Chapter 2: How to Derail a Plot

Xiao Fan had, in her previous life, been a project manager. She approached the problem of saving her brother with the same methodology.

Step one: assess the situation.

Their father was cold, political, and valued usefulness above everything else. Their mother was dead. Their household was run with the efficiency of a mid-sized corporation and the warmth of a tax audit. Xiao Chen, in the original novel, had responded to this environment by becoming brilliant, ruthless, and entirely unable to form a genuine human connection — which the narrative had then punished him for extensively.

Step two: identify the critical failure points.

The first was the mentor. In the original story, Xiao Chen had been taken as a student by a man named Lord Wen at age ten. Lord Wen had taught him everything, then betrayed him for political advantage at a pivotal moment. The wound had never healed. Everything that followed had followed from that.

Step three: intervene before the damage becomes irreversible.

"You're seven now," she told him one morning over breakfast. "That gives us three years before Lord Wen shows up."

Xiao Chen lowered his chopsticks. He had been doing this for two years now — listening to her say strange things and deciding to believe her anyway. She was not sure she deserved that trust. She intended to earn it.

"Who is Lord Wen?" he asked.

"Someone who's going to try to become your teacher. When he does, I need you to say no."

"Why?"

She met his eyes. "Because he's going to hurt you. And I'm not going to let that happen."

He was quiet for a long time. Then: "You always say things like you know the future."

"I do," she said. "It's complicated."

"Complicated how?"

"The kind of complicated that requires more breakfast before I can explain." She pushed his bowl toward him. "Eat. You're too thin."

He ate. Small victories.