Chapter 68.2 — Birthday Banquet
At that moment, Su Yanmo finally reached the Qin family. He greeted them coldly, "Ladies and gentlemen, please come in."
Good lord, neither the sister nor brother knew how to let the other party save face.
A handful of the people from the group wanted to turn around and leave. What was with that attitude? That difference in treatment? It was outrageous!
Then, the Wang family arrived. Aside from the hospitalized Wang Zhilin, the entire family had come. Su Yanyi had just escorted the Bai family inside when she saw the bejeweled Wang family members strutting in. She dropped the conversation she was having with Bai Qing and turned to Su Yanmo.
"Mom didn't invite the Wang family, did she?" she asked bluntly, and loudly enough that the family in question was able to hear her. Their faces instantly darkened.
"Of course not," Su Yanmo answered with certainty. He had seen the guest list and the Wang family was definitely not on it. No one in the Su family was fond of the Wang family, so there was no way they would invite them.
After hearing that, Su Yanyi turned to the Wang family. "So what are all of you here for? You're unwelcomed."
Wang Pide sneered in response. "Since it's Old Master Su's birthday, of course I have to come. Yanyi, in the end you're just a junior. You shouldn't act so rudely."
"Not everyone is worthy of respect, especially not when they decide to attend a banquet uninvited. Your family is a good example of that."
Her ridiculing words brought ugly expressions to their faces. Who was it that said Su Yanyi was indifferent, arrogant, and a woman of few words? The Su Yanyi they were seeing was clearly too sharp-tongued to be "a woman of few words"!
Seeing that her father was unable to retort, Wang Zhiruo stepped in. "Yanyi, today is Grandpa's birthday. We came to celebrate, that's all. You're not going to stop us, are you?"
Su Yanyi looked at her coldly. For a second, Wang Zhirou felt an overwhelming sense of murderous intent directed at her. Involuntarily, she trembled and took a step back.
"Don't use such an intimate address, Miss Wang. It's misleading," Su Yanyi jeered.
Admittedly, from an outside perspective, Su Yanyi was acting very petty. However, the Wang family had tried to harm Qin Jiran, so she refused to show them any degree of respect.
Wang Zhiruo's eyes darkened, but she covered it up well. She turned to Su Yanmo, who had not said a single word during the exchange, and asked piteously, "Yanmo, I just want to celebrate Grandma's birthday. Can't I? Our families are old friends too, right?"
Wang Zhirou was beautiful; faced with such a pitiful expression, most people would feel sympathetic, but unfortunately for her, she was up against the Su siblings.
"You cannot," Su Yanmo rejected immediately.
The Su family was a family that lived solely for themselves, allowing them to lead comfortable lives and foster children like Su Yanyi. They were all family-oriented and similarly hostile to their enemies. Why would they want to leave face for people who were always trying to hurt their family? As far as the Su siblings were concerned, the Wang family deserved to be eliminated, so there was no need to be polite with them.
"Su Yanmo, Zhirou was once your wife! How could you treat us like this? Aren't you afraid people will denounce you for being so ruthless? And say that the Su family is heartless?" The indignant Mother Wang joined in.
"Do I need to remind you what Wang Zhirou did? Evidence that she stole confidential information from my company is still in my study." Su Yanmo was amazed by the Wang family's stupidity. The parents were stupid, and the daughters were too.
Did they seriously think that they could control the Su family through a honey trap? And they were stupid enough to assume that he didn't know that Wang Zhirou been secretly stealing information from him. He'd known about it from the start, but it was a trivial matter that he hadn't cared to handle. Only after learning of the Wang family's grand scheme did he finally decide to make a move.
Wang Zhirou paled and a panicked expression appeared on her face, but she managed to push it down before asking with feigned calmness, "What are you saying? What information? I don't know what you're talking about. Could it be that you've misunderstood something?"
"Right, there must've been a misunderstanding. You divorced Zhirou so suddenly. Could it be that someone deliberately tried to split the two of you apart? You are still young and inexperienced, don't listen to the lies of others. Trust is the most important thing in a relationship, Yanmo." Mother Wang was grasping every opportunity she could to paint her daughter as an innocent flower. The Su siblings were disgusted.
"Fake." Su Yanmi tossed out that word before leaving. If it weren't for the fact that it was her Grandpa's birthday, she would've kicked out them out already.
Su Yanmo thought the same. He made a hand gesture, and instantly, a group of bodyguards appeared and surrounded the Wang family, making his intentions clear.
At this point, the Qin family finally couldn't just stand just watching and not doing anything anymore.
The eldest son Qin Zhenren chastised, as an adult would a child, "Yanmo, that was wrong of you. Although you've divorced, the feelings are still there, aren't they? It's the Old Master's birthday today and we came to celebrate, so you should've been a good host. How could you be so rude? And you, Jiran. Don't you know to greet your uncle, father, cousins, and other seniors? You should take some time to get to know the family later."
Qin Zhenren was, frankly, just as self-righteous and hypocritical as Qin Zhenyi was traditional. It was acceptable for him to bring up respect because he was indeed a senior, but using kinship as a reason too? That made Su Yanyi a little angry.
How dare they bring up kinship when they were the ones who abandoned Qin Jiran in the first place?
Su Yanyi was very impulsive at this time. She really wanted to kick out the Qin family and even felt like her hatred for them had surpassed her own hatred for the Wang family.
"If you and your family do not want to come in, then don't. The Su family will no longer welcome you in the future!"
The Qin family was already considered an enemy anyway, so it was okay to tear away at their faces. She genuinely did not want these disgusting people inside Su Manor.
After speaking, she waved and several bodyguards responded, blocking the Qin family in a similar fashion to the Wang family.
By now, most of the guests had arrived, and the loud commotion at the entrance drew the attention of a few curious onlookers.
"Su Yanyi, this is not very appropriate, is it? You can't deny that you're one of our family's daughters-in-law. It was excusable before because you didn't know, but by now, shouldn't you have come to visit your parents-in-law?" Qin Zhenren's expression was dark, but his tone was one of haughtiness, as though he was anticipating a play.
Qin Zhenren and the Wang family had worked together to expose Qin Jiran's identity, delivering a negative impact on both Qin Jiran and Qin Zhenyi. His plan was to destroy Qin Zhenyi's reputation and at the same time, pit him against the Su family.
He was confident that Qin Jiran, who had been abandoned for 28 years, would not forgive Qin Zhenyi so easily. The Su family was very protective of their people, so they would definitely not let Qin Zhenyi off easy either.
Qin Jiran watched without saying a word, though the aura around him became increasingly cold. This was the Qin family. Suddenly, he felt grateful that he hadn't been raised in such a family. Simultaneously, he realized that although orphans were unfortunate, sometimes the non-orphans were even more unfortunate.
VIN: I am fluff-deprived and sleep-deprived. Also, I made a teaser for ch68.3 because I'm not sure how long it'll be before I post the next chapter :((
RELEASE SCHEDULE: 1x a week, 3x every other week.