In the afternoon, Bai Zhi was reviewing sheet music in the Academy library when she spotted Chen Yuxuan walking down the corridor outside.
Their eyes met through the glass.
He stopped.
So did she.
For a moment, there was silence. Tension. The weight of memories and unsaid words.
He opened the door.
"Zhi'er," he said quietly.
She stood. "Don't call me that."
He frowned. "We need to talk."
"We have nothing to talk about."
"I didn't mean to upset you. Meilin and I.."
"You met her two weeks ago," Bai Zhi said sharply. "Don't act like there's a deep bond."
He looked frustrated. "You think I'm lying?"
"I don't care," she replied. "You were never truly mine." That much is clear."
Not Now and Not even in the future.
He reached for her wrist. "You're being unfair."
She pulled away. "No, Chen Yuxuan. I'm being honest, for the first time."
She walked past him, leaving him standing
alone among the shelves of books he never understood her enough to open.
That evening, as the sun dipped low over Jianning, Bai Zhi sat on her bedroom floor with her guzheng across her knees. Her fingers moved slowly, methodically, creating new progressions.
There was a knock.
She opened the door to find her second brother, Bai Liang, standing there with a small bowl of soup.
"I heard you made it to the finals," he said.
Bai Zhi blinked in surprise. "You heard?"
He offered her the bowl. "I'm not as clueless as I look."
She took it, fingers warming around the ceramic.
"You've grown colder lately," Bai Liang added. Sharper. But I guess that's not a bad thing."
She glanced up. "Are you… worried about me?"
He hesitated. "I don't know. I just don't want you to forget you're still our sister. No matter what blood says."
For a second, the weight in her chest eased.
Then, she nodded. "Thanks. I won't forget."
In the shadows of the night, Meilin met someone in a hidden corner of a popular café.
She wore a hoodie and sunglasses, nervous eyes darting to check for surveillance.
The man across from her smirked.
"She's strong," Meilin whispered. "Stronger than I thought."
"I told you," he said. "You'll need something more than charm to beat her."
"I need a way to ruin her second performance," she murmured. "Not physically, just enough to make her look incompetent."
The man tapped his fingers on the table.
"I'll send someone to alter her audio feed. It won't affect her directly, but the judges will think she's out of sync."
Meilin hesitated. "Make it subtle."
He grinned. "Sabotage is an art, princess."
But even as she plotted, Bai Zhi received a message on her phone.
Unknown Number:
"They're coming for your sound system. Watch the maintenance crew tomorrow."
Bai Zhi read the message, her expression cool.
So the game had begun.
Let them come.
She wasn't the same girl they remembered.
This time, she would fight back.
The next morning, the Jianning Academy campus was unusually lively. The first rounds of the National Talent Selection Showcase created quite a buzz, and now, the finalists are being treated like celebrities.
But Bai Zhi wasn't interested in the media attention.
Her attention was on the tech crew.
She sat quietly in the back of Studio 7, pretending to review lyrics. A pair of men in overalls came in with boxes of cables and tools. They wore official academy badges, but Bai Zhi recognized one of them from the surveillance photo she'd received in a message the night before.
She pressed the record on her phone, angled it toward the corner where the men began working on the soundboard.
They worked fast, too fast. One of them pulled out a USB stick and plugged it into the main console, his partner blocking the view.
The moment they left, Bai Zhi stood.
She walked over, unplugged the USB stick, and dropped it into a small static-proof bag she had prepared in advance. She quickly restored the original backup configuration from her drive.
And then, she smiled.
They thought she was just an artist. A pretty face with some talent.
They had no idea she'd studied system design, too.
That afternoon, in a sleek black car parked outside the academy, Li Jiannan received the footage from one of his men, silent, sharp, and efficient.
"She caught the interference and restored the system in under a minute," the man said. "Also, she took the USB."
Li Jiannan's cold eyes glinted with amusement.
"She's smarter than they expected," he murmured.
His assistant, Lin Shao, looked curious. "Should we tell her someone paid to sabotage her?"
"No," Jiannan replied, resting a hand on the windowsill. She already knows. She's just playing along now."
Lin Shao grinned. "Boss, you seem… intrigued."
"She's not what I expected," Jiannan said simply. "And that's rare."
Meanwhile, Bai Meilin was getting anxious.
She sat in a salon chair, surrounded by stylists prepping her for her promotional photo shoot. Her phone buzzed with a single text from her contact.
"It's done. She'll fall flat tomorrow."
She stared at the message, then frowned.
Why didn't it feel satisfying?
Was it because Chen Yuxuan hadn't replied to her last message? Or was it because Bai Zhi's confident expression lately felt… unbreakable?
No, she thought. This is how it's supposed to be. I'm the real Bai daughter. I deserve the spotlight. Bai Zhi had her turn.
Now it's mine.
Back at home, Bai Zhi finished analyzing the USB stick.
It wasn't just a simple sound disruption file.
It had been programmed to introduce random sync errors every 20 seconds, just
enough to make a live performance seem unstable. Judges would assume she lacked control or timing.
She forwarded the contents to a trusted contact, her former university mentor, Professor Qiao, who owed her a favor in this timeline.
Then, she sent an anonymous report to the Academy board. No names, just the evidence.
Let the officials do their work.
Later that evening, Bai Zhi sat by the koi pond in the Bai family courtyard. The moon reflected on the water, quiet and silver.
Her eldest brother, Bai Yuanzhou, appeared, hands in his pockets.
"You're still awake," he said, taking a seat
beside her.
"So are you," she replied softly.
He glanced at her. "You're not really the same girl from a month ago."
"No," she admitted. "And that's a good thing."
He was quiet for a moment. "Do you hate us?"
She looked at him, surprised.
"For what?"
"For… accepting Meilin so quickly. For not questioning anything."
Bai Zhi looked back at the water.
"I don't hate you. I just learned not to depend on you."
He winced. "That's fair."
Then, she turned to him. "But if you ever want to earn that trust back… you'll need to open your eyes, not just your heart."
He nodded slowly.
"I'll try."