Everyone quietly listened to Chang’an's story, but when he reached this part, the room fell into a silence even deeper than before.

  “…Sorry, I can’t understand,” Zhu Shi said in disbelief.

  “Jin Yu joined a nightclub her father frequents—how does that rete to her wanting to entrap him?”

  Jin Yu pretended to be indifferent and said, “Exactly the way you’re thinking.”

  Chang’an, however, id it all out pinly: “Jin Yu wanted to create a situation where her father would choose her and spend the night with her, ultimately leading to his ruin.”

  Clearly, this kind of scheme was too extreme for Zhu Shi’s moral compass.

  She stammered in confusion, “Wait, let’s not even talk about why she wants to do this… Wouldn’t her father recognize his own daughter? How could he possibly end up choosing her in a nightclub?”

  “In that club, customers wear hoods, and employees wear masks, which creates conditions where they wouldn’t recognize each other,” I recalled from my earlier investigation into the nightclub's inner workings.

  “Wait, Ah Cheng, how do you know what it’s like in there?” Chang’an was shocked.

  “I did some research,” I replied.

  “Don’t ask about me for now—keep going.”

  “…Alright.”

  With that, he continued his story—

  Upon learning of Jin Yu's outrageous pn, Chang’an was dumbfounded and immediately asked her why she had such an idea.

  Perhaps feeling like she had nothing to lose, or maybe seeing Chang’an as an emotional outlet despite meeting him for the first time, Jin Yu poured out her heart in a tearful confession.

  The reason she resorted to such an extreme pn to entrap her father was, of course, due to deep-seated resentment towards him.

  Jin Yu’s parents were both born in a rural vilge.

  They had no notable education or family background but shared a deep bond.

  Her father was once a strong, dark-skinned young man, while her mother was an attractive girl with an oval face, often wearing a goldfish-shaped hairpin.

  When her father left for Xianshui City with dreams and ambitions for the outside world, her mother abandoned everything and followed him without hesitation.

  At the end of the 20th century, Xianshui City was far less stable than it is today, with various gangs operating throughout the city.

  In order to rise to prominence quickly, Jin Yu's father joined a major gang during his youth.

  Thanks to his aggressive, fearless nature and a fair amount of luck, he managed to amass considerable wealth while still in his early years.

  Eventually, he married his childhood sweetheart—the woman who had followed him into the city and stood by him through poverty and wealth alike.

  As the tides of time gradually pushed gang influence out of the city's stage, he managed to escape official crackdowns by undering his past and transforming his career just in time.

  By middle age, he had successfully entered the upper echelons of Xianshui City's society through the real estate business, gaining a prestigious social status.

  However, much like the wine club that seemed luxurious on the outside but was rotten within, beneath his gmorous fa?ade y a darkness unknown to others.

  Due to his constant business trips and social engagements, Jin Yu had grown up close to her mother and had little connection with her father.

  In fact, when she was still in elementary school, she once mistook him for a "kind uncle who occasionally visited" due to his long absences from home.

  Generally speaking, her parents’ retionship had been retively harmonious, but this peace did not st.

  After Jin Yu graduated from elementary school, everything changed.

  For reasons unknown, her father became votile and temperamental, frequently shing out in violent rage, verbally abusing and physically assaulting her mother.

  His terrifying, almost demonic outbursts instilled deep psychological trauma in Jin Yu, filling her heart with fear.

  This nightmare persisted throughout her school years, worsening even after she entered university.

  Her father didn’t stop—on the contrary, his abuse grew more extreme.

  Every time he came home, he would unleash a storm of violence on his wife, and even Jin Yu herself was not spared.

  There was even one incident where he beat his wife so severely that she suffered serious internal injuries and fractures, requiring urgent hospitalization and leaving her with sting pain and aftereffects.

  This event was the breaking point.

  The years of fear that had built up inside Jin Yu finally ignited into pure hatred and fury.

  From her perspective, her mother was the only real family she had ever known—the one who had always been there for her.

  Her father, on the other hand, was nothing more than an intruder who would barge in from time to time to bring pain and suffering.

  Logically, domestic violence to such an extent should have been enough to involve the authorities, and after that incident, Jin Yuh finally resolved to have her father imprisoned.

  However, somehow, he managed to leverage his social connections and escape any legal repercussions.

  He even turned the tables and brutally beat Jin Yu, nding her in the hospital as well.

  Yet, after being discharged, the fmes of hatred in Jin Yu’s heart were not extinguished by his punishment—if anything, they burned even fiercer.

  She began to ponder how she could take revenge on her father.

  As a lone and powerless female university student, how could she possibly bring down a man with such an extensive social network?

  She secretly investigated her father while racking her brain for a solution.

  She even considered killing him in his sleep, but unfortunately, her father had recently stopped staying at home overnight, leaving her with no opportunity to carry out her pn.

  Then one day, she learned that her father frequently visited a certain wine club.

  Rumors suggested that this club was actually a masquerade-themed nightclub that provided “special services.”

  Upon hearing this, inspiration struck her like a lightning bolt—her mind raced with possibilities.

  While she couldn't bring her father to justice through legal means, she could ruin his reputation instead.

  Her pn was simple: she would find a way to infiltrate the nightclub, ensure that her father unknowingly chose her for a night, and collect enough evidence during the process.

  Afterwards, she would spread the evidence online to expose him.

  Even if it didn’t spark a major public outcry, it would be enough to let everyone in her father’s social circle know the truth.

  Who would be willing to associate with a man who had unknowingly engaged in such an act with his own daughter?

  Her father’s reputation would be in shambles, and his career would come to a screeching halt.

  As for how her own reputation might suffer afterwards—she simply didn’t care.

  Fueled by hatred, she wasted no time putting her pn into motion, and to her surprise, everything proceeded with uncanny smoothness.

  The owner behind the nightclub was a former wife of an upper-css aristocrat.

  Having gone mad with resentment after her husband’s infidelity, she had thrown herself into managing the establishment and, by a twist of fate, ended up running it successfully.

  Upon hearing Jin Yu’s story, rather than stopping her, the club owner—whether out of a twisted desire to watch the drama unfold or for some other unknown reason—decided to hire her without hesitation.

  However, even the club owner couldn’t directly pair customers with employees—choosing a specific companion was entirely up to the customers.

  The owner cimed that helping Jin Yu to this extent was already the limit of her goodwill, and after that, she treated Jin Yu like any other employee, offering no further assistance.

  If everything had continued going so smoothly, Jin Yu might have actually succeeded in her pn.

  However, perhaps there truly is a bance of fortune in this world—good luck is often followed by bad.

  Or maybe, for Jin Yu, successfully joining the club was the real misfortune, and what happened next was actually a stroke of luck.

  The first customer she served in the club was none other than Chang’an.

  Upon learning about Jin Yu’s past, Chang’an felt a deep sense of pity for her and wanted to prevent her from embarking on a path of self-destruction.

  He began trying to persuade Jin Yu to abandon her revenge pn.

  It wasn't that he thought she shouldn’t seek revenge—he just believed she shouldn’t degrade herself or ruin her future in the process.

  Unfortunately, he wasn’t a very persuasive person, and his words didn’t get through to Jin Yu at all.

  But he had one trait—whether it was a virtue or a fw was debatable—he was incredibly persistent.

  The more Jin Yu pushed him away, the more determined he became not to leave.

  So, the next night, Chang’an visited the club again and once more requested Jin Yu.

  His second attempt at persuasion also ended in failure.

  But he didn’t give up.

  After the second failure, he came a third time; after the third, a fourth… He continued this pattern for nearly three months.

  Each time, he would bring Jin Yu into a private room and, instead of doing anything “serious,” he would just talk endlessly—about life, about the future, about dreams.

  Even on nights when he couldn’t visit, he would pay in advance to book Jin Yu, ensuring that she wouldn’t have to entertain other customers.

  As Chang’an recounted this part of the story, Jin Yu suddenly spoke up.

  “—Customers like him, who enjoy lecturing others, actually aren’t that rare in pces like this,” she said.

  “Every now and then, you’ll get these middle-aged men who act like they’re pying an adult dating game but insist on a ‘pure route’ clear. They request a specific girl, do nothing at all, and just sit there rambling about nonsense like, ‘If I set up a machine gun here, I could control the whole street’… It’s beyond boring.”

  Although she said that, perhaps Chang’an’s past efforts were not in vain.

  Her current attitude seemed more like she was trying to cover up her wavering resolve.

  “So, the rumors at school about you frequently visiting such establishments... it's because of this?” I looked at Chang’an.

  Zhu Shi, on the other hand, looked at her brother with newfound respect.

  “I never expected you were doing it for a good cause... I've really misunderstood you all this time.”

  “Hehe...” Chang’an chuckled sheepishly, like someone whose secret good deed had just been exposed.

  But honestly, no matter how persistent someone is, would he really go to such lengths—spending over two months tirelessly trying to persuade a stranger in a nightclub just because he heard about her absurd past?

  From what I know about him, his desire to prevent Jin Yu from ruining her future was definitely sincere.

  However, as the saying goes, men have had two major pursuits since ancient times—one is "coercing good women into prostitution," and the other is "convincing prostitutes to turn over a new leaf."

  I couldn’t help but suspect that Chang’an’s emotions might also contain a trace of this cssic romantic notion of “saving a fallen woman.”

  Since Zhu Shi had just gained a new perspective on her brother, I decided to hold my tongue on this matter.

  “So, what happened next? Does all of this have anything to do with you being kidnapped and beaten by that strange entity?” I asked.

  “This story isn’t over yet, right?”

  “No, it’s not over.” As he spoke, Chang’an’s expression darkened considerably.

  “At first, I was only going to that club every day to persuade Jin Yu to turn over a new leaf... I mean, to abandon that ridiculous pn. But as time went on, I discovered that the nightclub itself harbored an undeniable darkness and evil.”

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