A Cannon-Fodder Omega’s Self-Saving Guide - Chapter 5

Naturally, Yin Yin did not believe her.

But the woman before her possessed both a cat’s nimbleness and a fox’s sly, alluring charm. Her shifting eyes were full of lively fascination. Even someone like Yin Yin, whose perception of the outside world was somewhat sluggish, felt a faint moment of confusion when facing her.

The woman seemed to have seductiveness carved into her bones. Every glance she cast, every light laugh, every breath she released as she drew close, and every touch of her fingertips against each inch of skin was measured with perfect allure.

In the silence, she heard Xia Weichen sigh softly.

“Miss Yin, don’t worry. I won’t do anything too outrageous. I only want a verbal agreement confirming the relationship between us.”

The words sounded like a compromise, but Xia Weichen knew very well that she truly could not do anything.

In any case, with Yin Yin’s personality, she would never fall in love with anyone. By placing words like romance and love onto herself first, Xia Weichen could make Yin Yin think she had merely been blinded by so-called love at first sight, allowing Yin Yin to lower her guard more easily.

The system could not watch anymore. “Host, isn’t it a little bad for you to use Yin Yin like this?”

Hearing the system say it so unpleasantly, Xia Weichen could not help refuting it. “This isn’t called using her. This is called mutual benefit.”

Since she had promised to give Yin Yin sufficient investment, she would not fail to do so. Even if, after dragging Lin Langruo down from her current glory, Xia Weichen terminated the agreement with Yin Yin and the two separated, Yin Yin would not lose anything.

“I suspect Host is finding crooked logic.” The system jumped onto Xia Weichen’s shoulder.

“Then do you think someone like Yin Yin has any possibility of falling in love?”

The system fell silent for a moment. Using its knowledge of the overall plot, it responded, “Probably not.”

This was the consensus anyone who had seen the entire plot would reach. Someone like Yin Yin seemed naturally incapable of thinking in terms of romance. A person like her was almost entirely occupied by her career.

“She doesn’t have that possibility, and neither do I. But regarding the Xia family, I still need to give them a reason for such an impulsive decision.”

Because Father Lin had done Father Xia a great kindness, that layer of connection was there. For her father, who valued righteousness and loyalty, asking the Xia family to completely sever ties with Lin Langruo was almost impossible.

“All right. I agree.”

Yin Yin’s voice made Xia Weichen’s heart, which had only been seventy percent certain, finally settle completely. She glanced at Yin Yin’s expression. Yin Yin looked distant and indifferent, her entire person giving off an air of handling business strictly according to procedure.

It was not that she believed Xia Weichen, but that she wanted to gamble once—that Xia Weichen really was merely acting on a whim and had come to use her as some so-called observation subject.

Although Yin Yin had carved out a place for herself through her own efforts, in front of the Xia Consortium, she was still extremely insignificant. By placing such a tempting condition in front of her, Xia Weichen was undoubtedly offering her a high-stakes gamble.

Yin Yin was very calm, but her calmness was more like the ability to indifferently consider a mad decision.

This gamble—she decided to accept it.

However, she could not let Xia Weichen suffer a loss either. After the project was completed, she would distribute the profits to Xia Weichen according to a share agreement. If Xia Weichen insisted on using the so-called name of “keeping” her, then she could do as she pleased.

“Sister Yin, don’t worry. Being with me won’t make you lose out.” Seeing that Yin Yin had agreed, Xia Weichen smoothly pushed the document back in front of Yin Yin. “Sister Yin can look over these clauses first. If there are no issues, I have a pen here.”

She then took a pen out of her small bag and was about to hand it to Yin Yin, but Yin Yin beat her to it, using the pen she carried with her to sign her name.

She signed without even reading the contents? Xia Weichen was slightly startled.

“Actually, Yin Yin already read it,” the system reminded Xia Weichen from the side. “Yin Yin has the ability to read ten lines at a glance and remember everything she sees.”

The bedroom light was a warm color, slightly dim, setting off Yin Yin’s side profile and making it appear even cooler and more noble, as if glowing beneath the lamplight.

“Sister Yin’s handwriting is very beautiful,” Xia Weichen praised, seizing the opportunity.

Yin Yin paused, seeming unaccustomed to receiving compliments.

“…Thank you.”

Yin Yin’s thanks were extremely light, like a faint breeze brushing past one’s ear, leaving no trace behind.

When Lin Langruo returned home and saw that the familiar pair of shoes was missing from the doorway, her expression became especially subtle.

Lin Langruo hurriedly called a servant over and asked where Xia Weichen had gone.

In her view, after the car accident, Xia Weichen had followed her suggestion and rarely gone out. She stayed quietly at home, and even if she wanted to go out, as long as Lin Langruo blocked her slightly, Xia Weichen would continue staying at home without making a fuss, like a caged bird imprisoned behind bars.

“Chenchen, have you forgotten? Last time, it was because you refused to listen to me and insisted on going out that you got into that car accident. Do you still want to make me worry so much?”

Every time Xia Weichen wanted to go out, Lin Langruo tirelessly instilled this thought in her: she could not go out. If she went out and got into another car accident, Lin Langruo would worry.

If she did not confine Xia Weichen at home and instead allowed her to come into contact with the outside world, how could she control Xia Weichen? How could she make Xia Weichen willingly hand the Xia family over to her?

Xia Weichen trusted her deeply, and she had used that trust perfectly. She used Xia Weichen’s complete, unreserved trust in her to seize the Xia family’s businesses into her own hands.

If not for the Xia family, how could she have fallen into her current state of living under someone else’s roof?

A sinister shadow flashed through Lin Langruo’s eyes.

Seeing that Lin Langruo’s expression was poor, the servant hurriedly said, “Just now, the youngest miss of the Ming family had something to discuss with Miss Xia and called her out. Miss Xia left in a hurry, so it was probably something important.”

Hearing this, Lin Langruo’s heart sank. “Ming Lanyi?”

This servant specialized in working for wealthy families and could name most people in the circle with even a little status. She nodded repeatedly.

“And you just let Miss Xia go out?”

Lin Langruo’s voice was as cold as frost, containing a deep sense of danger.

The servant was so frightened by Lin Langruo that she could not even speak. She involuntarily stepped backward. Suddenly, a violent gust swept past her. She felt a sharp pain in the left side of her face, and under the forceful impact, her entire body fell toward the ground.

“President Lin, I…”

“Useless!”

Lin Langruo cursed, then turned and hurried upstairs. A faint sense of unease had already risen in her heart. In the past, no matter what Xia Weichen wanted to do, she would always ask her first. But now…

Could it be that Xia Weichen had begun to suspect her?

Lin Langruo pushed open the half-closed bedroom door. Everything in the room seemed no different from when Xia Weichen had still been there, except—

Her gaze fell on the head of the bed. Something had clearly been placed there.

It was a sheet of letter paper.

On the letter paper, there was only one simple sentence:

Lin Langruo, let’s break off our engagement.

That night, Xia Weichen stayed at Yin Yin’s home. She chose to spend the night there for no other reason than because she knew very well what kind of reaction Lin Langruo would have when she saw Xia Weichen’s proposal to break off the engagement. Lin Langruo would definitely chase her all the way to the Xia family home and interrogate her endlessly. Now was not yet the time to completely fall out with Lin Langruo.

The only evidence in her hands was the medicine she had taken when she left Lin Langruo’s home, but the probability of detecting that slow-acting poison from that bottle was extremely low. Lin Langruo had always been cautious. The medicine bottle mixed with poison was very likely the one Lin Langruo carried with her.

According to the plot Xia Weichen knew, three days later, Lin Langruo would leave Linqi City on a business trip and would not return for three months.

This would be the perfect time to assist Yin Yin in gaining a firm foothold.

Early the next morning, Xia Weichen sat on the sofa, racking her brains as she recalled Yin Yin’s career path.

She remembered that Yin Yin had a project during this period, and this project had a significant competitive relationship with Lin Langruo. In order to curry favor with the Xia family and offer borrowed flowers to Buddha, those businessmen had not hesitated to trip Yin Yin up.

Thinking of this, Xia Weichen suddenly sat upright, her voice serious. “System, I suddenly thought of something.”

The system, which had been dozing off, was startled. “What is it?”

“The so-called golden finger may not be Lin Langruo. It may be the Xia family.”

Looking at the entire process, the reason Lin Langruo could sit firmly in the female lead’s position, command wind and rain from that position, and receive endless flattery from those below was that the vast majority of people were not submitting to Lin Langruo herself, but to the Xia Consortium in the hands of Xia Weichen, Lin Langruo’s wife. Even if they did not respect the monk, they still had to respect the Buddha. No matter what, they had to show Lin Langruo some respect.

Once that respect accumulated over time, it naturally allowed Lin Langruo, who was already ambitious, to climb to an even higher position.

What if the person cultivated by the Xia Consortium was changed to Yin Yin? Even with the entire Xia family backing her, Lin Langruo could only barely hold a sixty-forty advantage against Yin Yin, who had no background at all. If the two of their backgrounds were switched…

“That’s right! Why didn’t I think of that?” With Xia Weichen’s reminder, the golden ball suddenly understood. But it soon became pessimistic again. “But Host, how much say do you still have in the Xia family now?”

“…”

Xia Weichen began seriously considering this question.

It was true that she had been away from management for a little too long. Ever since the car accident, she had been trapped in the gloom of her damaged gland and unable to break free. Because of that, Father Xia and Mother Xia had not forced her to come out and continue learning how to manage the Xia family. After all, they believed that she and Lin Langruo would get married sooner or later, and when the time came, handing things over to Lin Langruo would be the same.

She did indeed have some real authority in her hands, but it was probably far less than the amount she had boasted to Yin Yin about before.

The words she said last night had truly been exaggerated.

Sensing Xia Weichen’s low mood, the system hurriedly thought of a solution for her. “How about this? Host can see which family has a banquet coming up recently and bring Yin Yin along. Anyway, with Host’s identity, those people have very sharp eyes. How could it not spread from one person to ten, from ten to a hundred, until the whole city is full of rumors and everyone knows?”

“…You’re misusing idioms.” Xia Weichen complained, but she had to admit that the system’s suggestion was indeed a good method.

In Linqi’s circle of wealthy businessmen, banquets were especially popular. If someone bought an antique, obtained a painting or calligraphy piece, or even found some rare flowers and plants, they would specially hold a gathering for it. When Father Xia was young, he had also liked drinking and feasting with friends. But now that he was older, these social and diplomatic matters had fallen onto Xia Weichen’s shoulders.

However, Xia Weichen had not gone out for half a year. These small social skills felt to her as if they belonged to another lifetime. Even at the Ming family’s cocktail party yesterday, she had nearly shown her inexperience. If she wanted to deal with these things, it would be best for her to slowly familiarize herself again.

It seemed that whether it was management or social skills, she would have to slowly pick them up again. From now on, she was still only on her own.

After all, she was the sole heir of Xia Group. Unless she was willing, no one could forcibly snatch the Xia family from her hands.