Imperfect Desires

Mother Xin looked like someone just sucked her soul away and Xin Suyin had a complicated look on her face. Her slow processing brain couldn't even register this much information. But she still understood one thing, the man who raised her was her own father, and yet, she had no idea about it all along.

Xiu could even read Xin Suyin's emotions easily. "You're really a selfish man. Even if you did it all for revenge, you never even accepted your own daughter."

"When I never even liked her mother, why would I like her?" retorted Xin Zhao. "But she was useful. So, I had to keep her alive. And I was right, her impulsive and stubborn nature indeed helped me a lot. The only mistake of her life was letting you live."

Xiu grinned at that, "In this case, we are very alike. We are both like cockroaches. We don't die easily."

Xin Zhao laughed at her words, "It seems like it." He took a pause and wondered out loud, "I have a question though. Even people who were there couldn't find flaws. How did you manage to catch these flaws so easily?"

Xiu recalled back how when Liu Mingfan gave the information, something had caught her attention. It was a photo of Xin Zhao's butler with Xin Zhao. She couldn't think of why Xin Zhao would choose to do something like this to his own family. But all the information from Liu Mingfan pointed towards Xin Zhao.

She spent hours trying to recall where she had seen the other man in the photo. And then it dawned on her. When she was traveling abroad as Chen Xiu, she had come across him. As for why she would remember such an insignificant passerby? It was because she had almost hit him with her car when she tried to learn how to drive. It was that incident because of which she never tried to learn to drive again as Chen Xiu.

Usually, she wouldn't really believe her own memories since there were way too many blank spaces in her own memory. However, even if there was a single chance that her memory served her right, she wanted to take that chance.

Later Xin Kuan's information proved that he was actually Xin Zhao's supposedly dead butler, something clicked in her mind.

"I should say thanks to Wen Ai for that," said Xiu with a smile. 

"What did you say?" asked Xin Zimen in confusion.

Xiu repeated herself and added, "In fact, I should thank you as well, Ah-Xin. Back then if you hadn't let me borrow that book. It wouldn't have been easy to uncover this whole plan."

"Book?"

Xiu nodded her head, "The last book your wife wrote. 'Behind the Red Curtain.' It wasn't just psychological fiction, it was more than that. That was the story of two brothers. One killed the other and snatched his identity. Your wife had been too close to the truth." In fact, Xiu would have never thought much about that significant butler if she hadn't read the book Wen Ai wrote. 

At first, it was just a story to her but later, it turned into something else. The more she concentrated on the content of the book, the more she felt like the author was trying to create a map that led to a huge discovery. In the end, the discovery was what laid before her now.

"And that is why she had to die," added Xin Zhao.

Xin Zimen glared at him with red eyes while Xiu held his hand and tried to calm him down. She could see that the other person was trying to incite Xin Zimen. And that's not what she wanted.

"You have a sick desire to watch your brother's sons treat each other exactly like you brothers did with each other, didn't you?" questioned Xiu even though she knew the answer herself. "However, both Xin Zimen and Xin Zemin went against your wishes. No matter how you tried to make them fight, they didn't. They only drifted apart but they never held hostility for each other. Even when Xin Zimen was called the shadow of his brother, he didn't try to replace his brother. He instead tried to find his own identity.

"But you still wanted to continue trying. It's such a shame that all of a sudden, Xin Zimen married Wen Ai. All of your plans went downhill especially when he broke his relationship with the Xin family. You knew Wen Ai was a threat, so you targeted her. But how did you know about my birth?"

"I didn't know," answered Xin Zhao. "The reason why we chose to attack that day was simple. It was rare for Wen Ai to go anywhere alone. On that distant island, she went alone with her daughter. How perfect was that moment to kill her? It was such a shame that she survived." Then he noticed the rage and helplessness reflected in Xin Zimen's eyes and went on, "But I was still happy. So what if the mother survived? She lost her precious daughter. She lost her forever in the depth of the ocean. Imagine that little girl suffocating under that deep ocean with no way to breathe or see the light of the day again."

Xin Zimen slammed his hand on the table and a crack appeared on its surface from how riled up he was. Wasn't it enough that he had nightmares of that exact same scene? Watching helplessly as his daughter drifted in the current of the water? Now that this man said it out loud, it made him want to burn this whole place down.

Xiu also couldn't help recalling that feeling of suffocation she felt underwater. But it didn't stop her from why she was here. 

"Then how did you know about me?" 

"It was a coincidence that we came across Carina Novell who was looking for Wen Ai. It was because of her carelessness that we managed to find out about your identity. She was trying to reach Xin Zemin since she learned that Wen Ai was dead. Since she gave away her identity along with yours, we couldn't let you live either."

"Why? Got scared of a little teenager?"

Xin Zhao snorted, "No, it was because Xin Zemin was easier to control if he didn't have an heir of his own. Your appearance disrupted our plans so we decided to get rid of you just like we got rid of Wen Ai."

Xin Zimen rushed up and clutched his neck, "You, sick man! That was my wife! You killed my daughter! And then took the life of my wife as well!"

Even though it was difficult for Xin Zhao to breathe, he still continued, "Your wife was gonna die anyway. She was under severe depression. You can think that I took pity on her and gave her an easy and quick death."

Xin Zimen punched his old face without holding back his strength. He was mad. He was losing his mind after learning about all of this. He couldn't help it. The one who lost the most in all of this sick game was him! He didn't care whether he received love from his so-called parents or not. But just the thought of his wife and daughter drove him crazy!

Xiu didn't stop him this time, she could understand what he was going through right now. In the end, the mastermind of this whole game was just a crazy old bastard! And that crazy old bastard did everything just for fun. 

What did they say? If the world wronged me, I'm gonna retaliate against the whole world?

That was exactly his mentality. Since his brother started this game, he did everything to make this exciting for himself. Whether it was to take his brother's identity, take his brother's wife, or even ruin his brother's sons. It was all done because he wanted to play. 

Xiu didn't care about how Xin Zimen treated Xin Zhao. It had nothing to do with her. She walked over to Xin Suyin who was staring in space in a daze and crouched down before her.

"How does it feel to know that your own father didn't care about you?" Xin Suyin didn't react to those words. Xiu didn't mind that as she added, "I guess now you can imagine how much despair Chen Xiu must have gone through knowing what kind of a mother she had."

Finally, Xin Suyin's eyes wavered and she stared at Xiu, "Who are you?"

Xiu smiled at her, "What if I say I'm the grim reaper? And I'm here to take your life?"

Xin Suyin looked into her clear eyes and felt shaken, "Last time we met, you weren't like this."

Xiu knew she was referring to the time she had tied up Destiny to threaten her up so she said, "Neither were you."

Xin Suyin shook her head, "I always thought human life is cheap." Her eyes dimmed, "I wonder how she felt when her life slowly drained away."

Xiu held her hand and placed a knife in it before saying, "Why don't try to figure it out yourself? How did she feel, you'd know."

After she said that, she stood up and didn't turn back to look at Xin Suyin. Instead, she looked at Xin Kuan before walking out of this place. She never planned on dealing with Xin Zhao on her own. That wasn't really revenge. That was something that she left for both Xin brothers. 

"Uncle Kuan," she called out.

"Yes?"

"It's time you clean up my darling grandmother's relatives from the Xin Manor. If my father is gonna be the head of the Xin family, then he definitely shouldn't have to see the faces of unnecessary people around."

"With everything you have in hands, even your grandmother can end up in jail for embezzling company funds," stated Xin Kaun.

"Oh then make sure she serves a good time," said Xiu lightly before she got inside the car and closed her eyes.