Chapter 30

Chapter 30

Xie Qiyan couldn’t see the expression on his face as he set his phone down and stepped out of the bathtub, sending a splash of water across the floor.

As he wrapped himself in a bathrobe and stood before the mirror, his eyes darkened at the memory of his conversation with Xia Wanzhi.

Was he just bored out of his mind?

Or was this particular brand of insanity contagious, passed down from Xie Tan?

How else could he explain sitting naked in a bathtub and actually admitting to Xia Wanzhi that he was her private butler?

Xie Qiyan’s aura turned cold. With a stony face, he stepped out and sent a message to Yu Fei in the middle of the night, telling him to go out and buy ten more sets of summer homework for Xie Tan tomorrow.

At ten o’clock the next morning, Xie Qiyan finished a meeting and received a notification from Xia Wanzhi. She told him to send a message before he headed over.

His eyes narrowed slightly as he finally remembered that little arrangement.

On the way back to the office from the conference room, Yu Fei watched his boss pause mid-stride to frown at his phone. His imagination began to run wild.

No one had ever been able to make his boss stop in his tracks just to carefully reply to a message.

He wondered what kind of sacred being the person on the other end was.

“Find an actor who knows how to fix a sink and bring him to see me,” Xie Qiyan said, putting his phone away and continuing forward with an expressionless face.

Yu Fei’s jaw nearly hit the floor. “Huh?”

Xie Qiyan glanced at him. “You have an objection?”

Yu Fei swallowed hard and shook his head vigorously. “None at all.”

The King of Hell had spoken; he had no choice but to obey and find the man.

When he learned that Xie Qiyan wanted someone for a roleplay, Yu Fei broke into a cold sweat. He looked at his boss with a complex expression, his thick dark eyebrows dancing wildly.

The world really had changed.

Yu Fei took the eighteenth-tier young male actor aside to sign a non-disclosure agreement and an employment contract. After relaying his boss’s instructions once more, he couldn’t wait to rush over to Huo Yang’s workstation to share this particularly explosive and outrageous maneuver.

Huo Yang raised an eyebrow and spoke up immediately. “I don’t think that daughter of the Xia Family will need to move out of Xingyao after all.”

Yu Fei clapped his hands together. “Forget not moving out-in the future, all of Xingyao might belong to her.”

Huo Yang agreed. “What’s Xingyao? For a man like President Xie, he’d pluck the stars and the moon from the sky for Miss Xia.”

Yu Fei gave him a high-five. “Why are you still calling her Miss Xia? You should call her Madam.”

“What are you two talking about?” Xie Qiyan’s voice drifted over from behind them, chillingly cold.

Yu Fei snapped to attention and spun around, laughing awkwardly. “We were just saying that the project over at Xingyao starts today, and Miss Xia’s side…”

Xie Qiyan glanced at his watch. “Enough. Huo Yang, come with me to Beicheng Mental Hospital.”

Realizing it was official business, Huo Yang quickly wiped the smile off his face, stood up, and followed closely behind Xie Qiyan.

***

Xia Wanzhi woke up at ten o’clock to wash up. She took the slices of bread Yun Li had prepared for her out of the fridge, popped them in the microwave to heat up, and ate them with some milk.

After eating, she crawled back into bed, closed her eyes, and actually fell back asleep.

It had started raining again this morning. It wasn’t as heavy as yesterday, but this kind of drizzly weather was perfect for sleeping.

When she naturally woke up again at noon and rolled over, she grabbed her phone. She froze when she saw the WeChat message from the “butler.” Scrambling out of bed, she threw off her pajamas, changed her clothes, and hurried to the door in her slippers.

She had told him to message her before he came over.

As it turned out, the man had messaged her saying he had arrived.

The problem was, the message had been sent at exactly eleven o’clock.

When she opened the door, sure enough, a young man dressed in work clothes was leaning against the wall, waiting with a toolbox in hand.

Xia Wanzhi pursed her lips and confirmed, “Mr. Qi?”
Qi Shi shifted into work mode in a split second, giving her a slight nod before raising the toolbox in his hand.

Xia Wanzhi: “…”

From the moment he entered the door until the repair was finished, Xia Wanzhi went from proactively standing by his side to ask a few questions every now and then, to eventually just sitting on the sofa waiting for him to finish.

Throughout the entire process, this Mr. Butler didn’t say a single word.

Not one word.

Xia Wanzhi almost wanted to politely ask: Are you a mute?

As soon as he left, Xia Wanzhi checked the repaired sink and couldn’t resist messaging Xie Tan: [Is your Mr. Butler a mute?]

Xie Tan was still buried in her homework and didn’t see the message until an hour later. She immediately guessed that the person Xia Wanzhi was talking about definitely wasn’t Xie Qiyan.

Mr. Butler was Xie Qiyan, but the one who met with Xia Wanzhi definitely wasn’t him.

That was a fake.

Xie Tan felt a surge of excitement.

Not only had Xie Qiyan accepted Xia Wanzhi’s WeChat request, but he had also accepted the identity of Mr. Butler and even specifically sent someone to play the part of the butler she had fabricated out of thin air.

What did this prove?

It proved there was a chance!

Xie Tan: [Maybe? I’m not really sure. He was arranged by the family.]

At the end, she added another sentence: [You’re wrong, he’s *your* Mr. Butler now.]

Xia Wanzhi: “…”

What a mess.

Switching out of the chat interface, Xia Wanzhi politely sent a message to Mr. Butler: [Thank you for your hard work.]

No wonder he had such an eccentric personality; it turned out he was a mute.

When Xie Qiyan received this message from Xia Wanzhi, he was still at the Beicheng Mental Hospital. Holding a black umbrella, he watched Hou Mengqiu with a cold gaze as she spun around in circles in the rain.

Xia Wanzhi’s message caused him to briefly look away.

In addition to Xia Wanzhi’s message, there was also a report from Qi Shi regarding what had happened.

It was written like an essay, detailing Xia Wanzhi’s every expression, every movement, and every single word she had said.

After reading it, Xie Qiyan switched back to Xia Wanzhi’s chat and replied: [Mm.]

“President Xie?” Huo Yang, also holding an umbrella, came over from Hou Mengqiu’s side and shook his head at Xie Qiyan. “No effect at all.”

Even when faced with Yang Datong, Hou Mengqiu hadn’t shown any cracks.

The caregivers at the hospital said she had become even crazier than before.

In the rain, Yang Datong circled Hou Mengqiu, repeating his name over and over and recounting how she had given him money to do her bidding back then.

But Hou Mengqiu didn’t recognize him at all. She cupped her hands to catch the rainwater and poured it into her mouth, then began her nonsensical rambling again. She grabbed Yang Datong and asked, “Son? You’re my son, right?”

“No, no…”

“You’re not my son!”

“You’re my grandson, right? Hahahaha, you’re my grandson!”

“Good grandson, let Grandma have a look…”

Yu Fei’s fists cracked as he clenched them. He closed his eyes, unable to watch any longer. “President Xie…”

Xie Qiyan’s face remained unreadable. He simply looked away indifferently and gave an order as he turned to leave: “Release Yang Datong. Have someone keep an eye on him.”

Yu Fei nodded. “Understood.”

As for Hou Mengqiu…

The crazier she acted, the more it proved she was faking it.

“Have someone watch Hou Mengqiu twenty-four hours a day. Report any situation immediately. As for her son, increase the manpower to find him,” Xie Qiyan instructed Huo Yang as he gripped the handle of his umbrella and turned away.

Xie An must have been hidden away by Hou Mengqiu.

She did it so he couldn’t seize her weakness.

Only by finding Xie An as soon as possible would Hou Mengqiu’s grand performance of insanity finally come to an end.