"If it was me, this would never happen. If only I wasn't too late, you wouldn't have to die like this."

The tears that spilled from his eyes shocked Su Xiaofei. She hadn't expected that in her last moment, he would suddenly show up. Lu Qingfeng, the little boy who used to follow her around when they were younger, was now a handsome young man.

Su Xiaofei lifted a hand and cupped the side of his face. She could feel her eyes stung with tears now. She thought that she would die a lonely death, without seeing anyone, but as she looked at Lu Qingfeng's teary eyes, she felt a warmth that she hadn't felt for such a long time.

"If you were mine, I'd protect you from everyone." Lu Qingfeng continued.

These were the words she had longed to hear from her wretched husband. And yet, here's another man saying the exact words her heart yearned to hear.

"Don't cry, Lu Qingfeng." She told the young man. "It's big sister's own fault that she ended up like this."

He was a man and yet he was shedding tears for someone like her. However, Su Xiaofei never thought that it was a weakness on his part. Lu Qingfeng might be a man, but he was still a human who knew how to feel hurt and sad.

Su Xiaofei's heart ached as she looked at him. Here she was, on her deathbed, abandoned by her own husband as he took everything from her while he cheated on her with her father's real daughter.

In the first year of their marriage, she thought that she and Mo Yuchen got along perfectly well. However, in the end, all of it was just his perfect scheming to get her mother's wealth and her inheritance.

Five years of marriage, and all of it was for nothing. She fell into the intricate trap and schemes of the man she thought loved her dearly and Ye Mingyu, her father's real daughter.

If only she could turn back time, she vowed not to make the same mistakes again. Alas, there was nothing else for her to do but to accept her end. If only she hadn't been blinded by love, she wouldn't end up like this.

"Su Xiaofei, I beg you don't die on me." Lu Qingfeng begged with tears flowing down his handsome face. "I wouldn't have any reason to live if I lost you too." He said as he lowered his head, his grasp on her hand tightening as he continued to cry.

"It's so unfair." He continued, "if only I was born a little earlier than you. If only I wasn't too young to stand next to you."

"Lu Qingfeng, what does your age have to do with all of this?" She asked softly, not sure what her childhood friend meant by his words.

"Everything." Lu Qingfeng lifted his head and stared at her pale face. "You wouldn't have fallen into the Mo Yuchen's scheme and married him, if only I was born a little earlier. The place beside you should be mine, not his."

"You…" Su Xiaofei stared at him in confusion. Why was he saying this?

As if knowing what was going on in her mind, Lu Qingfeng smiled bitterly.

"Because I love you."

The moment Su Xiaofei heard those words, she felt like all her remaining defenses collapsed at that very instant. Tears began to roll down her cheeks uncontrollably as she continued to stare at him.

Next to her, Lu Qingfeng felt pain as he saw tears fall from her eyes. He placed his hand on top of her hand and shook his head. He spoke to her in a gentle voice, telling her that none of this was her fault.

The same voice that reminded Su Xiaofei of the times when Lu Qingfeng would drop everything he was doing, no matter how important it was, to come and accompany her, assuring her like what he was doing today.

She had been a fool to believe that what she and Lu Qingfeng had was only an affection between siblings. She had been a damn fool not to notice that he cared deeply about her, making him feel helpless and miserable at the same time.

"Why? Why didn't you tell me?"

Lu Qingfeng only smiled. He didn't answer her. She should know the answer to her question anyway. Because of her obsession with Mo Yuchen, she had been blinded and had ignored the things that had nothing to do with Mo Yuchen.

Su Xiaofei understood his silence and it only made her cry more.

'You're such a Goddamn fool, Su Xiaofei.' She scolded herself inwardly.

"It doesn't matter. What's important now is for you to recover, okay?"

She shook her head. The doctors told her that she wouldn't be able to live much longer. Her days were already numbered. The poison that Ye Mingyu had fed her for years had caused irreversible damage to her body. Even if she survived, she would forever suffer chronic pain that would never go away.

"It's already too late now, Lu Qingfeng. There's no hope for me, but you still have your whole life ahead of you."

"No. No. No." Lu Qingfeng refused to let her go. "Xiaofei…"

"I cannot be by your side anymore, so you must take good care of yourself. Don't cause your grandfather any more troubles in the future, okay?"

Lu Qingfeng nodded absentmindedly as he continued to cry next to her. She was lecturing him once again, but he'd already tuned out her words. She would never understand that he cannot be without her.

"In the future, find a woman who will truly love you. Who'll never hurt you like I did and would cherish your feelings. When you find her, be good to her and live a good life with her, understand?"

If only she could return to the past, she would do everything in her power to not only to protect herself and her mother, but also Lu Qingfeng's heart.

Su Xiaofei thought that the moment she died, she wouldn't be able to see the end of the cheating couple who harmed her and family. She hadn't even expected that she would witness her own funeral. What kind of torture was this? She wondered.

Hadn't she suffered enough from her past life? Why are the deities forcing her to watch the events that took place after her death?

Just as she expected, not so long after Lu Qingfeng found her, she died peacefully in her sleep. Her last thought before she succumbed into darkness was how pathetic she had been, arguing and competing with Ye Mingyu arrogantly, not knowing that she wasn't the real daughter of the Su family.

But she didn't expect that in the end, she was the villainess whom everyone hated for her viciousness and arrogance. Because she had always been a pampered and spoiled child, Su Xiaofei had often forced people to do her bidding, never knowing how to repent and had been a proud woman all her life.

The moment she regained her consciousness, Su Xiaofei found herself standing in front of her tombstone. As expected, even in her death, her father's shadow couldn't be seen anywhere. Perhaps it was for the better. She didn't want that homewrecker and Ye Mingyu to shed crocodile tears at her funeral.

She resented her father for marrying her mother for money. Yun Qingrong, her adoptive mother, had loved her father deeply. But in the end, what did her mother receive? Her mother died with a grieving, lonely heart, leaving Su Xiaofei on her own.

Just a month after her mother's funeral, her father had the audacity to marry the homewrecker and lived with her lavishly using her mother's wealth. Su Xiaofei had no doubt that her father, along with the homewrecker and Ye Mingyu were celebrating her death.

Living with those three after her mother's death, Su Xiaofei felt like an outsider while they pretended to be a happy family. In the end, she realized that the only family that cared for her was her adoptive mother.

Everyone painted her as the arrogant sister who kept bullying Ye Mingyu and she was the wicked witch who dared to step in between her sister and her lover. Ha. How could they ignore the fact that she was Mo Yuchen's fiance and it was Ye Mingyu who stole her man?

In front of her tombstone, there was only one person who hadn't left even after the funeral had ended. Lu Qingfeng stood with a pair of listless eyes as he stared at the inscription of her name. This once handsome young man who had always paid attention to cleanliness, remained standing under the rain.

Su Xiaofei fisted her hands on her side. She was already dead. What could she possibly do to help this young man be happy again? Did she really have to witness how the others continue living their lives happily after her death?

Lu Qingfeng was younger than her by three years. At the time of her death, Lu Qingfeng was already twenty-five and yet, here he was, putting the remains of the woman he loved to rest while other men his age just started to consider starting a family of their own.

The next scenes were blurry for her. Su Xiaofei wasn't sure how many months or years had passed, but as she witnessed Lu Qingfeng kicking her father's family out of her mother's home, she noticed that he had aged and was unrecognizable.

"Mr. Lu! Why are you doing this? This is also our late Xiaofei's home! How could you evict us from our own house?! What do you think Feifei would think if she knew what you've done to her family?" Su Haoran asked Lu Qingfeng with a pale expression on his face.

"That's precisely why I have to eradicate the pests and termites like you. As to whether or not Xiaofei would be pleased with my actions, only she has the right to reprimand me." Lu Qingfeng said with a viciousness that Su Xiaofei had never seen on him when she was alive.

If looks could kill, Su Haoran and his family would have dropped dead from the intensity of Lu Qingfeng's hatred towards them.

To think that the young boy who used to nag and follow her around when they were younger had become a tyrant after her death. Su Xiaofei felt guilty for turning into this person she's looking at. Lu Qingfeng wasn't a chatty person, in fact, he was cold to everyone around him, except for his grandfather and Su Xiaofei.

Night time came and Su Xiaofei still found herself in the mansion where she used to live with her mother. She saw Lu Qingfeng returning past midnight with an urn in his hands and climbing up the stairs silently before stepping inside her bedroom.

Why did he come to her bedroom? Did he kick out her father and snatch back the Bluemedia, her mother's company to avenge her death? Not only that, he also went head to head and destroyed Golden Star Entertainment, which was owned by Mo Yuchen's family.

Su Xiaofei knew he had done all of it for her sake. If not, why would Lu Qingfeng target her enemies and destroy the man who hurt her the most?

Lu Qingfeng didn't have to do this, but Su Xiaofei would never understand that he had never cared about other people except for her. Since Su Haoran, Ye Xing, Ye Mingyu and Mo Yichen were the ones responsible for his beloved's death, he was willing to send them to the afterlife if needed.

"Xiaofei, your mother is home now. Are you happy?" He asked as he held the photo of her that was on the bedside table with the same helpless and miserable look he had the last time they were together.

Why did her heart ache so much when she was already dead? Why couldn't Lu Qingfeng let go of her despite the fact she'd asked him to move on and love another woman?

Lu Qingfeng had decided to live in her mother's mansion and every night, he would return home and enter her bedroom, holding the photo of her as he slept. At first, Su Xiaofei was confused. She had never thought her death would affect Lu Qingfeng like this. She didn't understand why he chose not to move on after her death when she had already told him to do so.

He kept everything in her bedroom in the same spot she left them before her death, only allowing the servants to change the sheets of the bed where he slept at night. This continued, and Su Xiaofei had no other choice but to watch him as a ghost.

Another year had passed, and it was her birthday. Lu Qingfeng returned that night with her favorite blueberry cheesecake he had bought from her favorite pastry shop. He sang her a very happy birthday, but his eyes were misty as he stared at her photo.

Su Xiaofei wanted to ask him why, wanted to console him, but all she could do was watch the events unfold in front of her eyes.

Years later, she heard the news that her father and Ye Xing had died in a car accident, with Ye Mingyu eventually getting a divorce after years of blissful marriage with Mo Yuchen. Perhaps, it was because Lu Qingfeng had destroyed and taken everything from Mo Yuchen to the point that the latter never got the chance to recover.

Su Xiaofei didn't know what happened to her sister after that. Not that she was interested anyway. To think that she wasn't able to give them the fatal blow herself was something she regretted the most.

Lu Qingfeng didn't need to do all of these for her sake, but she would be a liar if she didn't admit that she wasn't moved by his efforts. No one but him had gone to that extent for her sake.

Meanwhile, Lu Qingfeng remained unmarried as he lived in Yun Mansion, accompanied by his trusted assistant and a few servants. Su Xiaofei couldn't understand why he never got married.

Why did he turn down all those young women who chased after him because of his otherworldly face that could topple the most popular actors in showbiz and his value as the wealthiest bachelor in the country?

He could get any woman he liked, and yet he chose to remain unmarried. Su Xiaofei thought that he was wasting his time grieving over her death. It had been years since she had died, but the listless eyes remained on Lu Qingfeng.

Su Xiaofei had never assumed that his feelings for her ran this deep, that even after her passing, Lu Qingfeng couldn't let go and move on with his life without her. Guilt consumed her entirety, but she was helpless and was unable to do anything for Lu Qingfeng.

Why couldn't he meet another woman who could sweep him and make him fall in love again? No matter how many women Lu Qingfeng met, none of them seemed to be able to catch his eye.

After years of succeeding the Lu Corporation, taking over several companies under his management, Lu Qingfeng became renowned for his wealth and became a mogul of the business world, which frightened many people.

But why did he choose to remain single even after her death? He had already sought vengeance for her. Wasn't this enough for him to move on?

"Idiot." Su Xiaofei said and sobbed as she looked at Lu Qingfeng who had chosen to keep himself busy with work than to join others at the celebration of Lu Corporation's founding anniversary.

The following year, Lu Qingfeng adopted a young boy, a distant relative of his, whose parents had died in an accident. Since he had already made up his mind not to marry in this lifetime, he had chosen to become a good father to someone else's child.

Lu Junjie was only five years old when Lu Qingfeng took him in. He had made sure to give the boy the best things he would need and raised him as his successor, much to Lu Qingfeng's other relatives' disappointment. None of them were willing to accept that Lu Qingfeng would rather take in a child than to choose one of them as his successor.

Su Xiaofei scoffed at that. It was because they were incompetent that Lu Qingfeng never considered them. However, everyone knew that Lu Qingfeng wasn't to be provoked. Although he was indeed good-looking and coveted by many women, not many would dare go near him.

Had he married and had a child of his own, none of this would matter. Su Xiaofei thought. She found it foolish for Lu Qingfeng to remain unmarried because of her. He still had a life to live after her death, why did he throw all those chances and choose to grieve her death to this day?

"If it isn't you, then I'd rather stay single for the rest of my life." He once said as he held her photo late at night. Lu Qingfeng had just turned down several marriage proposals and arrangements for him that day, insisting that none of the women would be able to capture his heart.

"My heart died along with you, Su Xiaofei."

Su Xiaofei remained by Lu Qingfeng and the young boy's side for the following years, watching the boy grow up until he was old enough to succeed Lu Qingfeng. Even when Lu Qingfell fell sick, she remained on his side, watching as he refused to get treatments.

Finally, the day came and Su Xiaofei found herself standing next to Lu Qingfeng's deathbed. This man, who had devotedly loved her with all his might, remained faithful to her even after her passing, had made her heart ache terribly.

Lu Jinjie had become an outstanding man and a filial child towards Lu Qingfeng. At his adoptive father's funeral, his tears fell uncontrollably.. Next to him, Su Xiaofei stood, her eyes never leaving Lu Qingfeng's name.