All Chapters of TIME TO FALL IN LOVE: Chapter 161 - Chapter 170

[The Gilded Ledger]The air in the bedroom turned sweet and heavy, a sickly floral scent that Panni recognized instantly: Aconite mist. It was a traditional Lu-Sheng sedative, refined by the Vane industrialists into a weapon of compliance. Alistair Vane wasn't interested in a fair fight; he was a man who preferred his "assets" docile and ready for the ledger."Jinyan, the vents!" Panni choked out, pressing a silk pillow over Grace’s nose and mouth.Jinyan moved with the desperate speed of a cornered wolf. He didn't go for the door; he knew the iron shutters had turned this luxury suite into a tomb. Instead, he lunged for the heavy mahogany washstand. With a roar of effort that made the tendons in his neck stand out like bridge cables, he hoisted the marble-topped furniture and hurled it at the floor-to-ceiling windows.The reinforced glass didn't shatter—it groaned. The Vane fortress was built to withstand typhoons and revolutions alike."Again!" Panni screamed, her lungs burning.Jin

[The Glass Threshold]The black sedan cut through the neon-soaked rain of Macau like a scalpel. Inside, the silence was suffocating, broken only by the rhythmic click of the windshield wipers—swipe, click, swipe, click—a sound that felt like the ticking of a countdown. Panni sat in the backseat, her body wedged between the unconscious Grace and the man she had called her husband.But Jinyan was no longer sitting like the man she knew. His posture was rigid, his hands resting on his knees with a predatory stillness. The warmth that usually radiated from him—the "Hearth" that had kept her alive through the freezing Carpathian nights and the humid Mekong terrors—had vanished. In its place was a cold, metallic vacuum.She looked at his profile as the neon lights of the Cotai Strip flickered across his face. For a heartbeat, his eyes remained the deep chocolate brown she adored, but then they would shutter, his pupils dilating in a way that wasn't human. It was the look of a man calculatin

[The Golden Roquiem]The rain in Macau did not fall; it judged. It washed over the fractured pavement of the old district, mixing with the soot of coal-fired engines and the spilled oil of shattered clocks. Standing in the center of the deluge, Panni was no longer the fragile Saint Jinyan had pulled from the Carpathian snow. She was something ancient, something elemental. The gold in her eyes pulsed with the rhythm of the city’s hidden machinery, a soft, lethal radiance that made the raindrops steam as they hit her skin.Jinyan felt a primal chill. The "Medea" liquid beneath his skin—once a searing leash—now felt like a dying ember compared to the sun rising within his wife. He stepped toward her, his boots splashing in the rising water, his hands trembling."Panni," he whispered, his voice cracking. "Look at me. Don’t listen to the city. Listen to the hearth. Listen to the promise we made when the world was quiet."Panni turned her head. The movement was slow, regal, and terrifyingly

Jinyan frowned, his mind racing through the legal jargon of their forced union. "The 'Exit Protocol'?""No," Panni whispered, leaning close so only he could hear. "The 'Equilibrium Clause.' If the Saint loses herself to the gold, the Shark must take her hand and drown the sound in his fire. It wasn't a threat, Jinyan. It was an escape."Jinyan realized what she was asking. To stop Silas, Panni had to overload the Regulator. She had to become the "Master Key" at full volume, and Jinyan had to be the "Ground" that absorbed the feedback—a feat that would likely kill them both."I’m not losing you again, Panni," Jinyan said, his voice thick with emotion."You won't lose me," she said, her fingers interlacing with his. "We’re going to rewrite the contract. Right here. In the dark."Silas began to play. The iron flute emitted a high-frequency shriek that made the copper pipes glow white-hot. The Iron Gentry—those who had survived the harbor—descended from the ceiling on chains, their brass

Annie didn't look at Panni. She looked at the floor. "The Kyoto Accord was just a middleman, Panni. I’ve been on Lucien’s payroll since the mountains. Someone had to make sure the 'Equilibrium' happened. Someone had to push you and Jinyan together every time you tried to drift apart.""The cottage," Jinyan rasped, the realization hitting him like a physical blow. "The night the guards found us... that wasn't a mistake. You led them there.""I ensured the trauma was sufficient to trigger the resonance," Annie said, her voice devoid of emotion. "Love needs a catalyst, Jinyan. In your case, it needed the fear of losing her."Panni felt a coldness in her chest that had nothing to do with the subterranean air. Her whole life—the struggle, the pain, the 'Sweet Love' that she thought was her only truth—had been choreographed by a man she didn't even know."Is anything real?" Panni asked, looking at Jinyan.Jinyan stepped close to her, his forehead resting against hers. His skin was still hot