Chapter 37: The Incompetent and Malicious Ex-Boyfriend
After a long silence, Ming Yanzhou was the first to break the tension. He gripped his phone, his face so dark it looked like ink could be wrung from it. His tone was a mix of irritation and frustration.
“This is all your fault. What kind of unreliable, piece-of-shit idiot did you find?”
Jiang Ningyuan shrunk his neck, too ashamed to utter a word of defense. He really had no right to speak, and he certainly couldn’t talk back.
That evening, he had bribed Ye Xi’s supervisor to take him to a client meeting under the guise of work. In reality, it was a setup to drug Ye Xi.
He wasn’t actually that malicious; he just wanted to give Ye Xi a mild sedative to knock him out for a while. He planned to take him to a hotel and hire a man just to take some compromising photos that would look like a misunderstanding.
He never expected that the idiot he hired would take one look at Ye Xi and be overcome by lust. The man had intended to take advantage of the unconscious Ye Xi.
But in a critical moment, Ye Xi suddenly woke up.
However, since Ye Xi was still under the influence of the drug, he lacked the strength to be a match for the man.
During the struggle, Ye Xi spotted a crystal ashtray on the nightstand. He smashed it directly against the man’s head, splitting it open on the spot.
The man, possessing a violent temper himself, snatched the ashtray back and slammed it onto Ye Xi’s head with equal ferocity.
One side was weak from being drugged, and the other was striking with lethal intent; the result was inevitable.
After knocking Ye Xi unconscious, the man was overcome with fear. He clutched his own bleeding head and called Jiang Ningyuan, trembling as he cried that he had killed someone.
Jiang Ningyuan and Ming Yanzhou had been waiting in a cafe downstairs for the man to bring them the video. Hearing this news, Jiang Ningyuan nearly dropped his phone in shock.
He was just a fun-loving second-generation rich kid; he had no real malice in his heart, let alone any intention of causing a death.
As soon as they heard Ye Xi was in trouble, he and Ming Yanzhou sprinted upstairs.
When they reached the room, they thought they had walked into a murder scene.
In the dimly lit room, the man sat on the carpet with a vacant expression, his face and head covered in blood as he shook uncontrollably.
Ye Xi lay on the bed, the originally white sheets soaked through with blood. His face was partially hidden by his hair, and one hand hung limply off the edge of the bed. He showed no signs of life.
Fortunately, the man hadn’t hit a vital spot, and because they got him to the hospital quickly, Ye Xi’s life wasn’t in danger.
Upon coming out of the emergency room, Ye Xi had woken up once and asked to see Shen Ci. Ming Yanzhou, feeling deathly guilty and responsible, naturally agreed to his request.
However, within minutes, Ye Xi had fallen back into a deep sleep.
Ming Yanzhou suspected he had actually just fainted again.
“I didn’t know that idiot was such a beast in human clothing…” Jiang Ningyuan muttered. He looked at Ming Yanzhou. “What are we going to say when Shen-ge gets here?”
Ming Yanzhou felt like his head was about to explode.
Failing to commit a bad deed and getting caught in the mess was truly rotten luck.
As he let out his third sigh, the hospital room door was pushed open.
Shen Ci hurried inside.
Ming Yanzhou and Jiang Ningyuan quickly stood up from the sofa. Ming Yanzhou hadn’t seen Shen Ci in over a week, but right now he had no romantic thoughts. He was only wondering how to lie so that Shen Ci wouldn’t slap him in the face.
“What happened?”
Shen Ci asked, then looked at Ye Xi on the bed. The boy’s head was wrapped in gauze, and his eyes were closed. His face was a sickly, haggard white, and even his lips had lost their color. Like a flower on the verge of withering, he looked incredibly pitiful.
Shen Ci took a few steps forward and stared at Ye Xi, his brow furrowed tightly.
He then turned back to Ming Yanzhou and Jiang Ningyuan, his voice low but cold. “What exactly is going on here? What happened to Ye Xi?”
Jiang Ningyuan glanced at Ming Yanzhou. Seeing that the latter wasn’t speaking, he poked him in the back, urging him to talk.
Ming Yanzhou glared at Jiang Ningyuan, then bit his lip.
“Ye Xi was hit in the head by someone. His life isn’t in danger, but he needs to stay in the hospital for observation for a few days”. Ming Yanzhou paused. “Shen-ge, Ye Xi is still sleeping. Let’s talk outside”.
Shen Ci gave Ye Xi one last look before following the two of them out of the room.
After a moment of silence, Ming Yanzhou spoke up.
“Shen-ge, to tell you the truth… I like you and wanted to be with you. I hired someone to drug Ye Xi, intending to take some compromising photos while he was unconscious so that you two would break up… but that person…”
Ming Yanzhou didn’t hide anything and told the entire story from beginning to end. Of course, he didn’t name Jiang Ningyuan as his accomplice, taking the entire blame upon himself.
Something like this couldn’t be hidden anyway. Ye Xi had opened his eyes briefly in the ambulance and seen both of them.
Anyone with a brain could figure out what had happened. Rather than letting Shen Ci find out through Ye Xi, it was better to confess himself.
The second the words left his mouth, Shen Ci slapped him across the face.
“Ming Yanzhou, I treated you as a friend, and I told you clearly that I didn’t like you. And you pull this kind of underhanded crap on me… do you realize this is illegal?”
Shen Ci’s voice was cold and vibrating with intense fury. “Ming Yanzhou, I don’t like you now, and I never will. If I had known, I never would have brought a wolf into my house in the first place. We’ll deal with this after Ye Xi wakes up. If he wants to call the police, you’ve brought it on yourself”.
Shen Ci finished and turned back into the hospital room without a backward glance.
He was deeply disappointed in Ming Yanzhou. He hadn’t expected the man to use such despicable methods against Ye Xi.
Nor had he expected that the person he had treated like a younger brother had been lying to him from the very beginning. This “big bad wolf” had been pretending to be an innocent little rabbit in front of him.
This kind of deception was something Shen Ci simply couldn’t tolerate.
Ming Yanzhou stood frozen in place, his cheek burning with pain. He watched Shen Ci’s resolute back as he entered the room, his Adam’s apple rolling as he felt a bitterness in his mouth like he had swallowed bile.
Jiang Ningyuan stood aside, watching with his head ducked like a quail. “Zhou-zai, this is all my fault…”
“Forget it. Don’t say any more”.
Ultimately, both he and Jiang Ningyuan were in the wrong, but he was more to blame. He had been wrong from the moment he approached Shen Ci with an agenda and lied to him.
But he had wanted to possess Shen Ci so badly that he had even abandoned his basic morality to get him.
Ming Yanzhou stared at the closed door, his fingers unconsciously clenching. Shen Ci had always taken care of him since they met. This slap felt like it had finally struck him awake from his obsessive infatuation.
After a moment of silence, Jiang Ningyuan whispered. “Zhou-zai, maybe we should come back tomorrow? I don’t think Shen-ge wants to see us right now…”
Ming Yanzhou said nothing, his legs feeling like they were made of lead. He knew Jiang Ningyuan was right.
Shen Ci was currently in a fit of rage; staying away was the best choice. He was also very afraid of seeing Shen Ci look at him with that expression of resentment and disappointment again.
Translator’s Note: A note to my readers: not every man who appears in the plot is a “Male Lead.” If they make it to the table, they’re a Male Lead; if they don’t, they’re considered “Supporting Cast”. Ming Yanzhou just blew his chances big time! Deception and dangerous schemes are a quick way to lose the protagonist’s trust. Poor Ye Xi, though. He really suffered in this chapter.
Recommended Reads
![I Can See Esports Players’ Attribute Entries [Transmigration]](https://beereads.space/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/see-215x300.jpg)
