"I want your soul."
Shen Yichen's voice was flat, emotionless—cold like frost forming on glass in the dead of night—yet it struck precisely at the deepest crack in her heart.
Su Rui froze.
She had imagined countless possible conditions he might propose, but not this. Never this.
It was absurd. Ridiculous. Laughable even. And yet, somehow, it made a terrifying kind of sense.
In a rebirth already detached from reality, the soul had long stopped being a metaphor.
Her once upright posture wavered slightly.
"You're going too far, Shen Yichen!" she snapped, voice rising. She barked the words like armor, like a fragile shell barely holding together the last of her strength.
But he just stared at her—quietly, frostily—watching her trembling fingers, the redness creeping into her eyes.
His gaze carried no warmth. No compassion. Like a demon from the depths of some myth, waiting with perfect patience to see her break.
Her heart pounded—wild, chaotic, as though something uncontrollable had broken loose in her chest.
The air around them turned oppressive. Even the ticking of the clock sounded like a hammer striking the silence.
"You don't think… this is ridiculous?" she bit out, jaw clenched.
He didn't respond. He leaned back into his chair, fingers interlaced as if the words he'd spoken were no more significant than idle conversation.
Su Rui stood, turned, ready to walk out.
This negotiation—if one could even call it that—was over.
But just as her foot touched the ground, his voice sliced through the air behind her, cold and merciless—
"If you walk out now, you're not just losing your job."
"You'll be trapped in that body forever."
"And one day, you'll die—quietly, anonymously—as Lin Yueying."
Her body locked in place. Frozen.
Her breath caught. It was like falling, weightless, into a void she couldn't see the bottom of.
How could he know?
She had never spoken those fears aloud, but he had voiced them word for word.
She had tried to believe she was strong. Tried to believe she could survive the rumors, the mockery, the loss of control. But deep down, she was terrified.
Terrified that this body might become her permanent cage.
Terrified that the stage would never wait for her to return.
Shen Yichen knew. He had always known.
He knew how to strike hardest—exactly where it hurt the most.
Su Rui slowly turned back to face him, her eyes burning with a mix of fury and helplessness. Her voice dropped to a whisper, raw with pain:
"You knew everything, didn't you?"
He said nothing. Just stared back, silent and immovable—because he knew. From the beginning, he had known this game would end with her surrender.
After a long pause, her lips parted, and the words fell from her like something cracked open inside:
"If there's no future left…"
"Then what use is a soul?"