Inside the grand banquet hall, the chandeliers glowed like clusters of stardust above polished marble and gold-trimmed tables. Velvet drapery cascaded along the walls, soft music flowed through the room, and the air was thick with money, perfume, and expectation.
Shen Yan stood beside her mother, holding a flute of champagne she hadn't touched.
"They're late," Madam Shen whispered—not annoyed, but gleeful. Her eyes kept flicking toward the grand entrance. "He's doing this on purpose."
"Of course he is," Shen Yan muttered, already turning slightly every time the doors opened. "He's dramatic."
"But he's bringing her," their mother said, her voice barely containing the giddiness of a teenager at her first crush reveal. "That alone is more shocking than any scandal in this room."
"They better walk in soon or I'm going to combust."
Their guests were mingling—business moguls, politicians, celebrities, socialites. But more than a few had already noticed the subtle glances from the hosting family. The way Madam Shen and her daughter kept glancing toward the door. The way the six heiresses handpicked by Madam Shen were seated nearby, waiting for a possible introduction that was never going to happen.
And then—
The double doors opened.
And the world paused.
Literally.
No music stopped, but the noise did. Conversations stalled mid-sentence. Cutlery froze mid-air. Eyebrows lifted. Glasses tilted. A gasp—faint but real—rippled through the crowd.
Because he walked in.
Shen Rui.
The untouchable, unreadable, unbeatable CEO of Shen Conglomerate and RUIX CORP. A man so impossible to reach, his nickname in certain elite circles was "The Walking Iceberg."
But this time, he wasn't walking in alone.
He had someone with him.
A woman.
And not just any woman.
She walked beside him with the grace of moonlight cutting through fog—quiet, controlled, eerily elegant. Her expression was unreadable. Her dress—deep velvet black with a slit that revealed one long, devastating leg—seemed to silence the room as much as her presence did.
And her face—
It didn't look like she belonged here.
It looked like she ruled here.
Flawless makeup. Razor-sharp gaze. Eyes that flicked through the crowd like a scanning AI processing potential threats. Cold. Unblinking. Untouchable.
Beautiful in the way that made people want to look away but couldn't.
The six heiresses seated together all stiffened. Some straightened in their chairs, suddenly very aware of their own gowns. One tried to fix her lipstick discreetly. Another whispered, "Who is she?"
Because compared to Lin Xie, they looked like they were still in rehearsal.
Madam Shen was smiling now. Nearly vibrating.
"She's perfect," she whispered, hands clutched together as if she were watching her son win gold at the Olympics.
Shen Yan couldn't take her eyes off Lin Xie. "I think she might be scarier than him."
"She's not scary," Madam Shen whispered. "She's everything."
Shen Rui didn't stop to greet anyone.
Didn't slow down.
He walked with her toward the main table like it was a battlefield. Like they owned the entire banquet—and maybe they did.
Lin Xie didn't smile. Didn't flinch. Didn't shift her posture under the weight of a hundred stares. She had scanned every exit, every angle, and every weaponized wine glass in the room within the first fifteen seconds of entry.
The only reason she didn't break anyone's nose was because Shen Rui had said: "Just act like my girlfriend."
So she did.
Her hand slipped effortlessly into his arm. The act was natural. Fluid. Controlled.
Gasps echoed.
At least three elderly socialites dropped their fans.
One director whispered to another, "That's not an actress, is it?"
"No. But she should be."
By the time they reached their table, the mood had completely changed. People had stopped pretending to mingle.
They were watching.
Waiting.
Whispering.
Guessing.
Speculating.
Because for the first time in recorded social history—
Shen Rui had brought someone to a banquet.
And not just anyone.
He brought her.
Whoever she was.
Whatever she was.
And none of them—not the heiresses, not the investors, not even the reporters trying to pretend they weren't secretly snapping photos—could look away.
Madam Shen sat up straighter the moment her son approached the main table, hands folded neatly on her lap like she hadn't spent the last twenty minutes vibrating with anticipation. Her stern face, perfected through decades of board meetings and public events, threatened to crack.
Shen Yan had already turned to face them, legs elegantly crossed, champagne forgotten.
And then—finally—they were in front of them.
Madam Shen looked at Lin Xie.
Up close, the girl was even more striking. Not just beautiful—there were thousands of beautiful women in this city. But this one... she had a stillness about her. A cold, quiet presence that felt like danger wearing lipstick. She looked like she'd studied everyone in the room and already assigned threat levels. And yet she stood beside Shen Rui like it was the most natural thing in the world.
Which made Madam Shen's heart flutter.
A match.
A perfect match.
"Mother. Yan." Shen Rui's voice was calm, steady, detached as ever. But there was something smoother underneath tonight. "This is Lin Xie. My girlfriend."
He said it like he wasn't setting the entire social order of the capital on fire.
Shen Yan choked on her own delight and covered it up with a sip of champagne.
Madam Shen blinked once, then let her lips curl upward in what, for her, was practically a squeal.
"A girlfriend," she repeated softly, like it was a rare species. Then louder, warmly, "Lin Xie. We're so pleased to finally meet you."
Lin Xie stared at her for a second too long. Her processing time lagged—just a second. She had not been briefed on this.
The introduction. The warmth. The welcome.
She had been prepared for suspicion, judgment, interrogation.
Instead, there was... beaming.
From both.
And worse, enthusiasm.
She had practiced one smile earlier in front of the mirror while the makeup artist poked her face with a brush. Shen Rui had commented that it looked like she was about to interrogate someone.
Now seemed like a reasonable time to deploy it.
So she did.
It wasn't... quite a smile. Not really. But it was something.
A twitch of the lips. A careful, slow movement, like she'd read about smiling in an instruction manual and was attempting to execute it for the first time.
Madam Shen's eyes lit up.
"She smiled," she whispered, elbowing Shen Yan.
"She did," Shen Yan whispered back.
Lin Xie heard them, of course.
She wasn't sure if her attempt had been successful or not, but both women seemed pleased. Their expressions weren't hostile. Their posture was relaxed. She marked it as a neutral-to-positive result.
"Please," Madam Shen said, gesturing toward the empty chairs beside them. "Sit. Join us."
Lin Xie looked to Shen Rui, who offered a subtle nod.
She followed his lead again—fluid, measured—and sat gracefully, hands in her lap, back perfectly straight. Shen Yan leaned toward her.
"I love your dress," she said, genuine and bright.
Lin Xie blinked. "I didn't make it."
"…Okay," Shen Yan said, clearly holding back laughter. "But you're wearing it well."
Lin Xie paused. "Thank you."
She had read that compliments required responses.
Shen Rui glanced at her, slightly amused, but said nothing.
Across the table, Madam Shen was still watching Lin Xie like she was the answer to every unanswered prayer—and perhaps even a solution to world peace.
"Would you like anything to drink, dear?" she asked, already signaling for a server.
Lin Xie was about to say no when Shen Rui cut in smoothly, "Just water."
She nodded once.
Their performance was seamless.
But beneath the surface, Lin Xie's mind was whirring.
She didn't expect warmth.
She didn't expect smiles.
She didn't expect to be welcomed like someone they wanted.
And somehow, sitting beside Shen Rui in a hall full of the city's most dangerous social players, being studied and whispered about and speculated on—
She didn't feel out of place.
She felt… stationed.
And as she quietly scanned the room once more, lips pressed together, mind alert—
Madam Shen was already whispering to Shen Yan again.
"She smiled again."
"I saw."
"She's perfect."
"She might be a little scary."
"I'm going to name my grandson Jiàn."
"We don't know if they're even—"
"Let me dream."
And the banquet had only just begun.