I Am Not a Vicious Stepsister! - Chapter 24

After finishing their meal, Modesty tugged at Ni Songan, leading her on a leisurely stroll through the shopping mall.

They didn’t have a specific goal; they were simply walking off their dinner and enjoying a slower pace of life, a preemptive strike to prevent Ni Songan from having a sudden brainwave and rushing back to the office for overtime.

Ni Songan knew Modesty was worried she was overworking herself, which was why she’d been forced out to relax. She followed along, beginning to pay attention to the surrounding shops. It just so happened that several Rodney-owned brands had outlets here. Ni Songan’s restless professional heart began to flutter, she wanted to check those stores out to learn more about the Rodney empire.

Stealing a glance, Ni Songan noticed that Modesty hadn’t spotted the Rodney-related shops on the directory map. She gently coaxed Modesty to keep wandering around. Modesty, whose entire focus was on “how to make Ni Songan enjoy shopping,” didn’t suspect a thing. She followed along blindly as they drifted toward that section of the mall.

“Wait, that person… looks a bit familiar?”

Ni Songan caught Modesty’s arm, stopping her in her tracks. She pointed across the railing toward a couple embracing. One of them was a member of the family’s side branch whom Ni Songan had seen at a shareholders’ meeting, a woman named Sandra Rodney.

She had bumped into Sandra a few times outside the company as well. She remembered that Sandra was usually accompanied by another woman in a very intimate manner, leading Ni Songan to assume they were in a committed relationship.

But the person with Sandra before was clearly not the woman they were seeing today, they looked completely different.

Ni Songan had encountered them just yesterday, and today Sandra was already with someone else, Ni Songan suddenly realized her previous assumptions might have been a bit off the mark.

“Ah, yeah, I remember seeing her at family dinners before. Her name is…” Modesty frowned, thinking for a moment. “Sandra?”

“Right, Sandra Rodney,” Ni Songan nodded.

Sandra was older than both Modesty and Ni Songan. Strictly speaking, they should have addressed her as “older sister,” but Ni Songan hadn’t seen much interaction between their branches. At most, they were the type of relatives who exchanged polite greetings at family banquets.

Seeing Ni Songan’s apparent interest in her, Modesty bit her lip and gave a solemn warning, “Sister, you’d better stay away from her.”

“Why do you say that?” Ni Songan asked, tilting her head with curiosity, waiting for an explanation.

“Because she loves playing with people’s feelings. She’s been a serial cheater since middle school. Her family spoiled her, and now that she’s grown up, she’s completely unscrupulous.” Modesty looked worried. Pushing aside her own slight annoyance, she urged Ni Songan in a heavy tone, “It’s common for her to date multiple people at once. She even has a fiancée…”

Ni Songan finally understood. “So those people I saw with Sandra aren’t actually her ‘partners.’ No wonder it was one person yesterday and a different one today.”

“Exactly. she’s incredibly fickle and has zero loyalty. She isn’t a good person,” Modesty whispered, bad-mouthing the woman in Ni Songan’s ear.

“I think you’ve misunderstood. I’m not interested in her.” Ni Songan noted the sheer resentment in Modesty’s expression and gave her hair a vigorous playful rub. “At least for now, I have no intention of looking for a relationship.”

“…So it really was just curiosity,” Modesty sighed in relief. “Anyway, I think people like that are unreliable. If she’s like that with her emotions, imagine how she handles business.”

“Alright, alright,” Ni Songan said, covering Modesty’s mouth to stop her from gossiping further. It would be a disaster if they were overheard. “I get it. Aside from work, there won’t be any involvement anyway.”

With that promise, Modesty seemed satisfied. She pulled Ni Songan toward the mall exit. “Let’s go then. Let’s find a park to walk in. The air in the mall is stifling, the energy here is bad.”

Just a few minutes ago, Modesty had been full of enthusiasm…

Ni Songan grumbled inwardly, still thinking about those stores she hadn’t visited, but she didn’t want to ruin Modesty’s mood. she let herself be dragged outside.

“Speaking of which, Sandra might end up being your colleague. After all, once you come of age, the position of Head of the Family will have to be returned to you,” Ni Songan suddenly remarked.

Modesty strode forward without looking back. “I’m not an adult yet. I’m not even eighteen. Even when I am, there’s no rush because I still have to graduate… Sister, you should just go ahead and lead boldly. Don’t worry about the rumors.”

“It’s not because of that…” Ni Songan’s ability to handle external rumors was decent enough. Most of them were just fabrications about how she bullied her stepsister at home or how she would kick her out as soon as she inherited the company.

She had tasked Zhu Tingran with handling the more egregious ones, while the obviously fake news was simply ignored. After all, anyone who believed such nonsense was a fool.

The outside world speculated wildly about her relationship with Modesty, unaware that Ni Songan truly viewed Modesty as her own younger sister.

Her eyes were full of indulgence for Modesty, no different from an adult humoring a child. “You’ll be willing when the time comes. Once you take over, it will be time for me to leave.”

“…”

Modesty stopped in her tracks. She turned around and glared at Ni Songan, puffing out her cheeks. “How can you be so sure I’ll be willing? And who said anything about you leaving? Did someone say something to you?”

No one had said anything to Ni Songan. It was just that she wasn’t a block of wood; in her current position, her every word and action were prone to being misinterpreted and attacked.

Even if others didn’t say it, was she supposed to be blind to it?

However, these weren’t things she could discuss with Modesty. Ni Songan thought for a moment before answering, “I wouldn’t leave immediately. Of course, I’d only make plans after you are capable of taking responsibility for the family.”

“But you’re still planning to leave, aren’t you?” Modesty fixated on that one point. “Can’t you just stay?”

“I can’t stay with the Rodney family forever.”

The breeze carried this reply to Modesty’s ears. She stared intently at Ni Songan, seeing no sign of her stance wavering. Modesty didn’t say a word. She threw off Ni Songan’s hand and ran away.

Ni Songan couldn’t just let her run off. She didn’t even have time to worry about the bag in her hand, she tossed it aside and immediately gave chase. “Hey! Why are you running?!”

Fortunately, Ni Songan’s reflexes were sharp. Before Modesty could get far, she managed to grab the hood of her jacket and haul the girl back. “If we have a problem, let’s solve it, okay? Don’t just run away every time.”

Modesty remained silent, looking stubborn as a mule.

Ni Songan sighed deeply at her expression. She forced Modesty back to where the bag had fallen, picked it up, and looked around. Her gaze landed on a café.

“That café over there has outdoor seating. Let’s go sit and talk, okay?”

Even if Modesty said no, Ni Songan would have found a way to force her there. The question was a mere formality; her actions were brutally honest as she directly dragged Modesty over to a seat.

When she sat down across from Modesty, intending to have a proper conversation, she was met with the girl’s reddening eyes.

“Why can’t you just stay? Quxi Orange County has everything. Even if I become the Head of the Family, I won’t drive you away. Isn’t living with me good enough?”

“Or is it just that you don’t want to be with me?”

“What is out there that attracts you so much? I can find a way to bring it here!”

“Sister, I only have you now.”

A string of words poured out of Modesty’s mouth as tears began to fall steadily from her eyes.

Ni Songan hurriedly pulled out a tissue, wanting to wipe the girl’s tears, but in the next second, her wrist was firmly caught by Modesty. “Modesty”

She hadn’t expected a casual comment to provoke such a massive reaction. But looking at Modesty’s words, everything actually had a trail.

As a transmigrator, Ni Songan felt a natural sense of detachment toward Ni Tianjiao, Althea, everyone around her, and even Modesty. In her eyes, she was a traveler. Even though she had lived in this novel world for over a year and had seen these 2D characters become three-dimensional, she still observed them from a higher-dimensional perspective.

As time passed, the boundary between reality and illusion might blur, but it didn’t disappear.

Ni Songan still couldn’t abandon her “reader’s mindset.” Subconsciously, she still viewed everyone she met as a fictional character.

Under these circumstances, Ni Songan could naturally say things like “I’ll leave in the future” or “we will definitely be separated” without much thought.

But from Modesty’s perspective, things didn’t work that way.

While Ni Songan wasn’t her biological sister, she had accompanied her through a significant portion of her youth, especially during the critical period of transferring schools and adapting to a new environment.

Althea cared far more about her own life than about Modesty. An “imprinting” instinct had made Modesty dependent on Ni Songan, and the fact that her biological mother, who shared her blood, had died in a plane crash made her instinctively seek security from Ni Songan.

Before she had even moved past that trauma, Ni Songan told her: I’m going to leave you in the future.

To Ni Songan, it was a careless remark; to Modesty, it was a bolt from the blue.

Having cleared up the underlying reasons, Ni Songan felt a twinge of regret for her loose tongue. Modesty’s tears were still falling. Rather than dwelling on regret, her priority was to soothe Modesty’s emotions.

“When I said leave, I didn’t mean we would never see each other again. I just meant I won’t stay at Rodney. But if you want, we can see each other anytime.”

Under her patient coaxing, Modesty gradually stopped crying. However, she still clung to Ni Songan and wouldn’t let go. It seemed she had been so badly rattled by the earlier words that she was relying on physical contact to reassure herself.

Ni Songan waited until she returned to normal before taking Modesty home.

“Why did you use your mother’s ‘death’ to gain Heloise’s sympathy?” System 313 asked Modesty, sounding confused. “Didn’t I tell you? Ni Tianjiao and Althea faked their deaths. They’re perfectly fine.”

“Sister doesn’t know that. Isn’t it normal for me to use it to have a good cry?”

Modesty shrugged dismissively, checking the redness in her eyes in the mirror. “Also, don’t call her Heloise. She doesn’t like it.”

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