After I Was Reclaimed, My Biological Parents Became My Stepping-Stones to Success

First, a heads-up for anyone who might want to avoid this.

The male lead isn't perfect, so if you only like stories where both leads have had no previous partners, this one isn't for you. In my opinion, it goes against common sense to expect a successful man of a certain age to remain chaste for the female lead just to suit the plot. It's not as if he lacks the means to find a wife, so how could he reach that age without ever marrying? The same goes for women, of course. The female lead in this story is young for a reason; otherwise, there wouldn't be a story.

Zhou Qingyun was adopted.

She grew up in a poor village.

At eighteen, she got into university. When she couldn't scrape together the tuition, her adoptive parents told her the truth.

With no other choice, she reunited with her biological parents.

The experience of being given up made her especially fixated on being someone's one and only.

From the moment she learned she was adopted, a wound that could never heal was buried deep in her heart, even though her adoptive parents had treated her wonderfully and her biological parents later found her and gave her the love she'd been denied. She was someone who had once been abandoned.

She often told herself: So what if they had their reasons? So what if they had no choice? If they could give her up once because of their circumstances, what about next time? Once could become twice, then countless times.

To her, if she couldn't have someone's exclusive devotion, if they couldn't choose her without hesitation, she'd rather have nothing.

Especially when it came to love, which she didn't need to survive.

She would cut away with her own hands whatever part of her heart didn't belong to her, no matter how much blood she shed or how much pain made it hard to breathe. She would never look back.

Her love was passionate and pure, possessive and unwavering: either wholehearted joy or a complete retreat.