Qi Xi had no idea what exactly Gu Xuehan had said to Xi Wen that day, but though her mother had seemed thoroughly downcast at the official divorce registration, not long after, when Qi Xi saw her again, there was a new light in her eyes.

Qi Xi, still worried about her mother, dropped by to check on her and found her trying on a professional skirt suit. Seeing Qi Xi, she looked a bit self-conscious but full of energy. “Xi Xi, Mom hasn’t worked in so many years—I don’t know if dressing like this at a law firm, at my age, would look ridiculous?”

Not at all!

Qi Xi said sincerely, “Mom, you’ve kept yourself in such great shape—this suit makes you look sharp and confident. It really suits you!”

Xi Wen let out a relieved breath at that. “Good, that’s a relief. Xuehan picked it out for me—turns out she also graduated from Rongda Law School, technically a junior of mine. I feel a bit useless as the senior here, still troubling my junior with everything…”

Qi Xi’s mother was someone who warmed up slowly to people, so the fact that she was already calling Gu Xuehan by her given name showed just how close the two had become.

Qi Xi felt genuinely happy about it, though she was also a bit curious about the professional outfit. “Mom, are you planning to…”

Before Qi Xi could even finish, Xi Wen announced the news herself, gentle excitement in her voice. “Mom’s going back to work.”

Faced with Qi Xi’s surprise, Xi Wen seemed far more composed, explaining, “I know I’m older, and I don’t have much work experience to speak of, but I did pass the bar exam, and I graduated from Rongda Law School. You’re grown now, you don’t need me helping with homework or taking care of your daily life. The marriage is over too—no husband to answer to or influence my decisions. There’s really nothing at home holding me back anymore, no burdens left. I can handle overtime, business trips, all of it. I might not get into a top firm like yours, but Xuehan knows a small newly-founded firm that needs people. The pay isn’t great, but they’re all Rongda alumni, and the founder is even a senior of mine from school. Xuehan recommended me, and they’re willing to give me a shot…”

At that point, Xi Wen did look a bit anxious. “I don’t know if I’ll actually be any good at it…”

People weren’t meant to sit idle—as long as there was something to work toward, some goal in life, there was something to look forward to. Watching her mother now, Qi Xi could still see traces of sadness on her face, but far more prominent was a sense of anticipation for her uncertain new career ahead.

“Mom! Of course you’ll be good at it! If there’s anything you don’t understand, just come ask your senior colleague here!”

Hearing that, Xi Wen made as if to swat her. “Now you’re teasing your mother.”

“How is that teasing! Mom, you’re about to be the rookie starting from scratch as an intern lawyer, but I’ve already been an intern lawyer for a while now—I’ve got way more experience than you. So how about this—make me a pot of chicken stew this weekend, and I’ll pass on some invaluable veteran-intern-lawyer wisdom to you for free.”

Xi Wen smiled. “Fine, Mom will make you chicken stew this weekend. As for your so-called wisdom, I’ll pass, thanks—you’ve only got a few months more experience than me, and you already call yourself a veteran?”

“Then let’s have a real competition. Once your one-year internship is up and you can handle cases independently, we’ll see who brings in more revenue in a year.”

Qi Xi’s challenge sparked something competitive in Xi Wen. She thought it over, then nodded with a smile. “Deal. Xuehan says being a lawyer isn’t just about technical skill—it also really tests how well you handle people and communicate. She thinks my age might not actually be a disadvantage. Mom doesn’t like to lose, so let’s see who wins!”

Mother and daughter went back and forth, happily hashing out the rules for their little competition.

Watching the light return to her mother’s eyes, Qi Xi felt genuinely happy from the bottom of her heart.

**

While Xi Wen’s life was steadily rebuilding itself after such devastation, things weren’t going nearly as well for Qi Ruiming on the other side.

Qi Ruiming hadn’t wanted the divorce from the start. After all, Xi Wen was gracious, well-educated, worldly, and gentle-natured—as a wife, she was truly the one he could actually talk to. Wang Juan had youth and looks going for her, but she was a shortsighted woman with no real wisdom about life, only knowing how to spend money. He’d assumed that as long as he kept giving her money, everything would stay fine—he never imagined this foolish woman would go running to Xi Wen to expose everything just to try to move up in status, completely shattering the balance he’d worked so hard to maintain.

In the end, when things came to a head, Wang Juan had stubbornly denied everything, but the divorce had already gone through. Though Qi Ruiming seethed inside and gave Wang Juan an earful, treating her coldly afterward, he ultimately had to hold back his temper, since she was, after all, his son’s mother.

But just as Qi Ruiming had managed to endure it all, Wang Juan couldn’t hold herself together. Having crossed some other influencer with real backing while playing at being a social media personality, she ended up not only having her own information dragged through the mud but dragging Liangliang and Qi Ruiming down with her.

In truth, when it first happened, Qi Ruiming had assumed almost immediately that Qi Xi and Xi Wen were behind it. It wasn’t until he later reached out to a media contact he knew, hoping to clean up his image online, that he discovered the other side had clearly hired a professional team of paid commenters, with serious backing behind them—something Qi Xi and Xi Wen could never have pulled off. Only after his media contact discreetly filled him in did he learn that this idiot Wang Juan had crossed another influencer while playing at internet fame, and this was the bitter fruit of it.

Qi Ruiming had known Wang Juan liked to flaunt her wealth online, but he’d never imagined she could stir up something this massive—now half the legal community in Rong City knew about his and Wang Juan’s sordid affair.

“Can a sleazy old man like that really be a good lawyer?”

“Wow, anyone who hires this old man to represent them is probably just as bad…”

“Abandoned his wife and daughter for a mistress a whole generation younger—disgusting…”

…

If it had stopped at online abuse, that might have been bearable, but the fallout clearly spilled into Qi Ruiming’s everyday life. First came the flood of outraged netizens filing complaints against him with the bar association; the firm’s phone lines were jammed with abusive callers; someone even threw paint at the firm’s front entrance, making it impossible to operate normally. Qi Ruiming had to give all his staff several days off. Wherever he went—court, client meetings—old acquaintances gave him sidelong looks, and he no longer had the face to attend even alumni gatherings.

He’d thought the storm would eventually die down with time, but instead, several corporate clients he’d worked hard to secure, whose legal department heads happened to be women, found his affair and illegitimate son utterly intolerable and terminated their advisory contracts, refusing to renew. A number of female clients gradually stopped working with the Ruiming firm too, for the same reason.

Between placating panicked clients and fielding endless inquiries from the bar association, Qi Ruiming was utterly exhausted, mentally and physically.

But apparently his bad luck wasn’t done yet. Some time ago, Qi Ruiming had used improper means to help a divorcing male client secure a larger share of marital assets, fabricating a large amount of fake in-marriage debt and deliberately making the client’s company appear to be operating at a loss, resulting in his ex-wife walking away with almost nothing.

That ex-wife, seizing on the momentum of Qi Ruiming’s own scandal, took the opportunity to expose her ex-husband’s affair too, along with the improper methods Qi Ruiming had used to ensure her ex not only got away with cheating but suffered no financial consequences in the split.

This set off yet another wave of outrage—another affair case, this time also involving falsified evidence, and the crooked lawyer behind it was the very same Qi Ruiming who had his own history of infidelity. Public sentiment exploded again, and this ex-wife suddenly found herself receiving massive support and attention, as this long-forgotten old case got dredged back up. The identity of the male client who’d cheated and hidden assets was also dug up and exposed, subjected to doxxing and harassment.

But in trying to calm the situation, Qi Ruiming never expected that male client to turn on him. Originally, it had been that client who’d begged Qi Ruiming to help manipulate the case, offering him a secret extra payment—Qi Ruiming had only taken the risk because of the money. Now, to protect his own interests, the man threw all the blame onto Qi Ruiming, even agreeing to an interview—

He claimed he’d known cheating on his wife was wrong and that it had hurt her badly, and that he’d originally just wanted a normal divorce with a fair property split. But the lawyer had told him everyone handled asset transfers this way, that there was no need to give his ex-wife more than necessary, assuring him it was all perfectly legal. Being uneducated and unfamiliar with the law himself, he’d believed it and paid extra in legal fees to have it arranged. He said he had no idea it was illegal, and asked people to stop harassing him and his current family.

With that, all the blame landed squarely on Qi Ruiming, and the bar association launched a formal investigation into the case.

The whole situation exploded. Forget helping Wang Juan manage the fallout—Qi Ruiming could barely keep his own head above water now. He was terrified that if this kept escalating, if the bar association dug deep enough, they’d uncover all his other underhanded dealings from the past, and he could genuinely lose his law license.

But when it rains, it pours. While Qi Ruiming and Wang Juan were already on the verge of collapse dealing with their own mess, trouble struck his precious son Wang Qiliang too.

Wang Qiliang’s international school was a boarding school, and he’d only ever come home on weekends. Qi Ruiming hadn’t paid much attention before, but lately he’d finally noticed the boy growing increasingly withdrawn, flinching from touch, as if hiding something. By the time he discovered the fresh and old cut marks on Wang Qiliang’s body, self-inflicted with a blade, nearly a month had already passed since it started.

Having been consumed by his own troubles, Qi Ruiming realized far too late that something was wrong. Wang Qiliang had already been diagnosed with severe depression, accompanied by self-harming behavior, and after showing signs of suicidal tendencies at school several times, the school’s teachers finally urged Qi Ruiming to withdraw him temporarily for treatment.

It was only then that Qi Ruiming learned Wang Qiliang had been isolated and bullied by his classmates—the online exposure and the abuse directed at him had dealt him a severe psychological blow.

The thing Qi Ruiming had once been proudest of—sending his son to Rong City’s best school for an elite education—had now become his greatest regret. He wanted justice for his son, but the children leading the bullying all came from powerful, well-connected families; in front of them, Qi Ruiming himself was little more than an ant.

“The other kids all call me a bastard, and some of them say our school used to be such a good, elite school, and now because of someone like me, its reputation online is completely ruined—the message boards are full of people cursing me, telling me to get out of the school, saying I should just leave.”

“They all say I’m a child who should never have been born, that my existence itself is a mistake…”

Looking at Wang Qiliang’s face—so nearly identical to his own—and the despairing, lost expression on it, Qi Ruiming felt as if his heart were bleeding.

This was his most precious son!

Everything he’d sacrificed for this child!

He’d finally managed to keep Xi Wen and Qi Xi calm, only for everything to fall apart because of that damned Wang Juan! Why did she have to be so loud online! Flaunting her wealth was bad enough, but did she have to go make enemies too!

Qi Ruiming refused to give Wang Juan another cent, wanting nothing more than to throw her out immediately, but since she was, after all, Liangliang’s birth mother and still needed to accompany him through his treatment, he had no choice but to swallow his anger.

But while Qi Ruiming managed to hold himself back, Wang Juan couldn’t. Having been driven to an emotional breakdown by the online abuse, she’d hoped to find some comfort from Qi Ruiming—only to find that not only did he refuse to offer any, he scolded her and cut off her supplementary credit card. Her son had depression and was threatening self-harm daily, needing treatment, and on top of that, she received a court summons—Qi Ruiming’s ex-wife had discovered the apartment he’d bought her and was now suing for its return as improperly gained property.

The more Wang Juan thought about it, the more unbearable her life felt. Depression wasn’t like a broken arm or leg that healed after a few months of rest—she’d looked it up online, and many patients needed years of treatment, with a real risk of relapse even after recovering. This son had once been her golden ticket—a healthy, promising student, a tool for squeezing money out of Qi Ruiming. Now that he was this sick, not only could she no longer count on him to support her in old age, he’d become a burden she had to look after herself.

Qi Ruiming wasn’t giving her any money anymore, his career was clearly on the decline, and he was already in his fifties and looking every bit his age—while she was only in her early thirties, still well-preserved. Why should she waste her life tethered to a useless man and a sick child? Was she supposed to spend the rest of her life nursing an old man and a sick kid?

While Qi Ruiming was still working up the resolve to forgive Wang Juan and hoping she’d properly care for their son through treatment, Wang Juan simply abandoned the whole mess. She gave up the apartment, and while Qi Ruiming was asleep, she transferred out several million yuan he’d secretly stashed away from his ex-wife across two bank cards. She left the severely depressed Wang Qiliang behind in the hospital and vanished overnight, whereabouts unknown.

**

By the time Qi Xi learned all of this, three months had already passed.

Though Qi Ruiming hadn’t had his law license revoked, his reputation was thoroughly ruined, and continuing to practice in Rong City’s legal circle had become nearly impossible.

Several of the cases he’d been handling before were also found to contain serious errors—one, a merger and acquisition case, turned out to have caused the client massive losses due to his mistakes, and he now faced a substantial damages claim.

Backed into a corner, needing large sums of money for both the damages and his son’s treatment, Qi Ruiming had no choice but to report Wang Juan to the police for secretly transferring his money. She was quickly arrested and was now under investigation for theft.

Who would have guessed the affair’s final chapter would end with the two lovers turning on each other like dogs.

Meanwhile, on her mother’s side, everything was proceeding steadily.

At first, Xi Wen had struggled to adjust to her new job, but her direct supervisor turned out to be an old schoolmate, himself recently out of a failed marriage. Sharing similar experiences, the two got along well, developing something like a mentor-friend dynamic—he was patient and encouraging with her, and Xi Wen worked hard to make up for the years of professional experience she’d missed, staying late and pushing through overtime.

Who could have imagined it? The mother who’d once settled comfortably into being a full-time housewife had transformed into a workplace powerhouse—these days, Qi Xi could barely even pin her mother down for a meal.

Since starting at the firm, Xi Wen positively glowed. She genuinely loved the work, finding it both meaningful and challenging. She’d even, somewhat shamelessly, “taken back” the cases suing Wang Juan for the return of marital assets and suing Qi Ruiming for concealing marital property from Qi Xi and Gu Yan, determined to handle them herself—determined to slap that shameless pair down hard and reclaim what was rightfully hers.

Seeing her mother so fulfilled, her life finding a new center of gravity, Qi Xi felt genuinely happy for her.

She could finally leave the past behind completely and return to the happy life she’d once had.

But what Qi Xi hadn’t expected was that she and her mother weren’t the only ones bidding farewell to the past and stepping into a new future.

That afternoon, while she was writing up a case summary, an unexpected visitor arrived.

“Hello, Lawyer Qi. Is Lawyer Gu in?”

Qi Xi looked up—and was surprised to find it was Chen Xiang.

She answered automatically, “I’m sorry, Lawyer Gu just stepped out for something urgent. If you didn’t have an appointment, you’re welcome to wait—her afternoon is currently open, so if you’re not in a rush, she should be back within about fifteen minutes. Or if you’re pressed for time today, I can help schedule an appointment for you.”

Chen Xiang smiled. “That’s fine, I’m not in a rush. I’ll wait.”

This time, Chen Xiang wore an elegant, well-tailored professional suit, with vivid makeup, no longer carrying the gentle air she’d once had—now there was something sharper about her. She’d cut her hair into a crisp, efficient bob. Seeing Qi Xi, she greeted her with a polished smile.

Qi Xi felt a strange sense of unreality. The last time she’d seen Chen Xiang, it had been when she’d ultimately withdrawn her decision to divorce—Qi Xi still remembered how haggard she’d looked then, the obsessive glint in her eyes, and had once doubted whether staying in that marriage in name only had really been the right call.

But now, she looked remarkably well. Had Ai Xiang really turned over a new leaf?

Chen Xiang seemed to read exactly what Qi Xi was thinking, and smiled, immediately putting her question to rest—

“You must be wondering why I’m doing so well, right?”

She pressed her lips together in a small smile. “Because I’ve decided to get divorced.”

Qi Xi froze, eyes widening slightly in surprise.

Her reaction seemed to amuse Chen Xiang. “I know this might catch you off guard, but that’s exactly why I’m here today—for the divorce. Over this past while, I’ve been using the evidence-gathering methods Lawyer Gu taught me before, and I’ve saved every piece of evidence of Ai Xiang’s affair. I also know the financial situation of his studio inside and out—this time, there’s absolutely no way for him to hide or transfer assets by faking losses in the studio. I’ve brought all the evidence and materials with me, and I’m here to ask you to represent me in this divorce case.”

Qi Xi was practically stunned. “So the reason you didn’t divorce him before was to stay close, to lower his guard, so you could gather evidence more easily?”

Chen Xiang shook her head. “Lawyer Qi, I wasn’t as decisive or brave as you might think. At first, I genuinely didn’t want to divorce—partly out of resentment, partly because I still held onto some hope for him. But going back and maintaining that hollow, fake marriage over time just wore me down, left me anxious and paranoid, without gaining anything for it. Because I didn’t file for divorce, he took it as tacit approval of his affair—instead of reining himself in, he only got worse, treating me even more coldly, not even bothering to pretend anymore.”

“So I finally came to terms with it. I decided to let go of this marriage, let go of this sorry excuse for a man. If he doesn’t care, why should I keep chasing after someone who doesn’t want me? Especially now, with the evidence I have, I can walk away with more than half his assets—why wouldn’t I?”

“So you’ve made up your mind this time?”

Facing Qi Xi’s question, Chen Xiang’s expression turned resolute. “Yes. And I believe this is also an excellent time to file for divorce.” She left it there, a hint of mystery in her smile. “As for why, you’ll find out soon enough.”