(More than one love interest) [BL, corruption, revenge, dark themes, powerful seme]
In an age ruled by money and power, everyone is both a pawn and a player.
The top financial families make the rules, while the lowly struggle through their assigned roles.
And he was lower than even the lowliest.
Yun Jiu, the illegitimate son the Jiang family kept hidden from the world.
His mother tried to use the child in her womb to blackmail a wealthy family. Instead, she vanished without a trace.
As an infant, he was dumped at the Jiang residence, where for eighteen years he was treated like a “thing” that even the servants could beat and berate at will.
At eighteen, his biological father packaged him up and gave him away like a piece of merchandise.
From the side residence to underground clubs, from the torture chambers of the powerful to pitch-black punishment rooms, he was trampled again and again. His only friend died before his eyes, and he wasn't even allowed to cry.
He named himself An Jiu and swore to climb to the very top.
He used his looks to open doors, his wits to stay alive, and everyone who had ever hurt him as a stepping stone. Some gave him an identity, some drew him into their schemes, and some gave everything for him. He accepted it all without hesitation, never refusing and never making promises.
The man at the pinnacle of power asked him, “What is it you really want?”
He said, “I want to make sure no one can ever step on me again.”
In the end, he succeeded. His enemies knelt in droves, and the powerful rushed to curry favor with him.
But standing atop Golden Bay, he realized he had long forgotten how to smile.
He repaid every slight in full and every kindness in kind, yet he owed one person his heart and spent his whole life trying to repay it.
As the shadows vanished one by one, those who had once looked down on him were forced to meet his gaze. Standing at the highest point in the city, he suddenly realized that it had been a long time since anyone had called him by his original name.
