Chapter 91: Begging for Forgiveness

Over the course of a week, Liu Jiajia’s cravings struck three or four times in all. Perhaps the treatment was working, because each episode grew a little milder than the last.

Only then did Li Ming finally begin to feel at ease.

By the second half of that week, Liu Jiajia could even remain conscious through the attacks. Though the suffering was intense, she was able to keep her emotions and behavior under control, and Li Ming removed the ropes that had bound her.

Seeing such progress filled them both with joy beyond measure.

Another week passed. Li Ming no longer stayed home all day to keep Liu Jiajia company. After all, life had to go on: he had to earn money, and he still had to repay the debts Liu Jiajia had previously owed their friends.

So after the second week, once it was clear that Liu Jiajia could control herself well during the bouts of craving, Li Ming returned to work as normal.

He had thought everything was finally moving in a better direction, but he never imagined that an even deeper abyss of despair was about to descend upon their family.

Liu Jiajia had taken drugs again, and this time the substance she touched was several times more addictive than the one before.

Li Ming was consumed by rage. He cursed her, he struck her. In the end, though they had been husband and wife for decades, he could not bring himself to do something as extreme as murder.

As for calling the police, when he saw his wife kneeling before him and begging bitterly, he still could not make that choice.

For a time afterward, Li Ming believed the old methods might once again help his wife control her addiction. But this time he encountered a far more troublesome situation.

When Liu Jiajia’s cravings flared, they became so severe that she used self-harm, even threats of suicide, to force or coerce Li Ming into giving her drugs.

She knew there was still a stash at home, hidden away by Li Ming.

Tears streaming down his face, Li Ming looked at the woman he loved so deeply in such a state. No matter what, he could not harden his heart, and he could not bear to watch her continue injuring herself, so he gave her the drugs she wanted.

Over the next month, Li Ming exhausted every method and every approach he could think of to help Liu Jiajia break free of her addiction, but every attempt ended in failure.

The strain on his mind was so great that he was nearly drained dry, on the verge of collapse.

To keep his wife supplied with drugs, he slowly began drawing on the savings he had painstakingly accumulated over many years.

Each time he saw his wife tortured by addiction, he felt heartbroken. And yet he could not help wondering: was the addiction truly that powerful, or was his wife simply not strong enough in spirit?

Perhaps the pressure had become unbearable. Or perhaps, after a month of such strain and exhaustion, he was truly worn out. In any case, a reckless thought suddenly took root in him: he wanted to try the drug himself and see what it felt like.

He felt that with his own willpower, such a petty addiction ought to be easy to overcome.

Once that idea arose, he could no longer shake it off.

Moreover, Liu Jiajia’s words during her attacks kept echoing in his ears again and again.

“You don’t understand what I feel at all.”

“When the craving hits, it is worse than death. No one can resist it.”

“You can’t possibly understand what kind of feeling I am in right now.”

After thinking all this through, his last trace of hesitation was cast aside. He decided that if he took the drug in front of Liu Jiajia, then later conquered the addiction through sheer will, it could serve as a model for her.

So, before her eyes, he injected himself with the drug.

But when he first experienced the overwhelming pleasure and comfort it brought, and then, for the first time, the torment of withdrawal so severe it felt worse than death, the stark contrast taught him something undeniable: by human will alone, one could never shake free of the drug’s control.

Once touched, it became a lifelong bondage. Only death could truly grant release.

In that instant, all of Li Ming’s resentment toward his wife vanished without a trace. The inability to break the addiction was not his wife’s fault, or rather, the entire matter had little to do with her.

The blame lay with the people who sold the drugs. The ones most deserving of death were those who manufactured poison in pursuit of wealth. Even calling them animals was an insult to animals.

When Li Ming could no longer endure the craving and took the drug a second time, he wept alone for more than an hour after the effects wore off.

From that point on, their lives officially became the life of two people both consuming drugs.

Before, supporting one person had already been enough to bring down an entire family’s finances. Now that another person had been added to the burden, the collapse came all the faster.

Within just a few months, Li Ming had spent every last penny of the blood and sweat he had earned through years of hard work. Not only that, he had already borrowed from everyone he could possibly borrow from.

But the drugs could not be stopped. To supply their daily needs, the two of them discussed it and began taking out high-interest loans.

By the end, when even the house had been mortgaged away and not a single cent could be borrowed, people from the Grand Prosperity Han Palace Nightclub came to tell them something: they knew Li Ming had a daughter studying out of town, and she was extraordinarily beautiful. She could certainly be sold for a very good price.

At first, the two of them flatly refused. But after repeated bouts of cravings, they began to waver, especially after the nightclub people promised that nothing would happen to their daughter and that they would arrange a good job for her, one that could earn a great deal of money.

After several days of struggle, they finally agreed. After that came the repeated phone calls urging Li Jia to hurry home, and then everything that happened after Li Jia returned.

The day after Li Jia came home, Liu Jiajia secretly put sleeping pills into the breakfast she had bought, then sent Li Jia to the Grand Prosperity Han Palace Nightclub, where she was exchanged for a large sum of money, which in turn was used to buy a great quantity of drugs to bring home and consume.

Li Ming recounted, piece by piece, everything that had happened over the past half year, missing almost no important detail. His account was exceedingly thorough.

Li Jia looked at Li Ming, who had just finished telling the general course of events, and at her parents, who had suddenly knelt before her, while they kept apologizing and begging for her forgiveness.

Though the two people before her had given her life, they had also destroyed her with their own hands.

She could not hate them, yet she could not forgive them either.

Li Jia hurried forward and helped her parents up. No matter how many wrongs they had done, the kindness of raising her for more than twenty years was greater than heaven; she could not bear to accept a bow of repentance from them.

And yet, though she lifted the two of them to their feet, she did not say the words of forgiveness. It was as though she did not dare accept such a gesture from her parents; the words simply would not come.

Her heart had long since shattered. Once broken, a thing is never easy to restore.

“If you want me to forgive what you did to me, it’s not impossible. But you have to agree to a few conditions,” Li Jia said after thinking for a moment. In the end, she decided to give her parents a chance to change and earn her forgiveness.

As she spoke, a few more tears quietly slipped from the corners of her eyes.

“Jia, you tell us. Your mother and I will do whatever you say,” Li Ming said at once.

Of everyone, the one he least wanted to face now was Li Jia, and the one whose forgiveness he most desperately wanted was also her.

Liu Jiajia, standing to the side, remained silent. Her eyes moved slightly, and no one knew what she was thinking.

“It’s simple. We’ll go to the drug enforcement office and report it right away. After that, the three of us will go to rehab together and break this addiction,” Li Jia said, naming only those two conditions.

Perhaps this was the last path by which their family could return to the life they once had.

Because they were her parents, she did not ask them to turn themselves in or confess to the illegal crimes they had committed against her.

“All right. Your father and I will do as you say,” Li Ming agreed without much thought.

When he finished speaking, it was as though some burden he had carried for so long had suddenly been set down. His whole demeanor lightened at once.

“Mom, what is your answer?” Li Jia asked, turning to Liu Jiajia.

Her father’s attitude pleased her, but her mother seemed hesitant, clearly harboring her own thoughts.

“Jia, since your father has already agreed, I naturally have no objection. It’s just that it’s too late today, and this all happened so suddenly. We should discuss how to proceed properly. How about your father and I talk it over and give you a definite answer first thing tomorrow morning?” Liu Jiajia said after some thought.

“What is there to discuss about something like this?” Li Jia snapped, and for reasons even she did not fully understand, anger suddenly surged up in her. Her tone sharpened at once.

She stared at Liu Jiajia with a look of confusion and fury. In her eyes, her mother could not escape responsibility for the family’s ruin; her share of the blame was the greatest.

Her father had always been an honest, plain-spoken man. In the household, it had always been her mother whose mind was most active.

Liu Jiajia had never before faced her daughter in such a state of anger. At once she felt guilty and afraid, and quickly averted her gaze, turning to Li Ming for help.

After all, they had been husband and wife for so many years. With just one glance from Liu Jiajia, Li Ming knew exactly what was on her mind.

After thinking for a moment, he said to Li Jia, “Jia, what your mother says makes sense too. This really should be discussed carefully. In truth, your mother and I have thought more than once about doing exactly what you said, but those high-interest lenders and drug traffickers are deeply entrenched in this city. They even once boasted that they were not afraid of us taking this matter to the police station or the drug enforcement office, and that if we did, they would make us taste what it truly meant to be worse than dead.”

At that moment, Pei Min, who had been quietly listening behind Li Jia all along, stepped forward, moved closer to her, and said softly, “Sister Li Jia, what your father said is not without reason. From what I know, many of the major leaders in Pei City are actually regular patrons of that nightclub. Otherwise those people would not dare act so lawlessly and recklessly. If we go to the police now, we might be taken away ourselves the very next moment. This really should be considered carefully before deciding.”