Chapter 3: You Are Not Allowed to Stay, Go Back and Take Care of Grandfather
Liang Sheng knelt on both knees before the hospital bed. His hands tightly clasped Mother Liang’s already icy palm, pressing it against his own cheek as he wept uncontrollably:
“I’m sorry… Mom, I came too late…”
In his heart, he was never just an adopted son. He had long considered Mr. and Mrs. Liang, and everything about the Liang family, more important than his own life.
But now, he was watching his adoptive mother die right before his eyes. This was undeniably a massive blow.
His sorrowful weeping echoed throughout the ward. Shen Xingyu found it incredibly irritating to listen to. Looking at the dead Mother Liang, even though the woman’s face was a bloody, mangled mess, he could still clearly picture her face from when she was alive. The nightmare from when he was five years old merged with this face.
She finally died.
His meticulous efforts hadn’t been in vain.
Shen Xingyu tugged at the corner of his mouth, a smile hidden in his deep eyes, but the fingers by his side unconsciously tightened.
It’s been twenty years, Auntie Liang. Hope you’ve been well.
It was just a pity that some people would never wake up again.
Immersed in his grief, Liang Sheng didn’t notice the expression of the person beside him. He kept repeating to his mother’s corpse that he was late, continuously blaming himself for leaving.
“Why did this happen? Mom, you were perfectly fine before I left, why? Why did you jump off a building… Didn’t the doctor say your condition was improving…”
“Sheng-sheng is back, don’t sleep anymore, okay? Look at me, I won’t leave ever again…”
Shen Xingyu took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and opened them again to look out the window. He said indifferently:
“Enough, stop crying. She’s dead, what is there to be so sad about?”
Hearing this, Liang Sheng’s sobbing choked in his throat. He slowly turned his head, raising his tear-soaked eyes to look at him, and said resentfully, “If it weren’t for you forcing me to leave, my mom… wouldn’t have died!”
Shen Xingyu frowned slightly, glaring at him with displeasure, his tone cold and hard:
“Recognize your own status. You are just an adopted son. You’ve already done everything required of you after all these years. On the other hand, as my wife, running outside every couple of days, have you ever considered my feelings?”
Liang Sheng hadn’t expected him to say such cold-blooded words. He trembled with anger, then stepped forward, crying as he shook the man’s long legs. “That’s my mom! Even if I was adopted, they’ve never treated me like an outsider all these years… I haven’t even had the chance to repay Mom…”
Shen Xingyu sneered, “That younger brother of yours just punched and kicked you. Is this what you call not treating you like an outsider?”
“He, he just resented me for not keeping a close eye on Mother.”
Liang Sheng clenched his jaw, tears falling profusely.
His hands gripping the man’s trousers slowly slid down. He stared blankly at Mother Liang’s corpse and murmured:
“It’s all my fault. I shouldn’t have left with you. Mom was such a good person. She toiled for half her life and never got to enjoy a single day of happiness… Why did God have the heart to take her away…”
Unexpectedly, upon hearing this sentence, the originally expressionless Shen Xingyu suddenly darkened his face. Anger laced his eyes as he enunciated each word heavily: “Good? Your mom was such a good person? How laughable.”
Liang Sheng heard the sarcasm in his words. He stood up angrily, sniffled, and for the first time in all these years, gathered the courage to loudly retort:
“I know our family is poor, and you’ve always looked down on us, but my mom is gone now. There’s no need for you to humiliate her like this!”
Shen Xingyu was also startled by this sudden outburst of anger. Normally, his little wife was incredibly docile and never dared to disobey him, but right now, he was like a ragdoll cat with its fur standing on end, actually daring to lose his temper at him for the sake of his maiden family!
Moreover, this maiden family happened to be his enemy…
Intense murderous intent surged in the depths of Shen Xingyu’s eyes. He looked at Liang Sheng with reddened eyes and said word by word:
“If I told you that your mom was once the mistress who seduced someone else’s husband, causing their family to break apart, would you still think she deserved to live and enjoy happiness?”
“What… what are you talking about?”
Liang Sheng’s face paled further, but he quickly understood that Shen Xingyu was fabricating things out of thin air.
The other party was just this jealous, resorting to any means to make him hate his mother, so that he would devote himself entirely and exclusively to his husband.
“My mom could never be that kind of person! You’re always like this, liking to pin unwarranted crimes on others. My mom is dead! Can you stop smearing her name!”
“Me smearing her name?”
Shen Xingyu sneered, but he didn’t want to spell the matter out explicitly. He restrained the gloominess in his eyes and said carelessly:
“Sometimes I really wish I could make her confess to the despicable, filthy things she did back then herself. It’s a pity, the dead can’t speak. But dying doesn’t mean everything is written off. The living will remember it for her.”
That voice was extremely calm, yet it felt like a chilling winter wind.
Seeing him speak with such certainty, and connecting it with his mother’s sudden death, Liang Sheng suddenly felt a chill run down his spine.
“It has nothing to do with me.”
Shen Xingyu unhurriedly exonerated himself.
He picked up a document from the table, skimmed over it roughly, and tapped his fingernail on the final conclusion on the paper:
“This is the autopsy report, right? It clearly states suicide. She hasn’t improved at all over the years. Mania, severe depression—it’s already incurable. Dying can be considered a release.”
Liang Sheng’s mind was in a complete mess right now.
The tiny suspicion that had just sprouted in his mind was quickly obliterated by the man’s explanation.
He really couldn’t think of any reason Shen Xingyu would have to murder his adoptive mother. As for that lie about being a mistress, it was pure nonsense. After all, over the years, Shen Xingyu often said crazy things; he had become a bit schizophrenic since the car accident.
He stopped overthinking, knelt in front of the hospital bed, and began to tidy up his mother’s remains.
Suddenly, as he folded back the blanket, an old flip phone fell out. Attached to the phone was a vintage pocket watch.
Liang Sheng sobbed. Just as he was about to bend down to pick it up, the man beat him to it and picked it up first.
He looked up at Shen Xingyu holding the phone and hurriedly stood up to grab it.
“This is my mom’s belonging! Give it back to me!”
Shen Xingyu held it high above his head and said with an undeniable tone, “I can give it back to you, but you have to leave here with me. Right now, immediately.”
“W-what exactly do you want to do!”
Liang Sheng was about to be driven mad by this torment.
He stopped trying to grab it, choked out a sob, and shook his head: “I can’t go. I want to stay and handle my mom’s funeral arrangements. This is the last thing I can do for her…”
“Isn’t that younger brother of yours here? There’s no need for you to care about it. My grandfather is sick, and I don’t feel at ease having others take care of him. Come back to our hometown with me.”
Shen Xingyu gave him no room to breathe. As he spoke, he grabbed his hand and tried to pull him outside.
“Let go of me! I want to stay with my mom! Your relatives are relatives, does my mom deserve to have no children observing mourning for her?”
Liang Sheng cried and struggled, but it was to no avail.
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