Chapter 258

When people face the world, they are often structuralists. Experience shapes the way humans think, making them cautious and suspicious when encountering completely new things. But if it is a similar event they have encountered before, the brain tends to directly replace some steps with preconceived premises.

This is the nature of prejudice.

The more experiences someone has, the more seasoned they become in handling matters, while also falling into the trap of experiential fallacy. These people are most susceptible to the inducement of prejudiced experiences.

When Shen Yue first appeared before Si Chengyou, she was just a clumsy little girl with a bit of cunning who couldn’t even brew a proper cup of tea. She was only 15 years old and with Shen Hui as the attention-grabbing target ahead of her, as long as she behaved ordinarily, even if Si Chengyou felt something was off, he wouldn’t be able to find the reason. After all, the information he currently possessed was ultimately insufficient.

And by the time Si Chengyou was certain in his mind that Shen Yue was just a kid trying to get her brother’s affection by being a little sly here and there, Shen Yue had already positioned herself high above, in an ignorable spot.

Meanwhile, the abilities Shen Yichen displayed made Si Chengyou look on him differently, once again covering up Shen Yue’s existence from another angle.

Shen Yue had her own plans in mind. She was very afraid at first, afraid to think about what she should do.

In her opinion, everything that the “Shen Yue” in prison had experienced was unrelated to her. Even if the world perished, it wasn’t something she alone could resolve.

Everything she did after recalling her memories was out of self-preservation, without any meaning.

But after she interacted with Shen Hui, after those memories about Shen Hui became feelings of her real existence, she changed her mind.

She also realized why the Shen Hui in her memories treated her so well, because they were the same person.

Shen Hui seemingly cared for “Shen Yue” when in fact she was caring for herself, “Shen Hui”.

She saw "Shen Yue" as another version of herself, hoping that she could walk out of the nightmare for herself.

Just like what the present Shen Yue wanted to do for Shen Hui now. She wanted Shen Hui to live a normal life.

With Shen Hui’s knowledge and abilities, she could easily climb to even higher and more dazzling places instead of walking towards destruction through self-destruction.

And once Shen Hui reached that height, she could also completely free herself from the shackles of memory and become her true self.

To achieve this goal, Shen Yue must leverage Si Chengyou’s power.

Not mission results reported layer by layer through Third Brother, but things she must insist Si Chengyou do through direct dialogue.

The premise for dialogue to be effective is that two people stand on equal footing. Clearly Shen Yue was incapable of that at present. All she could do was temporarily maximize the disparity she carried so Si Chengyou would doubt his prejudged verdict of her.

Shen Yue saw Si Chengyou look her way after drinking the tea she prepared and knew she had already succeeded halfway.

What followed next was the normal dinner time. During the meal, Shen Yue demonstrated her powerful command capability, specifically reflected in:

Stopped Shen Wu from slipping laxatives into Shen Hui’s bowl three times.

Prevented Shen Hui from putting some strange gadgets on Shen Wu four times.

Thwarted Shen Shuangchen who secretly wanted to pour the medicinal cuisine into Shen Shuangyi’s bowl once.

Comforted Fourth Brother once when scalded soup made him cry uncontrollably.

Humored Second Brother's request for praise twice.

Casually asked about big brother's stomach to ease his mind so he could eat properly once.

Although there were many people at the table, ever since he drank the cup of tea Shen Yue brewed that was almost perfect, Si Chengyou’s mind couldn’t shift away from Shen Yue.

It was true that Shen Yichen could suppress Shen Hui, but that suppression was temporary. Once Shen Hui grew up enough to leave the Shen family, that suppression would cease to exist.

The one who truly tamed Shen Hui was Shen Yue.

And when he met Shen Yue’s eyes earlier, Si Chengyou clearly felt that he had become a pawn under this girl in front of him too. This feeling was inexplicable, with no discernible reason, stemming purely from intuition honed by experiencing danger countless times.

Si Chengyou decided to find an opportunity to talk with Shen Yue alone.

One meal had Si Chengyou’s thoughts in turmoil. He even suspected Shen Shuangchen had schemed against him deliberately but soon regained his reason.

In theory, a 15-year old girl really couldn’t emanate such oppressiveness, but there were precedents. Shen Hui was the most typical example.

If Shen Hui were the Shen family’s daughter, and Shen Yue was the same age as Shen Hui, then... were they fraternal twins? Or...

A possibility struck Si Chengyou and his heart skipped a beat. Having finally finished the meal, Si Chengyou didn’t seek out Shen Yue to talk as originally planned. Instead, he left first.

Upon returning to the Si family, he immediately ordered Shen Yue’s profile, from birth to age 15. Si Chengyou went through all of Shen Yue’s experiences and eventually kept a few documents.

One of them was the variety show Shen Yue guested on at 12. It contained Shen Yue’s approach to disarming pineapple bombs and the essay she wrote back then on how to occupy a village.

Pineapple bombs were relatively outdated explosives that could still be found in some mission sites but there would be specialized bomb disposal units to handle those instead of special forces like Shen Shuangchen who had other main missions to carry out, let alone teach them to Shen Yue afterwards.

So where exactly did Shen Yue learn it from?

Si Chengyou also noticed a time - age 12.

In Shen Yue’s life, 12 years old was a dividing line. She hit her head that year.

Cases whereby head injuries lead to drastic change only happen with dissociative identity disorder.

But Si Chengyou believed Shen Yue’s condition was absolutely not simple dissociation.

That night, Si Chengyou didn’t sleep a wink, continuing to peruse Shen Yue’s documents.

Until the next afternoon, Si Chengyou didn’t go to the Shen house but went directly to Shen Yue’s school instead. Taking advantage of Shen Yue's gym class, he leveraged his privileges to summon her to the principal's office to talk, alone.

When Shen Yue came to the principal's office and pushed the door open to find not the principal inside but Si Chengyou instead, she knew she had succeeded.

She had already obtained the right to hold dialogue with Si Chengyou. In that case, she had to take command.

Because the other party was Si Chengyou.

Shen Yue said straight out, “Si Chengyou, Shen Hui needs your rescue.”