Against the Algorithm

Chapter 51: When the World Went Quiet

Summary: In the stillness that follows revelation, truths are read in silence, and legacies long hidden rise to the surface—carried not with noise, but with reverence. As one name reshapes everything, the weight of it nearly breaks her. But love, spoken through touch instead of words, holds her steady. And in the quiet, where no one demands anything of her, she finally begins to rest.

Chapter Fifty-One

The room was silent again, still thick with the emotions left behind by four letters that had each, in their own way, peeled open something deep—something old and buried.

Yao had not spoken since reading her mother's words. Her fingers had trembled once, and Sicheng had tightened his grip over her hand, anchoring her, grounding her. Lan stood quietly to the side, unreadable, but her eyes never left Yao. Sheng had pulled Yue into a rare moment of stillness, his hand resting lightly on his younger son's shoulder.

But now—there was one box left.

The fifth.

It sat quietly at the end of the table, as if it had waited patiently for the others to be opened first, knowing that whatever it held would come last because it would change everything.

Yao reached for it slowly. Her fingers curled around the latch. And the moment it clicked open, she could tell—this wasn't sentimental, or softly wrapped in emotion.

This was business.

Power.

Inside were ledgers. Dozens of them.

Tightly bound, meticulously kept. The paper was newer than what she'd found in the fourth box, but the handwriting on the notes tucked between entries— still her mother's. Dates ran up to the very year her mother had died, and even after, other handwriting picked up the mantle, still following her mother's instructions, still adding pages.

Yao flipped slowly through them. At first, it was typical—market holdings, property portfolios, real estate ventures. More corporate assets. Then international names started appearing. Brands she recognized. A few her mother had mentioned once, vaguely. Some she had never heard of. But then—halfway through a leather-bound ledger sealed with red ribbon—she stopped breathing.

There it was.

Riot Games.

League of Legends.

Her eyes widened, scanning the ledger again.

It wasn't just a small investment. It wasn't a few thousand shares tucked into a corner account.

It was majority holding.

Acquired quietly over years, positioned under a corporate veil that masked it beneath a layered structure of companies—all legal, all clean. All pointing back to her mother's estate.

She turned the page.

And there—another name hit her like ice poured through her veins.

Tencent.

The parent company.

She flipped again, and saw more—more evidence, more notarized pages detailing that this wasn't just an accidental inheritance. This had been intentional.

Riot was under Tencent, yes.

But Tencent... belonged to the estate.

Belonged to her.