Chapter 425: Your Future is My Past
Watching the knife get closer and closer, Long Hao, who didn't want to be the last eunuch of this era, had a flash of inspiration. He looked at Xu Ruoshui and Xu Ruoxue and said, "Xu Ruoshui, Xu Ruoxue, I know the whereabouts of your biological younger brother. Xu Ping'an isn't your biological younger brother; your biological younger brother is someone else…"
A torrent of silent apologies flooded Long Hao's mind, directed at the man who was supposed to become the Immovable Bright King, Xu Ping'an. He had already sold out Ye Yan, the future Lord of Youming Hall, to save his own skin. Now, with the cold, sterile glint of steel threatening his manhood, he had no choice but to throw another future powerhouse under the bus.
'Principles are worthless if you're dead… or worse,' he rationalized, the sweat on his brow turning icy. 'Besides, as a Reborn, my portfolio of future legends is deep. I have plenty of other investment targets.'
His mind raced, formulating a strategy born of pure terror. 'This monster, Shen Anyu, is an impenetrable wall of arrogance and cruelty. I can't reason with him directly. My only chance is to go through the women beside him. If I can make the Xu sisters indebted to me, maybe, just maybe, they'll plead my case. Shen Anyu might listen to them… he has to!'
The air in the Zhenxiu Pavilion was thick with a silence that pressed down on him, amplifying the sound of his own frantic heartbeat. He felt so utterly, bone-deeply tired. Without waiting for the twin sisters to question him, he forced the words out, his voice a strained rush of syllables.
"Twenty years ago, a nanny in your Xu Family household named Wang Qin committed a heinous act! She swapped her own infant son with the true young master of the Xu Family!"
He paused for dramatic effect, his eyes darting between the two beautiful, identical faces, searching for any sign of shock or intrigue.
"The man you know as Xu Ping'an is a fraud! He's the nanny's son, a cuckoo in your nest who has usurped a life of luxury that was never his to begin with. For two decades, he's lived in splendor, while your true flesh and blood, the real young master of the Xu Family, has suffered a life of poverty and hardship, a fate far, far worse than anything that impostor has ever known!"
He leaned forward as much as the guards holding him would allow, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper, a desperate salesman pitching his final, life-saving product. "Just say the word. Tell Shen Anyu to let me go, and I will immediately tell you where to find your real brother. What do you say? It's a fair trade, isn't it?"
A flicker of amusement, so faint it was almost imperceptible, danced in the depths of Shen Anyu's dark eyes. He remained silent, an observer watching a particularly entertaining play unfold.
Xu Ruoshui and Xu Ruoxue exchanged a look, and the expression that settled on their flawless faces was not one of shock or excitement, but of profound, baffling strangeness.
Xu Ruoshui, ever the gentler of the two, opened her mouth as if to speak, a hesitant look in her eyes, but she was cut off before a single sound could escape.
Her sister, Xu Ruoxue, let out a short, sharp snort of derision. The sound was as crisp and cold as shattering ice. She fixed Long Hao with a look of withering contempt, her voice dripping with scorn. "The saga of the Xu Family's true and fake young masters already caused a massive sensation across the city months ago. Our biological brother, Xu He, has already been welcomed back into the Xu Family."
She tilted her head, a cruel smirk gracing her lips. "To think you'd try and use such stale, outdated news as a bargaining chip to save your own pathetic life… it's not just laughable, it's insulting. Don't you think?"
"What???"
The single word escaped Long Hao's lips as a choked gasp. It felt as if the floor had dissolved beneath him, plunging him into an abyss of cold, stark confusion.
Stunned. The word was insufficient. He was utterly, cataclysmically dumbfounded.
'The truth about the Xu Family's switched sons has been exposed? How is that even possible? In my previous life, that bomb wasn't supposed to drop for another month, right around the time university classes started in September! Had I remembered the timeline wrong? Is my memory failing me?'
A memory surfaced, sharp and painful—the words of the old village chief from that remote mountain hamlet. He'd said that Xu He had already been taken away by a 'noble person' to enjoy a life of fortune. At the time, Long Hao had dismissed it, but now… the noble person was the Xu Family themselves?
It was all wrong. A chaotic, tangled mess that defied every memory he held sacred. What in the hell had happened to his future?
His mind, once a steel trap of future events and certainties, was now a complete and utter blank. He stood there, slack-jawed, the gears of his brain grinding to a screeching halt. His greatest advantage, his most profound secret as a Reborn—the prescient knowledge of the future—was supposed to be his invincible armor. But now, that armor was cracking, shattering into a million pieces. Why was everything completely, irrevocably out of order?
'Maybe… I'm a fake Reborn.'
[Ding! The Son of Destiny, Long Hao, is dumbfounded. Plundering +9999 Destiny Points!]
[Ding! The Son of Destiny, Long Hao's, mentality has collapsed. Plundering +9999 Destiny Points!]
[Ding! The Son of Destiny, Long Hao, is questioning his existence. Self-confidence has been critically damaged. Plundering +66666 Destiny Points!]
The robotic chimes of the system were like nails being hammered into his coffin. Just as his world finished crumbling, Shen Anyu's voice, impossibly calm and leisurely, sliced through the haze.
"Long Hao, if you can't provide a satisfactory explanation for maliciously intruding into my Zhenxiu Pavilion today, then…" Shen Anyu paused, letting the silence hang in the air for a torturous second. "I suppose we'll just have to proceed with the castration."
'A devil. This man is an absolute devil.'
Long Hao's gaze snapped to Shen Anyu. He saw that handsome, jade-like face, the lips curled into a smile of pure, predatory amusement. A violent shiver wracked his entire body, finally yanking him back to the terrifying reality of his situation.
'But what could I possibly explain? Should I tell the truth? That I snuck in to investigate why the future I knew was falling apart at the seams? That would mean revealing my status as a Reborn. That secret is as vital to me as my Investment Return System; it cannot, under any circumstances, be exposed. Or should I play the part of a jilted lover? Claim I was here to make trouble because my fiancée, Su Hongmian, had broken off our engagement for this man?'
He risked a glance at Shen Anyu's eyes, which had narrowed into dangerous slits. A chill colder than death itself ran down his spine. 'No, I can't say that. If I do, my 'little brother' below will be forfeited for certain.'
"Shen… Shen Anyu, I came… I came because…" Long Hao's brain worked furiously, churning through lies and half-truths. Suddenly, an idea sparked. It was a long shot, a desperate bluff. His eyes lit up. "I learned that Ye Yan and his Netherworld Palace were plotting a conspiracy against you! I came here specifically to warn you! I… I didn't expect my intelligence to be outdated. It seems the Netherworld Palace is already finished. But my intentions were good, weren't they?"
Shen Anyu regarded him with a lazy, half-smile, his head tilted. "Oh? Are we that close? You, a member of the Sichuan Long Family, came all this way just to deliver a warning to me?"
Long Hao managed a stiff, awkward smile, the muscles in his face twitching.
Just as the silence began to stretch, Shen Anyu spoke again, his tone suddenly magnanimous. "Forget it. I happen to be in a good mood today. Letting you off the hook isn't entirely out of the question…"
The words were like a divine pardon. A wave of wild, ecstatic joy crashed over Long Hao. 'Yes! I'm saved!' As long as he could walk out of this room with his body intact, he swore he would get as far away from Shen Anyu as humanly possible. He would lie low, invest in his other future titans, collect his system returns, and build his power base. Then, and only then, when he was strong enough to crush this man, would he return.
'A gentleman's revenge is a dish best served cold, even if it takes ten years!' he vowed internally, a fire of hatred rekindling in his heart. The humiliation of Su Hongmian breaking their engagement, the terror and threats he'd endured today—he would repay it all a thousand times over.
'Shen Anyu, oh, Shen Anyu… you really are nothing but a spoiled, arrogant scion of the Yanxia Shen Family after all,' he sneered in his mind. 'You actually believed my pathetic bluff. Heh, I suppose in your eyes, I'm not even worth a second thought, am I?'
'After all, what is my Sichuan Long Family compared to the monolithic Yanxia Shen Family? We're nothing. An ant you could crush without even noticing. But you have no idea. You have no idea that I am a noble Reborn, blessed by the heavens with an Investment Return System. With these trump cards, my rise is inevitable!'
'Just you wait! The day will come when I make both you, Shen Anyu, and that bitch Su Hongmian kneel before me together, offering me cappuccino as you beg for my forgiveness!'
Long Hao was lost in his triumphant calculations, a smug grin already forming on his lips.
But in the next instant.
Bang! Bang!
Thud!
An irresistible force slammed down on his shoulders. His legs buckled, and he was driven straight to the floor. His knees connected with the hard, polished marble with a sickening, dull crack. A blast of sharp, excruciating pain shot up from his kneecaps, radiating through his entire body.
He grimaced, sucking in a ragged breath through clenched teeth.
"Shen… Shen Anyu, you…!"
Long Hao stared in disbelief at the two Shen Family guards pinning him to the ground, then whipped his head up to look at Shen Anyu, his face a mask of shock and fury.
"I appreciate the thought behind your warning," Shen Anyu said, his smile never wavering as he looked down at the kneeling Long Hao. "But I really don't like your sneaky behavior."
He took a slow, deliberate step forward, his shadow falling over Long Hao.
"I'll give you two choices."
His voice was soft, almost a whisper, yet it carried the weight of an executioner's sentence.
"One, I castrate you."
"Two, you offer me a chip. Something that interests me. If you can do that, I'll let you go."
'An interesting chip?'
Long Hao's face turned bitter. 'What kind of chip could I offer that would interest a Shen Family Young Master like Shen Anyu from the Yanxia Shen Family? The Investment Return System? Information about the future?'
If he couldn't offer anything, Long Hao absolutely believed that Shen Anyu would castrate him.
'But how could I offer an interesting chip?'
After repeated setbacks, the future Asura Demon King Chu Yun, Leader of the War God Alliance Yan Lingxiao, Lord of Youming Hall Ye Yan, and Immovable Bright King Xu Ping'an, these four future prominent figures, all had huge changes.
Although Long Hao didn't know what exactly had happened, there must have been significant changes, and his foresight into future events might not be accurate.
If he said something wrong, Shen Anyu definitely wouldn't give him another chance.
'Information about the future must not be given. On one hand, I'm not sure if it's true, and on the other hand, if Shen Anyu discovers that I'm a Reborn, I'll definitely be secretly imprisoned and interrogated, and perhaps even sliced up. Absolutely not. Saying anything about Ye Yan and Xu Ping'an was already risky enough…'
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