Chapter 73—Conspiracy After Mourning!
The past, Country X
Time stood still for Xu Long Wei as his family organized his father's funeral. Throughout the preparation, he locked himself in his room and rejected anyone attempting to comfort him.
The devastating news spread fast, and the entire clan gathered in their house to decide the family's future. His first uncle temporarily took over Xu Holdings since his grandfather is in a coma after the accident that claimed the precious life of the Xu family's young master.
The funeral didn't take much time, as the family decided to bury his father three days later. This makes Xu Long Wei and his mother frustrated, for they didn't have enough time to say goodbye to his father. Add to the fact that no one questions the speed of his father's funeral because everyone is focused on the headmaster's condition.
Based on his grandfather's doctor, the older man is in a vegetative state, and there is no possibility of recovery in the future. They were given two options: one is to take his life support and let him pass on, and the other is to continue his help with the machine attached to his body, but he will remain unresponsive.
The family chooses the latter part, as they have no courage to end his grandfather's life. It was a tough decision, especially for his grandmother.
A week after their tragedy, things calm down in the Xu family; however, for Xu Long Wei, the past week was like a vague memory. Until now, the reality that his father died in a car accident didn't completely set in.
The people around him seem to move on and have forgotten his father, but as he witnesses his mother's mournful cry every night, he is reminded that his life has changed and he doesn't know how to go with the flow like others.
His life stays the same as time goes on. The Xu mansion, which used to be lively from all the activities, becomes hollow. His active personality is dampened by his mother's depression and neglect. Lost and alone, he isolated himself from others and tried to lessen his presence when others were around. These changes didn't escape the scrutiny of his grandmother.
Later, it became the main ground for his mother's and grandmother's relationship to deteriorate to a point where they were ignoring each other. Put in the middle of the situation, Xu Long Wei became more distant.
After nine months, another tragedy struck the family when his mother was accused of infidelity while his father was still alive. For no apparent reason, the news breaks out of his mother's affair, which she denied forcefully; however, her plea was ignored, and she was kicked out of the estate.
The worst scenario didn't stop as the family also questioned his birthright after they procured a piece of evidence that stated he is, in fact, an illegitimate child of his mother from another man.
This information shattered the remaining stability in his young mind. Same as his mother, he was thrown out of the house without anything to carry with him. He was fortunate that his mother was waiting for him outside the mansion, and he took her to country A to reside.
At the age of seven, his life that was envied by others turned dirty and messy as he lived in Country A. Since his mother didn't have enough money to support them, she daily left the house to work in a wealthy family's house.
Most often, he stayed in their apartment and tried to survive with any canned food they could manage to buy with her little income. Xu Long Wei decided to help her, so he started selling scrap metal. Under the excruciating heat, he would walk around their neighborhood and pick up metal he could sell.
Although his life was far different from what he was used to, he was happy that his mother was there for him. Until seven years later, she gave up and abandoned him when he found her lifeless body hanging in their bedroom.
He realizes then that for his mother, him being with her was not enough to fill in the void his father left behind. She became an empty shell trying to survive for her son and not for herself.
At fourteen, he became orphaned and entirely alone with nowhere to go. With no money in his pocket to have a proper ceremony, he has no option but to solely bury his mother in the empty lot located in an abandoned building. He stayed in that spot whenever he had time to be with her; it was then that he met Vera for the first time.
The life that died when his mother passed away revived with her smile as she introduced her name to him.