Though she wasn’t proud of it, Cheng Yao barely slept a wink that night, her mind haunted by the image of Qian Heng’s pitiful, aggrieved expression. Sure enough, when she got up the next morning, the mirror showed her sporting two dark circles under her eyes. Qian Heng, meanwhile, looked positively energized, as if he’d absorbed her vitality like some sort of demon king.
Fortunately, the two of them worked at different firms, so they could finally go their separate ways. Once Cheng Yao arrived at Jinzhuan, it was as if a compass had escaped a magnetic disturbance and could finally point true north again.
But before long, her mood was once again yanked into midair. Passing by the office pantry, Cheng Yao overheard a few interns talking.
“Did you guys see that thread?”
“You mean the one exposing Qian Heng? The poster went through all his morally dubious past cases, saying he has no bottom line at all, does anything for money—and it also came out that his dad is the richest man in City A, saying Qian Heng won all those early cases just because his family bought off the court…”
“Forget Qian Heng, did you see the thread about Attorney Deng? Guess it’s true what they say, fame invites trouble—both of them go on Lawyers Debate, get popular, and then people start digging up their private lives.”
“What happened with Deng Ming?”
“About how his ex-wife screwed him over. His ex-wife really is an embarrassment to us women—dating and marrying him while thinking of herself as some superior city girl looking down on him, spending his money to support a lover, and he ended up walking away with nothing in the divorce because he cared too much about their relationship.”
“That poor guy? That’s really rough. Coming from a poor background, going through all that, and Attorney Deng can still maintain that refined, easygoing temperament—now that’s a real man for you. Hearing you tell it, I’m actually starting to like Attorney Deng more and more…”
The interns were chatting casually, in the mood for gossip, but Cheng Yao’s heart sank as she listened. She pulled out her phone, a bad feeling creeping over her.
Deng Ming was never going to just lie down and let Qian Heng thrash him. He couldn’t win openly on the show, but just as Cheng Xi had warned her before, with his vindictiveness and vanity, he’d absolutely resort to underhanded tricks behind the scenes.
The Lu Jian case—though Deng Ming had lost, his sophistry and successful scapegoating meant the case hadn’t touched his vested interests at all; publicly he was still the shining “conscience of the industry.” As for Cheng Yao herself, though she hated to admit it, in Deng Ming’s eyes she probably wasn’t even worth being his adversary, so he hadn’t even bothered to seek revenge against her.
But Qian Heng was different. Qian Heng was too formidable, too dazzling—like the most precious, exquisite jade, next to which Deng Ming looked like some dull, lifeless fish-eye masquerading as gemstone. No one could stand across from Qian Heng without feeling that pressure, that sense of being outmatched. And this time, with Qian Heng having so mercilessly torn down his image, Deng Ming had once again started manipulating public opinion.
And Cheng Yao had to admit, when it came to playing the crowd, Deng Ming really had never once failed.
The so-called exposé thread had started fermenting in the middle of the night—first anonymous “insiders” leaving vague, insinuating comments buried in all the Qian Heng hype threads: “This Qian Heng guy has terrible character, no morals whatsoever, will do anything for money, and has been coasting on a powerful family background all along.”
Then more and more “insiders” sprang up like mushrooms after rain—claiming to be Deng Ming’s former neighbors, claiming to be Deng Ming and Cheng Xi’s schoolmates, claiming to be Deng Ming’s brothers… Yet no matter what guise they wore, all these “insiders” told a remarkably consistent story: they had all personally witnessed how the gentle, refined Deng Ming had been used and discarded by his ex-wife. Though only in scattered fragments, these “insiders” hit exactly the trigger points to ignite public opinion: a poor boy falling for a spoiled rich girl, working himself to the point of hospitalization for her sake, buying her a house and a car, handing over his entire paycheck, thinking he’d finally made it—only to be cruelly cheated on by her…
This struck a nerve with the vast majority of ordinary, non-wealthy people. In this world, most people are just ordinary folks who rely on hard work alone to try to climb up, gritting their teeth through miserable jobs to get by. Deng Ming’s story gave them near-total emotional resonance—an honest man who’d struggled for half his life, only to be ruined by a scheming, calculating woman—this hit the public’s anger button squarely. And that after enduring such tremendous pain, Deng Ming hadn’t become hysterical but had remained gentle and refined, continuing to advance in his career, eventually finding happiness again with a new family and child—this was practically a textbook karmic-revenge success story, giving everyone a vicarious sense of triumph.
Compared to Deng Ming, Qian Heng’s situation was much worse—he was too excellent. Handsome, in great shape, professionally outstanding, well-off, and even his family background was impressive—this hit exactly the pain points of many Chinese male netizens and successfully drew in the anti-rich crowd.
Amid this wave of public opinion, someone casually recounted, with embellishments, some of the cases Qian Heng had handled: representing a cheating tycoon and helping strip his poor legitimate wife of everything in the divorce; representing a scheming mistress and helping her illegitimate child win an inheritance; representing a sly, greasy old man and defeating his gentle ex-wife in a trust dispute…
At the same time, some “passersby” tallied up the cases Deng Ming had handled: helping an elderly, destitute couple demand support payments from their heartless son; helping an abandoned original wife recover assets her scumbag ex-husband had hidden away during their divorce; helping a legal spouse reclaim marital assets squandered by a mistress during the marriage…
Ordinary people, for the most part, lack a rational understanding of law and the legal profession—they can only judge good and evil at the simplest moral level, and whatever they see as unjust or immoral becomes something to attack. They’re not like Cheng Yao, who knew that Deng Ming’s cases were nothing more than fig leaves he trotted out periodically to build his own image, and that behind winning fame from these cases, when it came to taking on new clients he only cared about the size of the claim, and he’d stop at nothing—even bending the law—to win.
As it says in “The Crowd,” what a group pursues and believes is never truth or reason, but blind faith, cruelty, dogmatism, and fanaticism—only simple, extreme emotions.
Deng Ming had a thorough grasp of public psychology, and this hit almost dead center.
Overnight, public opinion exploded in a completely different direction. With obvious manipulation and paid bot accounts working together, Qian Heng’s online reputation collapsed practically overnight, cementing his label as the “industry menace”; meanwhile Deng Ming, riding on his “tragic past,” successfully turned his reputation around, harvesting a wave of sympathy mixed with goodwill and encouragement, once again securing his throne as the “conscience of the industry.” The stark contrast in the two men’s private lives had, in a single stroke, flipped their public images entirely.
Looking at these threads, Cheng Yao felt a surge of intense fury. Deng Ming was truly despicable—just like when he was handling cases, unable to win fairly here either, so he resorted to underhanded tactics to smear his opponent.
“Qian Heng is so disgusting, gross, I hope he ends up infertile and gets genital warts and HIV, face covered in cauliflower growths!”
“That woman, Cheng Xi, Attorney Deng’s ex-wife—she may look proper on the surface but women like her have really strong desires underneath, super wild in bed. Here’s a photo I dug up, let me break down her features for you all.”
…
Because of the Bai Xingmeng case, Cheng Yao wasn’t unfamiliar with online abuse herself, but in this moment, seeing these curses and malicious speculation, she realized this was somehow even harder to accept than being attacked herself.
Qian Heng wasn’t that kind of person. Neither was Cheng Xi.
Only now could she no longer lie to herself. She cared about Cheng Xi, and damn it, she also cared about Qian Heng. Both of them mattered to her equally.
For Cheng Xi’s sake and Qian Heng’s, Cheng Yao felt she ought to do something too—she couldn’t just sit here and take it.
But before she could figure out a plan, she learned some grim news from Li Chengxuan.
During lunch break, Li Chengxuan sidled up to her mysteriously.
“Cheng Yao, do you think I should change my hairstyle? This one’s a bit plain for TV, don’t you think?”
“TV?”
Li Chengxuan looked rather pleased with himself. “You know that Lawyers Debate show, right? Super hot lately—the production invited me to go up against Deng Ming tonight.”
Cheng Yao frowned, taken aback. “Isn’t Qian Heng facing Deng Ming?”
“That Qian Heng guy—he’s been getting torn apart online lately, probably couldn’t take the pressure. He’s paying the breach penalty to withdraw from tonight’s taping. The production came to me this morning practically begging me to save the day.”
Li Chengxuan said it offhandedly, but Cheng Yao caught something more in it.
A man like Qian Heng would never simply back out because he couldn’t handle public backlash. His personality was far too tough for that—he didn’t care what the world thought of him. Even if the whole world turned against him, he had the sort of aura that suggested he’d rather bring the world down with him than yield.
So what exactly had happened?
Cheng Yao couldn’t help herself. She ducked into a conference room and, after much hesitation, dialed that familiar string of numbers. Since the breakup, she’d actually deleted Qian Heng’s number, yet when it came down to it, she hadn’t needed to recall it at all—her fingers had already dialed it before she even thought about it.
Some things, even deleted, still stay remembered. Cheng Yao felt a rush of self-directed frustration.
The call connected almost instantly, and Qian Heng’s low voice came through. “Cheng Yao?”
Though she hadn’t been nervous dialing the number, now she suddenly felt her nerves kick in. Cheng Yao instinctively changed the subject to ease the awkwardness. “Are you that free today? You picked up so fast?”
“Your ringtone is different from everyone else’s.”
That was just like Qian Heng—sometimes this man was painfully blunt, but other times he had too much of a gift for saying things just right. He hadn’t said anything else, and yet in that one line, the unspoken sentiment was already obvious—
Only for you would I answer this fast.
Cheng Yao tried to shake off the emotion and got straight to the point. “Tonight’s show—why are you pulling out?”
Qian Heng clearly didn’t want to tell the truth. His voice was flat. “Just suddenly didn’t feel like going. No point to it.”
“But didn’t you invite me to come watch tonight?”
Qian Heng paused, his voice dropping slightly. “You weren’t going to come anyway.”
“I will.”
Qian Heng went quiet on the other end.
“If you go on, I’ll be there.” Cheng Yao decided to lay it all out too. “Deng Ming’s pulled all these tricks behind the scenes, and you’re not going—doesn’t that just play right into his hands? You’d be handing him a win for nothing, and it looks like you’re conceding without a fight, on top of getting saddled with all this bad reputation.”
“I don’t care about my reputation.”
“I know you don’t care.” Cheng Yao took a deep breath, putting on a stern tone. “But I do.”
Qian Heng seemed to freeze for a moment before he responded, as though only then catching what she’d said. “What? What did you just say?”
“I said I care.” Cheng Yao suppressed the heat rising in her face and said, matter-of-factly, “You’re currently, for the time being, considered one of my suitors. Having a suitor with such a terrible reputation reflects badly on me too.”
This time, Qian Heng’s response came quickly. “‘One of’? Who else is there besides me? Gu Beiqing? Is there someone else too? If you’re saying ‘one of,’ that means at least three…”
Could this man please stay on topic for once?!
“You need to keep going for the recording tonight.” Cheng Yao had to steer them back on track herself. “I don’t want to watch someone like Deng Ming keep coasting along on false glory. I want to watch you crush him in front of that many viewers, completely tear apart his image.”
“Cheng Yao, I can’t go.”
“Why not?!”
“Deng Ming called me.”
“What?”
Qian Heng paused, his voice calm and composed, but the content sent Cheng Yao’s mind reeling with fury—
“Deng Ming said, if I insist on continuing to record tonight, he’ll retaliate against Cheng Xi—release more of her private information, photos, her current work address, including her phone number. You know how poorly privacy protection works in our country—even if it gets leaked, seeking accountability and justice is not only difficult, it’s a long, drawn-out process. I know that after her divorce from Deng Ming, Cheng Xi took a big hit, apparently even fell into some depression according to what Wu Jun told me, and she’s only just now starting to feel better. If Deng Ming pulls something like this, I’m afraid it would really hurt Cheng Xi badly.”
Cheng Yao felt fury surging through her chest. How shameless of Deng Ming to think he could threaten Qian Heng using Cheng Xi like that. “Where does he get the confidence to think using Cheng Xi as leverage would work? Qian Heng, don’t worry about it…”
“Cheng Yao, he knows I love you.” Qian Heng went quiet for a moment before adding, “Very much. Enough to change my principles for you.”
“Cheng Xi is your sister, I can’t just not care about that. I don’t want you to get hurt, and I don’t want your family hurt either.” Qian Heng’s voice remained flat. “As for my own reputation, I don’t rely on reputation to get clients anyway. Besides, aren’t I already the industry menace?”
“You’re not. Deng Ming is.” Cheng Yao’s resolve was firm. “Qian Heng, go on the show. Go clear your name, go clear the name of our profession. Go show the whole world what a truly professional lawyer looks like, what real professional integrity means.”
Qian Heng was quiet for a moment, then said in a low voice, “Cheng Xi…”
“Qian Heng, I don’t need your protection. I’ll protect my own family. I don’t want you to sacrifice yourself to protect me. You protected me through the Bai Xingmeng case, through the Tang Bing matter—it was always you protecting me.” Cheng Yao’s voice carried a smile, firm and resolute. “This time, let me return the favor and protect you instead.”
“As for everything else, I got your back.”
Qian Heng didn’t want his family hurt, and neither did Cheng Yao want Qian Heng to suffer for it—being strong didn’t mean he should have to shoulder more pressure. She didn’t want him carrying this misunderstood reputation, but she also didn’t want him withdrawing tonight only to be criticized for lacking the nerve to show up. As for Cheng Xi’s situation, Cheng Yao already had a plan in mind—she just needed Cheng Xi’s consent.
After hanging up with Qian Heng, Cheng Yao took a deep breath and called her sister Cheng Xi.
“Sis…”
Cheng Xi cut her off first. “Yao Yao, I was just about to call you.” She paused, her voice firm. “I’ve decided to sue Deng Ming.”
Cheng Yao froze for a moment, then felt a rush of overwhelming excitement and surprise. “Sis!”
Cheng Xi’s decision aligned perfectly with her own plan!
“I saw the smear posts online.” Cheng Xi’s voice carried a light note of mockery. “Seems like as Deng Ming’s ex-wife, I’m quite the useful brick—wherever it’s needed, that’s where I get thrown.”
“Sis, I’m sorry, this whole thing with Deng Ming dragging you into it again is partly my fault…” Cheng Yao wasn’t sure how to explain. “How do I put this, there’s this legal variety show recently called Lawyers Debate, Deng Ming’s on it, and then, well, not me, it’s Qian Heng…”
“Yao Yao, I watched Lawyers Debate.” Cheng Xi cut her off. “I know who Qian Heng is.”
This time, Cheng Yao was the surprised one. “I figured you wouldn’t watch a show with Deng Ming on it.”
For the first time, discussing Deng Ming, Cheng Xi’s tone carried not suppression and avoidance, but ease and a sense of vindication. “I wouldn’t watch anything else, but when someone’s crushing him and slapping him in the face, how could I possibly miss that?”
Ever since her divorce from Deng Ming, Cheng Xi had struggled for a long time to move past it—not that she still had feelings for him, but that Deng Ming had utterly shattered her faith in love and marriage. A childhood sweetheart, a love she’d devoted so many years to, could turn out to be so cold and heartless—Cheng Xi had nearly lost interest in getting to know new people at all, almost lost the ability to connect with anyone.
She was beautiful and gentle by nature, and it wasn’t as if no one had pursued her after the divorce, but it had taken her a very long time to heal from the hurt—she’d even fallen into some depression, and only after Cheng Yao urged her to quit her job and travel for a while had she gradually started to recover. But Cheng Yao knew that although Cheng Xi appeared to be laughing and talking normally on the surface again, she truly hadn’t moved past it.
“I’m so, so grateful to Qian Heng.” At this moment, Cheng Xi spoke about Deng Ming with a calm voice. “Watching him slowly strip away Deng Ming’s facade in front of the whole nation—I found it satisfying, exhilarating, and also deeply grateful. He did what I never dared to do myself.”
“This is the first time I’ve actively followed news about Deng Ming,” Cheng Xi laughed softly. “Though the divorce was a long time ago, before this I could never say I’d truly moved past it. Because when it came to any information about Deng Ming, I always avoided it. Even though he slandered me so badly during the divorce, I still instinctively avoided confronting it—so no matter how much you encouraged me, I never wanted to sue, because I only wished the whole thing would just pass with time.” Cheng Xi paused. “Deng Ming is a wound in my life, and even knowing there’s pus and infection in it, I was too afraid of the pain, too scared—even knowing that facing him head-on and closing this Ni Ye You Jin Tian – Ni Ye You Jin Tian – Chapter was the only way to truly heal, I still wasn’t willing to reopen the wound and clean it out.”
This was the first time Cheng Xi had ever opened up her heart to Cheng Yao like this. Cheng Yao held her phone, aching with love for her sister, and equally seething with hatred toward Deng Ming. Cheng Xi was such a good person—why should she have to suffer at his hands again and again?
“But I don’t want to be like this anymore.” Cheng Xi’s voice was firm. “There are things you can’t keep avoiding forever. I don’t want everyone else protecting me all the time, don’t want everyone else fighting my battles for me. I should stand up and fight back myself. Otherwise it’s not fair to you, not fair to Qian Heng, and even less fair to my boyfriend who’s quietly looking out for me right now. I’ve been a coward for so many years—it’s time I stood up and settled things with the past, and said goodbye to it properly.”
Cheng Yao, thrilled for her sister, also found her attention drawn to something else, and she asked, stunned. “Boyfriend? Sis? You have a boyfriend?”
Cheng Xi’s tone was calm as she dropped a bombshell. “Yeah, Wu Jun and I are together.”
Wu Jun??
Her sister and Wu Jun were together??
Before Cheng Yao could even fully process her shock, Cheng Xi hit her with a second one, saying calmly, “I also recently found out about you and Qian Heng.”
Cheng Yao bit her lip. “We broke up.”
“Then why are you calling me for Qian Heng’s sake?”
“I’m not calling for Qian Heng’s sake!”
Cheng Xi laughed, gently perceptive. “You want me to fight back, you don’t want Qian Heng to carry a bad reputation—you care about him. Just as much as you care about me.”
Cheng Yao was practically on the verge of losing her temper. “Sis!”
“Alright, let’s talk business.” Cheng Xi finally stopped teasing her, pausing. “As for suing Deng Ming, I want you to handle it.”
Cheng Yao’s heart pounded with excitement. “I’ve wanted to sue him for ages! I’ll go organize the materials and gather evidence right now! But besides the lawsuit, we can’t let him off the hook on the public opinion front either! We need to fight back there too!”
“Right, I’ll leave that part to Wu Jun. He’s got plenty of connections in the media world.”
Cheng Yao nodded firmly.
The two sisters, for once, weren’t chatting on the phone—they were seriously and carefully discussing litigation strategy. Cheng Xi, after all, was a top graduate of T University’s law school, and once she truly dove into legal analysis, her ideas were sharp and well thought out.
A good lawyer shouldn’t let public opinion influence a court’s judgment, but when facing an opposing lawyer trying to manipulate public opinion, one also can’t just sit back—one has to push back directly. Law and public opinion don’t necessarily have to conflict. Cheng Yao believed that as long as they pursued this properly through legal means, presenting the full facts openly to the public without bias or distortion, then once the truth was laid out honestly, public opinion might actually give the law a positive push forward.
The public, faced with an edited version of the “truth,” tends to believe lies easily—and in times like this, it’s all the more important for someone to step forward and set the record straight.
Before hanging up, Cheng Yao made sure to confirm once more. “Sis, are you really sure about this? Even though we can clarify the truth about Deng Ming’s lies to the public, public opinion is public opinion precisely because it’s so varied—even if most people support you once they know the truth, there will always be some who won’t listen, who’ll keep attacking you and cursing you… And especially with the attention this whole thing has already gathered, once we release the facts, you’ll be even more in the spotlight than during your divorce from Deng Ming—constantly under scrutiny, and that quiet, peaceful life you want might not be possible for a while… So sis, are you really sure about this?”
“Yao Yao, I can’t keep letting you protect me forever.” Cheng Xi didn’t hesitate at all. “I know about Deng Ming threatening Qian Heng into withdrawing from the show. He cares about you so much he’s even willing to protect me by extension, not caring about the humiliation and reputation damage of withdrawing. How could I not do the same? You love him, want to protect him—I love you, and I’ll love the person you love too. How could I watch him get put in that position?”
After hanging up with Cheng Xi, Cheng Yao still felt her heart pounding with excitement, her cheeks burning. This feeling of fighting alongside Cheng Xi really was wonderful. Between family, even with past quarrels, past conflicts, past youthful misunderstandings—there was something about blood ties that had a kind of magic to it, pulling them together into one force. I protect you, you care about me.
Because of how their parents had unintentionally compared the two of them, she’d once harbored some complicated feelings toward Cheng Xi. But they would always be sisters. Forever.