After Becoming a Spare Tire, I Got Together with My White Moonlight - Chapter 29

Miss Yan was a business prodigy.

Even an outsider like Jiang Xuyu could come to this conclusion after just a cursory investigation, let alone the Yan family themselves.

Long before Madam Meng’s car accident, Yan Guiqiu had already been by her side, learning the ins and outs of the company. Initially, it was simply because the school was close to the company headquarters. Madam Meng missed her daughter but often had to work overtime, so she would occasionally bring her daughter to the office after school or during holidays.

Some non-confidential planning documents were casually left on Madam Meng’s desk.

Sometimes, when Madam Meng had to call an impromptu meeting with her subordinates, she would leave her daughter in the office. Yan Guiqiu finished her homework quickly and, having nothing else to do, would start browsing through the materials on the desk.

At first, Madam Meng didn’t pay much attention, only reminding her daughter not to use those documents for scratch paper. It wasn’t until one day when she revisited those plans and found annotations made in blue ink.

At the time, only Yan Guiqiu still used a blue-ink fountain pen for her homework.

The handwriting was unmistakably hers.

Initially, the suggestions seemed somewhat fanciful, appearing at first glance to be detached from the company’s reality. But Madam Meng was deeply moved by her daughter’s “filial piety” in wanting to share her burdens, so she made time to read through each suggestion carefully.

A few of them had some feasibility, and after some adjustments, she ended up using them.

It wasn’t until one day when a stern, senior executive left behind by Old Master Yan publicly praised Madam Meng in a meeting for her foresight and innovative ideas that Madam Meng was suddenly struck with realization. She went back to review the notes her daughter had written.

The more she read, the more astonished she became.

If the person had been a recent graduate in their twenties, Madam Meng would have praised them as a promising talent. But what if it was a middle school student?

Madam Meng’s feelings were a complex mix of “shock” and “well, it’s not entirely surprising.”

Yan Guiqiu had never been quite like a normal child.

She spoke early, walked early, but was prone to zoning out, often slipping into a dazed, absent-minded state.

As a first-time mother, Madam Meng wasn’t sure about the typical timeline for a child’s development. It was only when she took her daughter to the hospital for a check-up, worried she might be autistic or have some other mental issue, that she realized her daughter could almost be considered a genius.

Two years later, her younger sister, Yan Guizhou, was born. Sure enough, she started speaking and walking much later than her sister.

Madam Meng and her husband had held onto a faint hope, wondering if it was a genetic mutation and they had truly given birth to a genius.

However, as they observed their eldest daughter through her school years, their fantasies of raising a future scientist finally faded.

Yan Guiqiu was clever, but not exceptionally so. She simply learned faster than her peers, easily solving math problems from elementary to middle school after reviewing the textbooks a few times. But when it came to more advanced science and theory books, they were nothing more than sleep aids for her.

In contrast, Yan Guiqiu’s aptitude for the humanities was indeed higher. Her demeanor and interactions were often mature, to the point where Madam Meng sometimes felt as if she were dealing with a peer rather than a child just a few years old.

But Yan Guiqiu also had a childish side. Sometimes, she would engage in pointless arguments with her sister or the neighbor’s child, Song Anchen, over trivial matters, dragging them out for days. If she lost the argument, she would sulk and secretly hide away with a stuffed toy to cry.

Of course, such adorable moments became increasingly rare as she grew older, but Mrs. Meng still regarded her as an eternal child in her heart.

That was until she realized the weight behind those revised proposals.

It didn’t seem like mere talent, it felt more like a sharp intuition built upon countless experiences. But where could a child as young as Yan Guiqiu have accumulated such experience?

Mrs. Meng once suspected that someone with ulterior motives was lurking around her daughter. However, after a thorough investigation, nothing unusual was found. In the end, she went directly to Yan Guiqiu herself.

Yan Guiqiu seemed even more bewildered than she was.

When Mrs. Meng went through the revised proposals one by one and questioned her, the responses she received were surprisingly matter-of-fact: “Isn’t this the most basic requirement if we want to expand?” or “Of course this clause in the management system is crucial.”

Upon further questioning, it turned out no one had specifically taught her. She had simply wandered around the company, chatted with employees to understand the company’s situation, occasionally sat in on less important meetings, and gathered external reviews and assessments of the company. With that, she could articulate many issues with remarkable clarity.

And many of her insights were strikingly incisive.

Mrs. Meng then tentatively handed her the latest proposal. After carefully reviewing it, Yan Guiqiu laid out her analysis point by point.

Even the secretary and department heads, who had weathered years of professional challenges, couldn’t maintain their composure by the end. Their decades of experience seemed to pale in comparison to the judgment of a child.

But the facts were undeniable, speaking louder than any argument.

In the end, Mrs. Meng had no choice but to accept reality perhaps her daughter truly was a genius, just not in the realm of science and technology.

From then on, Mrs. Meng intentionally kept her daughter by her side for training. Yan Guiqiu’s insights were sharp, but she still lacked knowledge in certain areas and needed to gradually broaden her horizons within the company.

Her inner circle understood clearly, the young lady was likely the future successor. They often shared company updates with her in their daily interactions.

But no one knew that Yan Guiqiu had little interest in any of it.

Offering occasional suggestions as an observer was manageable and even helpful to her mother. But when the full weight of expectations and pressure descended upon her, Yan Guiqiu realized she had no desire for such a future.

At that time, her younger sister was still in elementary school, getting into fights with boys and requiring parental intervention. She had barely set foot in the family company, let alone developed any sense of responsibility or ambition. Meanwhile, her father also began to exert his influence.

Both parents placed high hopes on her. As the eldest daughter of the main family, it seemed only natural that she would inherit both sides of the family business.

Later, when Mrs. Meng was in a car accident, Yan Guiqiu naturally found it even harder to refuse.

During her middle school years, Yan Guiqiu didn’t possess complete memories of her past life, yet she wasn’t starting entirely from scratch either. The experiences from her previous life endowed her with exceptional talent. Once she familiarized herself with the company’s affairs, she handled them with remarkable ease, as if she had done it countless times before.

But those hazy, indistinct memories also brought her considerable mental distress.

It all started when Yan Guizhou was in high school, and her teacher brought up the topic of choosing a major for university. Yan Guizhou went home to discuss it with her parents, mentioning that she wanted to join the family company in the future to help her older sister.

Given her position in the family and her relationship with her sister, this choice seemed only natural.

At the time, Yan Guiqiu was in another city, preparing for her college entrance exams alone. When she returned home for the holidays, her younger sister told her about the idea.

One evening, while taking a walk together, they passed by the building of one of the Yan family’s subsidiary companies. Yan Guizhou gazed at the brightly lit building, then turned to look at her indifferent older sister, her eyes filled with envy.

“Will I ever be as capable as you, Sister?” Yan Guizhou asked nervously.

Yan Guiqiu turned to look at her.

But the moment she saw the expression on her sister’s face, Yan Guiqiu felt as if she had been plunged into an icy abyss.

In that instant, she was overwhelmed by a wave of intense fear.

It was as if someone else had once looked at her with the same mix of nervousness and admiration, a reliance born of trust that had suddenly twisted into a blade of resentment.

In that moment, memories of the past surged over her like a tidal wave.

At the beginning, her mother had stayed by her bedside day and night, holding her feverish body and weeping silently, saying she would willingly trade her own life for her daughter’s.

At the end, her mother stood outside the hospital room, holding her younger brother’s hand, whispering curses and wishing for her to die sooner.

They had once been a close-knit family, but in the end, it was all torn apart by the pursuit of “benefit.”

The look on her sister’s face was strikingly similar to the one her younger brother had worn in a past life, the same admiration, anticipation, and unconscious dependence, the desire to follow in her footsteps and carve out a place for themselves.

But as they grew older and gained more, their desires only grew. Unbeknownst to her, the sister who had once shielded them from the storm became the biggest obstacle in their path.

Their struggles were no longer about fair competition or capability. The intimacy and trust they once shared had turned into invisible blades of hatred.

Yan Guiqiu’s face turned deathly pale. Fortunately, she turned away in time, hiding her expression from her sister. She merely responded with a soft “Mm.”

Thinking her sister might be unwell, Yan Guizhou fetched a thermometer that evening and insisted on checking her temperature. Only after confirming that Yan Guiqiu wasn’t running a fever did she finally relax. She repeatedly urged her sister to go to the hospital if she felt unwell, and only after Yan Guiqiu nodded in agreement did she leave the room satisfied.

Yan Guiqiu didn’t sleep at all that night. She stayed home for the next two days, maintaining a calm facade. The next time she returned home, she sat down with her sister to carefully discuss her future career plans.

Although Yan Guizhou was only in her first year of high school, she already had a rough idea of what she wanted to do.

She had no particular hobbies or passions she felt compelled to pursue, and the idea of joining the family business seemed like the natural choice. She had no intention of just idling her way through it.

Both Madam Meng and Yan’s father saw nothing wrong with their younger daughter helping her older sister in the company. They began teaching her the ropes and occasionally praised her talent when speaking to Yan Guiqiu.

But they would often add, “It’s just a shame she’s not quite as good as Yan Guiqiu.”

Hearing this, Yan Guiqiu felt no comfort, only a growing sense of dread.

My younger sister has always been fiercely competitive. Whatever she does, she strives to be the best. If she didn’t rank first in school exams, she would hide away and cry. From a young age, she never understood the meaning of “admitting defeat.” Even when fighting with boys, she wouldn’t stop until she won getting called to the principal’s office was nothing to her; losing a fight was what truly embarrassed her.

As a child, she idolized her older sister blindly, but as she grew older, she gradually began to compare herself to her.

During a holiday house cleaning, she came across old photos and vividly remembered the things her sister had accomplished at different times, inevitably drawing comparisons to herself.

From academic achievements to places visited, she would bring up every detail, her tone filled with affection and admiration, always holding her sister up as a role model.

But what about the future?

Being perpetually overshadowed is hard for anyone to bear, let alone someone as strong-willed as her.

So, that year, after the college entrance exams, Yan Guiqiu secretly changed her choice of university and major without telling anyone.

And then she packed her bags and left without a second thought.

Support