Lu Sui gave a light sneer, waved the back of his hand toward Lu Qingqing and Wu Mangmang, shooing the two sources of “noise” away like driving off puppies.

Lu Qingqing pulled Wu Mangmang’s arm and led her downstairs. “Let’s go.”

Wu Mangmang still felt somewhat uneasy and said, “This means everything’s fine now, right?”

Lu Qingqing replied, “Should be fine now.”

Not getting a definitive answer, Wu Mangmang remained worried. She herself was fine – she had hands and feet and wouldn’t starve to death.

But all her family’s good looks were concentrated on her alone, and the male-to-female ratio was drastically imbalanced. If her younger brother lost his money, how would he find a wife in the future?

Seeing Wu Mangmang wanting to turn back, Lu Qingqing grabbed her and said, “It’s fine, it’s fine. You bring such good fortune to my uncle. Once word of tonight’s events gets out, no one will dare trouble your family again.”

Only then did Wu Mangmang finally relax, letting out a breath and laughing, “You know what, today was really strange. I’m famously unlucky at cards, so I originally thought I was doomed tonight. I never expected to actually draw the nine of dots.” This was truly bizarre.

Seeing the smile return to Wu Mangmang’s face, Lu Qingqing also said enthusiastically, “Then your luck must be super strong today. Come on, let me set up a card game for you to have some fun.” Lu Qingqing finished speaking and went to pull Wu Mangmang’s hand.

Wu Mangmang didn’t move. She looked at Lu Qingqing with some confusion. Honestly, Lu Qingqing had been a bit too nice to her tonight.

Earlier, when everyone was too scared to make a sound, Lu Qingqing’s hands were trembling yet she still spoke up for her. Knowing that her allowance had been confiscated, she was now finding ways to give her money.

Perhaps good fortune falling from the sky really existed, but it definitely wouldn’t land on Wu Mangmang.

“Qingqing, is there something you need? Just tell me what it is. As long as I can help, I absolutely won’t say no to anything.” Wu Mangmang said generously.

Lu Qingqing’s mouth opened and closed, finally saying, “Didn’t you show off that Hermès bag in your social media last time?”

As soon as Lu Qingqing mentioned it, Wu Mangmang remembered. That special material bag she had waited two years in line for through connections. But it wasn’t a big deal. Wu Mangmang immediately said, “Is that all? You helped me so much tonight, what’s one bag? I’ll bring it to you tomorrow.”

Lu Qingqing didn’t speak.

Wu Mangmang immediately changed her tune, “Or should we go to my place now and I’ll get it for you?” She completely understood women’s obsession with bags – once they could own one, they never wanted to wait until the next day to get it.

Lu Qingqing smiled and nodded several times.

Wu Mangmang’s mansion now definitely looked like super-rich-girl level.

Seven or eight years ago, when other places were selling for just a few thousand yuan per square meter, the developer here suddenly announced an eye-catching sky-high price of seventy thousand yuan per square meter.

Everyone who bought was called a complete fool.

At that time, Wu Mangmang’s parents had just reconciled and hadn’t had their second child yet. Eager to salvage their only daughter’s affection, they were willing to be called fools as long as their daughter was happy.

Looking back now, Wu Mangmang’s luck wasn’t too bad. Just this three-hundred-square-meter mansion, now worth two hundred thousand yuan per square meter, was enough to serve as her dowry.

However, Wu Mangmang had no intention of inviting Lu Qingqing to tour her residence at the moment. She turned to Lu Qingqing, who had parked her car downstairs, and said, “Wait here, I’ll go up and get it for you.”

“Could I use your bathroom?” Lu Qingqing asked with an embarrassed smile.

What could Wu Mangmang say?

As soon as Lu Qingqing entered Wu Mangmang’s home, she immediately let out a huge sigh of amazement. “Wow, OMG, did your house travel back to ancient times? Period dramas could be filmed at your place.”

Wu Mangmang’s home was completely Chinese-style, and specifically traditional Chinese classical style, with room dividers, screens, curtains, arhat beds, curio cabinets…

Even the toilet in the bathroom was blue and white porcelain.

The curio cabinets were mostly filled with ceramics, from imitation Ru kiln to famille rose and cloisonné enamel – everything was available. Wu Mangmang had used her work connections to have people create imitations, all in pursuit of recreating an authentic ancient setting.

For her self-directed performances, naturally.

But this was also why she was reluctant to invite people to her home.

Wu Mangmang poured a glass of plain water for Lu Qingqing, who had just come out of the bathroom. “Wait here, I’ll go get your bag.”

But Lu Qingqing wasn’t someone who stayed quiet. She got up and followed Wu Mangmang around to tour her house.

“You just pile your bags like this?” Lu Qingqing was truly eye-opening. Wu Mangmang had led her directly to the storage room.

The storage room was filled with antique-style shelves, with Wu Mangmang’s bags, shoe boxes, and other items piled layer upon layer on top.

“These things don’t match the style outside.” Wu Mangmang explained while struggling to dig through the small mountain of bags. “The space isn’t big enough, so I can only pile them here.”

With great effort, Wu Mangmang finally dug out from the bottom of the pile the bag she had waited two years in line for and handed it to Lu Qingqing.

Lu Qingqing said dramatically, “This is how you treat my precious?”

Wu Mangmang shrugged. These bags served no function for her except taking a few photos when she first got them to post on social media and Weibo.

But in reality, they were both delicate and inconvenient to use. Wu Mangmang still preferred her studded backpack.

Since she had already entered the house, Wu Mangmang had no reason to rush her guest out.

She boiled water in a ceramic pot to make tea for Lu Qingqing.

Lu Qingqing held the imitation Ru kiln sky-blue kung fu tea cup up to the light. “The quality’s not bad. You’re quite particular, doing everything as a complete set. Just the tea tastes a bit inferior.”

Wu Mangmang thought to herself: acting only requires looking authentic on the surface. You think TV dramas showing people eating actually use hot, fresh food?

So the tea cups couldn’t be compromised, but for the tea itself, third-grade jasmine tea costing over ten yuan per bag would do.

Wu Mangmang poured tea into Lu Qingqing’s cup with extremely elegant posture.

“This is tap water, right? There’s such a strong smell of disinfectant.” Lu Qingqing, accustomed to air-shipped mineral water, said pickily.

“Actually, water treatment plants all use chlorine for disinfection now.” Wu Mangmang conscientiously educated Lu Qingqing, then added, “The water purifier isn’t plugged in – saving energy.”

This was the misery of living in a mansion without money – she could barely afford the property fees.

Lu Qingqing couldn’t help but giggle.

“Actually, my uncle isn’t that petty. It’s just that your luck was really terrible that day, happening to run into my uncle being with Dong Keke.” Lu Qingqing said.

Wu Mangmang, who had been nestled in the cushions on the couch playing with her phone, immediately perked up with interest.

“I knew you’d definitely be interested.” Lu Qingqing said, pointing her index finger with a smile.

She leaned closer to Wu Mangmang and sniffed. “What perfume are you wearing? It smells really good.”

Wu Mangmang said, “Just Guerlain’s Lily of the Valley. Hurry up and tell me, why was I so unlucky?”

Wu Mangmang was full of excitement. She knew there must be a reason behind it. Otherwise, normal people would at most think she was having a breakdown that day. How could they immediately threaten legal action?

And this would prove that it wasn’t that Wu Mangmang wasn’t attractive enough, but that she had accidentally stepped on a landmine.

Wu Mangmang thought again about the financial god uncle’s nonchalant demeanor today, and the more she thought about it, the more her heart itched.

It was like the other person was holding a Persian cat and scratching at her heart.

Wu Mangmang was just this type of person – the more the other party ignored her, the more she shamelessly tried to attract their attention.

This psychological problem was supposedly because she received too much attention and could easily capture others’ admiration. The easier something was to obtain, the more she disdained it, preferring to climb peaks and conquer impossible tasks.

Many people couldn’t understand why rich people always organized expeditions to climb Everest, and whenever they had free time, they’d organize teams to climb K2 (the second-highest peak), dubbed the most difficult to conquer. That place was somewhere even if you had enough money to pile up another Everest, you still couldn’t guarantee your life safety.

Wu Mangmang quite understood this – they could no longer find targets that required effort to climb, so naturally they could only risk their lives for excitement.

And Wu Mangmang felt she was still young and hadn’t lived enough, so she’d just content herself with conquering the mountain peak of men. At least there was no life-threatening danger.

Maybe in the future, when she married a rich man, a really rich one, when she reached her thirties or forties, she’d also choose to conquer the world’s high mountains.

But she was getting off track – Wu Mangmang almost lost focus.

Fortunately, Lu Qingqing didn’t keep her in suspense. “Dong Keke and my uncle are childhood sweethearts.”

“I couldn’t tell she was that old. Oh, so she lied about her age.” Wu Mangmang couldn’t help but interject. “I knew those deep neck lines couldn’t possibly belong to someone only twenty-eight.”

“She just flew to Switzerland for sheep placenta treatment not long ago, and my mom happened to run into her.” Lu Qingqing said.

Wu Mangmang immediately asked curiously, “Is sheep placenta really that miraculous?”

Lu Qingqing immediately began educating Wu Mangmang.

Wu Mangmang said, “I could suggest my mom try it. If it works well for her, then I’ll go.”

“Great, we can team up when the time comes.” Lu Qingqing said.

Seeing the two women about to go off-topic again, fortunately Wu Mangmang still remembered the gossip and pulled the conversation back. “Continue, so Dong Keke is your uncle’s girlfriend?”

“First love. To be precise, just first love.” Lu Qingqing emphasized.

Wu Mangmang went off-topic again. “First love? You just said childhood sweethearts, so doesn’t that mean Dong Keke’s family also has money and power?”

Wu Mangmang hugged her cushion and touched her chin. “No wonder Dong Keke has had basically no scandals in all these years since her debut, and her first role was with a big director, big production, and co-starring with a superstar. I thought she had saved the galaxy in her previous life.”

“Tch, her? Nothing special. Her family just mines stuff.”

“Coal mines?” Wu Mangmang immediately asked, thinking that would be incredible. If Dong Keke was a coal baron’s descendant, her genes were too beautiful – how gorgeous must her mother be to raise the average?

“No, just marble quarrying.” Lu Qingqing said. “Her family’s nothing special to talk about. If you want to talk about what’s special, it’s that Dong Keke is the only woman who’s ever been pregnant with my uncle’s child all these years.”

“When?” Wu Mangmang immediately widened her eyes and asked, “I never heard that the national goddess was pregnant?”

“When she was seventeen or eighteen, I think.” Lu Qingqing said.

Wu Mangmang was first-rate at going off on tangents. She jumped in again, “I knew it! It must have been when they were really young. Look at your uncle’s demeanor now – absolutely watertight. It could only be when he was young and too impulsive. Either he didn’t want to use protection because it felt like scratching an itch through a boot, or he was too eager and didn’t have any with him, or maybe Dong Keke bought fake morning-after pills.”

Once Wu Mangmang opened this topic, she couldn’t stop. “But over ten years ago, we weren’t as open-minded, and the internet wasn’t as developed. The two of them probably didn’t even know how to use contraception. What a tragedy! How can our country be like this, with such lacking sex education, always hiding and covering things up.”

“I’m telling you, I saw news recently about two PhD couples who couldn’t have children after marriage. They went to see a fertility specialist, only to discover that the two idiots thought they could make babies just by sleeping under the same blanket.” Wu Mangmang burst into laughter as she told this story.

Lu Qingqing also started laughing.

“Which type do you think your uncle and she were?” Women especially loved gossiping about others’ private matters when gossiping.

“How would I know such details?”

“Okay, continue.” Fortunately Wu Mangmang remembered to pull the topic back. “The goddess definitely didn’t have the baby, right?”

“Of course not! At that time, Dong Keke hadn’t debuted yet, but she’d always wanted to enter the entertainment industry. Her family opposed it, but my uncle supported her in pursuing her dreams. Then that idiot Dong Keke, in order to enter the entertainment industry, secretly had an abortion behind my uncle’s back and lied to him that it was a natural miscarriage.”

The result was predictable – the two childhood sweethearts who were each other’s first love broke up.

“Now Dong Keke regrets it and wants to retire from the industry to win back my uncle.” Lu Qingqing made several “tsk” sounds. “Too bad! Now women wanting to have children for uncle are lined up all the way to the Pacific Ocean. Where’s the turn for the aged Dong Keke?”

Wu Mangmang nodded in agreement. At least she wanted to get in that line.

“Do you understand now?” Lu Qingqing asked Wu Mangmang.

Wu Mangmang nodded. “I understand. That incident must have caused immeasurable psychological trauma to our uncle back then, so now whenever he hears about a woman being pregnant with his child and going for an abortion, he immediately changes his attitude.”

Wu Mangmang sighed deeply and said with empathy, “So true, wounds received in childhood can hardly be healed no matter how happy you are when you grow up.”

Wu Mangmang bit her manicured nail. “After all, it was his first child, so the impression must be particularly deep. And his first love actually chose her career over him? How hurtful to his self-esteem!”

Having been through many relationships, Wu Mangmang had almost become half a psychological analyst. She leaned closer to Lu Qingqing and said in a tone that was both gossipy and lacking confidence, “With our uncle’s vengeful personality, didn’t he make things difficult for Dong Keke back then?”

“Our uncle isn’t that type of person. After all, one night as husband and wife means a hundred days of affection. He wouldn’t stoop to such things. What’s one woman? If she wants to leave, let her leave.” Lu Qingqing naturally had to defend Lu Sui.

“But then again, it’s not that revenge doesn’t come – it’s just that the time hasn’t arrived yet.” Lu Qingqing smiled. “Didn’t the Dong family run into trouble recently? Instead of properly running their mine, they got envious of others doing real estate. Now with the downturn, their capital chain broke, and there were problems with their development projects. That’s when Dong Keke thought of coming back to find uncle.”

“Oh, so that’s why Dong Keke came back to find your uncle?” Wu Mangmang said knowingly, thinking that apparently the financial god wasn’t very attractive to his first love either. With this thought, the financial god’s charm dropped by thirty percent in Wu Mangmang’s mind.

“Not at all! She’s been throwing flirtatious glances at my uncle all these years, wanting to rekindle their romance. But how could my uncle possibly eat grass that’s already been chewed? Before, she could still maintain some dignity, but this time she completely threw away her face, crying and begging my uncle to help her family.” Lu Qingqing pursed her lips.

“And then?” Wu Mangmang asked.

“Then what? My uncle isn’t a saint. Not kicking them while they’re down already shows his magnanimity.”

“But…” Lu Qingqing patted Wu Mangmang’s shoulder regretfully. “But it’s such a pity. Of all things to do, you had to touch my uncle’s old wound.”

This incident was literally “déjà vu” – Wu Mangmang also knew she had hit the bull’s eye.

“Actually, this really isn’t my fault. They were the ones who were careless or lacked biological knowledge, creating a life, and then through cause and effect, it somehow ended up affecting me. Who did I offend?” Wu Mangmang sighed deeply.