Chapter 155 Swapping Children

Chapter 155: The Child Swap

Zhang Xiangping exploded: "What nonsense are you spouting? Knew all along? Knew what?"

"If your biological parents hadn't come looking for you, what could I possibly know?"

Her attitude was almost entirely unreasonable. "Do you think I'm some kind of god? What could I possibly know?"

"I raised you for eighteen years, and this is how you speak to me?"

"Even slandering me?"

Jiang Luo looked at her, his expression placid. In his previous life, when he was a child, he had truly loved Zhang Xiangping, the woman he called Mother.

Like all children, he naturally depended on his parents, yearning for his mother's love.

But Zhang Xiangping, with her indifference and neglect, personally severed Jiang Luo's love and dependence on her.

By the time Jiang Luo was eighteen, he knew unequivocally that he could no longer love Zhang Xiangping. When Su Lan and the others came looking for him, he foolishly turned to seek Su Lan's affection instead.

Sadly, Su Lan didn't love him either.

Jiang Luo fell gravely ill back then, beyond medical help. Transferred from Haicheng to Peking Union Medical College Hospital, he lay alone in his bed, with nothing but time. He repeatedly replayed his past, even his childhood.

Again and again, he puzzled over it. Su Lan didn't know about the mistaken identity, hadn't raised him, hadn't shared those eighteen years, so her lack of love was understandable. But Zhang Xiangping was the mother who had raised him for eighteen years—why didn't she love him either?

He pondered it endlessly, deducing and re-deducing.

Later, knowing his terminal condition wouldn't improve and that he was nearing death, he slipped away from Wang Chuang and the others, returning alone to Haicheng to see Zhang Xiangping.

Zhang Xiangping, seeing his deathly pale, ghost-like appearance, was both terrified and utterly repulsed.

Only after his persistent questioning did Zhang Xiangping impatiently blurt out the truth: "Not love you? Why should I love you? Of course I don't love you!"

"You're not my son! Not my own flesh and blood! Why on earth should I love you!?"

"If it weren't for seeing how rich that family was, hoping my own son would live a life of comfort without want, do you think I'd have been willing to take you in?"

It turned out that year, at the Haicheng Maternal and Child Health Hospital, while Zhang Xiangping was still pregnant, she had already encountered Su Lan several times.

Heavily pregnant, Zhang Xiangping walked, cycled, or took rickshaws to the hospital for her check-ups. At the hospital entrance, she had coincidentally seen Su Lan on multiple occasions, always stepping out of a black car. Each time, someone even opened the door and helped her alight.

That woman was so radiant—beautiful, dressed in skirts, chauffeured, even sporting long, high-maintenance hair left loose, not tied up, the strands incredibly soft and lustrous.

Compared to her, Zhang Xiangping felt utterly inferior, believing she wasn't even truly a woman. She wore work clothes almost every day; if not, she certainly didn't wear skirts. When her belly grew large, she simply loosened the waistband of her trousers, often leaving a red mark around her abdomen from the tight elastic.

Zhang Xiangping realized that she and the beautiful woman stepping out of the car belonged to two entirely different worlds.

The woman had money; she did not.

The woman's family was wealthy; hers was utterly ordinary.

When did Zhang Xiangping first conceive the idea of swapping the children?

It was when she and that beautiful woman lay side-by-side in the delivery room, giving birth.

She was writhing in pain, sweating profusely and crying out, while the other woman, after receiving a then-scarce and expensive epidural, lay calmly on her bed, even watching her and offering words of encouragement.

During the prolonged labor, they began to chat, talking about their children.

Zhang Xiangping didn't say much; she knew she couldn't compare to the woman in any aspect. She simply listened as the beautiful woman described the nursery prepared for her baby, on the second floor of their Western-style house, complete with a crib, a bassinet, and all sorts of toys.

She also mentioned that she had originally planned to give birth in Hong Kong, but labor had started suddenly, forcing her to come to the local maternity hospital.

She spoke of a C-section procedure in Hong Kong where childbirth was entirely painless.

And that the family had hired a nanny who would care for the child later, as she had to return to work.

She confessed her fear of pain and inability to breastfeed, so the baby would be fed formula, mentioning a specific brand, assuring it was excellent, no worse than breast milk.

And so on.

Zhang Xiangping listened, enduring the pain, crying inwardly, tears welling in her eyes.

She thought, both giving birth, yet how was it that another's child would be born with everything, while hers would have nothing? A crib? Nonsense, what was that? She and Jiang Jianmin hadn't prepared anything, simply planning for the child to sleep in their bed after birth.

Toys? Not a single one.

Diapers? A few old cloths repurposed as changing pads.

Ha.

Zhang Xiangping laughed and cried inside, lamenting her own bitter fate, and the bitter fate her child would inherit.

After giving birth, when the babies were placed on the table and the nurse turned to fetch cloths to wrap them, the beautiful woman, exhausted, closed her eyes. Zhang Xiangping, having had a natural birth, endured the pain below, got out of bed, went to the two babies, and, as if possessed, swapped the differently colored hospital bracelets on their wrists. Before the nurse returned, she was back in her delivery bed, all without anyone noticing.

Then, Zhang Xiangping watched as the nurse wrapped the two babies, placing the child she had given birth to on the beautiful woman's bed, and the beautiful woman's child next to her.

In that instant, Zhang Xiangping smiled—this was the best gift she could give her child.

*Mom loves you.*

Now, looking at Zhang Xiangping before him, at the woman's utterly unrepentant, defiant demeanor, Jiang Luo said indifferently: "You certainly loved your son very much."

"You swapped the two children."

"Your son has since lived in a Western-style house, drank imported formula, and grew up surrounded by the love of his parents and elder brother."

"Your 'sacrifice' was well worth it."

Zhang Xiangping wore an expression of utter bewilderment: "Are you crazy? What nonsense is this?"

"How could I possibly do such a thing?"

Jiang Luo looked at her: "If you don't admit it now, I have plenty of ways to make you confess later."

"What do you want to do!?"

Zhang Xiangping slammed her hand on the table: "I am your mother! I raised you for eighteen years!"

Jiang Luo's expression was one of utter nonchalance: "Your job at the textile mill, the house you live in within the Jiang family compound—whichever one, I don't even need to lift a finger. Just a word to my people, and plenty would be willing to do it for me..."

Zhang Xiangping: "How dare you!!!"

Jiang Luo curled his lips into a smile that didn't reach his eyes: "After all this, what is there you won't admit to?"

"Ah..." Jiang Luo said, as if recalling something, "You went to America to find Zhao Mingshi, but he wanted nothing to do with you, right?"

"The plane tickets must have been quite expensive, weren't they?"

"Getting that visa sorted out must have cost you a fair bit too, didn't it?"

He added, "Compared to Jiang Jianmin, who never got to acknowledge his successful son—the one who could change his fate—it didn't actually hit you that hard, did it?"

"In your heart, you had already sacrificed yourself, all so that Zhao Mingshi could live the best life possible."

"Seeing him doing so well, so capable, so wealthy—that gave you peace of mind, didn't it?"

Jiang Luo looked at Zhang Xiangping, whose emotions were clearly written all over her face, gradually shifting through every shade. "Why didn't you tell him the truth?"

"Tell him, and maybe he would have accepted you as his mother."

"After all, it was you who 'gave' him everything he has now, wasn't it?"

As he spoke, he pulled out his phone. "Want me to do it for you—"

Zhang Xiangping abruptly stood up. "Don't you dare call him!"

Jiang Luo looked her way and smiled. "Not call him? Why? Afraid to tell him?"

His tone was leisurely. "Strange, you went through all this trouble to arrange such a meticulous plan for him…"

"What exactly do you want!?"

Zhang Xiangping shouted, clearly cornered.

Jiang Luo tapped his phone against his palm and chuckled. "I just want one thing from you: was it you who swapped the babies back then?"

"Yes, it was me!"

Zhang Xiangping said, "Listen to me, you are not to call Mingshi! Don't you dare disrupt his life!"

"Why?"

Jiang Luo's question followed immediately, his sharp gaze fixed on the woman. "Why did you switch the babies?"

Zhang Xiangping shouted back, "She was so refined! Her hair so smooth! She even wore a dress! She stepped out of a private car! Why? Why did her child get to be born into a life of wealth? My child didn't even have proper diapers—just scraps of cloth made from old clothes!?"

Before she finished speaking, a figure darted out from behind the screen and lunged at Zhang Xiangping, almost screaming, "What did you say!? What did you say?"

Zhang Xiangping was terrified. The person lunging at her was none other than the beautiful woman she had been madly jealous of years ago—Su Lan.

Su Lan, though now in her fifties, was still beautiful, still wearing a dress, still so elegant.

But at this moment, her face held no gentle expression—only pure shock and disbelief. Her eyes wide, she shrieked, "What did you say? What did you say!?"

"You switched the babies!!"

"You did it!???"

"Are you insane!? Are you insane!!!?"

Zhang Xiangping dodged away, denying everything. "I didn't! I didn't! I didn't switch the babies! It wasn't me!"

"It was him!"

Zhang Xiangping pointed at Jiang Luo. "He put words in my mouth! He made me say it!"

"I didn't switch the babies! I didn't!"

Su Lan didn't believe her at all. She grabbed Zhang Xiangping by the arms and shouted, "Is there a single word of truth in what you're saying!?"

"What actually happened back then!?"

"We had no grudges against each other! Why would you do this? Why would you switch my child!?"

Zhao Guangyuan stood by, protecting Su Lan the entire time.

He barked at Zhang Xiangping, "Tell the truth!"

"I didn't switch the babies!"

Zhang Xiangping screamed.

From behind the screen, Zhao Mingshi slowly emerged.

Zhao Mingshi looked at Zhang Xiangping with an expression of disbelief, unfamiliarity, and shock.

Seeing Zhao Mingshi, Zhang Xiangping froze as if she'd seen a ghost.

Mother and son stared at each other for a moment. Zhang Xiangping's eyes reddened, and she lunged at Zhao Mingshi. "You dare come back? Why did you come back?"

"Didn't you disown your father and me?"

"Didn't you stay in America?"

"My boy!"

Zhang Xiangping cried. "I loved you so much. How could you not acknowledge me?"

"I gave you the best of everything. How could you look at me like I'm some stranger!"

Hearing this, Su Lan immediately snapped and rushed at Zhang Xiangping again, her voice sharp, terrified, and trembling. "You switched the babies on purpose! It was you!"

Su Lan was already out of her mind, no longer caring about elegance or composure.

She reached out to grab Zhang Xiangping's hair, slapping and clawing at her. "How could you do this! How could you!?"

"We had no grudges! And you switched my child!"

Zhang Xiangping fought back just as hard, also screaming, "So what if I did! Even after the switch, you did a poor job raising him!"

"You dumped him all alone in America and didn't care about him!"

"Everything he has now, he worked for himself! It wasn't given by you!"

Zhao Guangyuan tried to separate them, while Zhao Mingshi stood there stunned, frozen in place—*What? It wasn't a mistake? It was intentional?*

*What? So it was really him who had taken Jiang Luo's life?*

Jiang Luo, meanwhile, just sat there, took a sip of tea, and acting as if he didn't even see the chaos in the room, calmly rose and walked out the door.

Zhao Mingshi also ignored the commotion in the room. Like a wooden puppet, he mechanically walked out. At the door, he lifted his head and looked at Jiang Luo's retreating figure.

In that instant, Zhao Mingshi suddenly realized one thing: Jiang Luo had known all along.

He knew the entire truth so clearly, yet he had never spoken a word of it to anyone.

Back then, he had simply, decisively, and cleanly severed the eighteen-year parent-child relationship with Zhang Xiangping and Jiang Jianmin. In the same way, he had cut off all blood ties with the Zhao family. Without any attachment, without looking back, he had walked his own path.

Jiang Luo had already gone so far ahead, no one could ever catch up.

Watching the figure disappearing further and further away at the end of the corridor, Zhao Mingshi's eyes welled up with tears, his lips pressed tightly together, and his hands clenched into trembling fists at his sides—

For so many years, he had seen Jiang Luo as his "rival," his "enemy."

But it turns out Jiang Luo had never even taken him seriously.

Jiang Luo had gone far ahead. In his eyes, they were nothing to him.

Zhao Mingshi recalled the time he had followed Su Lan and Zhao Guangyuan to that old apartment building—the way Jiang Luo had looked at him then: unfamiliar, disdainful, contemptuous, arrogant, and fierce.

Jiang Luo had always been that fierce.

Fierce enough to walk only his own path.

Fierce enough to never even acknowledge their existence.

Fierce enough not to care about the truth about the mix-up.

In that instant, Zhao Mingshi realized one more thing:

He had lost.

He could never compare to Jiang Luo.

In every way, he fell short.