Substitute Alpha Gets Confessed to by Her Ex’s Aunt on a Survival Variety Show – Chapter 184
by Little PandaHongdu Lovers
The Most Correct Decision
Zeng Mulin heard voices drifting from the elevator lobby. The arrogance drained from her face in an instant, replaced by a mask of aggrieved misery. She pressed a hand to her temple as though a headache had struck and shuffled toward the elevator.
Nan Huaixu turned to look, her eyes wide with shock. “Mama?!”
She never could have imagined that Nan Ze—whose last words to her had been two years ago at the annual corporate gala, a red envelope and a curt “keep up the good work”—would show up at her company at exactly the right moment, standing on her side against Zeng Mulin.
Liu Yinxi was equally stunned. They’d torn into each other just that morning, and now here they were again at dusk, standing in the same camp. What game was Nan Ze playing? Wasn’t she supposed to be cold and heartless, utterly indifferent to her daughter and wife? Why was she here now, helping Nan Huaixu rein in Zeng Mulin?
Employees who worked on this floor were still lingering in the corridor—mostly administrative staff, some of whom had been with Nan Enterprise for years and recognized Nan Ze. They bowed respectfully and called her Chairman Nan.
Nan Ze smiled and nodded at the staff, then pressed a finger to Zeng Mulin’s lips before she could launch into her grievances.
Nan Ze’s eyes were beautiful. Even with her youth behind her, they still radiated a captivating charm, like a mysterious sprite. Nan Huaixu had inherited that trait from her.
Zeng Mulin’s brow was knit with dark clouds of worry. She waited obediently for her wife to withdraw her finger, then spoke in a soft, gentle tone no one had ever heard from her before: “Ah Ze, you’re here at just the right time. I’ve tried every kind word and every harsh word, but Manman simply won’t listen. I told her—as a daughter of the Nan family, she ought to stay and serve under Nan Enterprise. But no, she insists on running her own little company. These past two years, the internet has been buzzing with rumors about her falling out with the Nan family. It’s terribly embarrassing.”
Nan Ze listened with apparent patience. “Mm.”
As she spoke, Zeng Mulin’s eyes welled with tears. She dabbed at the corners of her eyes and leaned into Nan Ze’s side. “I’m only doing this for Manman’s sake, for this family. She’s always been focused on acting—what does she know about the treacherous currents of corporate warfare? I just told her, don’t waste your effort on this foolishness, stay with the family entertainment company and everything would be fine. But Manman won’t listen. Maybe she thinks I’m in her way. I don’t know who put her up to fabricating false evidence to frame me. I’ve spent these past days dealing with summons, interrogations—it took everything I had to clear my name. But this mother’s heart, Ah Ze—your daughter has truly broken it.”
Nan Huaixu stared, dumbfounded. She never imagined Mami could twist the truth so brazenly, sow so much discord. Her chest ached with a dull, furious pain. Forget propriety, forget filial duty—she shouted her mother’s name outright: “Zeng Mulin! Is this what you’ve been doing all these years? Distorting facts, smearing my words, driving a wedge between Mama and me?! I’m your daughter—what is this all for?!”
Growing up, Mama had rarely been home. It was always Mami who raised Nan Huaixu, and every thread connecting her to Mama ran through Mami’s hands.
Mami said Mama could never forget her ex-wife and only doted on jiejie.
Mami said Mama was harsh and exacting, never satisfied with her no matter what, that she had to keep improving.
Mami said Mama had designated jiejie as the sole heir—they couldn’t let Nan Lingxuan seize all the Nan family’s assets. Nan Huaixu had to fight, to compete, to claw her way up.
Nan Huaixu had thought Mama was cold. She’d thought Mami was simply controlling. She’d never once thought Mami had been lying to her.
Zeng Mulin’s face twisted with heartbreak. “Manman, Mami wants to ask you the same thing—what did you frame me for?”
Nan Huaixu was choking on fury, her throat burning like fire, unable to force out a single word. Liu Yinxi was about to step in and tear into Zeng Mulin when Nan Ze, who had been standing between them as though watching a show, suddenly spoke:
“Manman reported you to eliminate a menace. And the reason you forced Manman down the path you laid out for her is that your insatiable greed1 drove you to manipulate Manman into supplanting Ah Ling’s position as first heir, so that when I’m dead and gone, you can swallow the entire Nan Enterprise for yourself. Am I correct, Ms. Zeng?”
Zeng Mulin froze in shock. Panic, fear, and wounded innocence flickered through her eyes in rapid succession. She took a step back, gazing at her wife with hurt. “Having Manman pursue entertainment, expanding Nan Enterprise’s brand recognition into the cultural and luxury markets—wasn’t that a plan we made together? Lingxuan is your child with Lin-jiejie, born noble. She’s the one and only heir of the Nan family. Manman and I came later. All we wanted was a stable, peaceful home. How could we possibly covet the Nan family’s sovereignty?”
Nan Ze smiled faintly and, in no hurry at all, took a stack of corporate financial records from her secretary—thirty years’ worth of evidence documenting Zeng Mulin’s embezzlement. “Yes. I once thought so too. A PR hostess of humble origins, obedient and agreeable—even with a little ambition, she couldn’t make many waves. Since she was my woman, a fondness for money and pleasure was no great matter. I let you have your fun. And you were clever. You grew bolder and bolder while I was bedridden with a high-risk pregnancy and postpartum depression, scheming step by step, seizing control of corporate operations, sidelining me, tampering with my medication. An illness that should have cleared up in a year dragged on for ten with no improvement, leaving me with severe lasting complications. You thought I’d just fade away in a muddle of confusion, and then you’d maneuver Manman into taking over the entire Nan Enterprise. But the Nan Enterprise’s foundation was built by generations of my Nan family. My eyes and ears are everywhere. Every move you’ve made in this company has been under my watch.”
Zeng Mulin’s face turned the color of ash. She snatched the papers from Nan Ze’s hands and tore them to shreds.
Nan Ze watched her destroy the copies with the calm detachment of watching a pet throw a tantrum. “Mulin, I have few regrets in this life. I don’t regret loving you. I don’t regret indulging you. I don’t regret inviting the wolf into the house or nursing a viper in my bosom.”
“My one regret is leaving Manman with you instead of raising her by my side. If I’d known how much she’d suffer under your roof, I’d have kept her under my own care, even at the risk of my manic episodes harming her. A mother who loses her mind occasionally is still better than a cold-blooded serpent.”
Nan Ze handed Zeng Mulin two documents. “I hesitated over this decision for a long time. Now the dust can finally settle. You can save the rest of your story for the procuratorate. And I owe it all to one person who gave me the strength.”
The strength to make up her mind, to stop letting illness and family ties keep her paralyzed in indecision.
Cut her losses. It wasn’t too late yet.
Zeng Mulin opened the documents—one a dismissal notice, the other a divorce agreement. Her eyes went blood-red. She tore the papers to pieces in a frenzy, her vicious glare tracking Nan Ze’s retreating back to the other end of the corridor, where Nan Huaixu and Liu Yinxi stood.
Nan Huaixu stood rooted in place, adrift.
It had all come too suddenly. Thirty-plus years of life, and only now did she learn the truth of her own family. The mother who’d raised her had been deceiving her all along. She’d misunderstood her other mother so deeply. She’d never even known how severe Mama’s illness had been, and she’d spent years resenting Mama for favoring her older sister.
Mama drew closer, and Nan Huaixu realized that the woman who’d given her life looked almost like a stranger.
She couldn’t remember the last time she’d looked at Mama this closely. Twenty years, maybe more.
She stared at Mama. Time had passed in silence, and without her noticing, the white in Mama’s hair had spread. Tears slipped down Nan Huaixu’s cheeks before she even realized she was crying.
Nan Ze’s expression softened. She gently pulled her youngest daughter into an embrace. “When you were little, your Mami told me you didn’t like your name—said your formal name was too plain and your milk name too strange. I asked her to pass along what I meant, but of course she never did. My favorite flower is the locust flower. Its flower language is reunion. I wanted my little Huaixu to have a life of completeness and joy. And you were so beautiful from the moment you were born. I was afraid you’d be bullied, so I wanted you to grow up strong and fierce. That’s why I gave you the milk name Manman.”
Nan Huaixu’s eyes brimmed with tears as she stared, stunned. So her name wasn’t something her mother had dismissed, slapped on at random because she was born in April.
She had come into this world bathed in love, just like her sister, just like every cherished child.
Nan Ze released the embrace and patted Nan Huaixu’s shoulder. She had her secretary bring over an approved qualification assessment report and pressed it into her hands. “Do what you want to do, Manman.”
Nan Huaixu clutched the report, tears plopping down one after another. “Thank you, Mama. I’m sorry. I didn’t know your illness was so serious. All these years, I never once tried to understand you. I…”
Nan Ze gently wiped the tears from Nan Huaixu’s face. “I’m the one who should apologize. I should have acted decisively long ago. I was old and foolish—afraid on one hand that my episodes would hurt you, so I did nothing, and on the other I stupidly believed your Mami would never truly harm you. I never imagined she’d let her greed drive her to such extremes, pushing you into so much pain.”
Nan Huaixu wiped her tears and shook her head. “No, Mama. I just want your illness to get better. I want you to be healthy.”
She sensed acutely that Nan Ze’s timely arrival at this critical juncture was no coincidence.
Nan Huaixu tucked away the hard-won qualification report and asked, “Mama, why are you here?”
Nan Ze smiled knowingly and turned her gaze to Liu Yinxi, standing behind Nan Huaixu.
Nan Huaixu followed her eyes. So did everyone else in the corridor. Every gaze converged on a single point.
Liu Yinxi was mortified. She wanted to smile but sensed it would be wildly inappropriate, so she wore a strange not-quite-smiling expression as she faced the collective stare.
Her toes curled inside her shoes, gripping the insoles. She prayed silently: Manman’s mama, please don’t expose me in front of everyone for cursing you out for ten solid minutes.
Nan Huaixu waited for an answer and tilted her head slightly. “Mama?”
Nan Ze broke into a broad, easy grin. “Your Alpha scolded me into coming—ahem, called me here. She came with your sister this morning to find me, told me you’ve been working too hard, and asked me to come check on you.”
Nan Huaixu’s eyes flew open. Today had been one shock after another. She turned to Liu Yinxi. “Xixi, you did this for me?”
Liu Yinxi first flashed Nan Ze a grateful smile, then gave Nan Huaixu a cautious, tentative nod. “Mm… I wouldn’t call it ‘doing something for you.’ It was just a stroke of luck. I went with President Ling this morning to visit Aunt Nan.”
Nan Huaixu threw her arms around Liu Yinxi, pulling her tight against her chest, a radiant smile breaking across her face. “You’re my heroine2. Thank you.”
“Liu Yinxi, I just knew it. Being with you is the most correct decision I’ve ever made in my life.”
Liu Yinxi froze for a heartbeat, then raised her arms and held Nan Huaixu with all her strength, wanting to pull her so close they’d melt into one.
Nan Huaixu, I’ve only just understood—loving you is the meaning of my second chance at life.
ding.
「Good evening, User liuyinxi.」
「Favorability feature reminder: Nan Huaixu’s favorability toward you has increased by 10%!」
「Nan Huaixu’s current favorability toward you: 95%」
「Congratulations! You and character Nan Huaixu have entered the Pledge of Eternal Love3 stage. From this point forward, you have a 100% success rate for completing marking on Nan Huaixu.」
「Please join your beloved in a feast of devotion, and leave upon each other a mark that reaches deep into the soul~」
Footnotes
- 人心不足蛇吞象 | renxin bu zu she tun xiang | Literally 'a person's greed, like a snake trying to swallow an elephant, is never satisfied'—a folk proverb warning that boundless greed leads to self-destruction.
- 英雌 | yingci | A modern feminist coinage that replaces the male radical in the word for 'hero' (英雄, yingxiong) with the female radical, specifically denoting a brave and admirable female heroine.
- 海誓山盟 | haishi shanmeng | Literally 'oaths to the sea and vows to the mountains'—a classical Chinese poetic idiom denoting unshakeable romantic devotion, adopted by the system as the name for the 91–95% favorability stage.
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