“My dear sister, the whip doesn’t feel very good, does it?” An elegant, wealthy-looking woman sneered as she grabbed the gray-haired old woman by the chin, following it with several more lashes of the whip.
“Su Yirou, this is… a hospital. Killing me… is against the law!” Su Yiwei looked up, her dark pupils filled with hatred.
Her hands were bound, her clothes whipped into rags, and her body was covered in blood. Her legs dangled at twisted angles, and her breath was so weak it seemed she might expire at any moment.
“Killing? Who said I was going to kill anyone? How could I do something so barbaric?”
Su Yirou squatted down, suddenly jerking the woman up by the neck. Her voice was cold and laced with venom.
“Tomorrow’s headlines will only report that a mental patient was beaten to death by several other mental patients. How about that? Are you satisfied with that way to die?”
Su Yirou’s gaze was freezing and manic, the twisted excitement in her eyes intensifying like a sandstorm. As she spoke, she gave the person on the ground several more disgusted kicks.
“Why? Seeing that you were a widow struggling to raise a son, we adopted him and let you live in our home for over thirty years. We gave you the best food and the best things. My husband and I treated him like our own. Why do you want to kill me?” Su Yiwei’s hatred was laced with disbelief.
“Tsk, tsk. Su Yiwei, you still don’t understand even on your deathbed. You’re so stupid; no wonder Wentao doesn’t love you!”
“And how can you say we were eating your food? My son was Wentao’s biological child all along. Oops! How did I let that slip?”
A sinister smile appeared on Su Yirou’s lips. Her expression was distorted and excited, yet she put on an innocent act as if she had accidentally said the wrong thing.
“You… what do you mean?” Su Yiwei’s entire body convulsed in horror.
“Is the literal meaning that hard to understand? It means the person Wentao has always loved is me. It’s just a pity I didn’t think much of him back then. If I hadn’t taken a fancy to your fiancé, do you think the Su family would have bothered to find you, their biological daughter? You, a lowly country bumpkin—by what right did you get to marry a favored son of heaven like Huo Jingsheng?
“So, I had my mother bring you back to the Su family to fulfill the marriage contract with Wentao, while I fulfilled the contract with the Huo family instead. Who knew Huo Jingsheng would be so short-lived? In three years of marriage, he never even consummated it, and in the end, not even his bones remained when he died. Since he’s dead, I naturally had to come back to resume my relationship with Wentao!”
So that was it. Recalling the torture of the past three months, Su Yiwei’s body shrank and convulsed. The feeling of unbearable agony was etched into her very bones.
“Su Yiwei, how does it feel now? Having your legs broken by me, being electrocuted, and being forcibly sent to a mental asylum?”
Su Yirou seemingly felt this wasn’t enough stimulation and continued, “Oh, look at my memory! There’s something even funnier. You took medicine every day hoping to get pregnant, but Wentao had a vasectomy right after he had a son with me! Hahaha! Don’t you think that’s hilarious? Wentao said that only by doing this would you willingly adopt our child, ensuring the Jiang family’s inheritance belongs to our son.”
“You… you beast!” Blood-red tears seeped from Su Yiwei’s eyes. In her fury, the veins on her forehead bulged, and her eyes nearly burst from their sockets.
“Oh! Don’t get so worked up. Not only are Wentao and I childhood sweethearts, but I am also Father’s biological daughter. You still don’t know that the jade pendant you wore since childhood has beauty-enhancing properties, do you? Look at the two of us standing together—who could tell we’re the same age? Even though your features are prettier than mine, you grew old day by day while I live on, becoming younger and more beautiful.”
The more pain Su Yiwei felt, the more excited Su Yirou became. She had waited over thirty years for this moment.
“I fell for Huo Jingsheng at first sight. He was more handsome than Jiang Wentao, and the Huo family was at its peak while the Jiang family was on the decline…”
Su Yirou rambled on. Whenever she thought about how this wench Su Yiwei had been legally by her Wentao’s side, she wanted to chop her into pieces and feed her to the dogs. Su Yirou grew angrier as she spoke, and her words became more incessant.
“Stop it… I don’t want to hear it… I can’t hear you… Don’t you dare lean in to tell me, I can’t take it anymore.” Su Yiwei shrank back in terror, her blood-stained lips curling into a cold smirk.
“You’re about to die; I must make sure you die knowing the truth, otherwise I won’t be able to eat or sleep peacefully… Ah! Su Yiwei!”
Just as she leaned in toward Su Yiwei’s ear to continue bragging, Su Yiwei suddenly grabbed a fruit knife from the bedside table and accurately plunged it into her throat.
The sharp tip pierced Su Yirou’s windpipe, spraying blood all over Su Yiwei’s face. Su Yirou’s pupils dilated…
Jiang Wentao walked in to see this brutal scene. Without a second thought, he rushed over to strangle Su Yiwei.
Su Yiwei drove the fruit knife hard into his chest. Instantly, Jiang Wentao spat out a mouthful of blood, and she too died from exhaustion.
She truly couldn’t understand. She had always been kind to others and had never done anything wrong; how did she end up in such a miserable state?
She hated Jiang Wentao. If he didn’t like her, why didn’t he divorce her? He had caused her to suffer such torment; she could not die in peace.
If there is a next life… If there is a next life…
“Uncle Su, Aunt Lu, I only have brotherly feelings for Yiwei. My romantic feelings are for Yirou. If I were to marry Yiwei in a state of confusion, that would be irresponsible to her.”
A firm and familiar voice rang in her ears. Su Yiwei opened her eyes in a daze.
Before her eyes was a boxy color television in the living room, and next to it on a cabinet sat a radio with a microphone.
She looked in terror at the calendar on the wall, which clearly displayed March 12, 1986.
Turning her gaze, she saw a young Jiang Wentao. Su Yiwei was stunned for a moment.
His face was as fair as jade, looking like an immortal from the celestial realm. Anyone who saw him would say he was a peerless gentleman.
He was sitting side-by-side with his parents on the leather sofa in the Su family’s living room. Su Yirou was sitting next to Jiang Wentao, and Father Su was next to Su Yirou.
Su Yiwei was sitting next to her stepmother on a single sofa at the short end of the coffee table. In an instant, she realized—she wasn’t the only one who had been reborn.
That lying scumbag had reborn a step ahead of her. A moment ago, she must have fainted from anger at the scumbag’s words.
Seeing Su Yiwei go from dazed confusion to terror, Jiang Wentao felt a surge of secret satisfaction. Heaven had taken pity on him, letting him live again to make up for his regrets.
In his last life, he hadn’t known Yirou was also Uncle Su’s biological daughter, so he had decisively abandoned her and chosen Su Yiwei. By the time he achieved success and fame, he deeply regretted not sticking to his original intentions and giving his beloved Yirou a proper status.
Now that he had the memories of his past life, knew how the times would change, and had the support of the Su family, he would surely reach the pinnacle of his life even faster than before.
“Yirou, Wentao wants to marry you. What do you say?” Father Su’s voice betrayed no emotion.
This marriage match had originally belonged to Yirou, but the Jiang family had insisted on marrying Yiwei instead, using the excuse that Yirou wasn’t the Su family’s biological daughter. Who would have thought that Yirou was so kind that she actually agreed to the Jiang family swapping the brides?
“Dad, Brother Wentao was my fiancé to begin with. Naturally, I am willing,” Su Yirou said bashfully.