Ju Ran dressed up impressively for the gathering.
From early in the morning, she took perfect care of her hair, makeup, and nails.
On top of that, she wore a dress and cardigan from brand C that she usually treasured, a limited edition handbag from brand H, and pearl earrings and necklace from brand M. She was wrapped in luxury from head to toe.
Today was the day for the monthly regular meeting of the ‘Emerald Club.’
The Emerald Club, which began as a casual gathering of upperclass ladies, had become the representative social gathering of powerful women involved in politics and business. It served as an important channel for discussing the marriage of upperclass children or business matters.
It wasn’t difficult to attend a meeting or two, but being a member wasn’t easy.
It was a place with a more intense atmosphere than any other political or business circle.
A place where if a rumor got out of hand, it could bury you in an instant.
That place was the ‘Emerald Club.’
At C&C, there was a hostess named Kim Ji Won, but in reality, Mrs. Kim Ji Won was involved in running a subsidiary company, and she hadn’t even attended such social gatherings for the past five to six years.
Ju Ran saw this gap and seized the opportunity. For the past five years, she had been attending these social gatherings as if she herself was the hostess of C&C.
Including the Emerald Club, there were three to four different gatherings, and no matter what happened, Ju Ran didn’t miss any of them.
It wasn’t enough to just have money to be considered upper class.
She had to secure a position within the social circle. That’s how one truly becomes a winner.
However, when Ju Ran first attended the gatherings, people did not welcome her at all.
It was understandable. Even though Kang Ju Ran came from a family within the top 30 conglomerates, there was indeed a separate hostess, and Kang Ju Ran was merely the woman who gave birth to Chairman Cha’s eldest son.
He might not be registered on the family registry, but who knew if Chairman Cha might have other sons out there?
Such incidents were commonplace in this world.
If they accepted everyone like that, it would tarnish the reputation of this social gathering, the highest in both name and reality.
Kang Ju Ran vividly remembered the blatant scorn and the atmosphere when she first attended the Emerald Club meeting.
“Is she crazy? Where does she think she is showing up here?”
“No, she should just quietly live in the back, taking money. What connections is she trying to make here? Does she think anyone will even talk to her?”
“I wouldn’t dare to show up even if I had a face of steel. Well, that’s probably why she snatched Chairman Cha from Mrs. Kim Ji Won’s house.”
“We can’t be misunderstood as the same kind by speaking with her, so we absolutely mustn’t.”
Even if they didn’t outright say it, their words heard from a distance, their gazes, all told Ju Ran, ‘You don’t belong here.’
But she didn’t care at all.
Where Kim Ji Won was absent, it was her world.
If she had intended to cower at those gazes, those backbitings, she wouldn’t have started in the first place.
The night she spent her first night with Chairman Cha Seung Jo, the day she sneaked into that room, Kang Ju Ran made a promise to herself.
“I will seize the opportunity, and I will never go back to the past. This house, the title of being the hostess of C&C, all of it will be mine. I will definitely do it. Just watch!”
With this determination, she had been enduring all this time and was achieving it one by one.
‘Someday, I’ll become the hostess of C&C, and it’ll be useless for you to grovel at me.’
But there was something Ju Ran didn’t know.
The shift in the gaze towards her was not due to her efforts.
The change in her image and assessment began when her son, Cha Min Woo, married Eun Ji Yeon, the third daughter of Onyu Pharmaceuticals.
Onyu Pharmaceuticals was solid, including its subsidiaries, and had a good corporate image with many charitable activities.
The reputation about Ji Yeon, who was of marriageable age, was also good, and many corporate mothers tried to connect their sons with her.
And now Eun Ji Yeon from Onyu Pharmaceuticals was marrying Cha Min Woo.
Thanks to that, the image of Cha Min Woo and Kang Ju Ran changed.
In a word, it was an increase in Kang Ju Ran’s stock.
“It seems Chairman Cha Seung Jo is pushing his youngest son, hence Onyu Pharmaceuticals becoming the inlaws.”
“If he gets a dowry from Onyu Pharmaceuticals, he will quickly grow bigger, isn’t he going to become the next chairman?”
“Thanks to her accomplished son, Kang Ju Ran might soon become the hostess of C&C, right?”
These were the kinds of gazes.
Three years ago, her son’s wedding increased Ju Ran’s influence in the Emerald Club, and she occasionally took on key roles in the club.
In particular, in the Emerald Club, there were occasionally people like Ju Ran who weren’t original wives or who came in as later wives, and among these groups, she played the role of a big sister and claimed leadership.
The Male lead Always Seduces Her with His Beauty (Matriarchy)
Xin Jiao Zhou is the leader of the world’s premier sect. She has just experienced betrayal from all sides, was poisoned in an assassination attempt, and faced death squad attacks while the poison was taking effect. After finally clearing out the scum from her sect, she was drugged again while trying to detoxify.
After waking up from a night of unconsciousness, she gained a “beautiful and kind-hearted” husband.
Xin Jiao Zhou: “???”
He fell ill.
She came to see him, bringing breakfast.
As she put down the breakfast and was about to leave, his hand slipped while holding the spoon. “Clank!”
She turned around upon hearing the noise.
He looked up at her, his eyebrows drooping: “My hand… has no strength.”
“Shall I… feed you?” she asked tentatively.
He opened his mouth cheerfully: “Ah—”
Thinking she was drowning, he jumped in without hesitation to save her, but nearly drowned himself. In the end, it was she who swam over to rescue him, giving him air underwater.
After emerging from the water, his ear tips turned red. He lightly brushed his cheek, tucking his sideburns behind his ear, revealing delicate, pink-tinged ear tips. He lowered his gaze, too embarrassed to look at her.
Xin Jiao Zhou: He’s truly beautiful, kind-hearted, and adorable.
A certain someone when disciplining subordinates behind the scenes: “If they don’t obey, just kill them.”
What’s that? She might already have someone she cares about in her heart? A certain someone: Find out who it is, kill them, and then there won’t be anyone.
What? She met a man by the riverside? What? That man even hurt her? A certain someone: Whichever hand hurt her, chop off his entire arm.
Love at first sight without realizing it, gradually falling in love, slowly getting closer…
Family and national grudges, schemes and desires, good and evil, crime and punishment, she and he face the future together, seeking justice with passion!
A naturally dark female lead who could accidentally destroy the world but is actually an honest person VS a weak, pitiful, and helpless but skilled fighter, beautiful white-cut black male lead
My heart is not of stone, how steadfast is your love? — Tao Yuanming “Imitating the Ancients (No. 3)”
— Reading Guide —
Cold female lead & dramatic black lotus with hidden yandere traits male lead
