At exactly six o’clock that evening, Su Jinxiu stood outside the entrance to a residential building in Emerald Bay Residence, on the east side of the city.
Apartments here sold for an average of 60,000 yuan per square meter.
The 120-square-meter, three-bedroom apartment Zhao Shiyu owned had required an 800,000-yuan down payment, and Su Jinxiu had paid every cent of it herself.
The monthly mortgage was 12,000 yuan, and for the first three years, she had made every payment.
Later, Zhao Shiyu claimed she’d received a raise and could afford the mortgage on her own, so Su Jinxiu stopped asking about it.
Looking back now…
What raise?
It was obvious that Liu Wanqing had started supporting her financially.
Su Jinxiu reached into her pocket and pulled out a silver key.
A faded teddy bear keychain still dangled from it.
It had been Zhao Shiyu’s eighteenth birthday gift to her.
She had never had the heart to remove it.
When they bought this apartment, she had deliberately made an extra key.
Zhao Shiyu knew about it.
Yet she had never bothered changing the locks.
She probably believed her “human ATM” of a mother would never dare come here.
The key slid into the lock.
A gentle twist.
The door opened.
The entryway light was motion-activated, flickering on the moment she stepped inside.
She slipped on a pair of disposable slippers beside the shoe cabinet and slowly walked into the living room.
The sight before her made her eyelids twitch.
Several luxury handbags had been carelessly tossed across the sofa.
A Hermès Birkin.
A Chanel Gabrielle.
A Dior Saddle Bag.
Every one of them cost tens of thousands of yuan, yet they were scattered around as casually as cheap market bags.
Half a glass of unfinished red wine sat on the coffee table.
Beside it was an opened box of Godiva chocolates.
She walked into the open-concept kitchen and opened the refrigerator.
It was packed to the brim.
Australian Wagyu beef.
French foie gras.
Japanese Aomori apples.
New Zealand cherries.
Every item was imported.
Any single ingredient inside could easily cover an ordinary family’s grocery budget for an entire week.
Closing the refrigerator, she headed toward what had once been the guest bedroom.
It had been converted into a walk-in closet.
Pushing open the door, she found three walls lined with custom-built wardrobes overflowing with designer clothing.
Coats.
Dresses.
Shoes.
Silk scarves.
Everything was neatly arranged by color.
Several unopened delivery boxes sat on the floor.
Judging from the logos, they were yet more luxury brands.
Standing silently in the doorway, Su Jinxiu’s expression remained unreadable.
Where had all this money come from?
Zhao Shiyu worked as an administrative manager at a private company.
Her monthly salary was only 15,000 yuan.
Even if she never spent a single cent for ten years, she still couldn’t have afforded even a tenth of what filled this room.
There was only one answer.
Jinxiu Trading Group.
Every yuan Su Jinxiu had earned through years of exhausting work had become designer handbags, foie gras, and luxury clothing for her daughter.
While the woman who had paid for everything…
Wasn’t even considered worthy of sharing a meal.
She sat quietly on the living room sofa without turning on the lights.
As dusk gradually filtered through the floor-to-ceiling windows, her figure disappeared into the gathering shadows.
She simply sat there.
Waiting.
At 6:47 p.m., the sound of a key turning in the lock broke the silence.
The hallway light came on.
The clicking of high heels echoed through the apartment, accompanied by laughter from short videos playing on a phone’s speaker.
Zhao Shiyu strolled inside while scrolling through her phone.
Only when she looked up and noticed a figure sitting in the darkness of the living room did she freeze.
“Ah!”
She nearly dropped her phone and instinctively took a step backward.
“Who’s there?!”
Su Jinxiu calmly reached over and switched on the floor lamp beside the sofa.
Warm yellow light illuminated her graying hair and thin, haggard face.
Zhao Shiyu stared for two seconds.
The moment she recognized her mother, the fear on her face instantly turned into disgust.
“How did you get in?” she demanded sharply.
“Who told you to come here?”
Su Jinxiu said nothing.
She simply looked at her daughter.
Throwing her handbag onto the sofa, Zhao Shiyu folded her arms across her chest and lifted her chin arrogantly.
“I’ve told you how many times? Don’t come here anymore.”
“What if the neighbors see you?”
“Do you know how embarrassing that is?”
“An old woman who’s been kicked out of her own home showing up at my apartment.”
“They’ll think I can’t even afford to support my own mother.”
Su Jinxiu’s fingers curled slightly before slowly relaxing again.
Looking up, she spoke quietly.
“I’m your mother.”
“Is it really so shameful for a mother to visit her daughter?”
“My mother?”
Zhao Shiyu laughed as though she’d heard the greatest joke imaginable.
“You’ve actually got the nerve to call yourself my mother?”
She pointed toward a framed photograph hanging on the living room wall.
It showed Zhao Shiyu and Liu Wanqing embracing each other with bright smiles.
“Mom Wanqing is a hundred times better than you!”
“What did you ever give me besides money?”
“How many birthdays did you attend?”
“How many parent-teacher meetings did you ever show up for?”
“When I was bullied at school, who came to stand up for me?”
“It was Mom Wanqing.”
“Not you.”
Every word pierced Su Jinxiu’s heart like a poisoned needle.
She didn’t argue.
Because…
Some of it was true.
She really had missed much of her daughter’s childhood.
During the years she was building her business, she had wished every day contained forty-eight hours instead of twenty-four.
She had devoted every ounce of energy to expanding the company.
She thought providing the very best life money could buy would be enough.
She never realized that, while she was working herself to exhaustion, Liu Wanqing had quietly stepped into the empty space she’d left behind, stealing her daughter’s affection little by little with companionship and sweet words.
But that didn’t mean she deserved to be treated this way.
After a long silence, Su Jinxiu spoke again.
“Shiyu.”
“I came today because I’d like to have dinner with you.”
“Just the two of us.”
“It doesn’t have to be anything fancy.”
Zhao Shiyu rolled her eyes, openly mocking her.
“Dinner?”
“Can you even afford it?”
“You’ve got nothing left.”
“I bet you’re struggling just to pay your rent.”
“And now you’ve come here hoping for a free meal?”
Before Su Jinxiu could answer, Zhao Shiyu’s phone rang.
She glanced at the caller ID.
Instantly, her entire demeanor changed.
Her eyes curved into crescents.
A bright smile spread across her face.
Her voice turned as sweet as honey.
“Mom Wanqing~~”
“Mhm, yes! I’m free tonight!”
“Okay, okay! I’ll head over right now!”
“Wait for me!”
Ending the call, she picked up the handbag she’d just tossed aside.
Without sparing Su Jinxiu another glance, she walked toward the door in her high heels.
As she reached the entrance, she tossed one sentence over her shoulder.
“See yourself out.”
“And don’t touch any of my things.”
Bang.
The front door slammed shut.
The sound of her heels gradually faded down the hallway before disappearing completely.
Silence returned to the apartment.
Su Jinxiu remained seated on the sofa without moving.
The warm glow of the floor lamp illuminated her face.
But it could not soften the icy chill in her eyes.
A memory slowly surfaced.
When Zhao Shiyu was ten years old, she had suddenly developed a high fever in the middle of the night.
Her temperature had climbed to 40.2°C.
Zhao Mingyuan had been away on a business trip.
Su Jinxiu had carried her burning-hot daughter all the way to the hospital by herself.
Emergency registration.
Waiting in line.
Blood tests.
IV drips.
She spent the entire night sitting on a hard bench in the hospital corridor.
Around three in the morning, her feverish daughter had opened her eyes slightly.
Tiny fingers clutched the corner of her clothes.
In a weak, trembling voice, she whispered,
“Mom… I’m scared…”
Su Jinxiu had hugged her tighter.
“Don’t be afraid.”
“Mom’s here.”
“I won’t leave you.”
That night, her daughter had fallen asleep peacefully in her arms.
Her little face rested against her chest.
Her breathing was warm and steady.
That…
Was her daughter.
The daughter she had carried for ten months.
The daughter she had endured a fourteen-hour labor and emergency cesarean section to bring into the world.
Su Jinxiu slowly closed her eyes.
Five seconds.
Ten seconds.
When she opened them again…
Every trace of warmth had vanished.
Only bone-chilling coldness remained.
“If you no longer acknowledge me as your mother…”
She rose to her feet.
Her voice was as soft as a sigh.
Yet as cold as the winter wind.
“…then I won’t hold back anymore.”
She walked into Zhao Shiyu’s study.
The second drawer of the desk.
Left compartment.
She knew her daughter too well.
Ever since childhood, Zhao Shiyu had always kept her important documents in exactly the same place.
She pulled open the drawer.
Just as expected.
Her ID card.
Household registration booklet.
Bank cards.
Everything was neatly stored inside a transparent document pouch.
Su Jinxiu took out the ID card and photographed both the front and back.
Then, with a silent thought, she stored the images inside her interdimensional space.
The original card was returned to its exact position.
Next, she picked up a bank card.
Industrial and Commercial Bank of China.
Card ending in 3377.
The PIN?
A faint smile tugged at her lips.
When Zhao Shiyu turned eighteen, she had personally accompanied her to the bank to open her first account.
Su Jinxiu herself had helped choose the password.
It was Zhao Shiyu’s birth date.
199206.
After all these years…
Her daughter had never even bothered changing it.
Opening the bank’s mobile app, Su Jinxiu entered the card number and PIN.
The balance appeared.
874,562.33 yuan.
More than 870,000 yuan in savings.
An administrative manager earning 15,000 yuan a month somehow possessed nearly 900,000 yuan in cash.
Su Jinxiu stared silently at the number.
How much of that money had originated from her company’s accounts?
How much had Zhao Mingyuan and Liu Wanqing quietly handed to Zhao Shiyu to buy her loyalty?
She no longer cared.
She didn’t need to know.
She began transferring the money.
The daily transfer limit was 50,000 yuan per transaction.
So she sent it out…
Fifty thousand at a time.
First transfer.
50,000 yuan.
Second transfer.
50,000 yuan.
Third.
Fourth.
…
Seventeen transfers.
Less than twenty minutes.
874,562.33 yuan.
Not a single cent remained.
Every yuan had been transferred into her own bank card ending in 6688.
Looking at the confirmation messages, Su Jinxiu felt no satisfaction whatsoever.
This had always been her money.
She was merely taking it back.
When everything was finished, she returned the bank card to its original place and carefully closed the drawer.
Everything looked exactly as before.
As for what would happen when Zhao Shiyu eventually discovered the missing money…
That was no longer Su Jinxiu’s concern.
She sat back down at the desk and switched on Zhao Shiyu’s laptop.
The login password was the same six digits.
Some habits never changed.
Opening Zhao Shiyu’s credit report, she examined every page carefully.
Then…
She smiled.
Not bitterly.
Not mockingly.
It was the smile of a hunter who had finally found the perfect prey.
Zhao Shiyu.
Thirty-two years old.
Owned both a home and a car.
Stable monthly income.
And most importantly—
Her credit record was flawless.
She had never taken out a loan.
Never missed a credit card payment.
Never had a single negative mark on her credit history.
To online lenders…
A borrower like that was the ideal customer.
High credit limits.
Fast approvals.
An exceptionally high approval rate.
Su Jinxiu flexed her fingers, opened a browser, and entered the address of the first online lending platform.
“My dear daughter…”
she murmured quietly, her voice devoid of emotion.
“You always said your mother only knew how to make money.”
“Then today…”
“I’ll make money one last time.”
“Using your name.”