Chapter 1 — My Driver is No. 1 Young Master in the Capital

The afternoon mist was still hanging across the slopes of Bach Thao mountain when Tham Bach Duong knelt in front of her ancestor's shrine, holding a cup of tea with both hands to offer it to her master, whose hair was as white as clouds. For the past fifteen years, every time there was an important matter, she had knelt in this exact position, on the old woven hemp cushion because many generations of Bach Thao Duong descendants had knelt before entering the world.

"Have you looked carefully? The wedding is in three days, I don't want any mistakes." Tham Uy Vien, the former head of Bach Thao Duong, sat on an old rosewood chair, his hand holding an agarwood rosary, his eyes both gentle and unfathomable.

"I've checked Song Huainan's pulse three times this year." Bach Duong replied, her voice calm as if she were narrating a medical case, not her own marriage. "There's nothing unusual about the pulse. This person has no serious illness."

"I didn't ask about the pulse." He shook his head, his voice slow. "I asked if you looked closely at his eyes."

That question made Bach Duong pause for a moment. For twenty-seven years of her life, she was taught to feel the pulse and diagnose diseases, to practice punching and kicking to defend herself, to read every pain in another person's body with accuracy to every moment - but no one had ever taught her how to read the heart of the person she was about to marry.

"Master, what do you mean by that?" She raised her head, her sharp eyes narrowed slightly.

Tham Uy Vien did not answer directly, just waved his sleeve, stood up and walked to the window looking down at the valley below, where the city lights had begun to sparkle in the evening mist. "I've been looking at your love life since you were twenty. The hexagram says that you have to go through a lot of lies before finding your true destiny. The wedding is in three days - I just hope you get off the mountain a little early and see for yourself the villa where you're about to live. Don't wait until the wedding day to find out."

Bach Duong lowered her eyes, feeling that there was something left unsaid in her master's words, but she figured that her master had been like that since childhood - always letting her find the answer herself instead of saying it out loud. She bowed her head and worshiped, then stood up, put on a gray silk robe, and walked out of Bach Thao Duong down the mountain.

The private car took her straight to the villa in the Kim Son area - an engagement gift that Tong Hoai Nam's family had prepared to make a home for the future couple. The lights in the villa were still on even though it was still quite early. Bach Duong got out of the car, used the spare key that Hoai Nam had given her last month, quietly opened the door and walked in, intending to give him a small surprise before the wedding.

The surprise did come — just not in the way she imagined.

The women's giggles echoed from the living room on the second floor, mixed with Tong Hoai Nam's familiar voice, so affectionate that it made Bach Duong's heart cold. She walked up each step, her feet making no sound - years of practicing light martial arts had turned her steps into the silentest weapon. The living room door was ajar, revealing a gap big enough for her to see the entire scene inside.

Tong Hoai Nam was sitting on the sofa, a strange woman - she later learned that her name was Vu Khanh Chi - sat across his lap, her arms around his neck, her lips close to her ear whispering something that made Hoai Nam laugh out loud.

"You're getting married to the Tham family in three days. You still dare to call me here?" Vu Khanh Chi cooed, her fingers playing on his chest.

"Marry for prestige." Tong Hoai Nam sneered, his voice full of contempt. "The Bach Thao Duong family is famous and has seven senior brothers behind it. If I marry a daughter from that family, I won't have to worry about anything in my life. As for real feelings? Of course it's just you."

Each word fell into Bach Duong's ears like a knife cutting into her skin. She had partly guessed - the relationship between her and Hoai Nam had never been passionate, just an arranged marriage between two famous families - but hearing him admit from his own mouth that he had taken advantage of his family's status so blatantly, the anger in her heart flared up like a fire fueled by fuel.

She pushed the door open and walked in without saying a word.

The noise caused them both to turn around in surprise. Vu Khanh Chi screamed, quickly rolled off Hoai Nam's lap, and Tong Hoai Nam's face changed, he stood up, the wine glass in his hand fell to the floor and broke.

"Bach Duong… when did you come? This is not what you think—"

"Not what I thought?" Bach Duong smiled faintly, her voice cold as ice. She walked closer, her eyes swept over Vu Khanh Chi who was frantically pulling at his shirt, then turned to look straight at Hoai Nam. "You just said you'll get married in three days for status. You said it very clearly, I heard it very clearly, there's no need to explain anything further."

"Bach Duong, calm down—"

"I'm very calm." She interrupted, her voice not shaking at all. This is exactly what the master wants her to see for herself - love life is not a disease that needs to be cured, but a truth that needs to be faced. "So calmly that I can tell you right now, the wedding will not take place in three days."

Having finished speaking, she took off the engagement ring on her hand, placed it firmly on the tea table, then turned and walked out of the villa, ignoring Hoai Nam calling after her.

Coming to the gate, the anger in Bach Duong's heart still had not subsided. The night wind blew past, causing her gray silk robe to flutter, but it was not enough to extinguish the fire burning in her chest. For twenty-seven years, she lived according to the rules of a descendant of the Bach Thao Tang — studying medicine to save people, practicing martial arts to defend herself, accepting an arranged marriage for the good of the family — and in return, what did she get? A fiance openly admitted that he only married her for status, while his heart was completely devoted to someone else.

"Very well, Tong Hoai Nam." She muttered to herself, pulled out her phone, her fingers quickly scrolled across the screen to open the ride-hailing application that her seven senior brothers often teased was a "modern toy" she had recently learned to use. "Do you think I need status from a marriage with you? I'll show you, I don't need that much."

The first car to receive identification arrived within a few minutes — an ordinary black sedan, nothing special except for the application sign stuck on the windshield. Bach Duong opened the back door, plopped down on the chair, her whole body still shaking from unresolved anger.

"Hello, where are you going?" The driver in the driver's seat turned back and asked, his voice was so warm and polite that it made people pay attention. His face in the dim streetlight had unusually sharp features, his deep eyes seemed to contain a mysterious sky, completely unlike the normal technology drivers she had met.

Bach Duong looked at him for a long time, a crazy idea suddenly flashed in her mind. She had just announced the annulment of her marriage to a man who betrayed her - so why not immediately prove to both the Tong family and the Tham family that she did not need anyone's arrangements?

"What's your name?" She asked, her voice still filled with anger.

The driver was a bit surprised by the unusual question, but still answered. "My name is Tan."

"Mr. Tan." Bach Duong took a deep breath, her eyes steadily looking straight into the rearview mirror where the strange man's deep eyes were reflected. "I have a proposal. Do you want to marry me?"

The air in the car froze within seconds. The driver named Tan tightened his grip on the steering wheel, his eyes flashed with something difficult to name - not quite surprise, not quite wariness, but like a calculation running very fast in his head, weighing the pros and cons of an unbelievably strange proposal.

"Are you kidding?" He asked again, his voice still surprisingly calm.

"I'm not joking." Bach Duong replied, her voice stronger than ever. "I just broke off my marriage with my fiance because I caught him cheating. I need a husband, as quickly as possible, to prove to those who despise me that I don't need their arranged marriage. I will pay you well, have a clear contract, three months. After that, everyone goes their separate ways, no further obligations."

The man named Qin was silent for a long time, the streetlight passing by his face step by step, revealing a deep contemplation that was completely unsuitable for the appearance of a normal technology driver. Finally, he slowly nodded, his deep eyes shining with a light whose meaning Bach Duong could not guess.

"Okay." He said, his voice unusually calm. "I agree."

Bach Duong did not know that, just as she made that impulsive proposal in anger, she accidentally stepped into a chess game bigger than anything she could have imagined - a chess game that the man sitting in front of the steering wheel had been secretly preparing for many months, and a random marriage proposal in the middle of the night was the most perfect piece that fate had placed in his hands.