1 The Beginning of Face-Slapping

"I'm breaking up with you, Qin An. From now on, we don't have anything to do with each other."

A beautiful woman with a graceful figure said to a young man who looked ordinary. The clothes he was wearing were cheap local stuff that could be bought at a rundown clothes shop found in a corner street. On top of that, he had no sense of style whatsoever. He looked like he had put on whatever he picked up from the floor of his dormitory: although they were acceptably clean (barely), they were old and worn out.

In comparison, the girl before him was wearing trendy branded clothes. The young man, Qin An, didn't know much about designer clothing brands, but he at least knew the best ones. He once surfed the internet on a whim and saw the logo of Prada, the number one in the list for women. It seemed like Chou Yungran was wearing Prada clothes. He caught a glimpse of the elegant logo on her left chest. The dress must have cost over a thousand dollars. On top of that, she was holding a bag and was wearing a lot of accessories. The total value of everything on her would have already crossed the ten thousand dollar mark.

With that kind of money, a middle-class family would be able to buy a decent house in the suburban areas. A normal sedan or SUV car would also cost about that much.

Yet, all that money was wasted on simple clothes and fashion.

He knew it was weird, but Qin An felt his heart ache looking at Chou Yungran's Prada thousand-dollar dress and exquisite makeup. Wait…why the makeup? Ahem, anyway. He shouldn't feel like this because it wasn't his money. Why should he care whether she was abusing someone's wealth?

However…that wasn't her money.

Qin An looked behind her. He and Chou Yungran were standing at the mouth of an alleyway. Parked on the side of the pavement of the main street was actually a Lexus LC Convertible. Compared to fashion, Qin An was more interested in cars, especially the sports cars and supercars which he could only dream of. Although the Lexus LC could barely be considered a sports car, it still cost over $200,000. A family would have to be quite well-off if they could afford to use that kind of money for merely buying their child's car.

And to his knowledge, Yan Sha's Yan family indeed owned assets of nearly $5 million. A popular restaurant, Yan's Couch, and also a hospital was under their family's name.

Yan Sha was the typical rich second generation. However, Qin An also knew that he was on the lowest rung of the hierarchy. Compared to those companies with stock prices of tens of millions or even hundreds, his Yan family was only a small powerless family without any influence. There were many such families like them.

However…that was to be expected. Chou Yungran left him for a rich guy, but she would never be able to date a true second generation who could also be a third generation in their huge and powerful family. At most, she could only settle for a pseudo-rich dude like Yan Sha.

And this pseudo-rich dude was currently sitting lazily in the Lexus LC's driver seat. The top of the car was open. Yan Sha was leaning on the car door with his arm over the window that was rolled down. His other hand was resting on top of the driving wheel.

From where he was standing, Qin An could see Yan Sha's wrinkled face looking at him, as though he was disgusted. Most likely, it was because Qin An was someone who didn't care about appearance, and was also dirt poor. Chou Yungran must have told him quite a lot of interesting things.

Qin An actually also recognized what the dude was wearing. It was a long-sleeved casual shirt from Versace. They were also a top brand that had both men and women wear. The only thing Qin An liked about Versace was the cool name. He currently didn't care about how good wearing it looked, which was mostly because he absolutely couldn't afford one. However…that was now.

It would be completely different in the extremely near future.

Qin An was barely able to hide 9a smirk coming to his lips. He nearly couldn't stop the edges from curving upwards. His cheeks spasmed as though he was having a seizure.

Chou Yungran saw this and sneered, "Let's see if you can still laugh after this. You're just a beggar. Your life will only become tougher without me."

Qin An chuckled. He didn't feel offended being called a beggar. It was, after all, true. However, that was soon to change. In fact, it had already secretly changed. That was why he was laughing. He found all this ridiculous. Also, Qin An was speechless in the second half of her sentence. Her last remark; what did she mean? It was true that she had helped him and his sister with her family's finances, but he never relied on those things. He kept working hard by doing a lot of part-time jobs.

Chou Yungran frowned. Why was this fellow laughing? Shouldn't he be devastated after she broke up with him? After all, she had been his girlfriend. They had gone through a lot together. She knew what kind of person he was. It was true that he was the type to hide his true feelings and he was also good at showing a poker face or a sunny smile. He directed that sunny smile at his sister, Qin Yun'er, whenever they met. Honestly, that was one of the things that attracted Chou Yungran to Qin An. However, she knew that yesterday something terrible happened to someone close to the Qin siblings. Add to that the breakup with her today, Qin An was supposed to be devastated. He shouldn't be able to maintain a facade.

Yet, why was he still able to laugh? Did his mind finally collapse from the grief and pressure? That was the only thing she could think of that would cause Qin An to act like this. After all, he looked a little crazed.

Thinking about this, Chou Yungran's face turned cold. She had decided to not care about Qin An anymore. Previously, she only stuck to him because of that relative of his. But now that something happened to them, she wouldn't get anything by being around the Qin siblings anymore. Thus, she became decisive, and instantly called on her previous admirer, Yan Sha, who had pestered her for a long time. They immediately dated each other after that.

"I came here only to say this. Since that's done, I'm out. Bye. We won't see each other again after this." Chou Yungran coldly said as she turned around sharply. Qin An's lack of the expected reaction somehow irked her, and she found herself annoyed by his mere presence. At this moment, she just wanted to see his miserable appearance, so she tried provoking him with sharp words and exaggerated actions, but to no effect. From the corner of her eyes, she saw that he was instead calm and there seemed to be a look of indifference in his eyes. He didn't look crazed anymore, and his mouth wasn't twitching like he was holding back laughter. It was as if he'd made a decision, just like her.

Chou Yungran felt that something was a little off, but she didn't think too much about it. She snorted at what was probably Qin An's continuous act to maintain an unbothered facade. She was wearing high heels, but she was already considered an expert at walking with them, striding decidedly more elegantly to irk Qin An. She reached Yan Sha's side and smoothly entered the car and took the front seat beside him.

"Good riddance," snorted Yan Sha as he turned away from Qin An. Chou Yungran was quiet as she saw Qin An shake his head and retreated farther into the alleyway, retrieving a tricycle she'd seen behind him. The tricycle was old and had rust on some parts of its frame. Its wheels were a little crooked and the tires were worn down, looking in need of service and spare parts. However, Qin An was nonchalant and looked entirely unbothered as he mounted the tricycle and slowly pedaled out into the main road. Their paths didn't cross as he rode in the opposite direction. He didn't glance back even once.

Yan Sha had a look of absolute disgust at the ramshackle tricycle. "Seriously, how is he fine riding that thing? I really don't know what goes on in the minds of poor people. I'd rather eat shit than be seen riding something like that." Yan Sha looked uncomfortable, as though he genuinely loathed that thought from the bottom of his heart. He was also truly confused and perplexed.

"We can't understand the thoughts of paupers. Just treat them like a lower breed of people, like how gods look over mortals," Chou Yungran said some outrageous words lightly as she retracted her gaze from Qin An's disappearing back. Her face was flat and emotionless and Yan Sha couldn't see what she was really thinking. However, he was reassured that Chou Yungran was now his, and not Qin An's girlfriend anymore. He couldn't help but raise his lips when he thought of the impetus that caused all this, which was when Qin An's relatives went bankrupt because they offended someone terrifyingly powerful. In fact, the Qin family (not Qin An's family, but his relatives) was also quite rich, owning a few restaurants and having assets of up to $4 million, which was slightly lower than the Yan family. They were once relatively mild competitors, and of course, now that Yan Sha's family's rival was gone, their business became more prosperous every day; more than the usual. This was because the Qin family restaurants' regular customers had no choice but to switch to dining regularly at the Yan's Couch, among other things.

The Yan family had long thought of what to do to get rid of their rival. Although it wasn't very urgent because there was no intense competition between them, the fact still remained that they were losing customers. Now that this unexpected windfall had come out of nowhere, they naturally wouldn't reject it.

Yan Sha looked at Chou Yungran expectantly. "Yungran, why don't we go to my restaurant?"