She Was the Bait, Not the Prize

The silence was suffocating. Only the rhythmic water drip echoed through the vast, unfinished chamber. Xia Ruyan could hear her breath, shallow but steady. She had calmed down enough.

Her arms, bound tightly behind her, had long since gone numb. The rope bit into her skin, cutting deep, her veins pulsing faintly beneath the pressure. She shifted, with difficulty, leaning against the cold, rough wall. Pain radiated through her limbs, but it grounded her. Kept her from slipping into panic.

Whoever had taken her wasn't an amateur.

The abduction had been swift and calculated. A sudden force from behind, an iron grip that rendered her motionless in seconds. A cloth was thrown over her head. No chance to fight. She'd felt the smooth rumble of a van beneath her, heard no voices, only silence. The vehicle was clean, spacious, deliberately so.

Then...…darkness.

Now, she was here. Alone. In a place that smelled of dust, concrete, and damp metal, with a mix of oil. Somewhere unfinished, an under-construction site, perhaps. She let her head fall back against the wall. She needed clarity. Focus. Panic was the enemy.

But then, the silence was shattered.

"So... it's true. You don't get scared easily, Miss Xia."

The voice came from the shadows, low, hoarse, and almost amused. Firm footsteps followed, not heavy but measured. In the darkness, as the person approached her, she could smell him.

Tobacco. And frankincense. Her stomach twisted.

"You really are your father's daughter," the man drawled, slowly circling her. "That wretched Xia blood. It's been a thorn in my side for far too long."

She didn't answer, didn't even flinch. But her body was losing the battle, fighting unconsciousness with every breath.

"No tears?" he mused. "Not even a little whimper? That's disappointing."

He crouched. Close. Too close. She could feel the warmth of his breath near her ear, and she instinctively flinched away, nausea rising in her throat.

"There are… rumors about you," he said, voice dropping lower. "Intriguing things." He chuckled, a sound without humor, more like a warning. His voice was hoarse, she noted, rough and rasping, a voice that is distorted over a long exposure to smoke.

"But I don't care enough to verify them. You're not the prize, Miss Xia. You're the mean." He paused. "Your only purpose is to break your father."

A beat of silence.

"And he will break."

He leaned in further, his breath cold now. "Apologies," he whispered. "Nothing personal, young lady. But the pain you'll endure.... it's the pain he'll carry."

He straightened.

"And you… You'll die slowly. Because the slower you fade, the harder he falls."

Xia Ruyan trembled, not from fear, but fury.

Who was this man?

And why did his voice sound so familiar?

On the other side of the city, chaos churned beneath calm skies. Mo Yichen had retrieved the surveillance footage, grainy, barely useful, but it was something. He had tried calling Xia Jingxuan, but the man wasn't answering. Mo Yichen knew why. He had lost every shred of credibility with him. With Mr. Xia, he was now just a man who made empty promises.

The police and the Eclipse Unit were working around the clock. There had been no ransom call, demands, or leads. The capital city, usually asleep by midnight, was wide awake at 1 a.m., but the night pulsed with tension.

Mo Yichen had shaken the city like an earthquake. He would dig through the earth. He would rip through the sky. He would find her. He had to find her.

All of this... It was his fault. His carelessness. They had called him a dishonorable man. A man who couldn't keep his word. The promise he gave her mother ... That he would keep her safe.

And now, all he could do was remember her.... Those pretty, stormy eyes. That porcelain proud face, her silent strength that both challenged and captivated him.

He clenched his fists.

"President Mo," the police chief finally spoke, cautiously, "based on our preliminary findings… it seems whoever took Madam Mo likely has ties to her family. This feels like an old grudge resurfacing."

The chief was sweating through his collar. Not because of the case, but because of who the victim was. Who would dare lay a finger on Mo Yichen's wife?

Everyone in the capital and beyond knew the man's reputation. Cold and Unforgiving. They called him the devil reincarnate. And now, someone had gone far enough to kidnap his wife. Everyone involved was already feeling the burn of that mistake.

"We should speak with Mr. Xia," added Mo Li, the young captain of Eclipse. His voice was firm, his military-trained posture unflinching. "She sent a distress signal to him. He might know more."

Mo Yichen's gaze darkened. Yes… she had reached out to her father.

Not to him.

She didn't even consider him.

Something inside him, something he didn't even know existed, was cracking. "Go to Xia Mansion," he said coldly, voice low and dangerous.

The room was dimly lit, shadows crawling along the floor of the Xia mansion like they knew what was coming. Xia Jingxuan stood by the grand desk, hands braced on the polished surface, eyes fixed on the grain of the wood. He was too still. The kind of quiet that comes before a storm.

Then, his phone buzzed. A single encrypted message.

Coordinates.

Location Confirmed.

Target: Xia Ruyan. Status: Alive. Not alone. Danger imminent.

His fist clenched. "Prepare the car," he said coldly to the butler standing by the door. "Call Yu Heng. We're going in." Xia Jingxuan emerged from the mansion like a general ready for war; gone was the gentle poetic man, dressed in his long black coat, his expression carved from ice.

The convoy tore through the night like a storm brewed in vengeance. Xia Jingxuan, once a legend in boardrooms and battlefields alike, had long sought peace. He thought they had lost enough. That they had bled enough. That they had finally earned the right to live a quiet, normal life.

That was why they settled here two years ago. But some shadows do not stay buried. And now, those very ghosts, bloody and merciless, had returned. And this time, they dared to come for his daughter.

He had always known a day like this might come. That's why he married his daughter to a man with the power to protect her, to shelter her. But now, as he stood on the edge of fury and despair, he realized the cruelest truth: He had been wrong.

Mo Yichen wasn't her shield. He was her silence. He had trusted the wrong man with his most sacred piece of heart.

The Xia family was no ordinary lineage. Rooted in a century-old legacy, they had once lived in Europe, entangled in both prestige and peril. But a decade ago, Xia Jingxuan had left that life behind for love; his wife, his children. He had chosen family over power.

Yet blood remembers. And blood always collects its debts.

Two years ago, tragedy nearly shattered them. A horror they never speak of. A night that stole their breath.

Since then, they had tried to heal together, slowly and quietly. But now, their very reason for breathing, their sweet girl, had been taken.

So tonight, Xia Jingxuan would not hold back. He would burn the world if he must. He would remind them all: the Xia family bleeds only once.

As their convoy neared the abandoned construction site on the city's edge, his voice cut through the silence, sharp as steel:

"Lights off. No noise. On my signal."

The vehicles skidded to a halt just beyond the structure. The building rose from the darkness like a corpse, half-built, skeletal, with ribs of rusted steel slicing through the sky.

Jingxuan stepped out first. Gun in hand. His calm was deadly, the kind that silences rooms before the storm begins.

Within seconds, his men had surrounded the building, slipping through the shadows like phantoms.

No alarms were triggered. No footsteps echoed. They were the darkness itself.

"Young Miss is on the second floor. Northwest corner," came the whisper through the comm.

"Clear the area," Jingxuan commanded. "Do not alert the enemy."

Yu Heng, his right-hand man, hesitated before stepping forward. "Sir, allow me to handle the rest. Please stay back."

Xia Jingxuan turned to him, eyes cold, voice quiet. "No," he said. "Tonight, I will show them what happens when you lay a hand on my treasure."

And in that moment, it was clear, the origin of Xia Ruyan's stillness, her icy resolve, her unshakable calm, was standing right there, weapon drawn.

The storm had come for his daughter. But now, it would answer to her father.