue had chosen the path of getting herself into trouble.
“The crypto world is a mess right now. Isn’t entering it just gambling?” Ye Xiao said.
“No, we can create our own virtual currency. I have a way to pump it up and cash out at the high point,” Li Mengyue said, sounding quite confident.
“How desperate are you? Aren’t you worried about getting caught and thrown into jail?” Ye Xiao asked.
“No, I’ve already bought a plane ticket to go abroad. If you don’t like jail food, you can come with me,” Li Mengyue replied.
“Doesn’t that still count as running away?” Ye Xiao gave a bitter smile. “Is it still about running away, and then using technology to have children?”
But once she left her little corner of the world, Ye Xiao couldn’t even imagine who would be the one carrying the child.