After Mistakenly Marking My Ex’s Older Sister, the Disabled Alpha Stood Up - Chapter 53

The television replayed the accident coverage over and over, mechanically looping the same footage.

Yunxi can’t be hurt. She can’t possibly be at the scene.

Yan Qingruo tried to shut her ears, but the screen betrayed her. The overturned Lincoln, its license plate ending in four glaring eights, was like a knife to the eyes.

How many of those custom-built stretch Lincolns with such a plate could there possibly be in the world?

The thought that Jin Yunxi might be gone was like a serrated blade sawing through her chest, back and forth, with every breath a tearing agony.

She couldn’t even last a few seconds watching. Stumbling, nearly falling, she rushed out of the house, her steps frantic, ignoring Song Mei’s desperate cries behind her.

“Mommy~~~” Little Xining called after her. Though still young, the child was frightened by Yan Qingruo’s expression. Her dark eyes welled up, lashes wet with confused tears. “Grandma, what’s wrong with Mommy?”

Mommy had always been gentle, always answering her questions with patience. But today, she hadn’t even looked at her.

Song Mei’s heart sank. She too had seen the accident report, and recent news of Jin Yunxi’s trip to F Country was everywhere.

“Sweetheart… your mommy just suddenly has something very important to do,” she murmured, stroking her granddaughter’s soft hair. Looking at the girl’s little face—more and more resembling someone—and remembering her daughter’s insistence on divorcing Shu Xiyue, her manic, almost deranged behavior… Song Mei felt a cold thud in her chest.

By the time Yan Qingruo reached the crash site, the area was cordoned off by police tape. The acrid stench of burned metal and flesh stung her eyes, but she lunged forward anyway, only to be stopped firmly by officers.

The Lincoln she knew so well was charred black, its frame twisted, the interior nothing but ashes. Not even bones remained.

Her voice trembled uncontrollably as she pleaded with the officers, her gaze raw with despair.

“Ma’am,” one said flatly, blocking her path, “there were no survivors.”

“No… no, that’s not true.” Yan Qingruo shook her head wildly, like a soul already shattered. She forced her shaking hands to dial again and again, but every call returned the same cold, mechanical voice: The number you have dialed has been powered off.

Her Alpha. Her lover. Her wife. Was she truly gone?

Why had she waited until now to admit it?

She cared. She had always cared. Now regret gnawed at her like madness—why had she let Jin Yunxi pursue the truth? Were those truths worth this?

If only she had kept silent, wouldn’t Yunxi still be here, smiling at her with that tender gaze, the three of them together, sharing meals, living in warmth and laughter?

“Baby hasn’t even called you Mommy yet… how could you leave us like this?”

…

Every day without her beloved was like living behind a curtain of endless rain. Sunshine no longer existed; there was only night.

During the critical forty-eight-hour recovery period, Yan Qingruo haunted the search teams, stopping each officer to beg for updates.

She even spent a fortune hiring a private salvage crew, determined to turn the entire river upside down if she had to. But day after day brought only disappointment—no trace of Jin Yunxi, not even a shadow.

At night, her bedroom was a frozen cage.

She lay alone, clutching Yunxi’s scarf in her arms. It was one she had bought years ago abroad, the scent uniquely hers, now fading. Still, Qingruo buried her face deep into the fabric, desperate to breathe in every last remnant.

Tears soaked her pillow. Her lips quivered as she whispered into the dark:

“Ah Yun… where are you?”

________________________________________

Su Yuening invited her to a restaurant. One look at Qingruo’s haggard face left her stricken—she had seen her own reflection; she wasn’t much better.

They exchanged glances. No words were needed. The grief in their eyes was already overflowing.

“In her final moments… Yunxi called me. She told me to entrust Jin Corporation to you.” Su Yuening’s hoarse voice scraped out the confession.

Qingruo’s lips trembled. Her shoulders shook. The wall she had forced herself to hold up collapsed at once.

“She isn’t dead. She wouldn’t take the easy way out.” Tears rimmed Qingruo’s eyes. “I won’t take her company. I won’t clean up her mess for her.”

Su Yuening sighed. News of Yunxi’s disappearance was becoming impossible to suppress in Yatran. Jin Hua was already circling like a vulture. If not for Jin Yunhan’s sudden change of heart and full support, she might not have been able to hold the line at all.
“Jin Corporation means everything to Yunxi. It was her mother’s company—her mother’s life’s work.” Su Yuening’s tone dropped. She told Qingruo about Yunxi’s childhood, the suffocating darkness, her mother’s depression after Jin Hua’s affair, and her final leap from the rooftop.

She carefully omitted any mention of Hengjia.

Qingruo listened in silence, her chest aching. She still didn’t know that even in death, Yunxi had been fighting for her, risking everything to uncover the truth, even forcing Su Yuening with her life.

Su Yuening’s eyes grew red as well. She lifted a hand, wanting to comfort Qingruo, but the weight of Hengjia choked her into silence.

Wiping her tears, Qingruo steadied herself. Endless grief was useless.

The evidence pointed clearly: Yunxi’s disappearance—it was still too painful to call it death—was no accident. Someone had wanted her gone.

Together, she and Su Yuening sifted through suspects. Political rivals surfaced, but one figure loomed larger than the rest: the Queen.

________________________________________

In the palace of Yatran, opulence was drowned beneath a suffocating air.

Queen Lin Ruxi sat on her gilded throne, brows drawn tight, eyes locked coldly on the man kneeling before her. Wei Ailun dared not even breathe too loudly.

“What did you say? She died in a car accident abroad?” Lin Ruxi’s voice was ice, tinged with disbelief.

“Yes, Your Majesty. I had cars sent to bring her back, but when Yunxi saw my vehicle, she ran—ran after that old flame, Yan Qingruo. She ignored your summons completely.”

Head bowed, his expression unreadable, Wei Ailun was certain: Jin Yunxi was dead. The river was merciless. Survival was impossible.

The salvage had yielded nothing. To him, their efforts were laughable. Even if the body hadn’t been eaten away, soaked that long it would be unrecognizable—if lucky, bloated beyond recognition.

He sneered inside, though his face wore sorrow.

Lin Ruxi, however, still refused to accept it. Her cold laugh barely concealed her ache. “Jin Yunxi… liar.”

From the USB Wei Ailun brought, she had listened to Yunxi and Qingruo’s pillow talk.

Necks pressed close, voices tender.

Especially Yunxi’s murmur: “Yan Qingruo, are all Omega pheromones this sweet? You smell so good.”

That line broke her.

So—Yan Qingruo was an Omega. Yunxi had never loved Betas at all. She had only ever loved her.

The deception cut deep.

She, a Queen, an SS-ranked Omega, had offered herself time and again, only to be rebuffed with excuses. Excuses that now looked like humiliation.

It was betrayal. An insult.

The fury burned like wildfire through her, consuming her chest with rage. Yet the moment she heard of Yunxi’s death, all that was left was hollow despair.

Still, Lin Ruxi was decisive. Her predatory instincts awoke. Yunxi’s company was now exposed prey.

Jin Corporation—once the pride of Yatran’ first tier, its empire spanning industries, dominating markets.

While Yunxi lived, Ruxi had tolerated her, kept her under the leash of the Secretary-General role, maintaining a fragile balance.

But with Yunxi gone, her political instincts flared sharp. Opportunity reeked in the air.

The heart of a ruler was as deep as the sea.

After a token display of grief, Lin Ruxi moved on Jin Corporation.

Without Yunxi to anchor it, the company was nothing but a feast laid bare before her. Rumors spread among the people: “With Jin Yunxi fallen, the Queen feasts.”

Before the storm could swallow everything, Yan Qingruo stepped forward.

She entrusted her child to Song Mei and threw herself into the fight. Like a tireless migratory bird, she flew between Yatran and F Country, searching for Yunxi while bracing against the Queen’s strike.

Day by day, her figure grew thinner, so fragile it seemed a single gust of wind might topple her.

Immersed in her own pain and obsession, she remained utterly unaware of the changes within herself. Life moved on in a numb, mechanical blur. It was Shu Xiyue, instead, who felt her heart ache first at the sight of Yan Qingruo’s haggard state.

Shu Xiyue found the right moment to ask Yan Qingruo out. At their meeting, she mysteriously produced a set of recordings and videos she had somehow gotten hold of.

“Yan Qingruo, I can’t bear to see you treated this way.”

In the recording, Jin Yunxi’s cold, detached voice was unmistakable. She threatened Shu Xiyue with a fatal medical malpractice case, forcing her to surrender the equity of Qingyue Corp.

The video was even more shocking. It showed Jin Yunxi, expression severe, negotiating with the professional manager of Yan Qingruo’s grandfather’s company, before decisively signing a takeover contract.

“Ruoruo, Jin Yunxi is ruthless and unscrupulous, willing to sacrifice anything for profit. What is there left for you to hold on to?” Shu Xiyue frowned deeply, her eyes full of urgency and pity, desperately trying to shake Yan Qingruo out of her obsession.

Yan Qingruo stared at the high-definition footage in disbelief. Yet it was indeed Jin Yunxi, sitting across from her grandfather’s manager, signing the contract.

“Do you still need proof?!” Song Mei suddenly barged in, her face twisted in fury as she charged straight at Yan Qingruo.

Yan Qingruo slowly lifted her head, her expression blank as she listened to Song Mei repeat the same old accusations. Once, those words might have stirred guilt, panic, and an instinct to explain herself.

But now—thinking of Jin Yunxi’s disappearance, of the very real danger she might have faced while seeking the so-called truth—Yan Qingruo felt her heart seized tight by an invisible fist. Her eyes dimmed, her body slumping into the chair as she gave a bitter laugh.

“Does it even matter anymore, Mother?”

Her hollow gaze made Song Mei’s chest tighten. Yan Qingruo went on softly, “She’s the mother of my child. You already know that, don’t you?”

Taking a deep breath, she steadied her voice. “Xining is our child—hers and mine. How ridiculous of me, caring so much about your feelings, about the baby’s school admission, that I went as far as to marry Shu Xiyue.”

“Mother, when I turned her away, Yunxi was devastated. Do you know that? She carried that grief for three years. I’m not a fool—I can tell when love is real.” Yan Qingruo’s eyes reddened, tears brimming.

Song Mei pressed on relentlessly, her voice sharp with reproach: “But she’s bound to you by blood hatred! Have you forgotten your grandparents? Forgotten how I was driven into depression because of her family?”

Those memories pressed down like a mountain on Yan Qingruo’s chest, leaving her gasping for air.

Her eyes glistened red as she choked out, “Yes, I’ve always known! From the very first moment we met on the Rhine River—it was me who first knew her. But I pushed her toward Yan Qingmei, all for your grand plan, Mother.”

“I watched her date Yan Qingmei, all the while repeating your words in my head: she’s our enemy, I must seek revenge—for you.”

Tears streamed down her face, raw and unrestrained. She had loved Jin Yunxi even before her memory loss but, for the sake of that so-called grand plan, she yielded her to Yan Qingmei, using blackmail to bind her step sister with guilt.

Later, when Jin Yunxi rose to Secretary-General, she forced Yan Qingmei to flee the marriage, stepping in herself as the “wronged bride.”

She married in Yan Qingmei’s stead, making the family owe her a debt, then feigned amnesia, waiting for fate to deliver Jin Yunxi into her arms.

Yan Qingruo had calculated everything—except this: that after losing her memory, her feelings for Jin Yunxi would only grow fiercer, turning into love so consuming it had not waned even during her pregnancy, even during every day spent abroad away from her.

She wept uncontrollably, shoulders trembling.

“What does family hatred matter? What does it matter that she’s ruthless, cold-hearted? All I know is that she is my lover, the mother of my child. She loves me, and I love her!” Yan Qingruo’s voice rang with an unprecedented firmness.

“You’re insane! She schemed and coerced, destroyed your grandparents’ lives! You unfilial girl!” Song Mei’s fury broke into a frenzied scream.

“Then let me be mad, Mother. Ever since Yunxi disappeared, I’ve been mad.” Tears spilled down her face, unstoppable. She had thought she had no tears left, that she was strong enough to endure anything. She had been wrong.

“Family hatred belongs to the past. Whatever she’s done to others, however cruel her reputation, I don’t care. Even if she was crippled, even if she truly was despicable, I don’t care. Mother, I love her—I love her for who she is. All those so-called flaws you see? They mean nothing to me. I beg you, please—let me go, let us go, and free yourself too.”

Her heart brimmed with Jin Yunxi’s goodness. Deep inside, there was a scale that weighed her love.

That long-delayed scale had already tipped firmly toward Jin Yunxi—perhaps it had long been so, only that she realized it too late. And now, the one to whom she wished to bare her soul was gone.

She no longer wanted to hear anyone’s one-sided accusations.

In the face of her love for Jin Yunxi, all slander and reproach became powerless.

Even the crushing weight of… family hatred.

Song Mei stood speechless, glaring at her daughter in bitter frustration. “You really have gone mad.”

Perhaps she had.

Even after seeing Jin Yunxi’s ruthless tactics in the business world, where others condemned her as unscrupulous, Yan Qingruo’s heart still reframed those actions as decisiveness and strength.

Love had draped a gentle filter over her eyes. Jin Yunxi’s disappearance had pushed her further into the abyss of madness, filling her with regret for not standing firmly by her side sooner.

Now, one thought alone consumed her: pray for Jin Yunxi’s survival. Even if she woke and no longer remembered their past, even if she cast her aside—it wouldn’t matter.

So long as Jin Yunxi lived, she would follow, even if it meant being hated. In life, she belonged to Jin Yunxi; in death, she would haunt her still.

As Song Mei turned to leave, her steps faltered. A tangle of emotions clouded her face. Once, she had secretly rejoiced at Jin Yunxi’s presumed death, glad that fate itself had exacted vengeance for the Song family.

But now, she only sighed heavily. Bending down, she took little Xining’s hand. “Come, dear granddaughter. Your mother needs some time to calm down.”

“What’s wrong with Mommy?” Xining tilted her innocent face upward, wide eyes brimming with confusion.

“Your mommy lost the person most important to her. And that person… is the one Grandma despises most.” Song Mei forced a weary smile, exhaustion seeping into her gaze.

“Grandma, please don’t hate that person,” Xining said softly, swinging her hand. “Mommy loves Grandma very much. But if Grandma hates the one Mommy loves, she’ll be so sad.”

Then her eyes lit up, and she added brightly, “Baby trusts Mommy! Whoever Mommy loves, I’ll love them too. Grandma, try to love Mommy more, and love Baby more too, okay?”

“Teacher said, if your heart is big, then hate will be small.” She spread her little arms wide, drawing a huge heart in the air. In her brows and smile, there was a faint shadow of Jin Yunxi.

Song Mei slowly crouched down, staring at her granddaughter who so resembled that woman. A sigh slipped from her lips.

She lifted a hand, gently stroked Xining’s head, and murmured, “Grandma is old now. I don’t want to meddle anymore.”

Since Xining’s birth, Song Mei’s state of mind had improved. Gazing at the innocent, lovely child, she wondered—was it possible her daughter was right, that perhaps Jin Yunxi had been misunderstood?

At least, a woman capable of giving her daughter such an adorable child couldn’t be entirely vile. For the child’s sake… why keep grudges with the dead?

Even if Jin Yunxi wasn’t dead, even if she returned to “plague” her lovesick daughter—what then? Perhaps such “troublesome souls” truly lived long.

Thinking this, Song Mei sighed again. Dead or alive, Jin Yunxi had stolen her daughter’s very soul.

In this revenge, there were no winners.

________________________________________

Yan Qingruo was utterly drained.

On one side, she fought a shadow war within the Jin Group against Jin Hua, struggling through the treacherous currents of the business world. On the other, she remotely managed Qingyue Corp, leaving no detail unattended.

All the while, her heart searched ceaselessly for Jin Yunxi, clinging to every shred of rumor, every faint clue.

But as the days dragged on, hope grew ever fainter. Just as despair threatened to engulf her, an urgent knock rattled the door.

Jin Fan stood there, panting hard, chest heaving, sweat dripping from his forehead.

“Jin… President Jin…”

He struggled to get the words out, and the sight made Yan Qingruo’s anxiety spike.

“What happened?” She rose quickly, voice taut with alarm.

Drawing in a deep breath, Jin Fan steadied himself before saying, “Reliable sources report… someone resembling President Jin has been seen in a small border town near Fonden. Only…” His brows furrowed, his expression troubled.

“Only what?” Yan Qingruo’s heart leapt to her throat, eyes locked on him.

“Madam, please don’t get your hopes too high. Perhaps you should see for yourself. It may just be someone who looks like her… not necessarily her.” Jin Fan faltered, then reluctantly handed over the documents in his hand.