A girl suddenly came looking for her outside?
Hearing the words of the servant outside the room, Lu Sheng was stunned.
First, she glanced at the clock, and the time displayed was already past two in the morning.
Then she looked at the sky outside the window. Although the thunder and lightning had stopped, the storm was still very fierce.
Which girl would brave such a violent storm to come to the Lu Family at such a late hour to find her?
"I see. I’ll go out right now."
Lu Sheng’s first thought was Gu Siyu, but it seemed unlikely. She put on the sleep jacket she had just taken off and opened the door to the entrance.
However, when she saw the drenched girl standing outside, shivering and hugging her arms, through the entrance’s security monitor, she couldn’t help but gasp.
Lu Sheng didn’t think twice and immediately opened the door.
The girl looked utterly distressed and helpless.
The moment she saw Lu Sheng, Juanjuan, shivering from the cold and hugging her arms outside, burst into tears, her eyes red and her voice hoarse, she called out: "Sis, sister..."
Lu Sheng was truly frightened by Juanjuan and immediately pulled her into the house, "Don’t talk for now, come inside quickly."
At the same time, she turned to the servant and said, "Aunt Li, could you please boil some brown sugar ginger tea and bring it to my room later."
"Alright, Miss, I’ll go right away," Aunt Li responded immediately.
In fact, Aunt Li, who had come with Lu Sheng, was also very surprised.
Firstly, because this girl looked younger than their young miss, it was a wonder why she would run over in such a storm at this time, and she seemed to be scared.
Secondly, this girl was so beautiful—even though her long golden hair was soaked from the rain, and she was dripping wet, it couldn’t hide or cover up her delicate features.
She looked like a mixed-race princess.
Juanjuan was completely soaked, her clothes still dripping with water. As she walked into the entrance, she hesitated, her upbringing making her worry that her wet self would dirty someone else’s house even in this situation.
Lu Sheng noticed her concern right away and immediately said, "Don’t worry, Aunt Li will clean up. Just come back to my room with me first to take a shower; whatever happened or whatever you want to say, let’s talk after you have a shower and change your clothes."
After seeing Lu Sheng, Juanjuan seemed a bit calmer, took a deep breath, and nodded, "...Okay."
Everybody else in the house was already asleep, so Lu Sheng didn’t say anything more and directly took Juanjuan back to her room.
She adjusted the shower temperature in the bathroom, found a clean set of pajamas for her, and let Juanjuan take a hot shower.
When Juanjuan came out of the bathroom, the room’s heating was on at full blast, and there was also a steaming cup of brown sugar ginger tea on the coffee table.
Faced with Juanjuan clean from the shower, Lu Sheng let her drink the ginger tea first. But Juanjuan, glancing at the ginger tea, suddenly burst into tears.
Like a panicked traveler drowning who finally grasped a life-saving log, she went straight into Lu Sheng’s embrace and cried, "Sister, sob sob..."
Lu Sheng had no idea what had happened to Juanjuan; all she could do was pat her back to comfort her, "Don’t rush, Juanjuan. Tell sister what happened. What’s wrong with you?"
Juanjuan lifted her head, her eyes red, and the first words she said were, "Sister, you mustn’t believe brother. Everything he says is a lie. Brother, he... is so frightening."
— It surely involves Chen Shu.
Seeing Juanjuan crying nonstop, Lu Sheng had an inkling that it was probably because of Chen Shu.
"What... did you say?" Lu Sheng steadied Juanjuan’s shoulders with her hands, her brows slightly furrowed as she asked.
Juanjuan said, "Sister, my memory came back. It happened tonight, just an hour before I came to find you."
"The night I escaped from the estate was exactly like tonight, with a raging storm."
"The thunder and lightning jolted me awake from my sleep, and as I sat there in a daze, I suddenly remembered everything."
"What did you say?" Lu Sheng paused, her senses sharpening on the keyword, "You mean, you escaped from your own home?"
"Yes," Juanjuan immediately nodded, her voice trembling as she spoke, "Before I ran away, my brother had me chained and imprisoned in the basement for an entire month."
"If it weren’t for that servant who looked after me since I was a child, who took the opportunity of the storm to get me onto a ferry bound for China..."
"I might still be locked up in that dark, sunless basement by my brother right now."
Upon hearing Juanjuan’s words, Lu Sheng took a deep breath.
Imprisoned, in the basement, for an entire month.
Those words formed a combination that was simply too horrifying.
Regaining her composure, Lu Sheng took another deep breath and asked, "Juanjuan, what exactly happened?"
Juanjuan tried to calm her emotions and began to reminisce, "My real name is Christine Brown, and my brother’s name is Crohn Brown. Our father is a Duke from Suli, and our mother is from Jiang City, China."
"All my life, I’ve lived carefree. Both my parents loved me dearly, and my brother too."
"However, three years ago, something happened to my brother, and his personality became somewhat odd."
"He would often lock himself in his studio, and I had no idea what he was painting."
"But the truly horrifying event happened a little over three months ago."
"One night, three months ago, I went to look for my mother in the main bedroom, wanting to ask if I could attend a dance party the next day."
"However, as soon as I got to my parents’ bedroom, I saw the door was ajar. I wasn’t thinking much at the time and was about to push the door open when I heard my brother’s voice coming from inside."
"I didn’t know why my brother would be in my parents’ bedroom so late, so I subconsciously peeked through the crack in the door, and then I saw, I saw..."
At this point, Juanjuan seemed to recall an extremely horrifying scene; her voice trembled even more.
"I saw my brother whispering something to my father while forcefully pinning my struggling father against the wall. The next second, he slashed open my father’s throat with a dagger."
"The blood gushing out from my father’s neck splattered onto my brother’s face and hair. And behind my brother, was the corpse of my mother, lying in a pool of blood with a knife stuck in her chest."
"I was so terrified at the moment; I didn’t understand why my brother would do such a thing. All I wanted was to run away. But my legs went weak, and I accidentally fell to the ground, making a noise."
"My brother heard it, and within seconds, he opened the door covered in blood. I retreated in horror, backing into a corner with no way out, and my brother crouched down in front of me."
"...And then what?" Lu Sheng asked, taking a deep breath.
"My brother, he touched my head gently as usual with those hands soaked in my father’s blood."
"And then he asked me, ’My dear sister, tell your brother, what did you see?’"