Volume 4: Hidden Struggles, Chapter 182: The Genius Fool

“Oh, I’m all ears.” Chu Tianyu was taken aback; he hadn’t expected Qin Nianran to respond so directly.
“It’s about seizing this opportunity to let go of everything, put aside all distractions, and fully immerse oneself in the experience,” Qin Nianran said, her eyes shining with calm determination.
“What? Is that really the reason?” Chu Tianyu asked in surprise. “Yes, it’s that simple. But it seems fate isn’t giving me a chance to let go of everything. Since everyone feels our relationship needs to be resolved, it’s better to talk things out openly,” Qin Nianran replied in her usual tone.
Chu Tianyu was deep in thought after hearing her words. Some things seem simple when spoken, but their deeper meanings truly deserve careful reflection. Especially the reason she gave—though seemingly simple—carried an atmosphere that made Chu Tianyu ponder for a long time. Perhaps this was the true loneliness of a genius: no friends, no freedom, only responsibilities and burdens. The joys and pleasures that seemed ordinary to ordinary people were distant dreams to her.
Though this loneliness manifested differently from Chu Tianyu’s own sense of isolation in martial arts, its essence was the same—a stagnation at a certain level of development.
“Do you have anything to say?” Qin Nianran suddenly asked. When Chu Tianyu didn’t respond, she smiled slightly for the first time and said, “Well then, let me speak first. There’s no need to beat around the bush between us. I don’t know who said it, but human misunderstandings arise because people worry too much and fail to express their true feelings. Today, let’s be direct. First, let me talk about myself.”
Qin Nianran paused, her expression complex. After thinking for a moment, she continued, “I won’t go into other matters today. I’ll only discuss what happens between us. Initially, I saw you as a fool, or just one of those ordinary people—engagement or anything else didn’t matter. To me, you were just another symbol.”
“But that meeting in Beijing stirred something in me. I explained it to myself by saying it might be because you’re my fiancé. Even if I treated you as a symbol, human instinct would still make me care, after all, that symbol is directly related to me.”

“Especially the appearance of Ouyang Ziyi and your strange behavior piqued my curiosity at that time. Fortunately for you, because of Ouyang Ziyi, I stopped paying attention to you. This directly led to Ouyang Ziyi pressing closer and closer to me, putting me at a disadvantage in every situation.”
“So Ouyang Ziyi used you to defeat me completely. I won’t hide from you now—back then, she really made me feel like I had a treasure right beside me that I hadn’t discovered, only for someone else to snatch it away first. I was filled with conflict and even more hatred and anger toward you. I think you can understand the complexity of those feelings.”
“Moreover, the information Ouyang Ziyi gave me later, along with witnessing your extraordinary martial skills that night, made me realize where Ouyang Ziyi’s confidence came from. At that moment, I knew my resolve was wavering, and a certain image also appeared in my mind…”
“Subsequent interactions and entanglements, whether through business cooperation or learning martial arts from you, only made me better understand and recognize your strength. That image in my mind grew deeper. Back then, I was nothing but confused and anxious. The arrogance I forced myself to show in front of you now seems laughable to me—those moments were truly pitiful.”
“However, during that concert night, your perfect performance with Xue Feifei, along with that final roar that seemed to break through all constraints, completely awakened me. It forced me to ask myself: Would you be willing to become one of his three thousand concubines?”
Chu Tianyu was also utterly shocked. With Qin Nianran’s completely unfiltered and honest confession, he seemed to enter her inner world at that moment, feeling its ups and downs.
So when Qin Nianran asked that rhetorical question, he quickly replied without hesitation, “Would you be willing?”
After saying it, Chu Tianyu regretted it. It was too direct—talk about a harem, three thousand concubines, and then he even followed up with “Would you be willing?” It felt a bit presumptuous.
Qin Nianran raised her eyes to look at Chu Tianyu, her expression revealing not a hint of her true thoughts. Even during that brief pause, Chu Tianyu felt almost suffocated under her gaze.
Suddenly, a thunderclap rang out outside, and the light in the room dimmed instantly. It seemed like a storm was approaching—dark skies, continuous thunder, and soon, it started pouring heavily.

At this moment, the two people inside the house were not affected by the change in weather. Qin Nianran finally spoke up, “Before answering your question, let me briefly talk about you to see if I’m right. In my opinion, you might have really been foolish when you were young, but when we met in Shanghai, you were definitely pretending to be silly. I don’t know why you had no objection at all to our engagement. Logically, with your personality and abilities, you should have the strength to take more responsibility and control your own fate—there was no need to do this at all.”

“But none of this matters now. What’s important is what you think now. I’ll be brief—you feel affection and love for me, but perhaps more so, it’s a sense of obligation. After all, to you, our engagement seems like just another choice you made. Even after meeting Ouyang Ziyi, Li Rou, and Xue Feifei, you still held onto your own persistence. When you’re with other girls, there might be reasons for that, and according to Ouyang Ziyi, it’s some irresistible force or fate at work. So, in your heart, there’s still some kind of expectation, some assumption.”

“Well, that’s all I have to say about you. Now I’ll answer your question. The answer is no.”

Actually, with all these elaborations from Qin Nianran, the answer was already obvious. So when Chu Tianye heard it, he wasn’t surprised. On the contrary, he gained a deeper understanding of Qin Nianran’s mindset. He finally realized that she was actually a pitiful person—a proud pitiful person who wanted to handle everything on her own.

It’s not hard to see from her words that since her husband was just a symbol to her, what difference did it make if that symbol had several wives and lovers? The answer, obviously, was no! From childhood onward, shaped by her environment, her title as a genius, and her extraordinary abilities, she had always solved others’ problems—why would she need anyone’s help? So now, suddenly, someone stronger than her appeared, and this person was the one she had always regarded as a fool, someone she was ready to marry casually so as to avoid further interference and troubles.

At the same time, due to many coincidences and unexplainable reasons, this person was surrounded by many equally outstanding girls. Faced with this situation, for the always-proud Qin Nianran, her only choice was the one she had just given—continuing to wear her proud mask while enduring inner loneliness.

At that moment, Qin Nianran’s voice came to Chu Tianyu’s ears again: “Alright. We’ve clarified our relationship through this opportunity. If you have no objections, we’ll break off our engagement once we go back. This is the best choice for both of us, and it eliminates this awkwardness. Perhaps we can work better together or even become partners in the future. To be honest, I’m quite interested in your Western Development Plan. I really admire you for thinking of taking on such a challenge. I guess only such challenges can give you a sense of excitement, right?”
Chu Tianyu didn’t answer this question. Instead, he stared straight at Qin Nianran and slowly said, “Once upon a time, there was a silly boy who was being bullied. Then, a proud little princess rushed over and loudly declared to those who were bullying him that the silly boy was her husband and no one could mistreat him.”
Before Chu Tianyu could finish speaking, Qin Nianran was shocked. She looked at him in disbelief, not expecting him to still remember the words she had said in anger back then.
“That silly boy kept those words buried in his heart. Until one day, when he realized he really had to get engaged to that little girl, he agreed without hesitation! Even if others still thought of him as a fool, he was willing to sign any harsh love agreement.”
Qin Nianran was completely confused by Chu Tianyu’s words. His two statements seemed to drop two bombs in her heart, completely disrupting the resolve she had just formed, leaving it utterly fragile.
Just as both of them were lost in their own thoughts, a large group returned from outside. Except for Ouyang Ziyi, everyone was drenched like drowned rats.
The room quickly became lively as people started talking about the unpredictable weather—how it started raining suddenly, with strong winds and storms, raising the water level on the ground by more than ten feet in no time.
After the initial pause, Qin Nianran took the initiative to join in the conversation about the weather, especially asking Chen Qing and the others if anything special had happened during their visit.
Meanwhile, Ouyang Ziyi stepped up to Chu Tianyu and secretly gave him a gesture—a thumbs up shaking up and down nonstop.
She also whispered, “Impressive, really. That story about the silly boy is incredibly powerful. Even girls would be moved by it. Don’t worry, Qin can never escape from your grasp, you fool.”

Chu Tianyu had long known that she had been hiding under the eaves, acting as the “third ear,” so he wasn’t surprised by her teasing. He simply gave Ouyang Ziyi a wry smile and transmitted a message: “It just came out naturally from what was on my mind.”
“Enough, great romantic. I already know you spoke from the heart. Anyway, even if we don’t mention this, Classmate Qin can’t escape anyway. Don’t worry. In fact, the fact that she opened up and said those words today means she already regards you as the most important person in her life. And as long as she agrees to the Western Development Plan, there will be plenty of opportunities for interaction. The real fun is yet to come—genius versus fool. I bet the fool wins, hehe.” Ouyang Ziyi leaned in a bit closer and whispered.
In response to Ouyang Ziyi’s reassurance, Chu Tianyu could only give her a “I hope so” expression.
The heavy rain had continued outside for the past two days, so Chu Tianyu and his group hardly left the house. Only on the third day, when the rain eased a bit, did they go to the minority village mentioned by Chen Qing.
The village wasn’t far away, so they walked there. The roads outside were muddy after days of rain, making it too troublesome to drive.
When Chu Tianyu and his group arrived, their first reaction was shock—shock at how poor and backward the village was. Their way of life was basically the same as that of animals; they ate and lived together with them. Animal droppings could be seen everywhere in the puddles, and both adults and children walked barefoot on the muddy ground mixed with feces, without any attempt to avoid it.
They visited a few households. Most of them spoke local dialects, with only one or two able to understand Mandarin. With Chen Qing’s translation, they tried to communicate. It turned out that this way of life had persisted for a long time. While the outside world had undergone tremendous changes, this place continued to operate on its own path.
So, not to mention basic requirements like literacy, even meeting basic needs for food and shelter was a problem. The slightly older children in the village started working for their families early on, busy struggling to survive.
Chu Tianyu asked if they had ever gone outside to see the world. Most said they had, but because they couldn’t read or speak any other language, they ended up returning and staying at home. This created a vicious cycle—a cycle of isolation that became more isolated due to its own isolation.

After leaving this village, Chu Tianyu and the others were in a heavy mood. Before leaving, they gave away everything they had to those villagers. Although it wouldn’t solve any problems, it was all they could do at the moment. Moreover, according to Chen Qing, there were many such villages in their county, some located in the mountains, even poorer and more backward than this one. Faced with this situation, Chu Tianyu and the others set aside all other thoughts and devoted themselves entirely to this field investigation.