Unconventional [Rebirth] - Chapter 72

Jiang Rui’s expression shifted instantly. He watched as He Fumei gasped for air, clutching her chest with lingering fear, while little Yuan Yuan continued to wail in his arms. Even the “Soul-Soothing Honey” he had fed the child couldn’t stop the sobbing. Everything pointed toward an impending disaster.

Jiang Rui’s pinky finger began to throb with rhythmic pain. He had experienced this before but had dismissed it as a lingering side effect of his recent breakthrough. Now, looking at his hands in a daze, he didn’t notice He Fumei’s panicked expression or the fact that Yuan Yuan was weakly mumbling a sound that resembled “Jie” (Sister).

Suddenly, the front door was thrown open.

Zhou Yongping stumbled in, looking utterly disheveled. He didn’t say a word to his wife or Jiang Rui, charging straight into the inner bedroom.

He Fumei’s heart sank. She hadn’t seen her two daughters with him. Driven by maternal instinct and the palpitations she had just felt, she followed him, shouting at the bedroom door, “Where are Xiao Xiao and Tong Tong?!”

Zhou Yongping stood with his back to her, his eyes bloodshot and his throat constricted with grief. He swallowed hard before forcing out a lie: “The car had a small scrape. Tong Tong’s leg was grazed. I’m just back to get some things before heading to the hospital.”

“What?!” He Fumei cried. She turned to change her clothes, but Zhou Yongping stopped her, insisting she stay with the crying Yuan Yuan. Reluctantly, she agreed, begging him to call the moment they reached the hospital.

Jiang Rui watched as his aunt took the baby away. Once she was occupied, he locked the door of the study and turned to his uncle.

“Uncle,” Jiang Rui said softly behind him. He watched Zhou Yongping’s trembling hands pick up a thin manila folder. “Did something happen to the girls?”

Zhou Yongping remained silent, his clothes stained and his posture broken. “Ruirui, you’re just a child. This has nothing to do with you. Be good.”

To Zhou Yongping, no matter how many powerful people Jiang Rui seemed to know, those connections were for “show.” He couldn’t bring himself to involve a nephew in a life-and-death crisis involving the underworld.

Jiang Rui didn’t argue. He ignored the pain in his finger and watched his uncle rush out of the house. Before following, Jiang Rui looked at his aunt, who was leaning against the doorframe crying. He sighed, walked over, and performed a quick hand seal, causing both her and the baby to fall into a safe, deep sleep.

In his previous life, Tong Tong’s fate had been a thorn in his soul. Thinking of that vibrant girl becoming a shadow of herself after the “incident” made it hard for him to breathe. Back then, he had believed he was cursed to be distant from his kin, but he realized now it was all karma he had failed to prevent.

Jiang Rui followed Zhou Yongping to the outskirts of Qing City.

Zhou Yongping parked the car and walked the rest of the way. His usually steady gait was gone; he stumbled and swayed like a man with a physical disability, looking utterly pathetic. In contrast, Jiang Rui floated silently in the air behind him, hands behind his back like a celestial child.

Eventually, they reached a dilapidated thatched shack. Jiang Rui was surprised; he had lived in Qing City for decades and never knew this place existed.

Inside the small shack, the twins were tied up in a corner, unconscious. Their mouths were gagged with cloth so tightly their faces were bruised and purple. Jiang Rui checked their vitals from afar and felt a small relief. As long as I am here, these two will not suffer.

“Zhou Yan, I brought what you wanted. Give me my daughters…” Zhou Yongping’s voice shook despite his best efforts to remain calm.

A man named Zhou Yan sneered. He signaled a lackey to take the folder.

“Boss, it’s the real deal,” the lackey confirmed.

Zhou Yan? Jiang Rui narrowed his eyes, noticing the man shared a slight family resemblance with Zhou Yongping.

“Well, well, big cousin. Your ‘Zhou Family Pharmacy’ has grown quite large over the years, hasn’t it?” Zhou Yan leaned back in a chair, looking like a common thug. “To think you were hiding these goods from me…”

Zhou Yongping adjusted his glasses, his breathing ragged. “The Zhou family does legal business! You know our profit margins. I’ve given you the medicinal herbs you wanted. Now, release Xiao Xiao and Tong Tong!”

“Whoa, slow down…” Zhou Yan raised a hand. Before Zhou Yongping could move, two thugs grabbed him and dragged him back. “You fooled me so badly a few years ago, cousin. You think one shipment makes us even?”

Zhou Yongping’s face twisted in rage, but he forced himself to stay still for the sake of his daughters. He looked like a shell of the man Jiang Rui knew—just a desperate father.

Jiang Rui finally understood the puzzle. The herbs, Zhou Yan, the inability to call the police… it was all connected to Wang Chenghui. This was the same trade war that had infuriated Xiao Lunan.

A wave of bitter memory washed over Jiang Rui. In his past life, after this kidnapping, Little Wu had died months later, and Mo Zhao had been brutally murdered in her own home. Xiao Lunan had been broken by the loss of his brother and his wife.

Worse, Wang Chenghui had manipulated the evidence to make Zhou Yongping believe Jiang Rui was the one behind the kidnapping. His own uncle had hated him until the day he died.

Jiang Rui’s eyes grew wet with fury as he pulled himself out of the memories.

Across the room, the thugs were beating Zhou Yongping. The noise woke the twins. Seeing their father being assaulted, they began to wail through their gags.

A one-eyed man wearing a patch grew annoyed by the noise. He looked at Xiao Xiao—the loudest one—and unsheathed a jagged knife. “Shut up!” He lunged, aiming the blade directly at the girl’s face.

Tong Tong shrieked and threw her body in front of her sister. Zhou Yongping let out a gut-wrenching roar from the floor: “NO—!”

In the split second before the blade could touch Tong Tong’s skin, a pale, clean hand reached out of thin air. It caught the cold steel and, with a terrifying display of strength, slowly bent the metal into a curve.

Jiang Rui had materialized beside the man. He held the blade in his bare hand, his expression calm and chilling as he looked into the one-eyed man’s terrified pupils.

“You owe my sister,” Jiang Rui whispered, his voice devoid of warmth. “Today, you pay it all back.”