Chapter 659 - 657: It’s You

The joy and anticipation on Su Li’s face receded like the tide. Her face paled, leaving only disbelief and helplessness.

She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to tell herself she must have misheard.

"Who... who are you?"

Su Li asked through gritted teeth, her voice low.

The words had barely left her lips when Su Li heard a familiar voice in response.

"Who do *you* think I am?"

Brimming with malice and ill-concealed excitement, it was like a serpent’s hiss—the voice Su Li despised most, the one that could jolt her from the deepest nightmare. It rang out once more.

It was so perfectly clear that it shattered Su Li’s last shred of hope.

Su Li’s body trembled. Her lips quivered for a moment before she clamped her jaw shut, determined not to let any emotion creep into her voice.

"Did you kidnap me? Why?"

Mrs. Tang. It was actually Mrs. Tang.

Su Li couldn’t believe it. She was actually hearing Mrs. Tang’s voice!

Mrs. Tang, a ghost that refused to be exorcised.

Su Li had thought it couldn’t be Mrs. Tang, who shouldn’t have had the means to pull this off.

Mrs. Tang’s sneer echoed near Su Li, followed by a burst of gleeful, malicious laughter.

"You still have the gall to ask why? A shameless woman like you should’ve been spat on and cursed long ago! How dare you ask why! The reason is because you deserve to die! You should have died long ago! You should have faced your retribution! And you’re still asking why!"

Mrs. Tang’s long-simmering rage finally had an outlet.

"The Tang Family was ruined because we let you marry in! We’re in this state because we married you, a walking disaster who jinxes her father-in-law, her mother-in-law, and her own husband! If I’d known this would happen, I should have beaten you to death before ever letting you set foot in our home!"

Mrs. Tang panted heavily. "The biggest regret of my life was letting you into the Tang Family’s home! It was not killing you back then! If God gave me a second chance, the first thing I would do is kill you!"

"But... it’s not too late. Your retribution has come! Hahaha..."

Mrs. Tang’s tirade ended with a triumphant, hate-filled laugh.

"Retribution is here! Hahaha! Go on, be arrogant! Go on, be smug! In the end, didn’t you still fall right into my hands? Hahaha..."

Mrs. Tang cackled, her distorted, manic voice sounding like a demon’s arrival.

Listening to Mrs. Tang’s curses, which seemed to echo right beside her ear, Su Li forced herself to remain calm. She ignored the insults and focused on rationally gathering any information she could.

’Mrs. Tang is partially paralyzed, so she must have come in a wheelchair. That strange sound from earlier must have been its wheels.’

’Judging by the speed and the lack of other noises, Mrs. Tang probably came alone.’

’She can’t stand, but her voice sounds close to the window, as if she were standing there talking to me.’

’But Mrs. Tang can’t stand up, so she has to be sitting. That means this little window must be very low to the ground.’

’Logically, a window that low should make it easier for passersby to hear something, but there’s no one. No sounds at all.’

’The fact that Mrs. Tang could get here means we’re still in the Imperial City. And for her to be this bold and loud, this place must be deserted.’

’Maybe this is a remote area, or maybe the surrounding buildings have been completely vacated.’

’Mrs. Tang found such a clever place to lock me up... Is it because she can’t bear to see me get married? Does she plan to let me freeze and starve to death in here?’

Su Li was startled by her own conclusion.

Other people might still be constrained by reason, but Mrs. Tang was fully capable of something like this.

Even though she had divorced Tang Yuanxiao and had no ties to him anymore, that was only how she and the rest of the world saw it.

In Mrs. Tang’s mind, once you were a daughter-in-law of the Tang Family, you were *always* her daughter-in-law—one she could dispose of as she pleased. The divorce made no difference.

The proof lay in her past life, where she had been so cruelly abused by the woman, who had almost Chen Tang-ed her.

That was why Mrs. Tang hated her so much in this life: because Su Li had slipped from her control.

Su Li closed her eyes again. She took two steps back from the window, tilting her head up slightly to look at the small opening. Ignoring the stream of curses, she asked calmly.

"Why did you kidnap me and lock me in here?"

In stark contrast to Mrs. Tang’s agitation, Su Li’s voice was ice-cold, devoid of any emotional fluctuation.

After cursing her heart out for so long, hearing Su Li’s placid tone made Mrs. Tang’s anger boil over.

There was another reason she hated Su Li: this very attitude.

Su Li was always so calm and cold, looking down on her from on high as she flew into a rage. Su Li’s indifference, the way she could shut her down with a few frosty words, terrified her.

’I hate it!’ Mrs. Tang thought. ’I’d rather she threw a fit and screamed back at me! Anything would be better than this! It’s like punching a wad of cotton with all my might!’

’But what right does she have? Even now, what right does she have to be so calm and proud!’

Mrs. Tang’s eyes turned red with hatred. ’You’ve got some nerve, Su Li. You really do!’

She gritted her teeth, a gleeful smile spreading across her face—one filled with both malice and greed.

"Why, you ask? Why do you *think* I kidnapped you?"

’To take your life, of course!’

’But before I kill you, there are a few other things I need.’

Mrs. Tang exhaled, tilting her head back. A strange twitch pulled at her face as she spoke.

"Hungry? Thirsty? Cold?"

"If you don’t want to starve, die of thirst, or freeze to death, then you’ll get on your knees, kowtow, and apologize. Give back what the Tang Family is owed. Once I’m satisfied, I won’t let you starve."

Mrs. Tang spoke from her self-appointed high ground, the madness and greed in her eyes twisting her face into an even uglier mask.

Mrs. Tang was ecstatic. How could she not be, getting to threaten and humiliate Su Li, to grind her under her heel? The very thought was enough to make her wake up cackling in her sleep!

Listening to Mrs. Tang’s deranged voice, Su Li’s lips twisted into a mocking sneer.

’Kneel, kowtow, and apologize? Heh. Leave it to her to come up with something like that. As expected, you can’t teach a dog not to eat shit.’

’Hadn’t she knelt and kowtowed to Mrs. Tang in her past life?’

’She had. She had knelt and slammed her head on the ground—BANG, BANG, BANG—until her forehead was bruised and bleeding, begging Mrs. Tang to believe her, begging her to let her go.’

’And what did she get for it? Nothing but more insults, beatings, and abuse.’

Now, in this life, Mrs. Tang was at it again.

Demanding she kowtow and apologize, still greedily eyeing the so-called "Tang Family property" she possessed.

’Heh... heh... heh...’

Su Li sneered inwardly but remained silent.

Seeing Su Li’s silence, Mrs. Tang assumed she was scared and weighing her options. She snorted and continued.

"Don’t worry, as long as you bang your head loud enough, I’ll be able to hear it. Kowtow until I’m satisfied, make your apology sound sincere enough, and I’ll consider giving you a sip of water."

Mrs. Tang paused, but she couldn’t hold back any longer and finally stated her real demands.

"If you agree to give me ten thousand yuan, and give that little car to Tangyuan, then I’ll give you something to eat. Think it over carefully."

This was a well-thought-out plan for Mrs. Tang. Ten thousand yuan would be enough to pay off the debt from when Qin Shanshan extorted her. The rest of the money could be used to find Tang Yuanxiao a good wife who could give her a grandson.

She was just green with envy over that car. With a car, plenty of women would surely be willing to marry Tangyuan!

She was going to find a much better wife for Tangyuan.