Chapter 9
Causality
At 2 a.m., the suburban clock tower rang out, while the high-pressure streetlights continued to illuminate the sparse houses. Three hours earlier, the residents had fallen asleep after a long day of hard work.
Now, only the green villa remained brightly lit. The owner of the villa, a woman in her fifties, paced back and forth inside, occasionally looking up at the clock before glancing toward the door, her eyes full of expectation.
The food on the traditional dining tray had been reheated multiple times, yet her son had not returned. At 9 p.m., he called to say he would be home late. By 11:55 p.m., she received a message:
Mom, I'm at the hospital. It's not convenient to call. The patient's condition is worsening, and I can't leave the little girl right now. Please eat and rest first!
Years of separation meant that mother and son could only meet through screens. Now, even if it meant waiting until dawn, she stayed up all night waiting for her son's return.
She had waited for hours, yet her son still hadn't returned. She'd called repeatedly, but he never answered. As anxiety gnawed at her, she decided to try one last time. If he still didn't pick up, she would rally his friends and athletics teammates to help her search.
Just as she was about to dial, the doorbell suddenly rang. Overjoyed, she ran to the door to greet her son. But when she opened the door, her smile instantly froze, and her face turned pale with fear.
Standing outside was not her son, but a man dressed in a faux leather jacket and wrinkled khaki pants. He looked imposing and commanding. This was her former lover—the man who used to favor that outfit. His sudden appearance left the unfaithful woman stammering, unable to utter a word:
- JK... Why... Why... did you come here?
JK carefully examined his former love from head to toe. After all these years, her life had changed significantly. The woman who once devoted herself entirely to caring for her child had now learned to take care of herself as well.
Her hair was no longer tangled and unkempt but neat and smooth, carrying the fragrance of soapberries. The once sloppy and foul-smelling clothes had been replaced with a black velvet dress embroidered with white daisies.
JK squinted, gazing at the silhouette that had once enchanted him. Thirty years ago, her figure had been a masterpiece—an hourglass shape, flawless and alluring. But time spared no one. The waist he remembered was now buried beneath layers of excess fat; the once-hot curves had vanished, discarded for those who wished to forget the past—a body where all three measurements were nearly equal.
Smacking his lips, JK grew weary of watching the crow's feet crack the beauty of the woman who had once mesmerized him. Her hair was now almost entirely white, and her flowery face and powdery white skin had faded with the hardships of the years. Time is a merciless hourglass—once the sand runs out, beauty dissolves, affection dries up, leaving behind only emptiness and resentment.
- Do you often welcome guests on the street like this?
Thanh Hang was the first to make mistakes. Before she could repay her emotional debt, she had already paid a heavy price. All mistakes were now in the past—she felt guilty toward the man she had betrayed, but she felt no shame.
For decades, JK had never appeared, but now, he suddenly came to her home, making her feel afraid.
- What are you here for?
- Too harsh—the mother of a world-famous star is even more arrogant and extravagant than her own child, strutting like a proud dog. Tomorrow, I will publish this news on the front pages of newspapers across the world!
Thanh Hang had endured all kinds of hardships. The only concern of this strong woman was her child. Children are both the strength and the weakness of their parents. When JK mentioned her son, the mother felt uneasy but still struggled to maintain her composure.
- After all, what do you want?
JK shrugged.
- I just want to 'have a chat' with you...
Thanh Hang refused coldly:
- I have nothing to say to you.
JK remained expressionless, pulled out his phone, and opened a photo of her son sitting with his head bowed:
- Oh? But your son has something to say to his mother...
Since the day she betrayed JK, Thanh Hang had lived in fear—especially after her husband's family went bankrupt, that fear grew even stronger. Over the past four years, Hoang Kim had become a global star, while JK's worldwide fame only deepened her unease. She feared he would take revenge by destroying her son.
Thanh Hang glanced briefly at the soulless Hoang Kim, and a storm of emotions raged inside her. The poisonous wind sown thirty years ago had now become a tempest. A storm called karma, which did not punish the one who sowed the wind, had instead fallen upon an innocent child.
- You… what the hell are you up to now? - Thanh Hang roared - Let my son go!
Seeing Thanh Hang's furious outburst, her face purpling, eyes blazing with rage as she glared at him, JK frowned and casually picked at his ear:
- You'll make me deaf. Want to wake the neighbors? This has nothing to do with them - don't drag outsiders in, or you'll suffer karmic retribution again!
With her son's safety in JK's hands, Thanh Hang was driven mad by his deliberate provocation but dared not overreact:
- If you want revenge, aim at me...
JK demanded they talk inside, leaving Thanh Hang no choice. He ordered his bodyguards to stand watch outside, then followed her in and sat across from his former lover on the sofa.
This was JK's first time here, so he wasn't in a hurry to get to the main point. The old bastard wanted to see what this doghouse looked like first. The building's exterior followed a modern Western style, each floor stacked with squares and rectangles.
Inside, however, it was classically ornate. The ceiling was made of pomu wood, intricately carved with waves, water, clouds, and sky motifs, while the floor was paved with lemon-blossom patterned tiles.
The interior furnishings displayed only a few antiques from feudal times. The wooden shelf in the living room emitted a soothing fragrance. The art carving on the left depicted pine and bamboo with drooping branches, while to the right, chrysanthemums and plum blossoms revealed their splendor. The Four Seasons enveloped the ink wash painting, depicting the nation's splendid and majestic landscapes. Statues of ancient generals from the Prehistoric Kingdom surrounded the bookshelf, exuding historical and cultural gravitas.
Hoang Kim wasn't short of money - he could've afforded more luxurious furniture, but worried his mother would need to dust them daily, so he kept the decorations simple. The old man noticed this and sneered at his so-called filial piety. With nothing left to watch, JK bounced his butt to test the elasticity beneath the leather-covered sofa.
- Nice sofa. Did Hoang Kim buy this with his race-fixing earnings?
Thanh Hang grew impatient with the old man's antics and urged him to get to the point. JK leisurely tapped his phone, revealing an image of a mother and her two daughters.
- Do you know who they are?
Thanh Hang squinted at the three girls huddled in the corner, sobbing while embracing each other. Her heart raced at the sight of Hoang Kim's lifeless state—it seemed the girls were enduring the same pain as him. She noticed the young woman bore striking resemblances to her younger self. As Thanh Hang hesitated between certainty and suspicion, JK revealed the truth:
- That girl looks exactly like you in your youth. Her name is Thanh Ngoc - she's your biological daughter!
Outside, lightning descended upon the earth, while the mother's spirit echoed with a thunderous shock of disbelief. She stared disbelievingly at JK when the old bastard threw down a DNA test report:
- You abandoned her at the orphanage over thirty years ago. - JK brought his demonic face closer to his former lover - You thought she died in that fire. Wrong! She escaped death and was taken to a southern orphanage by nuns. She married at fifteen and had three daughters. Those two are hers. The youngest has been. Terminally ill for three years—now lying in a hospital bed, awaiting death!
The matching genetic sequences confirmed JK's words. The undeniable truth stood like a supreme judge condemning her conscience. Although her late husband had forced her to abandon the child, Thanh Hang couldn't entirely shift blame onto the deceased—if she had resisted and raised the child alone, she wouldn't spend nights weeping in regret. Now, the karmic pain inflicted on her granddaughter crushes the old woman's heart.
JK watched Thanh Hang choke back tears as she mouthed apologies while caressing footage of her descendants on her smartphone screen. Triumphantly, he pulled a USB drive from his pocket and plugged it into the laptop on the table. From prior investigations, JK knew that Hoang Kim's mansion was completely soundproof—even if they argued loudly, the neighbors wouldn't hear, let alone the entire sleeping district. He turned the speakers to maximum volume and quickly pinned Thanh Hang into the chair to prevent her from smashing the laptop.
- I have a gift for my old flame!
She struggled futilely against JK's grip:
- What do you want? Let me go!
Her voice was drowned out by the soft moans from the laptop. While she was still arguing with JK, her arms suddenly and helplessly let hang from the chair. The video showed Hoang Kim and Ngoc making love, while the two granddaughters writhed, lost in their lust. What began with shy fear grew bolder by the second—these descendants, devoid of shame, sank deeper into depravity. Every lurid pose of their naked bodies, every passionate kiss accompanied by lustful moans, defiled the very meaning of "family" and tainted their bloodline.
Each incestuous scene was a tempest, plunging the mother into an abyss of regret. She let the bottomless void consume her soul. "As you sow, so shall you reap"—yet the retribution fell upon the descendants. The mother refused redemption, willingly embracing eternal damnation in this hell of agony.
JK leaned down to study the face of the love-betraying woman, eager to witness her torment. She neither complained nor wept. All he saw were endless tears of regret streaming down her numb, expressionless face.
- Parents create bad karma, descendants must suffer the karmic retribution. I always despised that stupid moral doctrine, yet it became prophecy: This world is not fair, but cosmic justice exists!
JK mocked his enemy's pain repeatedly:
- How would you rate your descendants' performance in bed? All four outclass the world's top porn stars, don't they?' - JK's lips curled into a vicious grin - This heartwarming family film runs a full four hours. Enjoy it... till dawn! Hahaha...
With a mocking farewell, JK blew his former lover a kiss.
- Ngoc is your daughter!