Chapter 181: The Thief Who Stole Power
Xiao Ye nodded in understanding. "Liu Loulan has wiped her past clean. She definitely doesn't want certain things getting out."
"The only reason she's kept you alive is that, besides wanting to watch you squirm, she still hasn't found what she's looking for."
Liu Rusheng nodded. "Exactly. It's useless even if she threatens me with my mother, because my mother was the one who hid it. Not even I know where it is."
His mother was the former Lady of the House of the Liu Family and had a very strong will. Otherwise, Liu Loulan would have killed her long ago.
Now, all that was left was to see if Liu Loulan would show up for their meeting tomorrow.
Xiao Ye left the care facility and was driven back to his villa.
After a night's rest, he arrived at the address Liu Rusheng had given him at nine o'clock the next morning.
It was a very remote location that had once been Liu Family territory.
There had once been a small children's playground here, built by the Liu Family specifically for its younger members.
But after the Liu Family's downfall, the place was abandoned.
Most of the great clans in the Imperial City believed in feng shui.
It was said that the feng shui here was bad, so no one had taken over the land.
9:50 AM.
Liu Rusheng arrived.
He was carrying the earpiece, recorder, and other devices Xiao Ye had given him.
He stood at the entrance to the playground, waiting quietly.
Ten o'clock sharp.
A car slowly pulled to a stop.
Liu Rusheng stared intently at the tinted black windows of the car.
After nearly twenty years, they were finally about to meet again!
Once family, now mortal enemies!
The car door opened slowly, and a woman emerged.
She was dressed in opulent attire, wore sunglasses, and carried a cane.
Liu Rusheng immediately rushed forward. "Liu Loulan!"
The woman didn't answer. The next second, two men rushed out of the car and slammed him to the ground.
Xiao Ye immediately got out of his car and raced toward them!
The woman took off her sunglasses, revealing a face remarkably similar to Liu Loulan's.
But Liu Rusheng knew with a single glance. "No, you're not Liu Loulan!"
She said nothing, instead motioning to her two henchmen with her eyes.
They immediately frisked him, taking everything from his person without leaving a single item behind.
Xiao Ye, who had been about to intervene, found a place to hide.
'Not Liu Loulan?'
'Then how could Liu Rusheng have been mistaken at first?'
'Unless they look incredibly similar!'
The henchmen found a file on Liu Rusheng. After they opened it and looked inside, the woman gave them a look, and they prepared to kill him!
'They're clearly trying to kill him to tie up loose ends!'
Seeing this, Xiao Ye stopped hiding and sprang into action!
BANG! BANG!
The two henchmen fell to the ground simultaneously.
The woman, realizing something was wrong, raised her dragon-head cane, aimed it in Xiao Ye's direction, and pressed a switch.
BANG!
A bullet casing clattered to the ground.
'It's a modified gun!'
Xiao Ye appeared in a flash from the side and kicked the woman to the ground.
The other two men recovered and immediately closed in on Xiao Ye from both sides.
Liu Rusheng knew he couldn't help, so he found a place to hide, determined not to be a burden.
The more Xiao Ye fought, the more alarmed he became. At the same time, he felt a sense of familiarity.
'The strength of these three is far beyond that of ordinary henchmen!'
'They're clearly... the Death Warriors who attacked me before!'
'They come from the same source, that's why they feel familiar!'
Xiao Ye no longer held back and quickly dispatched all three.
Liu Rusheng was terrified to see three corpses lying on the ground.
Xiao Ye grabbed him by the collar, hauled him into the car, and said, "I'm taking you back to the care facility!"
"Wait, what about the bodies? If we leave them here, someone will find out you killed them!"
"Don't worry. Liu Loulan's people will clean this up."
They attacked first. Besides, the Xiao Family would never want to expose the existence of their Death Warriors.
Now, Xiao Ye was certain: the people who had come after him before had been sent by Liu Loulan.
He started the car and sped off.
Sure enough, it wasn't long before the bodies on the ground vanished, as if they had never been there.
Death Warriors have no identities. Even when they die, no one will ever know.
「Back at the care facility.」
Xiao Ye dropped Liu Rusheng off and sat alone in the car.
'The Hidden Xiao Family, a clan with the same surname as mine.'
'And... Liu Loulan's relentless, repeated assassination attempts.'
'Then there were those people from the Hidden Xiao Family who looked just like me.'
'The truth... was just within reach!'
Xiao Ye guessed that he was a member of the Xiao Family.
And the reason Liu Loulan was targeting him was simply because he had become a threat to her position.
Based on the timeline, he was very likely the son of the previous Patriarch, Xiao Ling!
That made him the most legitimate heir to the Xiao Family!
If an heir existed, why would the Xiao Family be willing to hand over power to an outsider!
That was why Liu Loulan was so determined to have him killed!
'Looking at it this way, the reason my master found me back then was probably Liu Loulan's doing as well.'
Proving it would be simple.
He just had to expose it.
And then see how Liu Loulan would react.
Xiao Ye drove back to the villa and immediately had someone publish a news story.
The story was simple: it claimed that the deceased Xiao Ye's true identity was actually the heir of the Hidden Clan, the Xiao Family.
And that his death was surrounded by suspicious circumstances.
The article was written ambiguously. Many people didn't even know Hidden Clans existed, and it didn't mention Liu Loulan by name.
Yet, a mere five minutes after it was published, every trace of it had been scrubbed from the entire internet.
To test this, Xiao Ye had arranged for a full thousand people to publish the story.
He even paid to get it trending.
Based on Xiao Ye's previous investigations into the Xiao Family, they usually paid little attention to online chatter.
It was, after all, just baseless speculation. Once you reached a certain echelon of power, public opinion didn't matter much.
But this time, the Xiao Family acted with extreme speed—it was a dead giveaway.
This made Xiao Ye all the more certain that his suspicions were correct.
He was one of the Xiao Family!
The rightful Patriarch of the Xiao Family!
Liu Loulan was nothing but a thief who had stolen his birthright!
As the previous Patriarch, Xiao Ling couldn't have left nothing behind, even if he did die young.
Therefore, the entire Xiao Family couldn't be a monolith.
Besides Xiao Ling's loyalists, there must have been plenty of others who were unhappy with Liu Loulan.
He knew this from attending Liu Loulan's birthday banquet and overhearing the talk from the other major families.
Even outsiders mocked them for letting someone with a different surname become Patriarch; how could there not be internal strife?
Xiao Ye made his decision instantly and headed for Dragon Abyss Tower.
Dragon Abyss Tower.
A members-only teahouse.
On the surface, it was a place to drink tea and chat. In reality, it was a favorite haunt of the rich and powerful.
The tea was excellent, but more importantly, it was a place where one could try to do business with the various great families.