Chapter 440 - A Rich Man's Wife

It was a working day for Qing Lok. He had to attend to the matters about this invention. Qing Chen tasked him to check on with the lawyer of Ms. Chi's party so they could make sure that nothing was going to go bite them in the ass in the future.

He dropped by the lawyer's office which had been just outside the city. The lawyer had been generous enough and gave him an appointment despite it being a weekend.

The office was small and filled with filing cabinets. It was cramped but Qing Lok liked it. You have to admire other people's grit. He was sure that once this deal closes, this lawyer would move somewhere more expensive. That way, he would get richer clients as well.

Qing Lok had a list from Qing Chen about the things that he want answers to and the lawyer easily complied to everything. They were almost at the bottom of the list when things got a little bit complicated.

"Say," Qing Lok began, "off the record, are you going to say that Ms. Chi is a good client?

"Uh, sorry?"

"Is her team and her on a good place?"

"Yes, they are," he adjusted the glasses on top of his nose. 

"They don't seem like they are. You know, my brother is being skeptical about it all. He might pull out of the deal before we all know it." The final signatures were not yet in existence, so they were still safe for now. "That's why he's asking about this group. Especially Ms. Chi. Is she alright?"

The lawyer frowned at him. "You mean, if she's right in the head?"

"Yeah," he said. "If that's how you want to put it."

"Yes, she's fine."

"What about the others?"

"They're great too."

Qing Lok stared down the lawyer. "Sir, if you want to move out of this small office, you're going to have to tell me the truth. My brother doesn't like liars. You might regret it if he finds out something in the future."

That was not a full-on threat but it seemed to shake up the lawyer enough. "Okay, it seemed like the others are not completely okay with the idea of Ms. Chi doing all the decisions for them. But they also signed a contract. It's binding. They passed all of their decision rights over to her."

"What is that they want from the deal?"

"They didn't tell me. But after the meeting, they could not stop talking about how unselfish your brother is. They were glad that he offered that deal."

"So Ms. Chi is a problem?"

The lawyer did not answer and that was answer enough.

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Qing Chen was feeling great. He was really excited about The King's Artificer. That was the light at the end of his slump tunnel in their business. They were actually going to contribute something good to the world despite all the bad and evilness that they had injected in it.

He was high up in the heavens that he fell so hard to the ground when he saw his wife preparing a fruit plate when he got home. It was so easy to get lost in the talk about The Kingly that the grave things that he was talking about with his father totally slipped from his mind.

"How was your trip to the mansion?" Feng Xuan smiled at him as she cut up strawberries in half.

"Uhh… it was good. We got through all the things needed for Kingly."

She looked up at him expectantly. "And?"

"Yeah, about your mother," he swallowed. He didn't know where he should start. Hell, he didn't even know if he should start at all. What was he supposed to tell her? His father told him that they should not meddle with it.

This must how she had been feeling when the problems about his mother arose. She must've been so torn from doing something about it and keeping quiet.

"Chen?"

"I'm sorry," he told her. "My father won't tell me anything about it. He only said that you should ask YOUR father about it."

Feng Xuan processed his words. He did not try to filter it at all. "So you mean, there is something that he could tell me?"

"I guess. That's what my father was pertaining to."

Feng Xuan dropped the knife on the board. "But I asked him multiple times. He always said that there was nothing."

Qing Chen leaned over the counter and took a piece of banana. "Maybe you are not asking the right questions."

"I thought about that. That's how I got him to tell me about the whole shenanigan about The Zookeeper and The Underground."

"Maybe there's something else that you're not asking."

"Huh," Feng Xuan said and took hold of the knife again. She took an apple and started murdering it. "My father wants me to have it the hard way, huh…"

Qing Chen carefully watched the wide slim knife go through the apple. He was only worried about her fingers.

"Should I take his wife as a hostage?" Then she scoffed. "Well, it was not like he would actually miss Meilien's mother."

"Calm down," he said and put a hand on top of her knife-equipped one. "It's going to be fine. We're going to find answers. Remember, one thing at a time, right?"

She bit her lip but he saw that it quivered already. "I… I just want to be happy, Chen. I just want to be one of those rich men's wives. I want to live the boring life. Why can't I get that? Why can't WE get that?"

Feng Xuan actually started crying. Qing Chen saw this coming. She was bound to cry after all the efforts that she had been doing and yet coming up with nothing.

She had been through a lot… and yet…

How was he supposed to tell his wife that she had been the one that killed her own mother?