WMSR — QT Chapter 78

Chapter 78

In truth, he knew inwardly that given Wang Dazhi's disposition and courage, it was impossible for him to pull off anything untoward. In fact, Wang Dazhi hadn't done anything out of line up to this point; it was simply that watching Wang Dazhi's somewhat overly attentive gestures on the surveillance monitors left him feeling a bit displeased.

However, when heading out today, he had arranged for a bodyguard to be stationed right beside Wang Dazhi to keep a close eye on him. Believing that with a bodyguard present, Wang Dazhi would undoubtedly behave with even greater docility.

Having made his arrangements and departing with complete peace of mind, Xu Jiangzhe had no inkling that the moment he left, numerous undercurrents were quietly beginning to surge.

Some of these undercurrents were churning within arm's reach, while others originated from places Xu Jiangzhe had never even anticipated.

Over at the Qiao family estate, a gorgeous young girl clad in a custom high-end cocktail dress, radiating an air of commanding, aggressive poise, was seated within the spacious hall. The instant her mobile phone chimed, she snatched it up and immediately demanded into the receiver: "Well? Has he left?"

Upon receiving an affirmative response, Qiao Qianqian tightened her grip around the phone, lowering her voice into a rapid command: "Wait there for me. I'm heading over right now."

That's right—this stunning young woman was none other than Qiao Qianqian, the woman Xu Jiangzhe had recently been commanded to take out on mandatory dates. Yet, in stark contrast to Xu Jiangzhe's perfunctory, going-through-the-motions attitude toward these assignments, Qiao Qianqian genuinely harbored deep affection for Xu Jiangzhe. Even before they had ever interacted in person, she held a strong favorable impression of him, and with each actual date and subsequent encounter, her fondness for the man compounded further.

Regrettably, every woman possessed her own innate intuition; while deeply enamored with Xu Jiangzhe, she could distinctly sense that he likely didn't reciprocate her feelings. Not only did he exhibit absolute indifference and zero reluctance upon leaving every single date, but while sitting across from her, his mind and soul never seemed truly present.

Facing this reality, Qiao Qianqian was undeniably heartbroken, yet she refused to throw in the towel easily. Had she been born the daughter of an ordinary household, she might have nursed her sorrow in silence and chosen to walk away from this romance. But she was no ordinary citizen's daughter—she was the elite heiress of the Qiao family. The Qiao estate commanded colossal institutional leverage—arguably surpassing even that of the Xu family—meaning what ordinary people lacked the power to compel, she possessed every right to demand.

Consequently, her primary objective over recent days had been unearthing the core truth: why was Xu Jiangzhe treating her with such callous perfunctoriness? Was it a genuine lack of romantic interest, or did other, hidden factors drive his detachment?

After all, backed by her formidable familial pedigree, she couldn't fathom a single man on earth who would treat her with such cold dismissal purely out of a lack of attraction. Taking a step back, if Xu Jiangzhe genuinely harbored zero regard for her background, he would never have agreed to date her in the first place; yet if he did care about her stature, shouldn't he be investing far more effort into courting and flattering her?

Harboring this profound question, Qiao Qianqian—who had witnessed more than her fair share of high-society scandals and hidden secrets—hesitated not a second before hiring operatives to place Xu Jiangzhe under surveillance. Gradually, the personnel she dispatched began unearthing suspicious anomalies.

The single most glaring anomaly was that Xu Jiangzhe wasn't residing at the primary family estate; instead, he was living entirely by himself in a standalone luxury villa enclave. At first glance, that detail appeared unremarkable—plenty of adults preferred living apart from their parents. The bizarre catch, however, lay in the enclave's geographic coordinates: it was staggeringly remote, requiring a full one-hour drive just to commute from that address to Xu Jiangzhe's primary office building. Qiao Qianqian couldn't wrap her head around what possible motivation Xu Jiangzhe could have for choosing such an inconvenient, isolated residence. Furthermore, as her investigators dug deeper, they discovered that his dwelling was bristling with an extensive contingent of private bodyguards, maintaining a posture of airtight security. That excessive fortification dialed her curiosity up to a fever pitch.

Her intuition screamed that the secret behind Xu Jiangzhe's bizarre treatment of her was concealed squarely within those walls.

Regarding the nature of that secret, she actually harbored a distinct hypothesis—and that exact suspicion made it entirely impossible for her to turn a blind eye to the property.

Since Qiao Qianqian had consented to dating Xu Jiangzhe, she was naturally eyeing marriage as the ultimate destination; this was a formal strategic alliance between two dynasties. Prior to cementing that union, systematically exterminating any potential vulnerabilities or hazards threatening her future marriage was, in her eyes, a completely reasonable prerequisite.

Qiao Qianqian was intimately familiar with the hollow, facade-driven marriages populating high-society circles—couples bound by political marriages who maintained a pristine, affectionate display in public while playing their own separate games behind closed doors, treating keeping a mistress or establishing a golden house to hide a hidden lover as casual pastimes, with illegitimate heirs littering the landscape.

Yet within her own marriage, Qiao Qianqian refused to tolerate such degradation. True, she fancied Xu Jiangzhe; had affection not been part of the equation, a massive queue of suitors would have lined up for a marital alliance with the Qiao family long before Xu Jiangzhe ever entered the running. Since he was already extracting massive leverage out of this alliance, where on earth did he find the audacity to entertain a kept lover behind her back?

Fixating on the suffocating perimeter security surrounding that villa, Qiao Qianqian instinctively jumped to a preemptive conclusion: Xu Jiangzhe was fortifying the compound specifically to lock her out. Coupled with his chronic distraction during their dates, the realization left a bitter, toxic taste burning in her chest.

Therefore, upon intercepting intelligence that Xu Jiangzhe had departed for his usual corporate routine, Qiao Qianqian rolled out in person with a murderous aura, determined to storm that villa and expose the truth firsthand.

Simultaneously, while Qiao Qianqian mobilized, Fang Ruoming—who had already slipped back to side by Bai Yichen—was exercising meticulous patience, waiting for Xu Jiangzhe to travel far enough that even if an emergency alert reached him, he would be trapped beyond a critical distance required to rush back in time.

Yet, relative to Xu Jiangzhe reaching Fang Ruoming's targeted spatial window, Qiao Qianqian arrived with far greater speed. Pulling up outside the luxury enclave accompanied by a heavily reinforced entourage, Qiao Qianqian was predictably halted by the security gate guards. Naturally, that minor roadblock failed to stop her; her investigative groundwork had been exhaustively thorough, encompassing the administrative blueprints of this exact residential enclave. Rummaging into her limited-edition handbag, she retrieved a mobile phone and dialed a direct line, pitching her voice into an artificially sweet register: "Uncle Wang? It's Qianqian..."

The subsequent outcome unfolded precisely as anticipated: Qiao Qianqian's party was cleared through the gates instantly. Moreover, upon receiving an emergency call from executive management, the trembling guard fell over himself apologizing and assuring Qiao Qianqian that her entourage was free to demand anything they desired, adding that the property general manager had been alerted and was speeding to the scene.

Receiving that groveling response sparked zero surprise in Qiao Qianqian, nor did she care in the slightest about the impending arrival of the property manager. Striding forward with her retinue, she swept straight into the enclave. Her absolute, unshakeable confidence stemmed from a single, undeniable reality: the supreme owner of both the enclave's development corporation and its proprietary property management firm was none other than the very Uncle Wang she had just dialed.