Free Web NovelChapter 38: Chapter 38: Dream
The river that flowed through Xinghua Village was five or six meters wide but not particularly deep. The water only came up to a person’s thighs, or their waist at its deepest point.
The river wasn’t dangerous to an adult, except during the winter.
The moment Zhao Wenming went under, plunging headfirst into the water, a chill pierced him to the bone.
"Aah! Help me!" Zhao Wenming felt like he’d lost half his life in that instant. He thrashed and screamed, completely unable to get his feet under him as the current swept him downstream.
"Help me, help me..." Zhao Wenming was on the verge of a breakdown. He had already swallowed several mouthfuls of frigid water, and his prized glasses were gone. He struggled desperately, trying to stand upright.
Su Li stood on the bank, watching coldly as Zhao Wenming struggled in the water, her eyes filled with vindictive glee.
After a Herculean effort, and having been swept about ten meters downstream, Zhao Wenming finally managed to get to his feet in a calmer part of the river.
He was upright, but he had found his footing in the deepest part of the river.
"HUFF... HUFF..." Zhao Wenming gasped for breath, shivering uncontrollably. The cold had turned his lips blue and his face deathly pale, and his whole body was going stiff.
"Su Li! Su Li, help me! Quick, pull me out!" Zhao Wenming yelled desperately, seeing Su Li slowly walk over to the riverbank nearby.
Everything had happened in a flash. He had been in such a panic when he fell that he hadn’t even realized Su Li was the one who pushed him. Now, seeing her, he immediately cried for help. He was nearsighted and, without his glasses, couldn’t make out her expression at all.
He shouted and tried to struggle toward her, but as he moved, he suddenly realized his left foot was stuck. He couldn’t move it.
In his desperate attempt to avoid being swept away, he had planted his feet too forcefully and, as luck would have it, wedged one between some rocks on the riverbed. It was stuck fast.
Zhao Wenming yanked at his leg a few times. Pain shot through his foot, and he nearly lost his balance, but the rocks trapping him didn’t budge an inch.
"Su Li, my foot is stuck! Quick, give me a hand!" Zhao Wenming yelled, looking at her anxiously.
"I can’t pull you. It’s improper for a man and a woman to have physical contact." Su Li knew Zhao Wenming was nearsighted. A wide smile spread across her face, her eyes filled with scorn, but her voice was laced with feigned panic as she spoke.
Zhao Wenming was so angry he could have spat blood. His teeth were chattering from the cold, and he could barely speak clearly. "You’d be... you’d be saving my life! What are you talking about, ’improper contact’? Hurry up and help me!"
"No way. There’s no one else around. If someone found out, my reputation would be ruined. I’ll go get help. I’ll go find someone to pull you out." With that, Su Li turned and walked away, completely ignoring Zhao Wenming’s attempts to persuade her otherwise.
"...This water is freezing! I’m going to freeze to death! Su Li... you..." Seeing that Su Li didn’t even turn her head, Zhao Wenming had no choice but to change his tune. "Su Li, just hurry up and get help! Go quickly!"
Hearing what he thought was Su Li’s agreement, Zhao Wenming cursed under his breath. ’Idiot. All that beauty is wasted on her.’
He muttered curses, but the cold was becoming unbearable, so he started yelling for help again. Unfortunately, it was the middle of the New Year celebration. The village was filled with the constant crackle of firecrackers and the shouts of children. No one could possibly hear his cries.
After a few shouts, his voice grew weaker and weaker. He was running out of strength, drained by both the effort and the numbing cold.
He even thought about trying to bend down and move the rocks himself, but the water was just too cold. He tried once and failed.
In the end, his only option was to pin all his hopes on Su Li, praying she would hurry back with help. But he had no idea that Su Li had no intention of fulfilling his wish. The moment she was out of his sight, she found a hidden spot and crouched down, listening to his cries for help with immense satisfaction.
’He won’t die from this, at least not right away.’ She had never planned on killing him with her own hands, but letting him suffer in the freezing water a while longer was perfectly acceptable.
Zhao Wenming fought to stay conscious and upright. Every agonizing minute felt like a century. Before long, he couldn’t stop himself from crying for help again, cursing Su Li between his pleas.
Just when Zhao Wenming felt he couldn’t hold on any longer, his cries finally attracted some villagers. By then, about ten minutes had passed since he’d fallen into the water.
Seeing people run to rescue Zhao Wenming, Su Li slipped away quietly, a little disappointed.
Back at the Tang Family home, Su Li stood in the courtyard, once again lost in the memories that Zhao Wenming had dredged up.
In her past life, being tricked out of her cornea hadn’t been the end of it. Later, Zhao Wenming had set his sights on her heart. By then, he was rich and powerful. He deceived her, claiming it was just a matter of donating a kidney, all while planning to arrange her "accidental" death. When Su Li learned of his true intentions, she fell into despair, wanting to take him and his entire family down with her in a final, mutually destructive act of revenge.
At the time, Yu Zhengqing was in the Imperial City, but Su Li feared he was no match for Zhao Wenming. She didn’t want him to find out and get dragged into the mess.
As she was preparing to take them all down with her, Yu Zhengqing sensed that something was amiss. He pressed her for answers until she finally had no choice but to tell him everything.
Yu Zhengqing was furious when he heard the story and swore he would save her.
Everything that followed felt like a dream to Su Li. Five days later, on the very day Zhao Wenming had planned for her "accidental" death, Yu Zhengqing concluded his investigation. He published a report exposing all of Zhao Wenming’s crimes, including what he had done to Su Li. The story immediately caused a massive public outcry.
The scandal was enormous. Overnight, Zhao Wenming was investigated and brought down. The Yue Family was implicated as well, and even the superiors he had been cozying up to were dragged into it, leaving them scrambling to save their own skins. freewebnøvel.coɱ
Zhao Wenming was sentenced to twenty years in prison. He ended up dying there, long before Su Li herself passed away.
Su Li was in the courtroom to hear the judge deliver the sentence with her own ears. The moment it was over and the dust had settled, she broke down and sobbed uncontrollably.
For a long time after, Su Li remained in a state of shock. But it was during this period that she truly began to grow. She emerged from the nightmares of her past and found a dream of her own. freewebnσvel.cѳm
She wanted to become a journalist.
Because of what happened, she became completely captivated by the profession. She fell in love with journalism. Even though she was already middle-aged and had wasted so much time—it seemed far too late to start over—she still wanted to change her fate and begin a new life.
It was also then that she came to a profound realization: her miserable fate wasn’t entirely everyone else’s fault. Most of it was her own.
She had been too weak, too shortsighted, and that’s why she had ended up in such a wretched state. The pitiful often have their own failings. She had been foolish enough to be manipulated by Qin Shanshan, careless enough to lose Tang Mo, and that had led to everything that followed.
’Qin Shanshan and Zhao Wenming were evil, yes, but more importantly, I wasn’t strong enough.’ And wasn’t that a failing in itself? If she had been strong and independent, she never would have suffered so much.
Having finally matured in middle age, Su Li stopped blaming fate and everyone else, and instead decided to rely on her own strength.
Afterward, with only one good eye, she threw herself into her studies. She practiced her Mandarin, took an unconventional path to learn foreign languages, and applied to every vocational school that would accept her.
She studied day and night for five years. Leaning on her aptitude for foreign languages, she finally managed to get a job at a television station. She wasn’t a full-time employee, and she wasn’t a journalist yet, but her life had truly begun anew.
But fate played another cruel joke on her. Soon after, she was diagnosed with stomach cancer. In the end, she never truly realized her ambitions or achieved her dream, but she never forgot the lessons she had learned and the growth she had achieved.
And because she remembered, she was now, after her rebirth, changing her destiny one step at a time.
