Chapter 247: KANG SIYING BACKSTORY(1)

The car rolled to a stop outside a nondescript building, nothing about its exterior suggesting anything worth Liuxian’s attention, though the two men stationed near the entrance told a different story entirely.

Limo stepped out, straightening his jacket before approaching them.

"Name?" The taller of the two studied him carefully, hand resting near his side.

"Yang Limo." He held his ground under the scrutiny. "Someone inside is expecting me."

A brief exchange passed between the two men, murmured too low for Limo to catch, before the shorter one nodded and stepped aside, gesturing him toward the door.

Inside, the building held none of the grandeur its exterior suggested it might lack. Plain walls, a narrow hallway, the low hum of a television somewhere further in. A third man appeared at the end of the corridor, leading him wordlessly toward a small room near the back.

Limo’s chest tightened the moment the door opened.

Sitting on the edge of a bed, thinner than Limo remembered him, hollow around the eyes in a way nine years hadn’t been kind enough to explain fully, Kong Siying looked up.

Neither of them spoke right away.

Nine years collapsed into the space between them, memories rising unbidden, none of them simple. Limo had been fifteen when he’d first learned about the two of them, his father, already long divorced from his mother by then, fifteen years older than the man now sitting in front of him.

The relationship had drawn opposition from every direction, extended family, old friends of his father’s, all of them convinced Kong Siying had latched onto a wealthy, recently single man for reasons that had nothing to do with love.

Limo remembered the arguments. The pressure. His father’s face when he’d finally given in and ended things, worn down by everyone around him insisting he was being played.

He remembered, too, the whispers that came later, once Kong Siying had already disappeared from their circle entirely, about the debts he’d left behind, about the other men before his father, men who’d handed over money for relationships that had never been real to begin with.

Limo had never fully decided how much of that was true, and how much was simply the story everyone preferred to tell about the man who’d almost complicated things for his father.

"You look surprised." Kong Siying’s voice broke the silence first, thin, worn down, nothing like the confident tone Limo remembered from years ago.

"I thought you were dead." Limo stayed near the doorway, unwilling to close the distance just yet, the sight in front of him too disorienting to allow for the courtesy he’d normally have offered. "Your family held a funeral, Siying. I stood there and watched them bury an empty casket."

Catching himself immediately, he winced at the missing title. Whatever had happened between them, whatever Kong Siying had once been to his father, the man deserved better than being addressed like a stranger off the street.

"Uncle Siying." He corrected himself, quieter this time. "I’m sorry. Seeing you like this, I forgot myself for a second."

"I know." Kong Siying’s hands twisted together in his lap, something faintly grateful flickering across his face at the correction. "I’m sorry you had to see that funeral."

"Are you." Limo’s voice sharpened, old resentment surfacing faster than he expected despite the softer address. "My father never fully talked about what happened between you two, not once, all these years. Whatever you did with the others, whatever debts you left behind, he was the one person who actually loved you. And you still left."

Kong Siying flinched at that, something raw crossing his face before he could hide it.

"I didn’t leave because I wanted to." His voice cracked on the last word. "You don’t know what happened after. What I had to do just to survive."

Limo studied him, arms crossed, unwilling yet to soften despite the visible wreckage sitting in front of him.

"Then tell me." He finally stepped further into the room, pulling a chair closer, sitting down across from him. "Tell me everything, Uncle Siying. Start from the beginning."

Kong Siying’s hands stilled in his lap, his gaze dropping to the floor as though the memories themselves were easier to face without looking anyone in the eye.

"After your father let me go, I had nowhere to turn." His voice came low, unsteady. "The debts didn’t disappear just because the relationship ended. If anything, people came calling faster once word got around that I no longer had his backing."

Limo said nothing, watching him carefully.

"I won’t pretend I was innocent before that." Kong Siying’s jaw tightened. "There were others, yes. Men who paid for my company, thinking it meant something more. I’m not proud of it. But your father was different. I never asked him for money, not once, not even when I needed it most."

"That’s not what everyone believed." Limo’s voice stayed flat.

"I know that’s what everyone believed." A humorless breath escaped him. "It didn’t matter what was true. Once the story took hold, there was no correcting it. Plus they weren’t far off."

He paused, fingers pressing briefly against his temple, as though steadying himself before continuing.

"After your father, I needed money badly enough that I stopped being careful about who I turned to next." His voice dropped further. "That’s how I ended up with Shen Zihao."

The name landed heavy in the small room, and something in Kong Siying’s posture curled inward at the sound of it, as though simply saying it aloud cost him something physical.

"I didn’t know what he was at first." His hands had started trembling again. "By the time I understood, it was already too late to walk away."

Limo’s arms loosened slightly from across his chest, the anger he’d walked in with giving way to something more complicated, unwilling yet to call it sympathy.

"Because your father was the one man you couldn’t scam." He said it slowly, testing the shape of the realization as it formed. "That’s what you’re telling me, isn’t it? Out of everyone, he was the only one who was real."

Kong Siying’s eyes lifted to meet his, something broken and honest sitting behind them.

"Yes." The word came out barely above a whisper. "He was the only one. And I still lost him."