Chapter 1 The Prelude (Part One)
Chapter 1 The Prelude (Part One)
It was the middle of 21st century. H City was fully developed and completely in line with the world's
economy. It was possible to consider it as one of the most prosperous cities in all of C Country.
With a large number of assets, abundant funds and talents, ZY Real Estate Industry Group Co., Ltd.
was the most influential and leading enterprise in this city.
The ZY Group mainly engaged in real estate, supplemented by catering, entertainment and game
development. In addition to its own strength, it also had a particularly strong connection with the Qin
Group. The Qin Group was a low-key international family enterprise with a hundred years of business
history, a stable foundation, strong assets and a wide range of businesses. Its subsidiaries and
branches were distributed in major economic cities all over the world, and the ZY Group was one of its
three giants.
The so-called "three giants of the Qin Group" referred to the three subsidiaries. In addition to the ZY
Group, the other two subsidiaries were the CT Group of S City in C Country, and the STAR Group of D
City in R Country. They were different from other branches of the Qin Group. Other than the fact that
they were subsidiaries, they were relatively independent. But the reason why they were so special was
that the presidents of the three subsidiaries were all the Qin Group's family members.
Since Jack Qin, the chairman of the Qin Group, died three years ago, the power of the Qin Group had
been transferred to the madam in charge, Jean Xu.
The president of the ZY Group was Oliver Qin, the second son of Jack and Jean Xu.
The president of the CT Group was Lewis Qin, the eldest son. While the president of the STAR Group
was Ben Qin, the youngest son who had just taken office.
The head office of the Qin Group was originally the CASP Group in A Country. However, not long after
Jack's death, Jean Xu left A Country and stayed in R Country where her youngest son was. In the past
three years, the economic center of the Qin Group had gradually shifted to the STAR Group. After Ben
Qin took over the STAR Group on the board of directors not long ago, the elite managers of the CASP
Group had been transferred to the STAR Group under the arrangements of Jean Xu. Many of the
public guessed that among the three sons, Jean Xu loved her youngest son Ben Qin the most, and
assumed that in the future, he would take over the power of the Qin Group. In C City, A Country...
Although the CASP Group was still the nominal head company, in the near future, everyone had
predicted that Jean Xu would definitely transfer her shares to the STAR Group so that the assets would
be reorganized and thus replacing the status of the head company.
Although such conjectures came out one after another from people's public opinion, Jean Xu herself
had never had such a plan. As for the heir of the Qin Group, Jean Xu preferred it to be her eldest
grandson, Austin Qin.
There were three members of the younger generation of the Qin Group. In addition to Austin Qin, there
were also two granddaughters, Cassie Qin and Clare Qin. Both Austin Qin and Clare Qin were the
children of Oliver Qin. The two of them were more than one year apart. Although they didn't look very
similar, they were both shaped with the excellent genes of their parents. From childhood to adulthood,
Austin Qin and Clare Qin were outstandingly good-looking. Lewis Qin's daughter, Cassie Qin, seemed
to also naturally inherit the "fine appearance" of the Qin family. As for Ben Qin, he was still young and
single, and so he hadn't had a child yet.
Among the three, Austin Qin had the greatest business talent. At the age of 10, he was often brought
along to the meetings of the board of directors by Oliver Qin. By 12 years old, he was able to make his Content from NôvelDr(a)ma.Org.
own opinions and suggestions. When he was 16, he had the ability to manage his own auction
companies behind the scenes.
Cassie Qin, the eldest granddaughter of the Qin family, was the only child of Lewis Qin. She was
beautiful and had a good character. Although she was not interested in business, she was particularly
interested in creating new, innovative inventions. Her biggest dream since her childhood was to be a
scientist. Unfortunately, it was nothing more than just a dream for her.
Clare Qin, the youngest granddaughter among her generation, almost died when she was born, which
frightened the whole family. On the day of her hundred day baptism, Jean Xu specially hired the most
notable fortune-teller to tell what laid ahead for her. "Her good fortune is too much to bear. She might
die for it," the fortune-teller said. "This girl can't live under the protection of the ancestors of the Qin
family before 12 years old, or she will be entangled with all kinds of diseases and die early." In other
words, if Clare Qin wanted to grow up healthily, she couldn't live as a descendant of the Qin family until
she was 12 years old.
Although science ad rational thinking was prevalent in this time, the Qin family still believed in fate. In
order to make sure that their weak and sick granddaughter could grow up safely, Jack and Jean chose
to listen to the advice of the fortune-teller. Therefore, before Clare Qin was 12 years old, her name
hadn't appeared on the Qin family tree, and her family had been keeping the news of her existence
from the outside world.
When she finally turned 12, the Qin family decided to officially recognize her as a family and hold a
press conference to announce her identity. But at that time, Clare Qin had been used to living as an
ordinary person in front of outsiders, so she asked her family to continue to hide her identity until she
reached adulthood. So that year, although the Qin family arranged for her to acknowledge her family in
private, they did not make any public appearances or announcements. Therefore, up to now, in addition
to the Qin Group itself and the people who were particularly familiar with it, the outside world still only
knew that there were Austin Qin and Cassie Qin in the Qin Group, and did not know that the existence
of Clare Qin.
In the Qin family's villa in H City. The summer vacation was coming to an end.
"Brother!" A girl who was about fifteen years old, rushed into Austin Qin's study. She was wearing a
pink cartoon nightdress and a pair of cute sandals with rabbit ears. In her arms was a stuffed toy bear
that was almost as tall as she was. Her dainty, beautiful face was enough to lighten up anyone's mood.
This time, however, there was a sour look on her face. "I'm so upset right now!" she declared.
The young man who was playing online games in front of the computer turned around, looked at the
girl and gently asked, "What's wrong, Clary?" In fact, the moment Austin Qin saw the expression on his
sister's face, he had already guessed what his sister was going to say.
As he expected, the next moment——
"I don't want to be separated from you!" Clare Qin announced loudly, "I hate the end of this summer
vacation!"
Apart from the fact that he was the eldest grandson of the Qin Group, Austin was the most promising
candidate for the inheritance of the Qin Group. What was more, Jean had personally chosen him as the
heir.
Ever since he was in junior high school, Austin's elders had been telling him that he would have to
leave his parents once he had stepped into his second year of senior high school. The plan was that he
would go stay with Jean. There, he would still continue his studies while he was simultaneously
groomed as the group's heir by Jean herself. Everything had been planned out for Austin's life. Clare
had never been separated from her brother for more than a week. Obviously it was hard for her to
accept that he was now moving away.
Seeing his sister, Austin smiled helplessly. He stood up from the chair, walked to her, patted his sister
on the head and did his best to give some comfort. "Don't say wayward words. You won't even notice
that I'm gone! If you miss me, you can call me at any time. Besides, you can also take a plane to see
me during your vacation. Of course, I will come back to see you once my classes are not so intensive."
"No, I don't want you to go away!" Clare insisted.
Then, her lips trembled as she gave a pout. "I feel like you're abandoning me, brother," she continued
in a meek voice.
Abandon.
Hearing this word, Austin couldn't help but touch his forehead and suppress a smile. It was silly for her
to think that he was 'abandoning' her.
Austin always felt that outsiders were deceived by his sister's appearance.
When he was at school, he could always hear some people talking about the famous Clare Qin:
"Beautiful."
"Elegant."
"Smart."
"Calm."
All in all, she was a perfect girl that everyone wanted to be or be with. However, no one could imagine
that this perfect girl was really such a spoiled child at home, especially towards her brother.
The more Austin thought about it...
Well, he had to admit that she was rather cute.