Chapter 53 — Family Background

　　Although she seemed to be laughing at his expense, the fact that she had taken the initiative to joke with him made him very happy. Everything that was going on with the Qin family had inevitably dragged down his mood, but now he was feeling much better.

　　Compared to the happiness he had now, what did the Qin family count for? They weren't worth his attention.

　　"Yanyi, were you able to find out who the culprit is?" he awkwardly changed the subject.

　　He was rather skeptical about the culprit. It couldn't be that nominal father of his, but what about the other members of the Qin family?

　　"Old man Qin will be dying soon, so Qin Zhenyi and his three brothers are fighting to be the next head." Su Yanyi was quite familiar with the happenings in the Qin family. After all, power struggles were not uncommon in prestigious families.

　　And as for her addressing Qin Zhenyi by name, that was a decision she had made based on how Qin Jiran viewed the Qin family. Her family was of great importance to her, but as far as she was concerned, even though they shared blood ties, the Qin family was not worthy of Qin Jiran. Therefore, there was naturally no need for her to respect them as in-laws.

　　Over the past few days, Mother and Father Su had been doing some investigating and dug up the reason why Qin Jiran had been put into an orphanage.

　　His mother hadn't known that she was carrying Qin Zhenyi's illegitimate child. She was a beautiful but simple-minded college student. Although at the time Qin Zhenyi was already engaged, he still fell for Qin Jiran's mother, and the two had quickly tangled. When she was pregnant, Qin Zhenyi had married his fiancee and kept Qin Jiran's mother as a mistress.

　　In the beginning, Qin Jiran's mother was oblivious and hadn't even known Qin Zhenyi's real ident.i.ty. Back then, it was hard for an unmarried woman to support a child. When she found out about her pregnancy, she'd talked with Qin Zhenyi about marriage, only to learn that he had already married someone else. She was so sad that she had almost committed suicide, but for the child in her stomach, she'd held on until he was born. Unfortunately, the childbirth was what had killed her.

　　In other words, Qin Jiran had been born without a mother, while his paternal family was less than happy about his existence. Without so much as a glance at him, they had instructed their housekeeper to take him to an orphanage. Very few people in the Qin family knew about this—as a matter of fact, not even Qin Zhenyi's wife was aware.