Rong Qian found Rong Xiwen at the window table from that time long ago.

He was sitting in the same seat he had occupied all those years back. But the person who should have been sitting across from him was no longer there.

Rong Xiwen had ordered a whole table of dishes, barely touched his chopsticks, and had already drunk through half a bottle of liquor.

He had poured two glasses of wine — one placed at the seat where Xie Yan had once sat, and the other at Shen Yi’s seat.

Unlike the private booking of years past, every seat in the restaurant was now filled.

Waitstaff moved in and out with quick, hurried steps. Patrons filled the room — some raising their glasses in toasts, voices overlapping in cheerful noise — all of which only made Rong Xiwen, sitting alone, feel the emptiness more keenly, the people gone, the space hollowed out.

Rong Qian had brought only Xie Dong on this trip.

She had Xie Dong take the seat his father Xie Yan had once occupied. Then Rong Qian herself sat down in Shen Yi’s seat, picked up the glass in front of her, and drank it down in one go.

Rong Xiwen was not at all surprised by Rong Qian’s arrival. Looking at the two of them, he curved his lips in a smile of quiet, contented relief.

“Dad, don’t you have something to say to me?” Rong Qian didn’t even look up. She had the air of someone drinking away her frustrations.

Rong Xiwen glanced at Xie Dong, considered for a moment, and decided to send him away.

Xie Dong, though filled with a hundred objections, could only comply and leave. Once he was gone, Rong Xiwen said to Rong Qian, “What is it? Are you angry with me? Because I deceived you?”

“Didn’t you? You knew perfectly well that my time travel was real, and you deliberately pretended not to believe it?” Rong Qian seethed just thinking about it. She had trusted him so completely.

Rong Xiwen shook his head. “It wasn’t that I was pretending not to believe. It was that I couldn’t say.”

“Why couldn’t you say?” Rong Qian didn’t understand.

Rong Xiwen answered without hesitation: “Because the time wasn’t right.”

“And now? Is the time right now?” Rong Qian pressed him relentlessly. She was not going home without answers today — she was absolutely certain of that.

Rong Xiwen nodded. “Yes, the time is right.”

Rong Qian’s brow stayed tightly furrowed. She truly couldn’t figure out what role her father had been playing in all of this.

“Then let’s start from the very beginning.” Rong Xiwen stopped holding anything back. He laid everything out plainly: “That day, after you received the photograph, it wasn’t a coincidence that you saw Shen Yi’s film playing in the living room.”

Rong Qian’s eyes went wide instantly. “So it was you who arranged for me to see it!”

Rong Xiwen nodded — and then shook his head. Rong Qian, losing her patience, said irritably, “Well, which is it?”

“I’ll admit the disc was one I put in. But I only watched half of it before switching it off — I was planning to let you find it in the morning.”

Rong Qian’s expression turned peculiar. “You mean the television was already off when you went to bed? Then why was it playing when I came downstairs?”

“That’s something I find strange as well. But it’s not the main point.” Rong Xiwen told her: “To be honest — while I knew you would travel through time, I had no idea when you would go over, or when you would come back.”

“Dad, is that really true?” Rong Qian thought back over his reactions throughout this whole period. He had indeed, at times, seemed genuinely confused.

Rong Xiwen looked a little frustrated himself. “What else would it be? Shen Yi — that infuriating young man — only told me what I needed to do. He never told me why.”

Rong Xiwen certainly wasn’t going to admit that he’d been the foolish one at the time, doing everything he was told without question.

Rong Qian caught the key detail in what he had just said. “Dad, you just said all of this was done at Shen Yi’s instruction?”

“What else?” Rong Xiwen replied, somewhat exasperated. “And there was also this — he told me not to interfere with you, only to help you clean up loose ends so you wouldn’t come under suspicion. All of that came from him as well.”

“Did he tell you this before his accident?” Rong Qian immediately asked.

Rong Xiwen nodded. “Yes. That was over thirty years ago now. I’ve been waiting all this time — waiting for you to take on a certain case. When I saw that you were genuinely following the path Shen Yi had laid out, I knew the moment had come.”

Hearing everything Rong Xiwen had said, Rong Qian found that she wasn’t particularly surprised. She had sensed a certain inconsistency before — and now that it was explained, it all fit together far more naturally.

“Dad, you know better than anyone what happened to Shen Yi afterward. Don’t you?” Rong Qian now only wanted to know — what had Shen Yi gone through after everything?

Rong Xiwen seemed to be thinking through how best to explain it. After a long pause, he finally said to Rong Qian, “1987 was a year of many things. Xie Yan died in the line of duty. Thomas escaped overseas. Shen Fengren went to prison. Shen Yi’s assets were seized and frozen. Half a year later, he was found innocent and the charges were cleared.”

“Shen Yi’s assets were seized! Why?” Rong Qian heard this and knew at once he had been framed.

Rong Xiwen explained: “He had too many enemies. There was no shortage of people looking to smear him — fabricating false accounts, cooking up scandals to ruin his reputation. Those were simple enough things for people like that.”

“Fortunately, Shen Yi was no pushover. That lot couldn’t bring him down.”

At that, Rong Qian let out a quiet breath of relief. But what Shen Yi had endured during that period must have been immensely difficult.

Rong Xiwen continued: “Shen Fengren was executed the following year — 1988. And Shen Yi also met his end that same year.”

“I heard from Mu Chaoxue that Shen Yi died by his own hand? And that the banquet held aboard the ocean liner was something he organized himself — is all of that true?” Rong Qian was desperate to know the truth.

Rong Xiwen’s nod confirmed it — Mu Chaoxue had not lied to her. Rong Qian truly could not understand why Shen Yi would do such a thing.

“My dear, let me finish before you say anything.” Rong Xiwen gestured for her not to interrupt. “After Shen Fengren was executed, just when everyone thought this storm had finally passed, one day Shen Yi received an anonymous letter.”

“What did the letter say?” Rong Qian felt a sense of dread rising.

Rong Xiwen spoke four words: “Telling him to die.”

Rong Qian’s pupils contracted sharply. But what came next shocked her even more. Rong Xiwen said: “Not only that — the letter also stated that if he didn’t comply, everyone close to him would die because of him.”

“In other words, he didn’t die by his own hand — he was driven to his death. Only by dying could he bring this grudge to a final end.”

Hearing everything Rong Xiwen had said, Rong Qian’s heart could not settle for a long, long while.

Something inside her felt wrong — felt off — yet she couldn’t quite put her finger on what it was.

Then Rong Xiwen said something else to her: “My dear, the only person who can save Shen Yi is you.”

Rong Qian looked up sharply. Rong Xiwen had taken her hand in his. He looked into her eyes, and spoke each word with deliberate care: “If you can save him, he will live. If you cannot — then the outcome we already know will be his future.”