Chapter 2

Ignoring the doctor's objections, I got myself discharged and took a cab straight to the shrine where my parents were supposedly performing the rites.

I searched the grounds inside and out three times, but I never found either of them.

Exhausted, I sat down on the stone steps outside the shrine and pulled out my phone. The thread had been updated again.

"Mom and Dad flew out to Valrya today to have a seafood feast with me. Meanwhile, that idiot is still eating plain bread in the hospital. I'm dying laughing."

The attached photo showed a luxury oceanfront restaurant. The table was piled high with expensive lobsters, king crabs, and bottles of aged fine wine.

At the corner of the photo, part of a man's wrist had been accidentally captured. On it was a vintage watch that I knew all too well.

It was a collector's piece I had bought for Dad after working overtime for three straight months and closing one of the company's hardest projects last year.

In that moment, I was finally certain. The whole story about atoning for Caleb's death had been a complete and utter lie.

I took out my phone and opened the profile page of the account called "TraversingTheWorld". Caleb had always loved flaunting his wealth, and his page was full of posts documenting the lavish lifestyle he'd been living for the past ten years.

I scrolled through them one by one until I froze over a post. It was a photo he'd posted three years ago.

In it, he was drinking wine at an old-money estate overseas. The caption read, "Mom and Dad finally managed to squeeze half of that guy's company shares out of him. Bought myself a wine estate to celebrate!"

I remembered it now.

Three years ago, Mom had suddenly been diagnosed with uremia. She urgently needed a kidney transplant as well as an enormous amount of money for the surgery.

Without a second thought, I sold off half the shares of the company I had poured my blood and sweat into building and scraped together 30 million dollars for her treatment.

Later, her illness was miraculously declared a "misdiagnosis", but she never returned the 30 million dollars to me. They claimed they had set the money aside to buy a better, more luxurious burial plot for Caleb.

As it turned out, the money had gone to buy a wine estate for Caleb.

And there were plenty more posts. I went through them one by one, seeing basically every ounce of blood, sweat, and sleepless nights I had poured into the last ten years being spent on him.

I kept scrolling until my phone died and the screen went black. My pale face stared back at me from the dark screen, my jaw clenched tight.

…

Three days later, my parents returned from "the shrine".

The moment Dad walked in, he scowled in disgust and threw the designer shopping bags he was carrying onto the couch.

"What are you doing lounging around the house?" he barked. "Go make dinner! Your brother is suffering in the afterlife, and you still have the nerve to sit around doing nothing?"

Seeing the vintage watch on his wrist, I pulled my lips back into a cold smile.

"Dad, did everything go smoothly at the shrine? Does Caleb still need anything?"

A flicker of uneasiness crossed his face at my question, but he quickly put on an indignant expression.

"Even if he needs something, can you afford it? Last time I asked you to buy a mansion so we could burn it in his memory, you dragged your feet and made excuse after excuse.

"Now hurry up and make dinner! Your mother and I have been eating nothing but vegan food at the shrine. It has wrecked our stomachs!"

It was more like they'd ruined their stomachs by eating seafood nonstop in Valrya.

I lowered my eyes and answered in the same calm, low tone as always. "Got it. I'll go cook right now."

At the dinner table, Mom spoke up almost absent-mindedly.

"Asher, your company has really found its footing right now. You're working yourself to the bone all day, and you're going to ruin your health sooner or later. Transfer the rest of the shares to me next week. I'll manage them for you."

"Mom, I built that company from the ground up. If I hand over all my shares, how am I supposed to make a living?"

"You owe your very life to Caleb!" Dad snarled, slamming his fork onto the table. "We raised you all these years, and now we can't even ask you for a few shares? What? Are you planning on leaving things that belong to the Patterson family to some outsider?"

I raised my head, my gaze turning cold.

"Dad, did Caleb really jump into the river to save me back then?"

"You ungrateful little bastard!" Dad roared. "Your brother lost his life saving you, and you actually have the nerve to doubt him?

"Are you trying to erase history and pretend it never happened? I swear I'm going to beat some sense into you today, you ungrateful piece of trash!"

Dad grabbed the solid-wood cane from the corner of the room and swung it straight at my head.

In the past, I would have just stood there and taken the beating, apologizing while I endured the blows. But today, I reached out and caught the cane firmly.

"Dad, it was just a simple question. Why are you getting so worked up?"