Acting rashly could send one tumbling down into the abyss.
The woman was acting as if she was the best in the world just because she wore something that cost a thousand.
She had gotten herself into some serious trouble by that one action.
Zong Jinghao made no move to change his orders.
The woman was terrified. How was she going to live without her hand?
No, I can’t lose my hand!
Even so, she could not fight against the people standing before her.
Fear might have flipped a switch in her, and she broke free of her restraints all of a sudden, all before the bodyguards could react.
She barreled herself towards Lin Xinyan.
Zong Jinghao thought that she was going to hurt Lin Xinyan, and he kicked her away. The woman skidded sideways and crashed into a tree in the garden nearby, making it shake on impact.
Zong Jinghao’s eyes were red with anger. “What were y’all doing? You can’t even hold a woman down!”
The woman pressed a hand to her chest and coughed a few times. “I was not going to hurt her,” she rasped.
She looked up at Lin Xinyan. “I just thought that I could ask you for some mercy, since you’re a woman like me.”
Lin Xinyan’s face remained cold, not because she was heartless, but rather because the woman’s actions were beyond her threshold.
As a mother, she felt guilty for not being able to protect her child from harm, yet she couldn’t forgive the perpetrator so easily.
She was not a saint but an ordinary human and a mother.
“My daughter is only five, and I have never even scolded her, let alone hit her. Who gave you the right to hit her?” Lin Xinyan asked, her eyes reddened. “You probably don’t deserve to lose your hand because of this, but you have to be punished.”
The woman’s jaw dropped, and she was at a loss for words.
Lin Xinyan hugged Lin Ruixi close to shield her from the violent scene that was about to take place. “I’ll get on the car first,” she said.
Zong Jinghao nodded.
“Wait.
Lin Ruixi looked up at Lin Xinyan suddenly. “Mommy, didn’t you teach me to forgive and forget?”
Lin Xinyan lowered her head. That’s right, she taught her daughter that.
One shouldn’t be unreasonable, and one should forgive and forget once the situation is resolved.
Yet, she failed to do so.
As a mother, she felt furious and guilty the moment she saw her child getting hit by some stranger.
Lin Ruixi turned to look at the woman, who was still sprawled on the floor. “Do you know what you did wrong?”
The woman’s eyes had lost their shine, and she scoffed at herself. “One mistake is all it takes to understand the people around you.”
Her husband had been the sweetest man on earth before, yet he abandoned her and even told her that she was an embarrassment to him. She was left to fend herself.
Lin Ruixi sighed as she pitied the woman. “Mommy,” she said before turning to her father. “Daddy, let her go. My face doesn’t hurt anymore.”
Zong Jinghao pulled his daughter into his embrace. Her soft skin was still tinged with red, and the slap mark was still visible. He reached out to stroke her cheek but ended up wiping his fingers across her forehead as he was scared that he would hurt her. His daughter had a kind heart.
Even so, the world had its ugly side.
“You sure?” He asked his daughter gently.
Lin Ruixi nodded. “Yeah. Mommy said that you should forgive as much as possible so that you can be happy.”
Zong Jinghao raised his eyebrows. “What else did she teach you?”
“That we shouldn’t go looking for trouble, and if others try to mess with us, we fight back with twice the power!” Lin Xichen cut in.
Lin Ruixi looked at her brother. “Mommy only told you that, not me.”
Lin Xinyan took different approaches in educating her two kids. For Lin Ruixi, she did as much as she could to protect her from harm, and strived to shape her into a smart, compassionate and observant young lady.
As for her son, she taught him to be strong, determined, and fearless. She wanted him to become a reliable man when he grew up.
As a result, the things she told the two kids differed greatly as well.
“What does ‘an eye for an eye’ mean?” Lin Ruixi asked, blinking.
“It means that I will beat you up if you hit me first,” Lin Xichen said without much thought.
“But it’s not like you hit me back whenever I hit you,” the little girl said innocently.
Lin Xichen resisted the urge to roll his eyes. Was his sister stupid or something?
“You’re my sister, so it doesn’t count! Mommy said that we share the same blood since we’re twins, so I will never hit you no matter what happens. Mommy gave birth to both of us, so you’re forever my little sister.”
Lin Ruixi cocked her head to the side and pondered over it for a long while before saying, “Does that mean that if I slap her back, we’ll be even?”
Lin Xichen put his arms across his chest and held his chin as he considered his sister’s words. “Hmm…it should be two slaps, since she made the first move. We have to make her remember it somehow.”
“Two slaps then!” Lin Ruixi said, looking at Zong Jinghao. “You can ask Uncle Su to slap her twice, and we’ll be even. If you chopped her hand off, how is she going to eat?”
Zong Jinghao looked at his daughter’s clear, innocent eyes, and was at a loss for words.
Lin Ruixi took her father’s hesitance as doubt, and she wrapped her arms around his neck. “Daddy, just let her go…”
Finally, Zong Jinghao gave in to his daughter’s pleas, not out of mercy, but rather his reluctance to let his daughter down.
However, Zong Jinghao asked the bodyguards to do it instead of Su Zhan, since their training made them much stronger than Su Zhan.
“Let’s go,” Zong Jinghao picked up Lin Ruixi, while Lin Xinyan took Lin Xichen’s hand, leading them away from the scene. Su Zhan walked in front of them to lead the way.
One of the bodyguards held the woman down while the other administered her punishment.
They heard a loud ‘piak’ behind them as the bodyguard slapped the woman’s face.
They could tell that the bodyguard had used quite a bit of strength.
Lin Ruixi lifted her head out of curiosity, but Zong Jinghao immediately pressed her head back down, blocking her view.
She poked her head out and blinked at her father. “Daddy.”
“Hm?” Zong Jinghao hummed, looking down.
The little girl smiled. “Did you get angry because I got slapped?”
Zong Jinghao raised his eyebrows. “Why do you ask?”
“I can tell that you care from how angry you got and I am happy about it,” she answered. The look of fear on her face had disappeared.
Lin Ruixi blinked and repeated, “I’m really happy.”
Her Daddy loved her, and so did her Mommy and big brother. She felt like the luckiest girl in the world.
The slap didn’t even make a dent in her world.
She had the protection of all her love ones.
Zong Jinghao’s voice grew raspy. “Oh, you little dummy. Of course I love you dearly.”
The little girl broke into a huge grin, her smile was just like her mother.
Zong Jinghao loved it, but when his gaze settled on the red slap mark on her face, the smile he had disappeared into thin air.
He hid in a corner of the car with his daughter refusing to talk to anyone.
Lin Xichen rolled the jackfruit Su Zhan bought over to his sister. “Do you want some, Rui?”
She shook her head, much to his surprise. “No.”
Lin Xichen struggled to come to terms with the fact that his greedy little sister had refused an offer of food.
That was really strange.
Lin Ruixi snuggled closer to Zong Jinghao, as though she was trying to comfort him.
Lin Xinyan knew that Zong Jinghao was just brooding over the events of just now, and she couldn’t help but blame herself for it.
The car slowly backed out of the rest stop and entered the highway.
Lin Xinyan’s phone rang all of a sudden.
She pulled her phone out from her pocket.
