Volume One, Chapter 39: Opening One’s Heart

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“What are you thinking about? Do you think I’m aiming too high?”

Susan was so absorbed in her thoughts that she forgot to answer. It was only when Jiang Ming pressed her again that she came back to herself.

“No, of course not! You’re the standard-bearer and record holder in our country’s men’s individual medley. You’re an absolute all-round champion. At the World Championships the year before last, you were already the national team member with the most medals. If even you don’t set your sights high, where is our aquatic army supposed to find hope?”

“Pity the medals haven’t been gold.”

Jiang Ming gave a soft snort, sounding somewhat helpless. Yet after saying it aloud, he felt considerably lighter. So that was all it took to voice his disappointment. It was not such a terrible thing after all.

“Why are you so fixated on coming in first? You make it sound as if finishing second were some unforgivable sin! If you’ve given it your all, you have nothing to regret. Anyone who reaches the podium is a hero. Winning a medal was your first step; changing its color is only a matter of time! You’ve been working tirelessly toward that goal all along! Just as the wicked will eventually be punished—it isn’t that justice never comes, only that the time hasn’t arrived. Your efforts will receive an answer in the end too. It isn’t impossible; it’s simply a matter of timing.”

More moving than Susan’s sweet, beautiful face were her heartwarming words and steadfast faith.

Looking at her, the smile on Jiang Ming’s face deepened.

In truth, even before he had voiced his feelings, Jiang Ming had vaguely sensed that Susan would understand him.

At that moment, he even felt that the promise he had made to that little girl about becoming world champion could perhaps be set aside for later. For now, he would rather lose himself in Susan’s motivational words. Even if only for a little while, they made him feel lighter.

“Then why were you spacing out just now? As a reporter, you must have heard plenty of lofty talk about chasing dreams.”

It was a long while before Jiang Ming spoke again.

“I was thinking about how well you answered. Simple, but powerful. If that speech made it onto television or the internet, it would become popular more easily than Lin Tingyuan’s carefully crafted public image.” Susan raised an eyebrow and replied without hesitation.

Hearing this, Jiang Ming shook his head helplessly, then suddenly reached out and rapped her on the forehead.

“Your entire mind is filled with ways to chase traffic.”

“So you do understand traffic after all.”

Susan covered her forehead but was not annoyed. It was rare for Jiang Ming to open up, and she would gladly endure a few more knocks if it meant he was willing to let down his guard.

Jiang Ming, however, no longer looked at her. He sat on a long bench nearby and busied himself applying medicine to his wrist, answering her halfheartedly now and then. He seemed like an entirely different person from the man who had briefly opened his heart moments earlier.

“I’m not some primitive with a 2G connection.”

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“I know. You’re simply devoted. Apart from swimming, you don’t want to spend time on anything else.”

“If you understand that, why are you still bothering me?”

Jiang Ming had returned to his usual cool reserve, but Susan was no longer afraid of it. She had already seen through his cold exterior and warm heart, so she sat down beside him, braced one hand against the bench, swung her legs, and continued their idle conversation.

“It’s not as if I’m forcing you to appear on camera. Still, I really do think that with looks and conditions like yours, it would be a waste not to show your face.”

“Having my ranking displayed on the big screen is more important than appearing on it myself.”

“The two don’t conflict. Under the current system, isn’t it precisely because of the rankings on the big screen that people get more chances to appear on it? You just don’t care. But you’re such a positive force, preserving the original spirit of competitive sports and striving for greater speed, height, strength, and unity. You deserve to be seen by more people.”

“That’s sophistry.”

“I’m serious! I hear the International Swimming Federation is about to change the rules. At future international competitions, hosts will interview the champions right after they come out of the water. So once you win a world championship, the very first thing you’ll have to do is accept an interview. There’ll be no escaping it!”

“Did you come to check on my injury, or to persuade me to face the media more often?”

“I just want you to relax a little... You’re too tense, and it won’t help your performance.”

“You’ve been fighting one battle after another too, working nonstop. No, that’s not right—you even have two jobs. Aren’t you tired?”

“I’m bursting with energy. I can hold my own against an all-around champion like you.”

“You really are talkative...”

“That’s called having a way with words!”

“You’re conceited.”

“That’s called confidence!”

...

And so the two of them went back and forth, chatting about all sorts of things, with no limits and no defenses, until Jiang Ming finished applying his medicine. Only then did Susan leave.

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The next day was the seventh day of the competition, and the penultimate day of the meet.

Perhaps because they had enjoyed such a pleasant conversation the night before, Susan seemed to have been injected with adrenaline. She was brimming with energy. While her colleagues dragged their exhausted bodies around, gulping down cup after cup of coffee and repeatedly motivating themselves with cries of “the final two-day battle,” she did not feel tired in the slightest. If anything, she was almost giddy with happiness.

Yet by evening, Susan seemed to fall from the clouds, left weightless, lost, and uneasy.

It was simply because, at the medal ceremony for the men’s one-hundred-meter butterfly, she had come face-to-face with the most familiar stranger in her life—her stepsister, Suna.

Familiar, because the two had known each other for ten years and had lived together for five. They had once been together day and night, familiar with each other beyond words.

Strangers, because they disliked each other. They were not enemies, yet were worse than enemies. They had not seen each other for five years and would have been perfectly content never to cross paths again.

The moment this nightmarish presence appeared, the alarm system in Susan’s mind was triggered automatically. It silently reminded her that no matter how deliberately she concealed it, she could never change her identity: she was the heiress of the Su Group, the only biological daughter of its chairman, Su Qingtian.

Twelve years earlier, Susan’s mother, Yuan Meng, had tragically died of breast cancer. Stricken with grief, Su Qingtian had wept uncontrollably beside her hospital bed and drawn up a will on the spot, leaving Susan the inheritance rights to the Su Group and promising that no matter how the world changed, her interests would never be affected.

The man’s devotion had been real, but so was the fact that dead wood could quickly spring back to life.

A year later, Su Qingtian fell passionately in love with Hui Linyun, a senior executive in the group.

Hui Linyun was thirty-seven at the time. She took excellent care of herself and looked like a young woman not yet thirty, while possessing the allure of a mature woman. Though recently divorced and raising a fourteen-year-old daughter, she was still highly sought after in the marriage market. Yet she looked down on everyone around her. As a senior executive, she seized the opportunity to draw close to Su Qingtian, staying constantly at his side while he was at his lowest point after losing his first wife and burying himself in work.

Men were visual creatures, and emotional by nature. It was hardly difficult to understand why Su Qingtian soon succumbed to such a beautiful woman who remained steadfastly by his side.

Two years later, Su Qingtian remarried and brought Hui Linyun into the family. Her daughter, Meng Na, changed her name to Suna and moved into the Su family’s old residence with her mother, becoming Susan’s sister.

Just like that, ten years passed.

Under Hui Linyun’s constant influence at his bedside and Suna’s years of harmless, obedient pretense, Su Qingtian came to hold his stepdaughter in high regard.

Suna not only excelled academically but was mature and composed in her dealings with others. When it came time to choose a university, she also followed Su Qingtian’s arrangements and went abroad to study business administration. While still in university, she began interning at the Su Group, familiarizing herself with its operations. After graduation, she moved directly into the group’s upper management and now served as vice president.

Yet ever since Suna had pushed Susan into the swimming pool on a cruise ship ten years earlier, nearly drowning her, Susan had known that her sister had not come with good intentions. The peaceful days she had enjoyed at home were probably over.

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