Chapter 4
Madame Chen’s wanton moans were heard, and her behavior seen, by her own son.
Fang Liang’s face turned purple. He beat the floor and roared,
“Filthy whore!”
She pulled her clothes together and hurried forward to help him up.
He slapped her across the face. Disgust showed plainly in his eyes.
“Get away! Don’t touch me! A shameless whore like you, with no decency—you ought to be tied in a pig cage and drowned!”
Panting, he struggled to his feet and demanded,
“What about my father? What about all the ancestors of the Fang family?”
The blow had turned Madame Chen’s head aside. Hearing his curses, she froze for a moment.
Then her lips twisted, and she began to giggle.
Her whole body shook with laughter. She looked up and asked him coldly,
“Your short-lived father died years ago. I suffered alone to raise you. Without me, the Fang family would have no descendants. What do I owe your precious family?”
She touched the blood seeping from the corner of her mouth and carefully spread it over her lips like rouge.
A flash of defiance crossed her weather-lined face.
She turned and took the young man’s hand. There was an unfamiliar madness in her gaze as she looked at Fang Liang.
“I’ve been a widow for more than thirty years. I’ve wasted most of my life. Now I just want to be an ordinary woman!”
“You… you’re vile. Shameless…”
Red-eyed, he backed away, staring at her as if she were a monster.
Her voice turned shrill.
“I’m shameless?”
She lunged toward the dressing table. Her jewelry box overturned, spilling jewels and ornaments across the floor.
Like a madwoman, she scooped them up and thrust them into his hands.
“Son, look! I’ve envied these things all my life. Now I have them, thanks to her.”
She pointed at me.
“You married a good wife. She’s given us everything. Our good days have come! To hell with shame!”
She slipped a dangling hairpin into her bun and gently shook her head, looking like an innocent girl showing a new ornament to her sweetheart.
“Look. This is a swinging hairpin. I saw the young lady of a rich household wear one when I washed their clothes.”
As she moved, the hairpin tangled in her hair. She tugged it out, pulling strands with it.
At the white hairs in her hand, her expression turned sorrowful.
“But I’m old now. My youth is gone. What time have I left for shame?
“All these years, I kept chaste for you and your family. And what have I gained? A good name, and nothing else.
“If I hadn’t married your father or given birth to you, I wouldn’t have spent my whole life in misery!”
She leaned greedily into the young man’s arms and murmured,
“I don’t care about anything now. I only want happiness. The happiness a woman deserves.”
I quietly watched her lose herself in things she had once been denied.
People praised sharing hardship and prosperity because they could endure hardship together, but not prosperity.
Desires born of barren lives, once fed, became savage beasts clinging to the heart. They sucked out marrow, stripped flesh from bone, and changed people beyond recognition.
Fang Liang gasped violently with rage. Pointing at his mother, he vomited a mouthful of black blood and collapsed unconscious.
It was late at night when he woke again.
The physician cleaned the sores, now creeping up to his groin, and gave his final advice.
“There’s no saving it. The leg must be amputated, or you’ll lose your life too.”
Like a lamb cornered with nowhere to run, Fang Liang asked me hoarsely,
“You said you could heal my leg, but it would take someone related to me by blood… Is that true?”
I stood in the shadows of the candlelight and nodded with a soft laugh.
I had tortured him until he scarcely looked human. His eyes were hollow, his breathing labored.
When he looked at me, his gaze held a humble plea.
On one side was his debt to the mother who had raised him. On the other was his life. Weakly, he wavered, unable to choose.
But the cruelest thing was to make him choose for himself.
I urged him on.
“Husband, have you decided?”
After a long silence, he finally made up his mind.
“All right. All right, then go…”
“This magic is a delicate matter, husband. There’s something you don’t know.”
I watched him like a venomous snake watching prey already within reach, quietly baring my fangs.
“You must take that leg with your own hands.”
“What? You want me to… with my own hands…”
His lips trembled.
“She’s my own mother!”
I folded his cold hands into mine and rubbed them warmly, coaxing him in a tender voice.
“When she was desperately ill, you sought medicine for her. Now you’re desperately ill, and she doesn’t even ask after you. She does things like that without a thought for your bond as mother and son. Think—has she visited you even once all these days?”
I tightened my grip, stirring the fragments buried in his flesh and slowly churning the festering wound.
His veins bulged. He drew deep breaths. When he lifted his head again, a naked gleam of violence shone through his despair.