Jian clenched his fists tightly, his nails digging into his palms until they hurt.
His mother… she was alive all along.
He stood there frozen, his chest rising and falling in uneven breaths. The pieces of memory he had long dismissed as childhood dreams began to float to the surface—soft arms around him, the warmth of a gentle embrace, a lullaby hummed in a voice like starlight. A golden-haired woman with tired but loving eyes had once held him so close, so safe.
He remembered.
He had always thought those flashes were fantasy. Wishful illusions from a lonely orphaned child.
But now…
Jian shut his eyes tight, holding back the wave of emotion crawling up his throat.
All along, he had thought it was his decision to approach the Wang mansion. That he had done it just to rebel, to irritate Bian, to carve his own independence.
But no.
Wang Bushen had planned it all.
Every. Damn. Step.
He took Jian in not out of kindness, not even out of curiosity—but for a purpose.
"To breed…"
