“Li Chuxin, the doctor says you only have a few days left to live.”
“Hahaha…”
Li Xixi stood beside the bed, her face twisted with malicious delight as she looked at Li Chuxin, who lay there with a deathly pale complexion, her body emaciated to the point that she looked skin and bones, two tubes inserted into her arm.
Her eyes were filled with satisfaction.
In her hands was a transparent glass container filled with formalin. Inside was a complete human kidney.
“Chuxin, little sister, take a look. Do you know what this is? It’s your kidney.”
Li Chuxin could clearly feel her life slipping away.
Her kidney?
Ten years ago, she had donated one of her kidneys to her eldest brother, Li Jianyong.
How could it be in Li Xixi’s hands?
Could it be…?
Li Xixi was very pleased by the shock on Li Chuxin’s face. She caressed the glass container as though proudly displaying a victory from the past.
“That’s right. This is the very kidney you donated to Big Brother back then.”
“Your foolish eldest brother, Li Jianyong, is so simple-minded that it’s almost laughable. Whatever I tell him, he believes.”
“I lied to him and told him I had a serious illness and needed a kidney transplant, so he went to find you. I lied to you too, telling you that he had kidney disease. And what happened?”
“You idiot. You actually donated one of your kidneys to perfectly healthy Li Jianyong. And he immediately turned around and gave it to me, just to make me happy.”
“Big Brother really is so good to me. All I had to do was cry a little, and he would rush off like a knife-wielding fool to attack you. You have no idea how happy it made me to see him torment you.”
Li Chuxin trembled all over as she stared fixedly at the kidney inside the glass container.
She remembered how Li Jianyong had shown her the hospital examination reports. His condition had supposedly been severe. His face had been pale, his eyes dark and swollen, and he had told her that he had kidney failure and would never be able to marry if he didn’t get a kidney.
She had believed he was on the verge of death.
Without the slightest hesitation, she had donated one of her own kidneys to him.
She gave a self-mocking smile.
“So the hospital reports were fake. The pale face and those dark, swollen eyes were fake too. Everything was fake.”
“All of it was just to trick me into giving him my kidney.”
Li Chuxin’s breathing became rapid as she looked at Li Xixi’s sinister, triumphant smile.
When she was eighteen, she had followed her mother after her remarriage into the city, moving into the military family compound where the commander’s family lived.
Later, the commander’s family got into trouble.
Not wanting to be implicated, Li Xixi returned to the Li family.
Li Chuxin never understood what she had done wrong.
From that point onward, the brothers who had once treated her well all began blaming and criticizing her.
Li Xixi covered her mouth and laughed smugly and viciously.
“Only a fool like you would believe it. Big Brother really is my good big brother. Just like that, he managed to trick one of your kidneys out of you just to make me happy.”
“Second Brother was even better to me. Did you know that the car accident you had that year was actually caused by me? I had only just started learning to drive, and I deliberately crashed into you. Second Brother clearly saw that it was me, but to cover for me, he claimed he hadn’t seen anything. Then he even scolded you for making a fuss.”
“And Third Brother is even more adorable. Every time he saw an injury on me, all I had to do was shed a few tears in front of him, and he would go looking for you to vent his anger. He really is such a good dog for me to send into battle.”
“If it weren’t for the fact that you’re dying, why would I tell you all of this?”
She had only come because she had learned that Li Chuxin was seriously ill and was about to die.
She couldn’t wait to come to her bedside and reveal the truth. She wanted to watch Li Chuxin suffer and be heartbroken.
Li Chuxin clenched the bedsheets tightly.
She had worked tirelessly to advance her father and brothers’ futures and to make the Li family’s life better and better.
She had searched her conscience countless times and knew she had done nothing wrong toward her family or toward anyone.
She didn’t understand what she had done to deserve this.
“Why?”
They had once been her family.
She couldn’t understand why they had been unable to see through Li Xixi’s clumsy lies.
She understood that favoritism needed no reason.
She knew that.
Her entire life had been too painful.
All she wished for was that, in her next life, she would never become their family again.
Li Xixi looked at the frail Li Chuxin with a triumphant expression and gave a mocking smile.
“You want to know why?”
“Because I hate you. I hate that you’re prettier than me. I hate that you can obtain everything so effortlessly while I have to scheme and struggle for everything.”
“Why? Why is my life such a miserable mess while you get to live so much better than me?”
“When Mother and I remarried and moved into the military family compound, why didn’t I get to live as well as you? None of my stepbrothers treated me well. They didn’t even take me seriously.”
“Yet you got to enjoy the affection of your stepbrothers.”
“I wasn’t willing to accept that. All of those things belonged to me. I was going to take them back.”
Li Chuxin looked at Li Xixi’s proud, self-satisfied expression.
Her eyes lowered, her lashes trembling slightly as she looked at the tubes inserted into the veins of her hand.
Her skin was so pale it was almost translucent, and her body was frail and weak.
She had always been healthy.
Ever since she lost one of her kidneys, however, her health had gradually deteriorated until she had become so weak that she could barely even get out of bed.
Hidden inside her hospital gown, a small dagger rested in her hand.
Li Xixi noticed the jade pendant shaped like a chili pepper around Li Chuxin’s neck.
She reached out to snatch it.
But at the very instant she grabbed it
Li Chuxin raised the dagger in her hand and viciously plunged it into the artery in Li Xixi’s neck.
“Are you very pleased with yourself, Li Xixi? You shouldn’t have schemed against me. I don’t have much time left to live anyway. Before I die, I’ll take one of you with me.”
Li Chuxin tightened her grip around the dagger.
Before she even realized it, the blade had pierced into her own palm.
Li Jianyong and Li Jianwu rushed over after learning that Li Chuxin had killed Li Xixi.
They beat Li Chuxin’s body with their fists.
Li Jianyong personally tore off Li Chuxin’s oxygen mask.
“Li Chuxin, how can you be so vicious?! How could you kill my Xixi, the woman I love?!”
When Li Jianwu learned that the woman he had secretly loved was also loved by his eldest brother, his expression became complicated.
But this was not the time for jealousy. He joined his brother in condemning her.
“Li Chuxin, I will never forgive you.”
The three men continued beating and kicking the body lying on the hospital bed.
A man sitting in a wheelchair witnessed several grown men attacking a woman who was already dead.
He took photographs of them beating and kicking the patient and posted them online.
He also wrote a post to accompany the photographs.
Then he called the police.
“Hello, is this the police station? There are people murdering and assaulting a patient.”
Photos of the three men beating the patient were uploaded to the internet, sparking outrage among netizens, who began speaking out on behalf of the dead woman.
One netizen named Chuxin Xiangyang posted:
“One of them once received a kidney donation from the deceased. He’s also her biological eldest brother.”
“Another one used to be a thug. The deceased helped him build a future, and it was because of the contribution she made by saving an important figure that he was able to join the military and eventually become a regiment commander.”
“The third one used to stay at home doing odd jobs and fixing drains. The deceased paved the way for him to start a business, which eventually allowed him to become the richest man in Luzhou City.”
“These three men were the deceased’s biological brothers, yet they became the people who killed her.”
The post by Chuxin Xiangyang caused widespread public outrage.
People all over the internet spoke up for Li Chuxin.
Many empathized with what she had gone through.
They felt indignant on her behalf and heartbroken by her fate.
Li Chuxin’s soul drifted through the air.
She watched as netizens condemned the injustice she had suffered throughout her life, yet she could no longer feel any emotion.
Her soul curled up in a corner of the hospital.
On the television, she saw the news:
“Li Jianyong, Li Jianwu, and Li Jianyong have been convicted of intentional homicide. The death penalty will be carried out immediately.”
The man in the wheelchair was also watching the outcome on the television in the hospital.