Substitute Alpha Gets Confessed to by Her Ex’s Aunt on a Survival Variety Show – Chapter 183

Hongdu Lovers

“Your sister’s new amusement?”

Liu Yinxi knelt on one knee on the ground, holding a shoe in her hand.

            

Combining Nan Ze’s words and gestures, she could only deduce that Nan Ze wanted her to put the shoe on for her.

Liu Yinxi frowned with her head lowered, the unsettling strangeness in her heart growing thicker, and the texture of the soft shoe in her hand even made her feel a twinge of nausea.

In Liu Yinxi’s understanding, putting shoes on someone was an intimate act—its reasonable contexts were between partners or between parent and child, never between two strangers meeting for the first time, especially when Liu Yinxi had already made clear to Nan Ze that she was her daughter’s girlfriend.

            

The intense revulsion made Liu Yinxi’s movements hesitant. As she wrestled between reason and instinct, two contrasting images suddenly flashed through her mind—Nan Huaixu enduring Zeng Mulin’s hysterical tirades, and Nan Huaixu giggling and acting sweet in her arms.

Liu Yinxi’s heart seized with a sudden spasm. No matter what, she had to win some measure of Nan Ze’s favor—she never wanted to see Nan Huaixu suffer torment at the hands of so-called family again.

Liu Yinxi steeled herself and reached out to support Nan Ze’s foot. Just as she was about to touch her heel, Nan Ze abruptly pulled away and pressed a hand down hard on top of Liu Yinxi’s head.

            

Liu Yinxi maintained her kneeling posture, her head forced lower and lower by Nan Ze’s pressure. She couldn’t help clenching her molars, unable to fathom why Nan Ze was deliberately humiliating her like this.

Was she mentally ill?

Had she never recovered from postpartum depression, left unhinged like this?

            

Was that why she was in this rehabilitation center?

In terms of physique and strength, Liu Yinxi could crush Nan Ze effortlessly.

Out of respect for Nan Huaixu’s biological mother, Liu Yinxi made one final attempt to communicate with Nan Ze: “Aunt Nan, a few days ago Aunt Zeng brought people to storm Nan Huaixu’s company, obstructing her career, threatening her, and repeatedly sabotaging the company’s qualification reviews. As Nan Huaixu’s mother and the Nan Family’s Clan Head, are you just going to turn a blind eye to your own biological daughter being harmed?”

            

Nan Ze’s airy voice drifted down from above Liu Yinxi’s head: “What Zeng Mulin did—go find her about that.”

Liu Yinxi: “?”

The implication of Nan Ze’s words was that she simply wouldn’t lift a finger for Nan Huaixu, right?

            

Nan Ze not only ignored her daughter but couldn’t be bothered about her current wife either.

How could such a callous, heartless person exist in the world—indifferent to her wife and daughter, standing on the sidelines, treating her own family’s suffering as entertainment.

Liu Yinxi gripped the shoe tightly, bracing her other hand on her knee, and slowly rose against Nan Ze’s pressure. “Let me ask you—do you truly have no feelings at all for Nan Huaixu as your daughter? Then why did you bring her into this world? Fine, even if you don’t care about your daughter, don’t you care about the Nan family’s enterprise? All these years Zeng Mulin has used her executive position to illegally amass wealth, suppressing every talented professional who refuses to fall in line, causing enormous losses to the group—are you just going to turn a blind eye and let her run wild?”

            

Nan Ze’s tone was breezy and dismissive: “A little pocket money, that’s all. Isn’t it the perfect excuse to send Zeng Mulin in? Nan Huaixu turned eighteen long ago. When an adult asks anyone for help, they have to show their chips and sincerity—”

Before she could finish, Nan Ze was forced backward by a massive surge of force from in front of her. The Alpha standing behind her caught her quickly, and Nan Ze watched in astonishment as Liu Yinxi straightened up from the ground and slammed the soft shoe onto the floor.

Liu Yinxi lifted her chin, defiantly baring her sharp fangs: “I called you ‘Aunt’ to give you face for Manman’s sake. At my fresh and youthful age, calling you ‘Grandma’ would be generous enough, and you still act high and mighty. Go look in a mirror and see how clouded your eyes are, you old fogey.”

            

A tiger that doesn’t bare its claws gets mistaken for Hello Kitty—did she really think Liu Yinxi was a pushover?

The system had tricked her, prompting her to help repair Nan Huaixu’s family bonds with such moving, lofty language, making Liu Yinxi think Nan Ze was an inarticulate mother with a sharp tongue and a soft heart¹. Who knew this lunatic was even less reliable than Zeng Mulin.

Then they could all go to hell.

            

If she couldn’t count on Nan Ze to care about Manman, then they didn’t have to swallow the old crone’s abuse. Taking mistreatment without fighting back wasn’t Liu Yinxi’s style. Even if Nan Huaixu might blame her when she got back, she was going to have her say.

Liu Yinxi ignored Nan Lingxuan and the other Alpha’s attempts to stop her, unleashing a point-blank barrage right in Nan Ze’s face. Honestly, though, Liu Yinxi was a trained fighter—one of those Alphas was a desk-bound weakling, and the other was thin as a rail. Neither could hold her back.

She jabbed her finger at Nan Ze and cursed, spraying verbal fire like a submachine gun on full auto. Nan Ze across from her could only frown deeply and raise a fan in front of her face, utterly powerless to counter.

            

“At your age, pear blossoms pressing on crabapples², failing to act with elder dignity.”

“Your stinking shoe is filthy as hell. You’ve got money to keep a mistress but can’t afford deodorant?”

“And that getup—you’re dressed like a burial shroud. I don’t even want to say it. Playing dead already?”

            

Liu Yinxi cursed her out for a solid ten minutes. Eventually deciding it was a waste of breath on a lunatic, she looked down at Nan Ze from above and said in a low voice: “I misjudged you.”

“You don’t deserve to be Manman’s mother.”

Having said her piece, Liu Yinxi stormed out of the pavilion, strode through the white-flower vine corridor, and marched away.

            

Nan Lingxuan watched the entire spectacle with her jaw hanging open. From her exaggerated expression, her psyche appeared to have taken a massive blow.

“Ma, Ma…” Nan Lingxuan could barely get her words out, nervously crouching down. “Mama, I was wrong. I shouldn’t have brought her here. Every time I interacted with her before, she was so polite. I never imagined she’d be this disrespectful to you. I’ll teach her a lesson.”

Nan Ze slowly lowered her embroidered round fan, her eyes deep and unreadable. The corner of her mouth actually held a faint, barely perceptible smile. She raised her wrist, and the Alpha beside her placed a peeled lychee in her hand.

            

Nan Ze savored the sweet, juicy flesh at her leisure, raising an eyebrow at her eldest daughter. “Is this your sister’s new amusement?”

Nan Lingxuan’s biggest headache was how her mother’s conversations always went at cross purposes³. “I don’t think it’s just amusement. Manman takes things seriously. This looks like the real thing to me.”

Nan Ze curved her lips and nodded. “The real thing is good. Fun.”

            

Nan Lingxuan sometimes suspected her mother’s brain really was damaged. “Ma?”

Nan Ze spat out the lychee pit and tossed it aside. “Adaptable, unafraid of authority, physically sturdy, willing to stick her neck out for others, and quick with words too. The little one is adorable.”

“Your sister finally found it in her heart to report her dear Mami?” Nan Ze suddenly dropped her smile, her eyes devoid of any expression. “Has Zeng Mulin been sentenced yet?”

            

They’d been wives, after all. In the end, some decorum had to be maintained.

Back then, Zeng Mulin had been truly beautiful, truly fiery—obedient and clever, elevating her to the Queen Mother of the West every day, amusing her, coddling her around the clock.

But then, even genuine love struggles against the seven-year itch⁴, let alone a marriage born of calculation from the very start.

            

All these years, facing her wife’s reckless behavior, it wasn’t that she didn’t know—she was letting her inflate before her destruction⁵.

Besides, her innocent youngest daughter probably couldn’t bear to see Mami convicted.

After all, from childhood she had clung so desperately to her Mami, preferring to swallow the grievances inflicted by Mami rather than share a single concern with her, her other mother…

            

Nan Lingxuan paused briefly, then quickly caught on. “For a conviction, there’s still a bit missing. And wouldn’t the higher-ups have to give you some face?”

Nan Ze ate another lychee fed to her by the Alpha, then promptly put on a smile. “What face do I have?”

Nan Ze turned and tossed a handful of fish food toward the lotus pond. “Didn’t your sister’s meixi⁶ just say it? I’m an old fogey. No face.”

            

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What trashy old fossil.

Lunatic.

Liu Yinxi sat in the car heading home, stomach full of pent-up rage.

            

She hit the sports center first to pound the heavy bag and shoot arrows. After venting her anger, she went grocery shopping, picked up colorful dumpling wrappers, pork, and shrimp, and spent the entire afternoon chopping filling—kuangkuangkuang.

It didn’t matter. Two trash mothers who only knew how to hurt their daughter—better off without them. She would protect Manman and make up for every bit of love and care Manman had been denied all these years.

As for the main quest, leaving it unfinished had no impact on her current life. If she couldn’t complete it, so be it. Who cared about some system reward? She didn’t need it.

            

Liu Yinxi only wanted her Manman to be healthy and happy, never again to endure harm from family, free to live comfortably as herself.

For dinner, she used ham and dried shrimp to make a broth base. The dumplings were filled with two varieties—shrimp and conpoy⁷, and pork with water chestnut—prepared three ways: steamed, boiled, and pan-fried.

Nan Huaixu texted to say she had to work overtime and couldn’t make it home for dinner. So Liu Yinxi packed both flavors of three-way dumplings into a bento box, added side dishes, broth, and fruit, and drove to the company to deliver dinner to Nan Huaixu.

            

Inside the company, people greeted her all along the way. Everyone was beaming, seeming especially warm toward her, their smiles carrying a hint of amused entertainment.

It wasn’t until she ran into Xiao Zhu in the elevator and exchanged a few words that Liu Yinxi understood why.

She’d forgotten to take off her apron.

            

Xiao Zhu gave her a thumbs-up. “Yinxi, you’re a model girlfriend.”

Liu Yinxi looked down at her apron, a bit flustered. “Maybe I should take it off.”

“Don’t take it off! You look great like this. President Nan will definitely be thrilled.”

            

“There are so many people upstairs. It’d be weird if I didn’t.”

“It’s fine. President Nan would definitely prefer you keep it on.”

Ding—the elevator doors slid open. Nan Huaixu was already waiting at the elevator entrance. “Take off what?”

            

Xiao Zhu laughed and scampered off, leaving Liu Yinxi alone in the elevator, clutching two insulated bags in disarray. “I, um, that is, Manman—I forgot to take off my apron.”

Nan Huaixu crossed her arms and looked her apron-wearing little Alpha up and down, nodding with satisfaction. “Mm. Xiao Zhu’s right. It looks better on.”

Liu Yinxi was skeptical. “Really?”

            

Nan Huaixu clasped her hand and led her out of the elevator. “You’re especially appetizing⁸ like this.”

What did it mean to call someone “appetizing”?

Liu Yinxi didn’t dare think too hard about it.

            

She figured her darling Manman must be hungry and hurriedly pulled out the dumplings. “Shrimp filling and pork filling, and here’s the sauce.”

Nan Huaixu picked up her chopsticks. “Wow, smells incredible.”

She had just picked up a dumpling when chaotic voices erupted in the corridor outside.

            

Security guards scrambled to block the way. “President Zeng, you can’t go in! President Nan gave explicit orders that you’re not allowed in the company!”

“The world’s gone mad! I’m here to see my daughter—is that any of your business?!” Zeng Mulin shoved a security guard aside and craned her neck to peer down the corridor. “Manman! Mami’s here. Come out. You never answer my calls, I went to your home and you weren’t there. Mami needs to talk to you.”

Nan Huaixu’s brow furrowed tightly. She set down her chopsticks and walked to the office door. Before she could lock it, Zeng Mulin’s hand slammed against the door.

            

Seeing Nan Huaixu, Zeng Mulin instantly switched to a furious mask. “Well well, Nan Huaixu—your wings have hardened⁹, haven’t they? How dare you frame your own Mami! You said you had airtight evidence to report me? Look—I’m still standing right here! Let me ask you: where did you dig up all that fabricated evidence?! And who’s been turning you against your own mother!”

She pointed at Nan Huaixu with vicious intensity. “If you’re going to be unfilial, don’t blame Mami for being unmerciful. I’ll say it right here—this company of yours is finished! You will never leave the Nan family’s system, not in this lifetime! I’ll make you see reality—without me, you won’t earn a single cent!”

Nan Huaixu trembled with fury. She was about to retort when a languid voice drifted from the elevator end of the corridor: “My, dear—the Nan family’s enterprise—since when was it yours to call the shots?”

            

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