The Heiress's Game

Chen Cui's home.

Wang Xiaoying sat on the sofa and gently touched Chen Yao's cheek.

The redness on that half of her face had subsided—the scene had been filmed several days prior—but she still instinctively wanted to touch it, as if touching it with her fingers would confirm whether her daughter was in pain.

Chen Yao was looking down at her phone replying to messages, her thumb flying across the screen, when she felt her mother's hand touch her. She didn't even look up.

"Mom, it really doesn't hurt anymore. You've touched it several times already."

Wang Xiaoying did not speak.

Chen Cui sat on the single sofa opposite, with a bottle of mineral water with the cap not screwed on on her lap.

"Mom, Yao Yao, I'm sorry. This idea was mine, and I didn't expect people online to say such nasty things. Some of the things they said were really too hurtful."

Chen Yao finally looked up from her phone screen.

She glanced at Chen Cui, then at Wang Xiaoying, tossed her phone onto the sofa, crossed her legs, and sat up straight.

"Sister, Mom, can you two stop acting like this? You're both acting like I owe eight million."

She spoke with that familiar, feisty tone, "I gained 200,000 followers, 200,000."

Those who criticize me, after they finish their insults, still click into my profile to see who I am. Once they see it, some of them stay on my page. Those who stay are my traffic, traffic is money, and money is—”

She stopped, her gaze sweeping over her mother and sister, taking in the entire living room.

Outside the floor-to-ceiling windows is a small garden with orange trees that were already in place when we moved in, and the lawn is neatly trimmed.

The living room had a higher ceiling than any of her previous rooms, with a crystal chandelier hanging from the ceiling. The brass arms of the chandelier were polished to a shine, and every bulb was lit, making the entire space bright and warm.

This is a villa in Dahai City, their own house.

a year ago.

A year ago, her family was still living in a dilapidated thatched house in their hometown.

The roof was made of asbestos tiles. On rainy days, we had to use three basins to catch the water: one by the stove, one in the middle of the bed, and one by the door to catch the muddy water that seeped in through the cracks in the door.

Wang Xiaoying gets up at 4:30 every morning, rides a bicycle with a broken chain that she has repaired, to town to do cleaning work. When she comes back at night, her fingers are so frozen that she can't bend them, and she still has to mend clothes for her three children by the light of a kerosene lamp.

Chen Cui was already in Dahai City at that time, carrying Gu Mingyue's bag.

She divides her monthly salary into three parts: one part is sent home, one part is used to pay rent, and the remaining part is saved to buy a coat that doesn't look cheap.

—Because she was standing behind Gu Mingyue, and if she dressed too shabbily, she would be scolded for "disgracing the Gu family."

One year.

Only a year has passed.

They are now sitting in a villa in Dahai City.

The crystal chandelier was lit, the central air conditioning was silently blowing a constant temperature, and the kitchen refrigerator was full of imported fruits that the nanny had just bought that morning.

Chen Yao turned her gaze away from the crystal chandelier and back to her mother and sister's faces.

Her eyes shone with an astonishing light, a light that wasn't one of emotion or tenderness, but rather the light of someone who had been chased by poverty and had finally mustered enough strength to fight back.

"I can endure any hardship, but I don't want to suffer from poverty anymore."

Chen Yao removed her mother's hand from her face, clenching it tightly in her own.

"What's the big deal if someone insults me a few times? It won't hurt me."

"As long as my family can live a good life, as long as we can continue to live in this house and never go back to that leaky, dilapidated place—I'll accept being trending on social media for all the wrong reasons."

Chen Cui gripped the mineral water bottle tightly in her hand, the plastic bottle making a cracking sound as she squeezed it.

"You won't take all this scolding for nothing."

"Once the show is broadcast on satellite TV, the audience base will double."

Your fan base will grow, business opportunities will come your way, and brand endorsements, live-streaming sales, and appearance fees will all increase.

Every negative comment you receive now will eventually reduce your net worth to zero.

She paused, looked into Chen Yao's eyes, and said, word by word:

"I will not let anyone bring us back to square one."

Wang Xiaoying took a deep breath and pulled her two daughters' hands over.

"Your sister is right," Wang Xiaoying said, looking at Chen Cui.

"Our family has come this far not because of charity from others."

It was you who fought with every punch and kick, and it was your sister, your brother, and all of us who stood up for them.

"Let them curse us a few times. Back in our hometown, the villagers said much worse things to us, but we survived, didn't we? We even moved into a big villa."

Chen Yao chuckled, "Mom, you're making it sound like we're forming a group to get revenge."

Wang Xiaoying didn't laugh. "It's not about revenge, it's about standing firm."

"We finally made it up here, and nobody's going to pull us down."

Chen Yao put her phone back in her pocket.

"Mom, you're right."

"Besides, the way Mom hit me that day was fake; she kept her hand hidden, and all I heard was a thud."

The audience might not notice, but don't we know it ourselves? It's acting—as long as it makes our lives better and better, I'm willing to act for a lifetime.