Almost everyone there was someone she knew. Laughter and rowdy noise crashed over her; the air carried scents that had grown unfamiliar.

For a dizzy moment, the past five years felt like a dream.

Someone pulled Raina into a seat. She smiled, loosened.

And so: talk, drink, games, dance.

On the dance floor, brilliant lights spilled over her—colors shifting, never still.

She let herself burn energy. When the song ended, Raina wiped the sweat from her forehead, settled at the bar, and ordered a fruit wine—low alcohol. One glass only left her feeling slightly cooler.

Jing Lin still had endless energy, hips moving, expression bold.

Raina sipped her drink and smiled without meaning to.

Someone sat beside her and ordered whiskey.

Raina glanced sideways—someone from their group, though she didn't know him—and looked away.

Then knuckles tapped lightly on the wooden bar. An idle gesture. His voice was pleasant, smooth as polished stone, every word clear.

"Raina Lu. Long time no see."

Raina started. "Do I know you?"

He turned. In the dim, dappled light his face flickered—half smile, eyes long and slightly slanted, not unhandsome. "What do you think?"

The face was hardly forgettable. Raina searched her memory.

He took the drink the bartender offered—long fingers around the glass, tendons taut, lines sharp. Beautiful hands.

He took a sip, then said unhurriedly, "If you can't remember, forget it. I didn't think you would."

Raina swallowed an urge to snap at him, turned toward the dance floor, and ignored him.

The voice continued, threaded with amusement. "Your temper's improved a lot. Back then you'd have cursed me outright."

A stranger speaking as if he knew her—Raina found it absurd.

"If you know that, why provoke me? Is something wrong with you?"

She set down her glass and rose to leave.

He laughed, faintly helpless. "The tutor who spent most of your junior year cramming with you—you forgot him too?"

This time Raina was genuinely stunned.

She looked him up and down. "Ryan?"

He smiled and nodded. "I thought you'd forgotten me completely."

How could she? That whole year of hellish study—trying to reclaim a decade of neglected textbooks overnight was never simple.

Memory spread slowly through her mind. Those days had been brutal. Ryan Xiang, hired by her family as a tutor, had suffered alongside her—though Ryan was patient by trade; once through the material if needed, twice, three times, ten or twenty times, starting from the foundations.

She had never been patient with books. She had held on only because she wanted to draw nearer—to him, to be worthy of him.

After that year she could keep pace in class. Ryan Xiang graduated, took a job in another province, and they lost touch.

Meeting an old acquaintance now stirred feelings she couldn't name.

But—the Ryan she remembered wore thick black-framed glasses, perpetually faded shirts, hair a chaotic nest, awkward except when explaining problems—she couldn't connect that image with the man beside her.

So Raina asked directly, "Senior Xiang, did you get plastic surgery?"

Ryan Xiang nearly spat out half his drink.

Coughing, face red: "Cough… I look that different?"

Raina nodded.

Ryan Xiang laughed loudly. "Everyone says the same since I came back to work here. Do I look a lot handsomer now?" He leaned casually against the bar, colored light sliding across his face. Ryan Xiang had never been ugly; now there was something lazy in his features, a smile at his lips—easy on the eyes, objectively speaking.

Still, no matter how good he looked, he couldn't compare to that other man in her eyes.

Raina spared him the cutting reply. She lifted her glass, half sigh, half lament. "It's really been a long time. You seem to be doing well."

"Not great, not bad. At least I don't worry about meals, and I can support my parents." Ryan Xiang's smile faded. "What about you? Are you all right?"

Raina shook her head with a laugh. "Nothing like your success. I just lost my job."

Ryan Xiang didn't seem surprised. "Makes sense—with your temper, what boss could stand you? Did you quit on your boss again? Still, it's not the end of the world. Your parents can set you up with something you like, can't they?"

Raina looked down at the swirling liquid in her glass. A moment of silence.

She turned the glass, then drained what remained and smiled. "They disowned me three years ago. You didn't know?"

Ryan Xiang made a small sound of surprise and didn't know what to say.

Raina patted his shoulder, unconcerned. "So don't treat me like some spoiled rich girl anymore. And I'm not as hopeless as you think." Out of the corner of her eye she saw Jing Lin waving. "All right—I have to go. See you."

"Wait."

Ryan Xiang stopped her, pulled an elegant card from his shirt pocket, and held it out.

His eyes narrowed, faintly sly. "My card. I just arrived—I need an assistant. If you're unemployed, you're welcome. Excellent terms."

Raina looked at the card, then at Ryan Xiang, and this time she truly smiled. "I got it."

When Jing Lin came over, her expression said she already knew everything.

Raina couldn't be bothered. She excused herself to the restroom, avoiding whatever questions Jing Lin might ask.

At the sink, she heard soft sobbing from a stall.

She wasn't one for meddling—and bars were never clean places. Still… She turned off the water. The sound was familiar. She thought of the familiar woman's silhouette she'd glimpsed earlier. Raina paused only briefly, then strode forward and kicked the stall door.

Silence, instant.

The next second, a man's crude curses bounced back.

Raina hammered on the door. Under the torrent of abuse, the door flew open.

A disheveled woman was pinned to the floor, arms bound, struggling helplessly; the man's belt was half undone.

Raina didn't hesitate—she kicked him.

When she was young, her parents had sent her for martial arts training—not showy taekwondo, but real technique.

The blow to his ribs bent him double. Two more kicks dropped him flat.

Practice teaches you exactly where to strike so resistance fails.

She reached for the woman—but the woman didn't seem to see her and struggled again.

Raina snapped, "Ms. Yvonne Li!"

Only then did the woman wake as if from a dream, lifting a face streaked with tears and ruined makeup.

She looked terrible. Raina could barely connect her with the proud, cold, impeccably made-up heiress she had once known.

The woman's gaze lingered on her face a long time before she asked, hoarse and tentative, "Lu—Assistant Lu?"

Raina grew more impatient. Yes—she knew this woman because she had been Mason Han's girlfriend.

Calling it acquaintance was generous. They had no real friendship—only a connection. She had no obligation to save her. In the days when Yvonne Li had acted like Han family's young mistress, she had ordered Raina around endlessly, making her fetch this and do that.

She had saved her anyway—but why?

Because what…

Raina stalled.

In that moment Yvonne Li seemed to sober slightly. She shook her head and still weeping, shouted at her, "Why did you save me? Go get Mason Han—Mason Han, that bastard, bastard—why doesn't he want me anymore…"

Raina crouched and untied the rope on Yvonne Li's wrists. Her voice was cool and flat. "I've resigned. I'm not Mason Han's assistant anymore."

She had her reason.

She had saved her because Yvonne Li was the only woman who, after Mason Han dumped her, would run to his office crying and begging to reconcile.

She really did love Mason Han.

Foolish—in the same way Raina had been.

At Raina's words, Yvonne Li quieted.

Raina untied her and turned to leave.

Yvonne Li's voice came from behind—she seemed fully awake now, still carrying a spoiled heiress's imperious edge. "Hey—you're just leaving? I can't get up."

Raina replied without expression, "That's your problem."

The moment the words left her mouth, both women froze.

Because the person who said that most often was Mason Han.

Yvonne Li spoke first.

She stared at the floor tiles as if bereft, then lifted her head. Self-mockery, or perhaps irony, threaded her voice. "Raina Lu—you love Mason Han too, don't you."

"So what if I do?" Raina didn't deny it. There was no need.

Yvonne Li laughed suddenly—a bleak laugh. "Nothing. I just think—we're really pathetic."