After The Vicious Cannon Fodder Was Reborn

On July 7, 2018, at 10:28 am, Shanghai Yusheng Hotel.

Tao Mu stepped onto the edge of the roof.
It was a hot summer, but the wind from up here was strong and howled noisily.
If one lowered his head slightly, one could see a long line composed of red supercars in the middle of the city of reinforced concrete, like a red dragon weaving along the winding streets to arrive at the hotel.

Tao Mu stared fixatedly at the convoy, eyes seeming to penetrate the cold red metal walls to see Shen Yu and the Shen family sitting in the wedding car.

The cell phone in his pocket kept ringing noisily.
Tao Mu answered the call without any expression on his face.
Da Mao’s crying voice came from the phone as he pleaded: “Brother Mu, I beg you, can we think about it again, don’t be so impulsive——”

“I’m not being impulsive.” Tao Mu lowered his head.
At this vantage point, all living beings appeared like ants under his feet, all the while the wind whistled violently in his ears.
Vaguely, he could see the wedding reception and the crowds arranged down below.

“I’ve thought it over carefully.” Tao Mu said with certainty.
He curved his mouth with some amusement: “Say, what expressions will the Shen family have when they see my dead body?”

He was really curious.
In order to protect an outsider like Shen Yu, the Shen family did not hesitate to place the blame on their blood related son and treat him with indifference.
Would they even regret driving him out of the Shen family once they see his bloody remains.

“Brother Mu——”

Da Mao’s pleading sounded in his ears, but Tao Mu ignored it: “……Speaking of which, I would like to thank you for letting me know.
If it weren’t for you, I would truly be fooled by that son of a bitch Zhuo Yan.
I am really puzzled.
What is so good about a sissy like Shen Yu? Each and every one of them act like they’ve been bewitched whenever they see him.
Say, Zhuo Yan had been with me for three or four years, right? In order to please me, he had given Shen Yu a lot of trouble back then.
So why did he suddenly act like he’s so in love with that little sissy now, and even dare to play at being an undercover agent in my presence?”

“Brother Mu——”

“But it’s okay.
It at least lets me know that there is nothing to miss in this neurotic world.” Tao Mu chuckled lightly.
He really couldn’t understand why everyone he cared about eventually fell in love with Shen Yu, the cuckoo in the nest.

“Why is there nothing to miss? Brother Mu, you are rich and capable and you look so handsome.
There are so many good people waiting for you in this world.
Why hang yourself on such a rotten tree?” (TN: basically means the same as the idiom don’t insist on only taking one road to Rome).
Da Mao pleaded bitterly.
He really didn’t understand why Tao Mu had come to this point: “Where are you, stop making trouble, okay?”

Stop making trouble?!

Tao Mu sneered: “Wang Ye, are you annoyed of me too? You also think I shouldn’t fight with Shen Yu?” But why shouldn’t he, after all, he was the real son of the Shen family.
Everything Shen Yu had should belong to him.
He just wanted to regain his own things, so that Shen Yu, heaven’s favorite son (TN: slang for an unusually lucky person, or a specially privileged person), could also taste the humiliation and suffering he had suffered.
How was it he had become someone guilty of great evil?

Wang Ye was taken aback.
For so many years, Tao Mu had never called him by his full name during a private chat between them.

A deep anxiety arose in Wang Ye’s heart: “I’m not! Don’t change the subject, Tao Mu, you know I don’t hate you.
I won’t hate you in my entire life.
We are good brothers, including Xiao Pang and Feng Yuan.
All of us have always been on your side.”

That’s right.
Tao Mu was willing to believe what Wang Ye said.
But it’s a pity that people who like him do not end up with a good ending.
Maybe the Shen family was right.
That he, Tao Mu, was a disaster star (TN: a comet or supernova viewed as evil portent).
The closer you were to him, the more unlucky you were.

“……Zhuo Yan wanted to frame me for shorting, but I beat him at his own game.
Now it is him who lost more than a billion.
By the way, before I left, I kicked him in the balls.
It is likely that he will spend the rest of his life in jail as a eunuch.
You remember to make the necessary bribes and have Zhuo Yan stay in the same jail cell as Xiao Yuan.
Take it as me helping Xiao Pang get revenge……” (TN: A short sale is the sale of an asset or stock the seller does not own.
It is generally a transaction in which an investor sells borrowed securities in anticipation of a price decline; the seller is then required to return an equal number of shares at some point in the future.)

Tao Mu chuckled and looked up at the scorching sun.
The sun today was also very bright, similar to that sunny day when he first learned that he was the real birth son of the Shen family: “I have 40 million left in my account.
Help me donate ten million to the orphanage’s account.
Also help me give another ten million, and my few properties in Shanghai, to Feng Yuan when he comes out of the prison.
Tell him, it’s my fault, as the big brother I have done many things to disappoint him.
You keep the 20 million left.
The money is not much, so just take it as a little show of brotherhood.
After all, your company has just started.
I can’t help you much.
Also, I have swept the graves of Xiao Pang and the orphanage dean.
You remember to give them a few sticks of incense every Qingming……” (TN: Tomb Sweeping Day is the Chinese day for celebrating the dead)

“Tao Mu!” Wang Ye on the other side of the phone was almost going crazy: “Where are you? Don’t you fucking talk nonsense to me.
I don’t want to listen.
I want to know where you are now?”

“Da Mao,” Tao Mu interrupted Wang Ye: “Since you still treat me as a brother, just listen to my last words.
No one cares when I am alive, so I don’t want to be unhappy even after death.
Remember, in my life, since I was not acknowledged by the Shen family when I was alive, there is no need to enter the Shen family grave either when I die.
Let me rest in a new grave next to Xiao Pang and the dean.
I already bought the cemetery spot myself.”

“Tao Mu!” Hearing Tao Mu’s last words, Wang Ye was furious and frustrated: “Don’t keep bashing your head against a brick wall, okay.
Who says no one cares about you? Who says no one acknowledges you? Actually you don’t even know, the Shen family and Shen Yu care about you very much.
Haven’t you always been curious about how I found out Zhuo Yan betrayed you? Then I’ll tell you, Shen Yu personally told me.”

Tao Mu was startled when he heard this.

Da Mao’s voice came from the other end of the phone: “……Shen Yu said that Zhuo Yan pestered him like crazy and said something crazy like he will get you punished.
Shen Yu was worried about you meeting something bad, so he quietly notified me to alert you.
He was afraid you would be angry, so he sternly told us not to tell you.
And when we were sueing Zhuo Yan, the Shen family and Shen Yu’s friends dug a hole for Zhuo Yan, making it difficult for him everywhere, so that he didn’t have the energy to pay attention to our actions……”

In other words, that Tao Mu was able to successfully counterattack Zhuo Yan, the person who slept on the pillow next to him, was all with the help of Shen Yu and his admirers, and the Shen family who had kicked him out.

“Hahahahaha……” Tao Mu covered his face and laughed out loud.
This Shen Yu, as expected, was still such a Virgin Mary who went around conferring his grace everywhere.
But why did that mean Tao Mu should have to bear Shen Yu’s favor?

“Do you think I should be grateful for his favor?” Tao Mu yelled hysterically on the rooftop: “But don’t forget, if it weren’t for him, Shen Yu, who is a cuckoo that occupied the nest, I, Tao Mu wouldn’t be like this.
It was him who occupied my life, he owes me.
And the Shen family, why still get in my business if they look down on me? It’s because Shen Yu begged them to take action……did they really forget who is their real son?”

A gust of wind blew across the rooftops, and Tao Mu’s heart suddenly tightened, and the pain became suffocating: “You are right, I’m just being stubborn, I just can’t figure it out.
Why do you all like Shen Yu, why should I suffer in Shen Yu’s place? Why is it that whatever Shen Yu does is right while everything I do is wrong? How am I inferior to him?”

Tao Mu was almost roaring and venting by the time he finished speaking.

“Tao Mu——”

“Don’t, I don’t want to hear it anymore.” Tao Mu forcefully threw the phone out.
Looking down the long drop with red eyes, he then took a step forward——

In truth, his whole life had been spent in a muddled way.
The young master who was born with a golden spoon in his mouth was mistaken for someone else because of the negligence of the hospital.
He was then abandoned in a rented apartment by his adoptive mother who couldn’t bear hardship.
Growing up in an orphanage, he finally found his true blood family.
But the Shen family resented him in every possible way.
And even with his love life, that son of a bitch Zhuo Yan could betray him so easily.
Everyone complained that his character was too stubborn and that he didn’t know how to be likeable, saying that he couldn’t see through to the truth, couldn’t afford to lose, couldn’t bear to give up, and couldn’t let go.

But everyone forgot.
What he couldn’t see through was fate; what he couldn’t afford to lose was luck; what he couldn’t bear to give up was blood relati