Ming Lu entered the room with news from the Luo family, just in time to see Luo Chi fall back into Ming Weiting’s arms. He was startled. “Sir, what’s wrong with the young master?”

Ming Weiting caught Luo Chi’s head and neck in time, his arm supporting him, and let him lie back slowly. “He fainted from shock.”

Ming Lu was taken aback. “What?”

Ming Weiting sat back down by the bed, looking at the data displayed on the monitoring equipment. “There are some debts, the amount is not small. It might take a year or two to pay them off.”

“What’s the big deal about that?” Ming Lu was speechless. “How much is owed? We can just go and pay it off.”

Ming Weiting shook his head. “He has to do it himself.”

He changed to a new cotton ball, tested it on the back of his hand to confirm it was soft enough, and then carefully, bit by bit, dabbed away the remaining moisture from between Luo Chi’s eyelashes.

He was weighing whether he should not report the real number, but rather appropriately halve it or round it down.

That night at the hotel, Luo Chi had repeatedly stressed to him that he was very serious about his painting. If it weren’t for such an inspired work, it would take at least three to five days to finish one painting.

By the time he recovered and started painting, it would probably be half a year.

Painting slowly, one every three to five days, would be another year or two. He would need to rest for a few days in between, so perhaps it would take three or four years. If he rested a little more, five or six years was also possible.

“He can only do it himself.”

Ming Weiting replaced the cotton ball with the back of his hand and gently touched Luo Chi’s peacefully closed eyelashes. “There’s no rush on time.”

Ming Lu, not understanding, went over to check. After confirming that Luo Chi had only fainted from extreme exhaustion after enduring another headache attack, he was relieved.

“Is it that he’s unwilling to let others help?” Ming Lu said with a smile. “That’s no problem either. The young master is very capable.”

The sky outside the window was gradually darkening. Ming Lu turned on the soft ambient lights and drew the curtains. “In that case, sir can accompany him to pay it back slowly.”

Ming Weiting strongly agreed with this statement. He nodded, held Luo Chi’s hand in his palm to warm it, and slowly massaged the limp, slightly curled fingers.

He had calculated it. The number was neither high nor low.

Luo Chi never reneged on his debts, so Luo Chi would have to live well for five or six years.

He would accompany Luo Chi. He could help hold the easel. If Luo Chi had no ideas and felt frustrated, he could take Luo Chi to all the places that could inspire him, to see the most beautiful scenery, to see the people in every place.

He didn’t have to rush to finish a painting in three to five days. He could play in the scenery and relax after painting halfway. After spending five or six years so peacefully, Luo Chi might feel that the world was not entirely uninteresting.

Luo Chi might be willing to accept his invitation and completely leave that empty, desolate fog.

“By the way, sir.”

Ming Lu remembered his purpose for coming, went back to the table, and took the things he had brought. “The guests are all being entertained.”

Given Luo Chi’s current condition, it was impossible for Ming Weiting to leave the hospital room and personally handle those boring matters.

Ming Lu had organized the information on a computer. He was not sure to what extent Luo Chi’s hearing had recovered, so he deliberately blurred what he said. “The Xun family’s side is asking to what extent the person needs to be conscious.”

Ming Weiting nodded, signaling him to place the computer by the bed. “Tell the truth.”

“It might not be easy,” Ming Lu said in a low voice. “The truth is too important to her. It’s precisely to cover up and escape from these things that she has always been… I understand.”

Ming Lu suddenly cut himself off. He met the coldness in Ming Weiting’s eyes and remembered the part he had overlooked.

The truth was important to Luo Chi.

No one listened to Luo Chi’s words, but Luo Chi had always been speaking. He just wanted the truth, just wanted to understand everything.

Luo Chi was willing to trade all his belongings for a chance encounter with a shadow to believe that he had not done anything bad.

“I understand, sir,” Ming Lu said. “I will have them find a way.”

Ming Weiting lowered his gaze and did not speak again.

He was still holding one of Luo Chi’s hands. He opened the computer with his other hand and put on an earphone on the side not leaning against the bed.

…

The Ming family’s reception of the head of the Luo family was very polite.

At dawn yesterday, the head of the Luo family, for the sake of the detained containers, had boarded the cruise ship docked at the port with his eldest son.

Luo Chengxiu was not stupid. He would not think this was an unprovoked disaster.

He quickly had someone inquire about the origin of Luo Chi’s ticket, and also managed to find out about the hotel Ming Weiting had taken Luo Chi to, guessing how this catastrophe had struck the lifeblood of the Luo family.

Although he couldn’t figure out how such a chance encounter could make the “sir” of this generation of the Ming family personally take revenge for Luo Zhi… for Luo Chengxiu, this was not something that had to be figured out.

Faced with the established fact, Luo Chengxiu directly brought Luo Jun onto the cruise ship.

Luo Chengxiu dragged Luo Jun onto the deck and explained to Ming Lu, who had come with his men, that it was this good-for-nothing spawn who had harmed Luo Zhi, and that the Ming family could do whatever they wanted with him.

Luo Jun was dragged along like a ghost, his steps stumbling, thrown onto the deck by his father.

…

It wasn’t just today that he had started to become like this.

Since returning from the sea, some people had already felt that Luo Jun’s condition was a bit off.

He seemed to have acquired a new, strange habit that he couldn’t stop. He ignored the pile of work at the company and had to constantly check the rescue lists, rescue footage, and the latest rescue progress. When there was really nothing left to look at, he endlessly went to investigate some inconspicuous old matters.

For example, who had given him the cufflinks, for example, why a contract that was on the verge of collapse many years ago had suddenly gone smoothly, for example, the severe crisis the company had encountered the year before last, and what was the deal with the funds brought in by Vice President Jian…

Such things were most frequent five years ago. If he went back ten years, Luo Jun would receive gifts on almost every festival. After a few years, only his birthday was left.

Later, even his birthday was gone, only those one or two sudden turnarounds when the company’s situation was most dire.

Luo Jun seemed to have already guessed the answers to these questions, so he was not surprised when he got the answers.

He became more and more dazed because of these answers, his whole person gloomy and cold to the point of being almost frightening, yet he masochistically had to confirm them one by one himself.

He asked these people over and over again why they hadn’t told him the truth earlier.

The branch manager he had interrogated was almost in tears. “How is it that we didn’t tell you… Didn’t Luo Zhi tell you! He gave you all the evidence!”

Luo Jun was so struck by this answer that a metallic taste welled up in his throat. He didn’t believe he could do such a thing, so he forced the other person to dig out all the company’s surveillance footage from these past few years and searched day by day.

…When he found the surveillance video, as soon as he saw the image, the memory resurfaced from the depths of his subconscious, as if it had been instinctively blocked.

That day, Luo Zhi had come to the company to find him.

Luo Zhi hadn’t come to find him for a long time. When he came to find him that day, his expression was also very calm. He gave him a file folder in his hand and called him “brother” very politely and solemnly.

“Brother,” Luo Zhi said to him, “I just found out, you might have misunderstood some things.”

Luo Zhi said to him, “I had someone wire that money. You can check. I’ll have someone cooperate with you…”

Luo Jun looked at the image on the monitor. He watched himself furiously slamming the file folder on Luo Zhi, as if watching a monster.

People are always like this. When a preconceived notion has become so deep, what one sees in their eyes is the answer they want to see, and they will also complete the logic they are willing to accept.

When Luo Zhi came to find him, he had already determined that Luo Zhi was a good-for-nothing, stubborn younger brother. So he logically thought that Luo Zhi must be slandering Jian Huaiyi, and even shamelessly trying to steal the fruits of Jian Huaiyi’s hard work.

Luo Jun even believed that he must have had some suspicion at the time—this suspicion would only provoke a more intense rebellion and denial, and would only make him more angry and ashamed.

The angry and ashamed Luo Jun instinctively refused to consider another possibility, refused to believe and accept that it was such a good-for-nothing younger brother who only muddled through life and caused trouble, who had the ability to help him in his most critical moment.

Compared to Luo Jun’s baseless, weak rage, Luo Zhi was instead strangely calm, only bending down to pick up the file folder.

“I always thought you knew those were gifts from me. I was very happy about that.”

Luo Zhi’s gaze fell on his cuffs, then slowly turned to his tie. “Why would Brother Chenbai do this?”

Luo Zhi seemed to be talking to himself, and also seemed to be asking him, “Brother, do you need my gift?”

Luo Jun was silenced by Luo Zhi’s strange calmness, but the offended anger rose even more vividly in an instant.

He must have said very harsh and hurtful words, so hurtful that Luo Zhi, leaning against the door and looking at him, actually slowly curved his eyes and smiled lightly.

…

Luo Jun was pushed out by Luo Chengxiu and handed over to the Ming family for disposal.

He had been punished by kneeling too many times these past few days. He stumbled and fell on the deck, propping himself up on his arms to look at Luo Chengxiu. “Father, I want to know.”

Luo Jun was not asking Luo Chengxiu why he was handing him over. He had killed Luo Zhi. He deserved it. He just wanted to know another thing. “Those gifts, did Mother help Jian Huaiyi switch them?”

Many people had a hand in this matter.

Ren Chenbai had been deceiving Luo Zhi in his name all along.

Ren Chenbai told Luo Zhi that Luo Jun liked his gifts very much, that Luo Jun was particularly happy to receive the gifts, that Luo Jun actually really wanted to take him home, but was worried about upsetting his mother, so he had to wrong him for the time being.

Luo Zhi was still young at that time. It was because he believed these things that he had happily sent him more carefully prepared gifts.

Later, as Luo Zhi slowly grew up and began to notice the clues, the gifts became fewer.

Later, Luo Zhi no longer sent him gifts, only helping out when the company’s situation was not good.

And then there was that conflict. Luo Zhi came to him to clarify things, and he had furiously thrown Luo Zhi out… After that, Luo Zhi no longer sent him gifts, no longer asked about any of the Luo family’s business, and no longer looked at him seriously.

Luo Zhi just called him “big brother” while playing games, smiling and saying some unimportant and clearly unheard gossip.

Luo Jun had taken that as disrespect and would get angry for no reason every time. He had never looked closely at the games Luo Zhi played.

He later played that game. He had been playing it sleeplessly these past few days, but he could never keep the character alive.

The little person on the screen ran forward recklessly, dodging oncoming subways, dodging the pursuing vicious dogs and inspectors. The little person slammed hard into a fence, rolled on the ground, GAME OVER, and thus used up a life.

“You’re bringing up such old scores with me now?!”

At his ear, Luo Chengxiu asked sharply, “How would I know about such a thing? Even if it was your mother who switched them, so what?”

Luo Chengxiu said in a cold voice, “Luo Jun, your mother’s mind is not clear. Even if she really did it, she just wanted Huaiyi to be closer to you. I don’t know how such a small matter could make you harm your own brother…”

Luo Jun shook his head. He wasn’t trying to bring up old scores, nor was he trying to absolve himself. “It’s my own problem.”

“I was the one who had a prejudice against my younger brother first,” Luo Jun said. “It’s because of me. I wanted to believe this lie. I myself wanted to believe it.”

“I was already so bad to my younger brother. I didn’t protect him, didn’t help him. I watched him being bullied by everyone. How could he give me gifts?”

“How dare he give me gifts? Is he trying to prove that I’m the worst person in the world?”

Luo Jun lowered his head, looking at his hands. “So I was willing to believe it was a gift from Jian Huaiyi. I didn’t ask anything, didn’t investigate anything.”

Luo Chengxiu’s face was cold and sullen. He looked at this increasingly strange and neurotic eldest son and forcefully pulled him up. “Luo Jun, I’m telling you—”

“You don’t need to tell me. I have something to tell you, Father.”

Luo Jun looked at the Ming family members standing coldly in the distance. He withdrew his gaze and still looked at his own hands. “Father, do you still remember my tie clip?”

“That was a gift from my younger brother,” Luo Jun said. “Not Jian Huaiyi.”

Luo Chengxiu’s expression already showed a faint hint of offended anger.

He didn’t understand how his once-proud eldest son had suddenly become like this, nor did he understand why the Ming family members didn’t come to drag this culprit away and end this matter as soon as possible, but instead let them say such useless nonsense on the deck in such a wretched state.

Was it just to watch them make a fool of themselves?

The Luo family had been made a fool of enough. That cruise ship was a nightmare.

He shouldn’t have agreed to this trip in the first place. He shouldn’t have let the whole family go to that villa.

Luo Chengxiu could no longer suppress the rising intense irritation. Even though he was very clear that this was the Ming family’s territory, the increasingly bad situation these past few days had finally become the last straw. He completely lost control and slapped his eldest son hard across the face.

“Your younger brother is gone. Do you think I’m not sad?! If I had known he was also on the cruise ship, I wouldn’t have let you go to see him at all!”

Luo Chengxiu said sharply, “I was clearly already prepared to treat him well! It was you who pushed him into the sea. Now it’s too late for anything!”

“Yes, I did neglect him a little in the past, but did I let you harm him?!” Luo Chengxiu grabbed his eldest son’s collar tightly. “Who told you to do this?! How dare you—”

“Father,” Luo Jun said with his head down, “the tie clip was a gift from my younger brother.”

Luo Chengxiu hadn’t expected him to still dare to ask about this at a time like this. He was almost beside himself with anger, panting heavily, staring at this completely unfamiliar eldest son.

“I’m telling you this because the designer of this tie clip is a very famous designer.”

Luo Jun seemed completely unaware of his anger. “This is a business of the company I manage. You’re not very familiar with it, so you might not know.”

Luo Jun said, “This designer is the founder of a multinational jewelry group.”

Luo Chengxiu had already raised one hand, but suddenly paused at a familiar word, and the fiercely suppressed intense anger also froze in his eyes.

Luo Jun said a name and smiled. “Familiar? Father.”

Luo Chengxiu was frozen in place.

…How could he not be familiar?

How could he possibly not be familiar?

The Luo family, by holding that birthday banquet for their adopted son, had connected with several multinational companies and were competing for several large projects at diamond mines, wanting to win the mining rights.

Once you entered this kind of game, there was no turning back. More and more money was being burned. The Luo family couldn’t just stop the losses. The cash flow of the subsidiaries was also all poured in.

It was precisely because that shipment had been stuck that the money being burned on these few projects had its flow cut off, and a bottomless hole was instantly burned out by the sky-high breach of contract penalty.

“What do you mean?” Luo Chengxiu’s hands and feet suddenly turned cold. He felt a strange dizziness, as if the entire cruise ship had suddenly swayed. “What do you mean by saying this?”

Luo Jun fumbled with his tie. His hand paused at a certain position before continuing to slowly smooth it down, as if there were still an intact tie clip there.

Ren Shuangmei’s connections were far wider than the Luo family’s. After so many years of fighting with her rivals in the business world, they had actually developed a mutual admiration and had long been having tea together in private.

Hearing that Xiao Huo Miao couldn’t sleep these days and really wanted to give his older brother a gift, Ren Shuangmei, without a second word, drove him to have tea with her old friend.

The founder was over seventy and loved children with artistic talent. Watching the boy brought by Ren Shuangmei play sand painting with his own grandchildren, after watching the colors that child mixed for a few minutes, he almost snatched the person away to be his student.

These were all things he had later, when he had gone to find the heir he had briefly chatted with on the cruise ship, and asked out of him bit by bit.

“He really had talent. What a pity.”

The other party was abroad and didn’t know that Luo Zhi had had an accident. He told him with great interest how the old man had liked the child’s color sense, and how he had unsparingly praised them, saying how bright, rich, lively, and ardent those color combinations were.

The other party also said that Luo Zhi had been sending paintings over intermittently in the past few years. The old man was quite satisfied and had sent them to be exhibited in a gallery. Unfortunately, he hadn’t painted much in recent years. When asked, he would just say he had no inspiration. It was unknown what had happened…

Although such a large sum of money could never be made up for with personal connections, if Luo Zhi were to step forward and just delay the breach of contract deadline a little, it wouldn’t be a big deal.

Luo Jun slowly recounted these things. He could feel the admiration in the other person’s tone as he listened. He thought if he were a qualified older brother, he might have the right to be proud along with him at this moment.

But he was just being slowly flayed alive by these words.

He tried to think about why Luo Zhi had stopped painting, and then he felt he was ridiculous. Was there any need to think about such a question?

“Father, I wanted to tell you,” Luo Jun said, “it originally wouldn’t have come to this.”

Luo Jun said, “We deserve it.”

Luo Chengxiu was silent, staring at him fiercely, as if trying to find any trace of a lie on him.

But Luo Jun just stood up, swaying, and walked to Ming Lu, offering his hands. “I killed my younger brother.”

Luo Jun asked, “How will you have me atone for my sins? Thank you for helping me.”

Ming Lu shook his head.

Luo Jun’s pupils trembled. Fear suddenly arose.

“I made a mistake,” Luo Jun blocked Ming Lu. “You have to torture me. I’m sorry to Luo Zhi. He can’t take revenge himself. You do it for him—”

“Mr. Luo,” Ming Lu said, “you still call him Luo Zhi.”

Luo Jun suddenly froze in place.

“You are the eldest son of the Luo family, the future heir of the Luo family. You have a younger brother named Jian Huaiyi, and a younger sister named Luo Cheng.”

Ming Lu opened the file. “This is your family relationship. As for the Luo Zhi you are looking for, he is in there.”

Ming Lu closed the file, raised his hand, and pointed to the quiet, dark, and deep sea under the night sky.

“The person we invited as a guest is the head of the Luo family. If you have finished your conversation, please have the head of the Luo family come with us.”

Ming Lu turned to the seemingly soulless Luo Chengxiu. Two silent, sturdy crew members passed by him and took Luo Chengxiu by the arms.

Luo Jun still stood in place.

No one looked at him anymore. He didn’t even deserve to be punished, because he didn’t deserve to be an older brother at all, and he had never been one.

He watched his father being led into the cabin. He lowered his head and looked at his hands.

In his memory, Luo Zhi asked him, “Brother, do you need my gift?”

In his memory, another Luo Zhi leaned against the side of the ship, his vacant, empty gaze slowly moving, not speaking, looking at him with effort.

In what was probably a very long time, that was the first time Luo Zhi had seriously looked at him again, and it turned out to be the last time.

He was still calling him Luo Zhi. He didn’t dare to touch that name.

Luo Jun raised his hand. He was still slowly touching the tie. He had been trying to find the tie clip again these past few days, and then he could believe this was a dream.

His hand suddenly stopped at the edge of the tie.

Luo Jun’s heart was beating at a strange, frantic speed. His hand was trembling uncontrollably as he painstakingly, slowly lowered his head.

…He saw the ten-year-old Luo Zhi standing on tiptoe in front of him, nimbly and quickly taking off his tie clip.

The child held the tie clip and shook it, then nimbly ran off, disappearing in a flash.

Luo Jun chased after him in a panic. He looked everywhere for the person he had lost. Then he saw the twenty-three-year-old Luo Zhi leaning against the side of the ship.

Luo Zhi looked at him seriously, his eyes slowly curving into a smile.

“Don’t smile,” Luo Jun said, stumbling over his words. “Don’t smile. If you’re sad, don’t smile.”

“Come and hate me. Come and hate me,” Luo Jun said. “Come and punish me.”

Lojun was almost begging him, “Come and punish me. I was wrong, I was wrong, Xiao—”

He wanted to call out the name that had once belonged to his younger brother, but as the air reached his lips, he found that he no longer had the ability to say this word.

He hadn’t helped his younger brother. He had watched that name be snatched away, so he no longer deserved to call Luo Zhi that.

Luo Zhi was still smiling, but the smile didn’t reach his eyes. He opened his mouth and said something to him, the shape of his mouth overlapping with the Luo Zhi who had leaned against the office door that day.

“Brother,” Luo Zhi had called him this for the last time before leaving that day, “goodbye.”

The BGM of the game Luo Zhi often played rang in his ears, the sound effects so real it was as if he were there.

He saw Luo Zhi, like the character in the game, nimbly holding the tie clip, turning, and flipping over the side of the ship.

Luo Jun lunged forward, grabbing at the cold night fog.

The hem of the trench coat fell before his eyes, and was instantly swallowed by the icy sea, without a ripple.