Chapter 447: Cause and Effect

Chapter 447: Cause and Effect

"I was born into the Lan family, a once-prominent family that had gradually declined by my generation.

The prosperity of the past vanished like fleeting smoke, leaving only emptiness and decline.

In those years before China's reform and opening-up era, my family, in a desperate bid to restore its former glory, made the fateful decision to pick a side.

Yet fate seemed to delight in playing tricks—this critical decision became the spark that led to the family's downfall.

Having backed the wrong side, the family suffered devastating blows, nearly crumbling completely.

Long before this storm arrived, my life path had already been set by my family.

At the time, I was betrothed to Gu Yanzhi's family to secure an alliance between our clans.

However, even before this arranged marriage, I was already in love with someone else.

Bound by family duty, I had no choice but to sever my deep affection, put on my wedding dress, and step into the Gu household.

Married life was far from happy. There was always this huge gap between Gu Yanzhi and me.

He misunderstood me, believing I had married him unwillingly, under family pressure. Worse still, he thought I was still hung up on my first love, unable to let go.

His distrust just made things worse in our already fragile relationship. We grew more distant, to the point where we became like strangers."

As she spoke, Lan Ruolin's face kept changing color.

She had just resolved to lay bare the whole truth to Tinghua and the others, so they would understand how completely trapped I felt that had driven her to have Fu Tinghua taken away.

"It's alright, go on. This is all in the past now—we're only listening," Fu Dajun reassured her, seeing how hard this was for her in sharing such personal matters with the children.

Moreover, the fact that Lan Ruolin was willing to reveal such potentially embarrassing personal details showed her determination to reunite with Fu Tinghua.

"He believed I was unfaithful with my first love and never trusted me after that.

Perhaps because we had no real affection between us, he—he also had someone on the side."

At this, Lan Ruolin bit her lip.

How shameful. If Tinghua had grown up in such a family, he would surely have been miserable.

"And then?" Fu Tinghua prompted.

"Then—the woman he turned to came from a newly powerful family. Seeing their daughter attached to my husband, they pulled every string to break us up, hoping he would marry her instead.

"But though I never understood why, my husband never divorced me, nor did he bring her home.

It wasn’t until I discovered I was pregnant. At first, your father—no, Gu Yanzhi—was actually happy.

But then someone told him the child wasn’t his, and—can you believe it?—he bought it.

So he began suspecting I had been with someone else, though I'd been completely faithful.

Since we had no real connection to begin with, it was all too easy for others to sow discord and break us apart.

During my pregnancy, word got out that the other woman was also expecting.

I was furious, and the stress nearly made me lose the baby in my womb."

But thankfully, he pulled through.

With my mother’s family in decline, I had no one to turn to—just my husband.

But he was seeing someone else. I was young then, too proud to beg for his favor, so I endured much hardship in the Gu family.

Still, no matter what, the child was finally born."

Aunt Lan stopped here, choking up.

What came next was the worst time of her life, something she never wanted to recall.

But seeing how badly her son needed answers, she continued, "However, because I nearly miscarried early on, the fetus was unstable, and I ended up giving birth prematurely—my son was born at less than nine months.

He was small but strong, and I was so happy he was here.

But—Gu Yanzhi was convinced the boy wasn’t his, so he refused to even look at him.

Because of my husband’s indifference, no one in the family cared about me either.

I raised him by myself. It wasn’t easy, but I never complained.

Then one day, just while I was in the bathroom, the child was gone.

I screamed and begged—I was falling apart—I begged Gu Yanzhi to help me find our child, but he just said—"

Here, Aunt Lan suddenly couldn’t go on.

What he said next was the cruelest thing she’d ever heard.

"You don’t have to say it. I don’t want you to relive such pain," Fu Tinghua suddenly stood up and said.

"No, I must. I’ve carried this for decades—it’s always been an open wound. I need to say it, I need to expose how cruel he was back then."

Aunt Lan swallowed hard before continuing, "He called my boy a bastard—said it didn’t matter whose he was, and it didn’t matter if he was stolen.

After that, I lost my mind—I couldn’t function—but the whole Gu family just stood by, cold as stone.

I had no idea where you were taken.

Later, rumors said it was Gu family enemies who deliberately stole my son to threaten Gu Yanzhi.

But he simply didn’t care about this son. The Gus said the kidnappers held a grudge against them and wouldn’t let the child live.

Yet I always felt… he couldn’t be dead. But in my heart, I knew he was alive somewhere in this world."

As she spoke the last sentence, Aunt Lan’s gaze settled on Fu Tinghua.

The kitchen went dead quiet after that—no one dared to speak.

Especially Su Shiming and his wife, who looked like they wanted to vanish.

"So, back then, paternity testing technology didn’t exist yet. Otherwise, such a misunderstanding wouldn’t have happened," Su He gave a strained laugh to cut the tension.

"No. He never loved me, so how could he love my child?" Aunt Lan said bitterly.

"How did you find me? Jingdu’s a long way from Wencheng," Fu Tinghua suddenly asked.

"I saw your photo in the newspaper. You’re the spitting image of your—no, of Gu Yanzhi in his youth."

When she finished speaking, Aunt Lan took out a photo from her pocket and handed it to Fu Tinghua.

Seeing the super blurry photo but still able to recognize the striking resemblance between the person in it and himself, Fu Tinghua went quiet.

Fu Dajun, noticing him staring at the photo without speaking, anxiously snatched it from Fu Tinghua’s hands.

“Damn, it’s really like they were carved from the same mold. What was wrong with that husband of yours? His own child looks so much like him, yet he refused to acknowledge it,” Fu Dajun said angrily.

To call his son a bastard—he'd been dying to curse him out earlier.

“He never even came to see the child once. How would he know whether they looked alike or not? Besides, when the child was young, you couldn't really tell back then,” Aunt Lan replied bitterly.

The photo was then passed to Su He and Su Shiming, who finally understood why Aunt Lan had come looking for Fu Tinghua.

Fu Dajun now got it too—no wonder his younger son was so handsome. Turns out his biological father was just as good-looking.

“Dad, what about you? What happened back then?” Fu Tinghua then turned to ask Fu Dajun.

Fu Dajun sighed, as if recalling something, and began telling them what happened back then.