Just Wanting to Divorce My Love Rival - Chapter 21

Zhong Yingzhi looked down at the person kneeling on the ground, completely unmoved. She sneered, “This whole ‘old parents and young children’ routine to gain sympathy—don’t you think it’s a bit too cliché? Do I look like the kind of person who is overflowing with kindness?”

Mr. Liu crawled on his knees to Zhong Yingzhi’s feet. “Everything I’ve said is true. There isn’t a single shred of fake sympathy in it. I beg you, I beg you to let me go—spare Sihui’s mother.”

It was morning, the peak hour for traffic at the dormitory entrance. Students going in and out of the building constantly glanced over, whispering and pointing at the scene.

Mr. Liu had lived a successful life, and his company had been flourishing. He had never begged anyone like this in his life, yet here he was, throwing away all his dignity to kneel before a junior.

Liu Sihui couldn’t bear it any longer and stepped forward to pull her father up. “Dad, get up! Everyone is watching!”

Mr. Liu shoved her away. “I told you to shut up! If you weren’t out causing trouble every day, would any of this be happening?”

He shoved her so hard that Liu Sihui stumbled and fell to the ground.

Mr. Liu said with bitter frustration, “I worked hard to make money just to give you and your mother a good life. I’m busy at the company all day and then I have to go to the hospital to take care of your mom. I haven’t looked after you much since you were a child. I wanted you to at least finish university, so I worked hard to squeeze you into this school. I didn’t have the energy or time to educate you—that’s my fault. But can’t you be a bit more sensible? Can’t you think of your parents for once?”

Tears pooled in Liu Sihui’s eyes, but she stubbornly refused to let them fall.

She glanced at the students gathering in the distance to watch the drama, gritted her teeth, and finally knelt down as well. “I’m the one who caused the trouble. I’ll accept whatever anger you want to take out on me. I’m willing to endure any beating or cursing. But my dad’s company cannot fail. It doesn’t matter if I become a penniless nobody, but if my mom has no money, she will die.”

Zhong Yingzhi raised an eyebrow. “What a tedious and boring play.”

Liu Sihui grabbed Zhong Yingzhi’s foot as she moved to leave. “I was wrong. I was truly wrong. Please, have mercy. A great person like you shouldn’t bother being petty with people like us.”

“Let go.” Zhong Yingzhi looked down at her, her gaze frigid.

With just that single look, Liu Sihui’s hands trembled, and she released her grip.

Liu Sihui lowered her head. “Did I do something so heinous against heaven? Will you really not let us go no matter what, even after we’ve gone this far?”

Zhong Yingzhi mocked, “What far? To the point of acting pathetic? I seem to recall that when you were hitting people and acting like a tyrant in school, you didn’t look pathetic at all.”

Liu Sihui kept her head down. “Everyone should leave a path for others. Do you have to drive us into a dead end? Things change; in thirty years, who knows where we’ll be? We might be worth nothing in your eyes, just ants, but how do you know an ant won’t eventually strike back?”

“Then strike back,” Zhong Yingzhi said indifferently, not even lifting her eyelids. “For trash like you, forget thirty years—I could give you three hundred and you still wouldn’t be able to turn things around.”

With that, Zhong Yingzhi strode away without staying a moment longer, never having truly regarded these people at all.

Liu Sihui looked at her father, who seemed to have aged ten years in an instant while kneeling on the ground, and then at the departing Zhong Yingzhi. Her hands clenched into fists against the dirt. Through gritted teeth, she whispered, “Zhong Yingzhi, just you wait. I will prove it to you. I will make you regret today’s decision.”

Lin Zhuo had chased after Zhong Yingzhi to check on her foot, only to witness this scene of Liu Sihui and her father begging.

He let out a sigh.

Sometimes being cold-hearted is fine, but sometimes being too cold-hearted isn’t great.

However, this wasn’t the first time Lin Zhuo had seen her treat people this way. Once…

That year, Zhong Yingzhi had just started her third year of middle school. She was only fourteen, but she was a head taller than her peers, standing out in both appearance and grades.

She was an undeniably excellent child, yet this girl who seemed perfect to outsiders once stood before the hospital bed of her mother—who had been in a coma for years—and said something Lin Zhuo had never forgotten.

Zhong Yingzhi was wearing a blue-and-white school uniform. Even though the uniform was tacky, it couldn’t hide her elegance. She looked at the sleeping woman on the bed, smiled, and said: “It’s good that she’s asleep. Best if she stays asleep forever and never wakes up. Or better yet, why doesn’t she just die?”

Hearing this, Mr. Zhong immediately slapped her. The usually kind and approachable Zhong Kan had flared up in anger at his daughter for the first time. “She’s your mother! The one who gave birth to you and raised you! How dare you curse her to die?”

Zhong Yingzhi touched the blood at the corner of her mouth and said playfully, “Dad, you’ve got it wrong. I’m not cursing her to die. I’m wishing I could strangle her myself.”

The veins on Zhong Kan’s forehead bulged. He raised his hand for another slap, but upon meeting Zhong Yingzhi’s indifferent gaze, his hand froze in mid-air.

Zhong Yingzhi didn’t flinch or hide. She watched him quietly, her eyes full of mockery and disdain. “Dad, since you two are so deeply in love, if she dies, will you go with her? That seems like a great suggestion. If she dies, you must accompany her. Really, I support it with both hands.”

At that time, Lin Zhuo hadn’t been the Zhong family’s private doctor for long and didn’t know the complications behind the scenes. He only knew that the coldness and malice in the eyes of that fourteen-year-old girl made her seem less like a child and more like a heartless monster.

Lin Zhuo pushed aside these messy memories and dialed Zhong Yingzhi’s number. The phone rang seven or eight times before connecting.

“About Liu Sihui’s mother being ill—do you need me to verify that?” Lin Zhuo asked.

Zhong Yingzhi: “Are you that bored?”

Lin Zhuo thinned his lips. “What if it’s true?”

Zhong Yingzhi’s voice was icy. “Whether it’s true or false doesn’t matter. My decision will not change.”

Lin Zhuo sighed and nodded, skipping the topic. “Does your foot injury need—”

Zhong Yingzhi interrupted him. “If I need something, I will instruct you. When I don’t, please put away this unnecessary concern. I won’t appreciate it, nor will I think well of you for it. I hate talkative people. Don’t think that just because you’ve been by my side for a long time you can start overstepping your boundaries.”

Zhong Yingzhi picked up the pitcher and poured half a glass of water. “There are plenty of people who want your position. Replacing you is a decision I could make in an instant.”

Lin Zhuo fell silent for a long moment. He put away the friendly tone and said respectfully, “Understood, Miss. I will be careful in the future.”

Zhong Yingzhi hung up, took her water glass, and walked to the balcony to glance down.

Liu Sihui was still kneeling there, unmoving. Sensing Zhong Yingzhi’s gaze, she looked up and stared straight at her, her eyes filled with resentment.

Zhong Yingzhi took a sip of water, let out a cold snort, and indifferently looked away.

But she did not anticipate that this decision would make her—a person who had never felt regret—regret it countless times later.

A negligible ant could never hurt her directly; it couldn’t even touch her. But she forgot: an ant can hurt the people around her, using extreme and irreversible ways to make her live in endless guilt and remorse.