Chapter 134: I Die

Jing Fei was lowering his head over the proposal when he heard this. He glanced toward his fiancée, who was inside the room, humming as she began to change clothes. It was obvious that Jing Dule had informed Xiaowei first, so he could only nod helplessly. With a smile, he struck Jing Dule lightly on the shoulder and said, “All right, all right. We’re leaving now.”

As he watched Jing Fei enter his fiancée’s room, followed by the faint sound of intimate whispers, Jing Dule’s smile gradually became tinged with complicated emotions.

They sped along the road, the car’s speed climbing to nearly 180 kilometers per hour. Behind the wheel, Jing Dule let out an exhilarated scream. Xiaowei, too, had abandoned her usual capable and dignified manner from the office. Holding a cocktail, she stood before the windshield, whistling excitedly. Her slightly flushed, tipsy face and naturally crimson lips radiated an intoxicating wildness, drawing frequent glances from passersby.

Jing Fei felt somewhat uncomfortable, but it was rare to see his younger brother and fiancée so happy. He could only shake his head with a bitter smile, open a bottle of Ice Red, and gaze out the window. The fiery spirit of the night gradually stirred within him as well, and the smile at the corners of his lips slowly grew more uninhibited.

For all these years, he had frantically accumulated strength, suppressing the youthful fire within him and devoting himself entirely to the family business. He had shouldered the burden of the entire family so that his younger brother could enjoy his youth without a care in the world.

There was no choice. Every prominent family was built upon the constant sacrifice of its descendants, each one exhausting everything they had to win freedom for more of their kin. He was the one who had been forced to spend his youth in this way.

There was no choice. That was simply his fate, and besides…

As he watched his fiancée feed Jing Dule a sip of cocktail, the two of them laughing so carefree, a deep sense of satisfaction spread through his heart.

He truly liked it—he liked seeing others smile, seeing them happy, seeing them live the kind of life he himself could never attain. Somehow, as long as the people closest to him could live such a life, he was willing to accept a life that fell far short of his own hopes.

Yes, even Jing Fei himself thought it strange. Yet he had always given willingly, just as he had when they were children. Whenever his younger brother made a mistake, he would step forward without hesitation and take the blame for him. Though their stern father, unaware of the truth, would beat him until he was covered in wounds, Jing Fei would still grin every time he saw his little brother, guilt-ridden but unharmed, applying medicine to his injuries.

“It’s all right… Your brother is here…”

Just as Jing Fei raised his strong hand to stroke Jing Dule’s head once more from the back seat, the younger brother who had been brimming with joy suddenly grew gloomy. With a violent turn of the steering wheel, he slammed his foot down on the accelerator. The sports car shot straight toward the riverside promenade.

After a dizzying sensation of weightlessness, Jing Fei plunged into the freezing river. Unable to swim, he struggled for a moment before sinking completely into darkness.

When he opened his eyes again, he was in a hospital room.

His head splitting with pain, Jing Fei struggled to sit up, only to collapse once more beneath the crushing weakness that overcame him.

At that moment, muffled voices drifted in from outside the room.

“Mom, Dad, you have to save me this time. Xiaowei is dead. I killed her in the accident. Now the Huaxia Alliance has come knocking. Our family has to give them an explanation, or the elders of the clan won’t let me off either. Mom, Dad, you’re the only ones who can save me now!”

Jing Dule’s desperate pleas continued without pause.

A violent pain seized Jing Fei’s lungs and spread throughout his entire body. Enduring the agony, he held his breath and strained to hear every word outside the door.

“If this could have been suppressed, do you think we would have waited for you to say so? But there were only three of you at the scene. Your father and I had no way to tamper with anything. And now the Huaxia Alliance is watching us like a tiger stalking its prey. What are we supposed to do?”

His mother’s anxious voice followed, nearly breaking into tears.

“Old man, stop sitting there smoking and say something! What are we going to do?”

After a long silence, his father’s voice finally rang out. It was unnervingly calm and unhurried, yet every word landed with absolute force, as though his decision had already been made.

“In that case, let Little Fei take the blame. I will never let my own son go to prison. The Jing family has raised him for so many years. It is time for him to repay us.”

“Yes, yes, yes! How could I have forgotten? You adopted him many years ago, Father. He has eaten and lived under the Jing family’s roof all these years, enjoying so many of our resources. It is time for him to repay us! Father, you truly are wise. You planned our way out years ago.”

Seeing that there was hope, Jing Dule immediately seized upon this final lifeline, his voice no longer lacking confidence.

“But how are we going to make him confess? He isn’t stupid.”

His mother’s tone also settled. After thinking for a moment, she continued, “That’s easy. I’ll bribe a nurse and have her put some hallucinogens in his drip. He’s seriously injured, and with such a severe blow to the head, he’ll be easy to manipulate…”

Her voice gradually faded, but Jing Fei felt as though thunder had exploded above his head. He began coughing violently, and the pain that coursed through his entire body was so intense that he wished for death.

Yet what had just happened was even more unbearable.

Twenty-nine years. An entire twenty-nine years.

Over all those decades, how much had he sacrificed for this family? Far more than he had ever received in return.

He had done so much, and yet… yet he had inexplicably become nothing more than a substitute to take the blame for his younger brother’s mistake.

It was unfair. It was utterly unfair!

This should not be happening!

Things should not have turned out this way!

After everything he had given, was this all he would receive in the end?

He could not confess. Even if they beat him to death, he could never confess, no matter what they did to him.

In his dazed state, Jing Fei saw a beautifully dressed nurse push open the door. Seeing his agony, she said nothing. Instead, she slowly injected the liquid from a syringe into his intravenous drip.

An overwhelming weariness swept over him once more, and Jing Fei fell unconscious again.