“In any case, I’m playing the female rogue!” On this point, Qi Xi was fully convinced of her own logic. “Why should women only ever sit back and become victims? I want to do the opposite—portray a perpetrator, and this kind of villain role is actually more of a challenge to act, better able to showcase my skill!”
Because of Qi Xi’s insistence, Gu Yan eventually had no choice but to agree to her plan, though before finalizing it, he still pressed her repeatedly to confirm—
“I have no objection to you playing the role, but do you understand the impact this might have on you after it airs?” Gu Yan paused, then warned her, “Even though it’s just a legal-education video, plenty of internet users aren’t rational, and the abuse could very well escalate to target you personally. Your personal information could get leaked, you might even be harassed.”
Qi Xi didn’t take this seriously. “It won’t get that bad. Aren’t you overthinking this a bit?”
Gu Yan pressed his lips together. “I’m not overthinking it.” His eyes, calm and steady, looked at Qi Xi, then dropped away. “It’s something that really does happen.”
Qi Xi wanted to argue, but just as she opened her mouth, Gu Yan looked at her again and repeated himself—
“Qi Xi, everything I just said—those are all things that could really happen to you after the legal video airs.”
Gu Yan’s tone was even, with no hint of blame in it, and yet Qi Xi suddenly understood.
Why was Gu Yan so certain these things would really happen? Was it because…
Was it because of that video from her graduation ceremony? Even though Qi Xi had reported and gotten every link she could find taken down, it had still spread to some degree. Had that degree of spread alone caused this kind of impact on Gu Yan?
Throughout all of this, Gu Yan had never once scolded Qi Xi over it, had barely even brought it up on his own, and had certainly never used it as leverage to ask anything of her—yet this only made Qi Xi feel more guilty and more troubled, and it strengthened her resolve to play the villain role.
If it really would cause the kind of impact Gu Yan described, then she absolutely couldn’t let him go through it again—she should be the one to put herself in his shoes and feel what he’d experienced.
So Qi Xi made her decision almost like the final strike of a gavel, showing unwavering resolve: “Regardless! I’m doing it!”
**
On one hand, Qi Xi had finally succeeded in claiming the “female rogue” role and began revising the script; on the other, Cheng Junliang brought back feedback after talking with his supervising attorney—
His supervising attorney, after hearing him out, had, just like Gu Xuehan, completely disapproved of his earlier attempt to shirk responsibility over losing the original IOU.
“My supervising attorney now also thinks he bears some responsibility for not warning me at the time, so he’s willing to use his malpractice insurance to compensate me for this.” Cheng Junliang visibly relaxed as he said this. “But he also said that even though I admitted my mistake in losing the original, I still can’t just lie down and let Lu Juan extort me. On the Lu Juan front, my supervising attorney wants me to keep trying to handle it myself first—whether that’s negotiating directly with her, or finding indirect evidence to prove there really was a hundred-twenty-thousand debt between her and her ex-boyfriend. Either way, he wants me to keep making an effort, not just assume his insurance will cover me and stop trying.”
Cheng Junliang paused, then continued: “He said that even though I’m just a trainee lawyer, I still need to live up to the title, and put in every effort to clean up the mess I made through my own carelessness.”
Gu Xuehan didn’t seem surprised by this outcome at all. She took a sip of tea. “What he said is right. You’re the one who made the mess, so you clean it up. Learning to take responsibility for your own mistakes isn’t just a lesson for you—it’ll be a chance to grow, too.”
At the thought of having to face Lu Juan, Cheng Junliang was clearly still a bit nervous. “But can I really handle this alone…”
Gu Xuehan smiled slightly and looked toward Qi Xi and Gu Yan. “How about this—I’ll lend you Qi Xi and Gu Yan, let them help you as fellow classmates. Three cobblers with their wits combined can outdo a genius mastermind—surely the three of you together can figure out some way to resolve this with Lu Juan.”
After saying this, Gu Xuehan confirmed with Qi Xi and Gu Yan: “As classmates helping out, you won’t be charging for this. But if the three of you can’t solve it and have to come back to me for advice, then I will be charging legal fees.”
She glanced at Cheng Junliang. “My fees are steep, so you’d all better figure this out yourselves.”
Naturally, Cheng Junliang couldn’t have asked for a better arrangement, and Qi Xi and Gu Yan were of course willing to help. Seeing Cheng Junliang’s problem fully resolved was something they wanted too.
**
No time like the present—as soon as they left Gu Xuehan’s office, Qi Xi pulled Gu Yan and Cheng Junliang into a nearby meeting room.
“Let’s discuss how to find evidence.” Qi Xi twirled her pen. “Getting Lu Juan or Pan Zhendong to voluntarily cooperate and provide evidence of the loan is obviously not going to happen—the two of them have surely already coordinated their story. We need to find a different angle.”
The moment this came up, Cheng Junliang clearly looked troubled. “Maybe we could ask Lu Juan’s or Pan Zhendong’s friends or coworkers from back then, see if anyone knew about this loan between them, or check if there’s any mention of it in chat records between them and other people? I could spend the next few days visiting their social circles, try to gather what evidence I can.”
Gu Yan wasn’t optimistic about this approach. “That method isn’t very efficient. First, Lu Juan and Pan Zhendong were a cohabiting couple—a loan between the two of them might not have been disclosed to other friends or coworkers at all. Second, even if they were friends or coworkers of the two, why would they leak their information to some random lawyer they’ve never even met?”
So evidence-gathering had hit a wall…
Just as everyone fell silent, Qi Xi mulled it over for a moment, then suddenly had a bold idea: “If Pan Zhendong had already found someone new when he broke up with her, meaning he’d already betrayed Lu Juan back then—do you think we could break apart the current alliance between Lu Juan and him?”
Precisely because Pan Zhendong and Lu Juan had once been a couple, and might even have secretly gotten back together now, that relationship let the two of them present a united, unbreakable front. But if the foundation of that relationship had a crack in it, then maybe they wouldn’t even need an outside attack—if they turned on each other, their alliance would naturally fall apart on its own.
The more Qi Xi thought about it, the more she felt this was the right direction: “Think about it—Lu Juan may be sharp, but when it comes to Pan Zhendong, she’s a bit of a fool in love. It’s practically like she’s paying to date him—unconditionally supporting his business venture, even taking out online loans for him. She’s been completely devoted to him. This relationship is clearly one where Lu Juan has invested far more, and the person who’s invested more has higher sunk costs, so it’s harder for them to walk away, and easier for them to stay trapped.”
Cheng Junliang hesitated. “Is that really how it is?”
Just as Qi Xi was about to nod, she heard Gu Yan give a soft “Mm.”
Gu Yan wasn’t someone who spoke up lightly, but when he did, it was usually from personal experience.
The man seemed calm in that moment, but something about it left Qi Xi with an odd, uncomfortable feeling in her chest—that “Mm” of his was probably referring to that unforgettable moonlight of his, wasn’t it?
Qi Xi felt a pang of bitterness inside. They hadn’t dated for even a single day, hadn’t gone on a single date, hadn’t held hands, hadn’t kissed, hadn’t slept together—how deep could he possibly be in, to be this unable to pull himself free? What kind of modern-day fox spirit was Gu Yan’s moonlight, anyway?
But the thought only flickered through her mind for a moment. Soon, because of the ongoing discussion about Cheng Junliang and Lu Juan’s situation, Qi Xi snapped back into work mode, and the three of them began exchanging ideas on how to handle things.
With Qi Xi and Gu Yan’s guidance, Cheng Junliang finally began thinking along these lines too: “So, if we could find evidence that Pan Zhendong was unfaithful to Lu Juan, and then let Lu Juan find out about it, there’s a good chance she’d ‘split’ from Pan Zhendong out of sheer anger?”
“Exactly.” Qi Xi nodded. “My guess is that Pan Zhendong most likely sweet-talked Lu Juan into getting back together, and then the two of them are using the fact that you lost the IOU to try to extort a hundred-twenty-thousand out of you. So if we find evidence that Pan Zhendong cheated, and Lu Juan sees it—what do you all think would happen?”
“Let me put myself in a woman’s shoes here—I’ve given so much, even to the point of extorting my own lawyer for his sake, gotten harassed by predatory loan collectors, even lost my job, and blown through savings I’d worked hard to build up, all to fund his business. I wholeheartedly supported his venture from the start, only to find out I was a joke this whole time—he’d already cheated, already been spending my hard-earned money chasing women behind my back. If I loved that deeply before, I’d hate just as deeply now.”
Qi Xi tapped her fingers on the table. “Lu Juan doesn’t strike me as the weak, spineless type. If Pan Zhendong had already betrayed her, she wouldn’t just cry it out and let it go—she definitely wouldn’t accept her bad luck and drop it. She’d absolutely want Pan Zhendong to pay a price. And how does he pay that price? By taking on responsibility for that hundred-twenty-thousand debt. At that point, she’ll be extremely cooperative with us as lawyers gathering evidence, and provide proof of Pan Zhendong’s debt herself.”
Qi Xi pressed her lips together. “Because once Pan Zhendong’s affair comes to light, this stops being a simple loan dispute where she just wants her money back—it becomes an all-out act of revenge by a woman who’s stopped caring about consequences.”
Gu Yan voiced his agreement with Qi Xi’s plan. “At this point, rather than starting from these two people’s friends, it’s more effective to go straight at the relationship between the two of them—their alliance is already precarious as it is. As long as we find the breaking point that causes the alliance between Lu Juan and Pan Zhendong to collapse, Lu Juan will naturally turn to us for support in order to deal with Pan Zhendong, and reach a settlement with us. That would be a major win for Cheng Junliang.”
“I get it!” Cheng Junliang’s eyes lit up too. “I’ll go dig into Pan Zhendong’s social circle right away, see if there’s anything suspicious!”
**
With Qi Xi and Gu Yan’s guidance and help, Cheng Junliang now had a clear goal. He hadn’t been a bad student back in school, and though he’d been thrown into a panic earlier over the hundred-twenty-thousand debt, now that he’d calmed down, he was finally back to his proper level.
By the end of that workday, Cheng Junliang had, with remarkable efficiency, already gotten results—
“I snuck into the KTV where Pan Zhendong used to work, ordered something, pretended to chat with the staff there, and I actually found something!”
Cheng Junliang’s tone was quite excited: “Qi Xi, your guess was spot on. It turns out Pan Zhendong has a mistress on the side, and he’s been using the money Lu Juan borrowed online for him to support her this whole time. This mistress is actually a new waitress that Pan Zhendong’s KTV hired—the two of them hit it off a long time ago. Sometimes when Pan Zhendong told Lu Juan he was working, he was actually staying at the mistress’s place—he’s the one paying rent on her apartment.”
As he spoke, Cheng Junliang pulled out evidence: “Several of the other KTV managers there were envious that Pan Zhendong had the skill to have two girlfriends—I recorded all of that. I also found out where the mistress lives; Pan Zhendong is staying there right now. If Lu Juan’s still in denial, I could even go stake it out with her.”
This time, Cheng Junliang was determined to make up for his earlier mishandling of the case, and he’d clearly put in real effort—not only had he gotten audio evidence, he’d gotten other evidence too.
Cheng Junliang pulled a document out of his bag: “Even though Pan Zhendong tricked Lu Juan into extorting that hundred-twenty-thousand from me so he wouldn’t have to pay it back, I found out that the business he’d previously invested in wasn’t a legitimate industry at all—it was more like some kind of pyramid scheme. Now all his own money is tied up in it, and he owes other people a lot too. He’s under a lot of financial pressure from debt collectors, so he’s desperate for cash.”
“I found out that the apartment Pan Zhendong rented for his mistress is a two-bedroom, one-living-room unit. Right now he and the mistress live in the master bedroom, and there’s a second bedroom that’s originally been sitting empty. That would’ve been fine back when he wasn’t short on cash, but now that he’s under this much financial pressure, if I were him, I’d definitely think about subletting that second bedroom to bring in a little extra income.”
Cheng Junliang got more and more into it as he spoke, his eyes lighting up: “So with that in mind, I found a few real estate agents in that neighborhood and said I wanted to rent a second bedroom. That area’s within a good school district, so it’s actually pretty hard to find rentals there normally—most units are rented out whole, without a spare second bedroom sitting empty. I figured there probably weren’t many second-bedroom listings like that, so it was worth a try. Sure enough, the agents only sent back two vacant second-bedroom listings.”
Working a case sometimes feels like putting together a giant jigsaw puzzle—at first glance, you’re just staring at a pile of nearly identical little pieces with seemingly no way forward, but if you really dig in and compare them carefully, pull out the useful information from each piece, and patiently work through every possibility, as long as you’re willing to put in the time and effort, you can always complete the whole picture.
From his initial panic that nearly led to a disastrous mistake, to now—with the help of Qi Xi and Gu Yan, under Gu Xuehan’s guidance, and led by his own supervising attorney—Cheng Junliang had finally transformed from a green rookie into someone calm and level-headed.
Watching him now, meticulously explaining his case, painstakingly unraveling it thread by thread, Qi Xi felt genuinely moved.
Not long ago, Cheng Junliang had been a timid, hesitant young man who seemed utterly unfit to shoulder the responsibilities of a lawyer, yet in such a short time, given the right environment and the right guidance, he’d managed to grow this fast.
Good lawyers were never born that way—they grew out of trainees who made mistakes, corrected them, and kept working hard.
Even though it was just a small case Cheng Junliang had run into, Qi Xi didn’t know why, but she found herself genuinely inspired by it.
Gu Xuehan was elegant, composed, and formidable, seemingly capable of anything, and often made Qi Xi feel inferior and unable to measure up by comparison. But in this moment, she suddenly felt that even though she herself was still weak, still unprofessional, still unpolished, and still prone to mistakes—none of that mattered.
Because as long as she could correct her mistakes head-on, take responsibility, own up to them when she was wrong, and never give up on being a lawyer over a little setback, then as long as she kept working hard and persevering, she too would one day become a capable, independent female lawyer just like Gu Xuehan—the kind of lawyer who would even make her own father look at her with newfound respect.
Cheng Junliang had no idea what Qi Xi was thinking. He was completely absorbed in explaining the evidence he’d gathered against Pan Zhendong, walking Qi Xi and Gu Yan through the intense investigative work he’d done that afternoon in careful detail: “I got lucky too—the very first listing I saw happened to be Pan Zhendong’s place, and luckily, it wasn’t Pan Zhendong himself who showed up, it was his mistress. Since they were subletting, meaning they were essentially a second landlord, I asked to see the lease agreement they’d signed with the actual landlord, to prove they had the right to sublet the second bedroom. The mistress didn’t suspect a thing and showed me their lease agreement.”
“She was probably in a hurry to sublet it and recoup some rent money to help with cash flow, so she was very friendly with me, worried I might still have doubts, and even let me make a copy. That lease agreement was signed under the names of Pan Zhendong and the mistress! And the money came from Pan Zhendong too!”
At this point, Cheng Junliang pulled the photocopy out of his bag: “This completely proves that Pan Zhendong and the mistress are living together, and that he’s been spending money to support her!”
Since this wasn’t a marital dispute, the evidence of infidelity didn’t need to be submitted to a court. Cheng Junliang’s audio recording and the photocopy of the lease agreement were only meant to wake Lu Juan up to reality, so evidence like this was already more than convincing and persuasive enough.
The three of them discussed it and decided to move fast—that very evening, they arranged to meet with Lu Juan again.