“Wenjing, you’re not our biological daughter. We only found out recently, and now we’ve found our biological daughter, too.”
Li Wenjing had never imagined that a real-heiress-versus-fake-heiress drama would play out in her own life.
Worse still, she was the fake heiress—the one who had enjoyed sixteen years of privilege meant for another family’s daughter.
Of course, that “privileged life” was only how the Lis saw it.
Her father, Li Jianguo, was deputy director of a steel factory. Her mother, Wang Jinju, worked in the publicity department of a textile factory.
Her eldest brother, Li Yonggang, served in the military. Though still young, he was already a company commander.
Her second brother, Li Yongsheng, also worked at the steel factory and held a permanent position.
Her third brother, Li Yongqiang, had graduated from high school and had been idle at home ever since. Li Jianguo was trying to find a job opening for him.
It was 1975, after all. Getting a job was incredibly difficult.
Even though Li Jianguo was deputy director of the steel factory, he couldn’t bend the rules and simply arrange a job for his own son.
There were too many eyes watching. One misstep, and someone might report him. He could lose his post as deputy director—or even be sent to a farm for labor reform.
In Wang Jinju’s eyes, their family was unquestionably well-to-do.
When Li Wenjing was born, Li Jianguo had not yet become deputy director of the steel factory. He was on assignment in a county town in the Northeast, and Wang Jinju, heavily pregnant, had gone to visit her husband.
Unexpectedly, she fell and went into premature labor.
She had no choice but to give birth to a girl at the local hospital.
According to the story, Li Wenjing’s biological mother was also giving birth at that hospital that day. She had suffered a difficult labor and nearly died before bringing Li Wenjing into the world.
As it happened, someone had stolen babies from the hospital that day—and the two babies taken were the real and fake heiresses.
The police later recovered the babies. A nurse took them away for their baths, but because of the nurses’ carelessness, their diapers and swaddling cloths got mixed up. That was how the two children ended up with the wrong families.
No one had imagined that one mistake would last sixteen years. Sixteen whole years.
Wang Jinju felt that she had never let Li Wenjing go hungry for even a single day, and that meant she had done enough for her.
But her own biological daughter had suffered and worked hard in the countryside since childhood. Born prematurely, the girl had always been frail. Just thinking about it now made Wang Jinju’s heart ache.
“So, Mom, are you saying I should move out to make room for her?”
Li Wenjing asked sarcastically.
Blood ties were impossible to deny. Li Wenjing had spent sixteen whole years with the couple who raised her.
The bitter irony was that sixteen years together counted for less than a single meeting with their biological daughter.
Wang Jinju’s expression darkened. “That’s right. You’ve enjoyed sixteen years of her life in this family. I’m afraid she’ll be unhappy if she comes back and sees you here!”
She had been only a baby at the time. It wasn’t her fault.
The family she had lived with for sixteen years—the parents she had called Mom and Dad, the brothers she had called her own—suddenly weren’t hers anymore. She was hurting, too.
“Mom, you’re right. I was born with feet, ran over to this house all by myself, and stole sixteen years of your daughter’s life!”
After saying that, Li Wenjing went straight back to her room, paying no attention to Wang Jinju, who was so furious she looked like a kappa.
Li Wenjing wasn’t sad at all. She had already been through all of this in her previous life. Having died once, what was there left to get upset about?
She remembered how, in her previous life, she had been unable to accept the truth. She had screamed at them and begged them through tears, all in the hope that Li Jianguo and Wang Jinju would consider the sixteen years they’d spent together and let her stay with the Li family instead of sending her back to the countryside.
Back then, she had figured that staying in the city, shamelessly refusing to leave if she had to, was still better than going back to the countryside to suffer.
Li Yuerong had told Wang Jinju that back in her rural home, she had to get up before the rooster crowed to make breakfast for the whole family. After eating, she had to work in the fields and earn work points, or she wouldn’t get anything to eat.
Li Wenjing had grown up in the city. She had never worked in the fields, so there was no way she would want to go back.
In the end, Li Jianguo and Wang Jinju gave in and agreed to let her keep living with the Li family.
And so she began living under the same roof as Li Yuerong.
Li Yuerong was the sort of girl who seemed delicate and weak—in short, the classic white-lotus type.
She greeted everyone with a smile, giving the impression of someone harmless, shy, sweet, innocent, and kind.
Back then, Li Wenjing had been truly foolish. She had thought that even if they weren’t related by blood, the sixteen years they’d spent together still meant something.
Even if the Lis couldn’t treat her and Li Yuerong equally, surely they could at least live together in peace.
If nothing else, she could avoid trouble by keeping out of Li Yuerong’s way.
She only had to hold on for two more years. Once she turned eighteen, she could get a marriage certificate with her fiancé, Liu Chengjiu, and move out.
It wasn’t that she didn’t want to leave right away. It was just that she had no job, her household registration was still with the Li family, and she had no money. Where could she possibly go?
But on the second day after Li Yuerong moved in, it was as though she had given Li Wenjing a hard slap across the face.
The reason was simple. First thing that morning, Li Yuerong had started crying and complaining that there were mouse droppings on her bed.
Li Wenjing had been baffled. They lived in the steel factory’s family compound, and Li Jianguo was the deputy director. Their family of six lived in a small two-story Western-style house.
Ever since she could remember, she had never seen so much as a mouse dropping in that house—let alone an actual mouse. So why had mouse droppings appeared as soon as Li Yuerong came back? Was this some kind of “mouse-dropping destiny”?
Li Jianguo hesitated, then stepped forward. There, plain as day on the bedsheet, were mouse droppings. Beneath the bed, in one corner, lay a dead mouse.
It was obvious someone had beaten it to death, and brutally at that. Its entire head was a bloody mess, a horrifying sight.
Li Yuerong went over to Wang Jinju, still sniffling, and tugged at her sleeve. “Mom, should I never have come back? Does my sister not like me…?” she sobbed.
“But what am I supposed to do? I missed you, Dad, and my brothers so much. I really didn’t come back intending to take you away from my sister!”
After saying that, she glanced fearfully toward Li Wenjing.
Li Wenjing…
Before Li Wenjing could say a word, Wang Jinju had already decided that she was responsible. After all, she was the only one in the family who didn’t want Li Yuerong back.
Li Wenjing really wanted to explain, but no one in the family gave her a chance to speak.
After that, no matter how careful Li Wenjing was, she still couldn’t escape Li Yuerong’s schemes. Step by step, she walked right into the trap Li Yuerong had laid for her…