Chapter 48

The Jiang family's lakeside villa was shrouded in the dark night, like a silent beast, ready to devour everything at any moment.

When Jiang Ci returned home, unfortunately, Jiang Cheng and his stepmother Wang Lihua were both there.

The expensive crystal chandelier in the living room cast a cold light, elongating and distorting the shadows of the father and son onto the gleaming marble floor, like two sharp swords about to clash.

Seeing Jiang Ci enter, Wang Lihua greeted him insincerely, "Xiao Ci is back. You're finally back. Your father called you so many times but you didn't answer. We were all worried something had happened to you." She reached out to touch Jiang Ci's arm, but Jiang Ci dodged to the side.

Jiang Ci didn't even glance at her, and silently walked up the stairs.

Jiang Cheng, who had been silent all along, finally spoke, his voice as cold as ice: "Stop."

Jiang Ci did not stop walking.

"Do you think you're so great, that you've done something big that everyone knows about, and that you're some kind of savior?"

Jiang Ci stopped at the corner of the stairs, his back stiff as a statue.

After a long while, as if the anger in his chest had been completely burned away, Jiang Ci turned around and looked at Jiang Cheng across the distance. There was no fear in his eyes, only a cold ashes.

"Did I offend you again by trying to clear my name?" Jiang Ci's voice was eerily calm. "Or is it that I made the Jiang Group trend on social media, affecting your signing of the Linhu New District agreement and causing the Jiang family's stock to drop, so you're finally concerned about me?"

He emphasized the word "concern," each word carrying a barb.

Wang Lihua's expression changed slightly, and she immediately stepped in to smooth things over, lowering her tone even further: "Xiao Ci, why are you talking to your father like that? He was away from home for some important business the other day, but he rushed back to check on you as soon as he finished. Don't always be so hostile towards your father. He is, after all, your father. How could he harm you?" As she spoke, she gave Jiang Cheng a reassuring look, as if to say, "You're just a child, don't take it to heart."

“I’m talking to my dad,” Jiang Ci’s gaze finally fell on Wang Lihua’s face, his gaze like a scalpel, “who are you, an outsider, to interrupt?”

"Jiang Ci! How dare you speak to your aunt like that?!" Jiang Cheng slammed his hand on the table, the mahogany table making a dull thud.

Jiang Ci laughed, but the smile didn't reach his eyes at all; instead, it made his gaze appear icy and piercing. "Auntie? She doesn't deserve it!" He took a step forward, staring at Jiang Cheng, each word crashing into the silent air. "The day my mother died, you were trying on wedding dresses with her at the bridal shop. She was nothing but a mistress who took advantage of my vulnerability. Does she dare to act like an elder in front of me?"

Wang Lihua's face turned deathly pale instantly, then flushed red. Her eyes flashed with venom as she stared at Jiang Ci, but only for a moment. She quickly lowered her head, and when she looked up again, her eyes were brimming with tears. She forced a smile that was both incredibly aggrieved and forcedly magnanimous: "Old Jiang, calm down. The child was just saying things in anger. Don't take it to heart. It was my fault. I shouldn't have said anything."

This tactic of feigning retreat to advance proved effective. Jiang Cheng, even more enraged, pointed at Jiang Ci, veins bulging on his forehead: "Stop bringing up those old grievances! I'm asking you today, do you even think before you act?! I already gave you a chance when I transferred you to this school. If you had just finished your senior year of high school and gone abroad, we could have let what happened two years ago rot in the mud, and no one would have known. Now look what's happened, bringing it up again, making it to the trending topics, and causing the Jiang family's stock to plummet! Do you know how much money the group has lost these past few days? A project worth hundreds of millions almost fell through!"

“So that’s why,” Jiang Ci slowly walked down the stairs and stood in front of Jiang Cheng. The two were now almost the same height, and he could look his father in the eye, which was somewhat cloudy with anger. “You came back because of this.”

A defiant smile even played on his lips: "The day I had a depressive episode and almost died, you left this house with your lover. Now you're back, questioning me about why I'm not content, all because of money?" Jiang Ci's voice suddenly rose, trembling with suppressed emotion: "I want to ask you, doesn't your conscience hurt? Did you wish I had just died that day? Unfortunately, I didn't let you have your way. Not only did I not die, I'm alive and well. You're disappointed, aren't you?"

Snap!

A resounding slap landed hard on Jiang Ci's left cheek.

Five bright red finger marks appeared almost instantly.

Wang Lihua cried out in alarm and rushed forward, grabbing Jiang Cheng's arm. "Old Jiang, why are you hitting the child! Talk it out!" Turning to Jiang Ci, she feigned comfort, her voice trembling with tears. "Xiao Ci, your father didn't hit you on purpose. He was just angry. Quickly, quickly apologize to him, and everything will be alright..."

"Oh."

Jiang Ci tilted his head, his tongue touching the numb lining of his mouth, tasting a hint of rust. He slowly turned his head back, looking at Wang Lihua, whose face was hypocritical yet subtly smug, and at his father, who never felt he had done anything wrong.

"He hit me," Jiang Ci's voice was soft, yet incredibly clear, "and he wants me to apologize? Is there such a thing as a free lunch?"

He turned to leave. Wang Lihua, however, darted forward and blocked his path, grabbing his wrist tightly, her nails almost digging into his skin: "Xiao Ci! It's all my fault, don't let this ruin your relationship with your father, he loves you!"

Jiang Cheng roared from behind, "What did you do wrong! It's all this unfilial son's fault!"

A nauseating sensation came from where his wrist was being gripped. Jiang Ci tried to pull away, but the moment he looked down, his gaze froze—

The jade bracelet on Wang Lihua's wrist, with its excellent translucency and vibrant green color, gleamed with a cold yet dazzling luster under the dim light of the chandelier. He was all too familiar with that luster.

This is my mother's jade bracelet.

On her deathbed, his mother took off the bracelet and handed it to him, saying, "This bracelet is a family heirloom of the Liang family. Keep it safe and we will give it to the person you love in the future."

He personally locked the bracelet, along with several pieces of jewelry that his mother was reluctant to wear, into the small private safe by her bedside.

The mother's withered and empty wrist before her death and the hand in front of me, adorned with a bracelet, well-maintained, and even slightly plump, cruelly overlap and collide in visual perception.

In that instant, all reason, principles, and the bottom line of not hitting women burned to ashes in his chest. A cold, blood-stained rage shot from the soles of his feet to the top of his head.

"This bracelet," Jiang Ci's voice was squeezed out from between his teeth, so cold it could scrape off shards of ice, each word like a poisoned nail, "why is it in your hands?"

Wang Lihua was taken aback by the terrifying anger in his eyes. She subconsciously loosened her grip, a hint of panic flashing across her face, but she quickly suppressed it with her usual hypocrisy: "This...this is your father..."

"I'm asking you! How did my mother's bracelet end up in your hands?!" Jiang Ci suddenly raised his voice, his eyes bloodshot, like a wild beast on the verge of losing control, staring intently at the glaring emerald green on her wrist. It wasn't just a bracelet; it was his mother's keepsake, his last memory of her.

Wang Lihua shuddered at his words, and before she could even gather her thoughts, Jiang Cheng impatiently spoke up, his tone matter-of-fact: "It's just a bracelet! I bought it, do I need your permission to let anyone wear it?"

"You bought this?" Jiang Ci turned sharply to his father, his anger turning into a twisted, desperate laugh. "Jiang Cheng, look closely! This is a family heirloom jade that my grandmother left to my mother!! You couldn't even afford the dowry back then, how could you possibly buy this kind of old mine glass jade?!"

Before he could finish speaking, he had already grabbed Wang Lihua's wrist tightly, with such force that she cried out in pain. His fingers were icy cold, and with a resolute determination, he was about to yank the bracelet off.

"What are you doing! Let go!" Wang Lihua was truly panicked now. This bracelet was not only priceless, but also a symbol of her status as the legal wife; she absolutely could not let Jiang Ci take it away! She struggled desperately, twisting her wrist wildly.

As they pulled, Jiang Ci's fingers gripped the edge of the bracelet tightly.

Seeing that he was about to take the bracelet away, a ruthless glint flashed in Wang Lihua's eyes. Instead of pulling her hand back, she used the force of Jiang Ci's pull to slam her wrist hard against the corner of the hard marble coffee table next to her!

—Snap! Snap!—

A sharp, heart-stopping cracking sound rang out in the deathly silent living room.

The lustrous jade bracelet struck the cold corner of the table and shattered into several pieces, which then slipped from her wrist and clattered onto the gleaming marble floor. The emerald fragments scattered like a pool of frozen, broken lake water, or like a mother's tears that could no longer flow.

Jiang Ci's hand was still frozen in mid-air.

He looked down in disbelief at the glaringly green fragments on the ground. The world seemed to vanish instantly, leaving only the deafening roar of blood rushing to his ears. It wasn't the bracelet that had shattered.

That was the last warmth my mother left in this world, and it shattered.

His heart, too, shattered into countless pieces with that crisp sound, each piece reflecting his mother's empty wrist.

Time stood still for a second.

The next second—

"Smack!!!!!"

A resounding slap, delivered with all its might and echoing throughout the villa, landed squarely on Wang Lihua's face! The force was so great that it created a gust of wind, sending her staggering back several steps until her back slammed against the cold display cabinet. She covered her instantly swollen cheek, her eyes wide with utter shock, forgetting even her feigned tears and pretense, leaving only the most real, burning pain and disbelief.

The room was deathly silent. Only the howling wind outside the window and the cold, silent reflection of the jade fragments on the floor could be heard.

Jiang Ci slowly shook his numb, even slightly stinging, hand. He looked at the clear five-finger mark that quickly appeared on Wang Lihua's face, and at the emotions that flashed through her eyes like a revolving lantern—shock, pain, humiliation, disbelief, and a hint of smug satisfaction at her successful scheme.

She had waited so long for this moment. To break a bracelet and incur Jiang Cheng's disappointment in his son—it was all worth it.

"You unfilial son! You've gone mad! How dare you do such a thing!" Jiang Cheng snapped out of his shock and instantly flew into a rage, his face turning ashen. He grabbed the ashtray beside him and was about to rush forward.

Wang Lihua reacted swiftly, practically crawling over to hug Jiang Cheng tightly around the waist. Tears streamed down her face, her sobs heart-wrenching, yet she still managed a chilling display of sensibility: "Old Jiang! Old Jiang, please! Please don't hit him! It's all my fault! I accidentally broke my sister's bracelet. Don't blame Xiao Ci, he just acted impulsively, he's still just a child! Hit me instead, please!"

Her cries were sincere and heart-wrenching, perfectly portraying the role of a victim. Every tear accused Jiang Ci of his atrocities, and every word reminded her of his crimes.

Jiang Ci stopped listening and looking at the glaring shards on the ground. He slowly turned around, his back ramrod straight, yet carrying a heavy, almost crushing weariness. He climbed the stairs, each step landing on the cold fragments of his heart.

Behind them, Jiang Cheng roared in fury, Wang Lihua wept in humiliation, and the pile of jade fragments intertwined to create a nauseating farce.

He walked back to his room, and with his last bit of strength, slammed the door shut.

Bang--!

After the loud bang, there was a deathly silence. It blocked out all other sounds, but it couldn't block out the crisp cracking sound in my mind, or the image of my mother's empty wrist.

Leaning against the cold door, Jiang Ci slowly slid down to the floor. His cheeks burned, and his palms were numb. He had expected to tremble, to feel sad, and to be swallowed by overwhelming helplessness, just like countless times before.

The bracelet broke.

His last remaining fatherly affection for Jiang Cheng was completely shattered.

All that remained in my chest was a cold, all-consuming calm, and an overwhelming sense of injustice for my mother.

His mother used her dowry and youth to help Jiangcheng build his business from scratch, only to become emaciated and pass away sadly on her sickbed. Meanwhile, that other woman entered the household, wearing the jewelry that should have belonged to his mother, playing the role of a virtuous wife and loving mother.

Everything in the Jiang family is a testament to the mother's hard work!

The icy coldness in his eyes gradually ignited into a blazing, silent flame. He would no longer sit idly by and wait for death, no longer be a puppet manipulated by fate, by his father, and by gossip.

He wanted to take back everything that belonged to his mother.

---

Downstairs, Wang Lihua was still trying her best to comfort Jiang Cheng, handing him a glass of warm water: "Old Jiang, drink some water and calm down. The child is grown up and has his own ideas, which is a good thing. I told you before to talk to Xiao Ci nicely and not to get angry, but you wouldn't listen. Now look what happened, you didn't get to say a single word you should have..."

These words were like a needle, piercing Jiang Cheng's mind, which had been clouded by anger. He hadn't come back tonight specifically to lecture his son.

He has important news to share.

Jiang Cheng waved his hand irritably, as if trying to brush away the vexing atmosphere in the room: "Forget it! What's the point of talking to this unfilial son!" A resolute glint flashed in his eyes: "Once the documents are ready, send him abroad directly. I've already made contact with the UK; he has to sign whether he wants to or not. We can't let him stay here and cause any more trouble."

Wang Lihua lowered her eyes, concealing the glint of shrewdness that flashed in them, and obediently replied, "I will follow your arrangements."

---

Xie Qingyan was awakened by the sound of raindrops hitting the windowpane.

The rain was drizzling, carrying the unique, biting chill of winter.

He slept soundly last night and had a long, sweet dream. In the dream, there were no ancient scrolls or imperial examinations, only a ginkgo-lined avenue and a bright laboratory. He and Jiang Ci were walking side by side on campus, carrying books.

Mother Xie had already prepared breakfast, two portions as usual, neatly packed in insulated bags. "It's cold today, so let Xiao Ci eat it while it's hot," she instructed, her eyes filled with complete trust and care.

Holding an umbrella, Xie Qingyan squeezed onto the damp, crowded bus, staring at the winding rain streaks on the window, and took out his phone. His fingertip lingered on Jiang Ci's name for a moment, then he turned off the screen. He'd see him soon. He stopped himself from disturbing the peace of the morning, but he couldn't suppress the subtle, inexplicable unease that came with being a transmigrator.

The rain slowed down city traffic. The bus swayed and finally arrived at school. Xie Qingyan was the first to enter the classroom, placed her umbrella in the corridor, and patted the raindrops off her shoulder.

Jiang Ci's seat was empty.

He sat down, took out his breakfast and listening headphones as usual, and tried to calm himself down with regular English pronunciation. But the words were like raindrops outside the window, sliding across his eardrums without leaving a trace. Half an hour passed, and classmates arrived one after another, their noise rising, but the seat remained empty.

Xie Qingyan couldn't help but send a message: Jiang Ci, have you arrived?

No reply.

Until the sharp ringing of the morning reading bell rang, the back door of the classroom was suddenly pushed open—

Jiang Ci stood at the door, soaked to the bone. Water dripped from his hair, and his dark school uniform jacket clung to his body. His face was pale, except for a faint, unnatural red mark on his left cheek.

The classroom fell silent for a moment. Liang Ying was the first to react, taking a clean towel from her drawer and handing it to him: "Jiang Ci, wipe yourself down, this towel is new."

Jiang Ci thanked him softly, his voice a little hoarse. He took the towel and roughly dried his hair. But his soaked clothes still felt chilly.

Xie Qingyan's heart sank. Something had indeed happened last night.

Immediately afterward, Zhang Tao ran over carrying a bag, scratching his head a little embarrassedly: "Jiang Ci, here! My mom insisted I was careless and stuffed a spare set of clothes into my backpack, treating me like a kindergarten kid... Look, if my mom knew this set of clothes would come in handy, she'd be so happy!"

Good-natured laughter rang out in the classroom, breaking the suffocating silence that had just been there.

"Yes, Jiang Ci, hurry up and change, don't catch a cold!"

"That's right, when Lao Mo gets here later, he'll definitely scold you for acting like this!"

Everyone chimed in, their voices carrying the straightforward yet warm concern unique to young people. These voices, like tiny rays of light, struggled to penetrate the oppressive atmosphere surrounding Jiang Ci. His tense shoulders relaxed almost imperceptibly by a millimeter.

"Thank you." He thanked her again, took the clothes, and headed towards the restroom.

The class representative for Chinese language began to lead the reading, and the sound of reading aloud filled the air. Xie Qingyan, however, could not focus her gaze.

When Jiang Ci returned after changing into dry clothes, the cold, menacing aura around him had dissipated somewhat, but the deep melancholy in his eyes remained. Xie Qingyan pushed the still-warm soy milk and lunchbox towards him and asked in a low voice, "What's wrong? Is... your father back?"

During this time, while they were busy working on Tang Li's case, Jiang Cheng seemed to have vanished into thin air. Xie Qingyan didn't think they had done anything wrong; in fact, she felt that any normal father would feel guilty after learning the truth.

But then, recalling Jiang Cheng's actions, he understood. Perhaps the word "apology" simply didn't exist in this man's dictionary.

"Jiang Ci," Xie Qingyan looked at him, asking directly yet cautiously, "Do you still care about him?"

He didn't ask, "Are you sad?" but rather, "Do you still care about him?" He needed to confirm how much weight that so-called "father" still held in Jiang Ci's heart.

Jiang Ci looked up at the gray sky outside the window. Rainwater trickled down the glass like tear tracks.

“From the day my mother died,” he said calmly, yet his voice was like a surging undercurrent beneath the ice, “I haven’t paid any attention to him. Last night he came back and blamed me for bringing up something from two years ago, making him lose face, and causing the company to suffer losses.”

"This is outrageous!" Xie Qingyan said in a low voice, his chest heaving with anger. He knew Jiang Cheng had low moral standards, but he never expected this man to have none at all.

“I thought that was why he came back.” Jiang Ci twitched the corner of his mouth, a smile that was anything but genuine. “But this morning, he told me that once the documents were ready, he would send me to England. I had a fight with him and ran away.”

This is a notification, not a discussion. It's an order, an ultimatum.

“His patience with me has run out,” Jiang Ci said.

Then, he turned to look at Xie Qingyan. The last trace of mist in his eyes dissipated, leaving only a clear and chilling coldness, and a kind of do-or-die determination.

"And my patience with him has come to an end."

Jiang Ci's gaze seemed to pierce through the damp air and thick walls of the classroom, pinpointing precisely back to the lakeside villa, and to the silent metal seals in the study's safe—seals of absolute power. Those seals had once stamped countless contracts that determined the fates of others, but now, they were reduced to dust in his mind.

He suddenly turned his head, his eyes seeming to surge with magma: "Those paintings and design drafts left by my mother, if they were to come to light, they would be priceless, wouldn't they?"

Xie Qingyan was taken aback. Jiang Ci almost never mentioned his mother, let alone used such a calm, almost evaluative tone to assess her belongings. This wasn't remembrance; it was the prelude to a reckoning, a complete awakening of his awareness of property and power.

“Moreover,” Jiang Ci’s voice was low, yet sharp as a tempered blade, each word carving into reality, “I remember, that was her premarital personal property, protected intellectual property. In terms of sentiment, reason, and law—” He paused, his gaze burning as if to burn through all the barriers of pretense, “it should all belong to me. And it can only belong to me.”

It was a sharpness Xie Qingyan had never seen in him before; it was no longer a defensive thorn, but a sword drawn proactively, its cold light gleaming.

"I won't wait any longer." Jiang Ci raised his hand, clenched it in the air, as if he had grasped the invisible string that had controlled him for many years, and then snapped it hard.

"I will make Jiang Cheng spit out everything that Jiang Cheng swallowed, with interest, just as he did."