Extreme Pampering-Chapter 72 - You Dont Deserve to Be Loved
Chapter 72: Chapter 72: You Don’t Deserve to Be Loved.
Chapter 72: Chapter 72: You Don’t Deserve to Be Loved.
The sanatorium was peaceful, set amidst the mountains as a place of rest and healing, but for Father Pei, it was a prison, a prison his own son had built with his own hands.
Gazing at the bamboo forest outside the window, which seemed to have no end, he began to reminisce about the past, “You really were acting out of character back then. A child who had been submissive and obedient for over a decade suddenly made such an irrational decision. It surprised me. People say you’re like me in every way, but that untimely stubbornness is more like your mother.”
“Shut up.”
That was the very past Pei Yu did not want to mention, a nightmare that had trapped him for many years. In those nightmares, he found himself forced to let go of Shen Zhiyi, just as when he didn’t want to leave his mother’s corpse, Father Pei pried open his fingers that clung to the hem of her dress one by one.
It was Father Pei who taught him what it meant to give up.
He had to let go.
Father Pei turned his head, looking at Pei Yu’s cold gaze with interest, “Do you like her that much?”
It had been many years since Pei Yu had lost his composure like this. Starting from some point, he began to resemble himself more and more, both in appearance and in tactics. After Pei Yu seized control of the company, the relationship between father and son reversed; the once-dominant father became subordinate, while the silent and indifferent son occupied the high ground, scrutinizing his every move.
Towards Father Pei, Pei Yu initially harbored undisguised disgust, and even that emotion vanished without a trace after that gunshot—the last chance Father Pei had to turn the tables. The car accident took away his legs, and he aimed a shot at Pei Yu’s heart.
Pei Yu didn’t die; he became the winner. Since then, Father Pei had not seen him once. To Pei Yu, he was no longer a father, but a defeated opponent not worth any emotional investment.
And now, he once again held a weapon that could wound Pei Yu.
“Pei Yu, as a father, let me kindly remind you,”
Father Pei began slowly, a barely noticeable smile on his face because he knew Pei Yu was ultimately not his equal—he took feelings too seriously.
“No one can love you unreservedly. The only reason Shen Zhiyi is still willing to stay by your side is that she doesn’t understand what kind of person you really are,”
There was a delicate white porcelain vase on the table. Father Pei picked up a flower bud and snapped it off, saying lightly, “You are cold, selfish, cowardly, despicable, greedy, obsessive. You don’t deserve love.”
The noon sunlight had already set, and Pei Yu stood at the threshold between light and darkness. That sliver of light was slowly shifting across the floor, moving further away from him. Since Father Pei had begun to speak, he had lowered his head, saying nothing, his expression unclear.
It was only when Father Pei mercilessly pinpointed the part of his heart he feared the most that the hand hanging by his side began to clench tighter and tighter, yet he found himself unable to rebut.
He knew what kind of person he was; it was because he knew that he feared being seen through by Shen Zhiyi.
“My son,” Father Pei’s tone became even more gentle, as he had often been when teaching Pei Yu in the past, “If even your parents cannot love someone like you, how can you demand such from a partner? Likewise, you cannot hide your true self. Maybe for a year, but what about ten, twenty years?”
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“In the end, your relationship with Shen Zhiyi will be just another version of what happened between me and your mother.”
Before her death, Pei Yu’s mother was tormented by the question of why his love had faded so quickly. It was the cold aspect of his character that was to blame. He never concealed his true nature, and when it was time to part, he did so without hesitation. However, the true face is often the hardest to accept with the stark contrast between deep affection and lack thereof, which is why Pei Yu’s mother took her own life.
Like father like son, Pei Yu was no less elusive than he. Father Pei was content to play the role of father once more, to personally ensure that Pei Yu understood this.
“Be smart, Pei Yu. Being as persistent as your mother is not a good thing.”
——
When Shen Zhiyi returned to Huating, she did not see Pei Yu, but the car he had driven out in the morning was parked in the parking lot. She looked for him throughout the bedroom and study, but still could not find him.
Huating had one main building and three annexes, which were intended for the younger members of the Pei Family and had been vacant for years. Pei Yu would never go there, so Shen Zhiyi pondered and went downstairs to ask the butler.
The butler was startled at the query, “Isn’t the master in the study?”
Pei Yu had returned before dusk and had not left since then. The butler had not disturbed him, nor heard any sound of him leaving.
Shen Zhiyi shook her head, “I’ve checked there. He’s not around.”
She shook her cell phone, “Can’t get through on the phone either.”
Really strange.
From the morning when she saw him, Shen Zhiyi felt that he seemed a bit off, and during filming, he kept getting distracted, so they wrapped up early today. She had thought he would be as usual, working in the living room while waiting for her.
The butler thought for a moment, “Could he be underground?”
Shen Zhiyi had only been to the underground wine cellar, “The wine cellar?”
“Not that,” the butler shook his head, “There’s a basement room.”
She didn’t know much about it, having only visited once a few years back when she started working here to get familiar with the surroundings.
The basement was on the other side of the wine cellar, and one had to pass through a deep and narrow corridor. Shen Zhiyi found it rather odd, “Why aren’t there any lights here?”
Not even a single light.
Barely illuminated by the cell phone, the butler led the way in front. In such an environment, even their voices grew noticeably lower. “It was designed by Mr. Pei’s father. I was curious about it at the time too.”
At the end of the walk, the butler stood in front of a metal door, “Here we are.”
She stepped aside, and Shen Zhiyi approached hesitantly, gently knocking on the door, “Pei Yu?”
An echo filled the corridor, but there was no sound from inside. As she wondered if Pei Yu was actually there, the lock clicked open.
Shen Zhiyi pushed the door and entered. Inside, it was pitch black, the temperature a few degrees colder than outside, without a glimmer of light.
The light from her phone flashed across, revealing Pei Yu’s blurry figure hidden in the darkness. He stood in the corner, facing the wall, silently reaching out his hand to her.
“What are you doing?”
The basement room was eerily spacious, with only a set of metal furniture, cold and forbidding, which in Shen Zhiyi’s view was somewhat disconcerting.
She unconsciously clenched Pei Yu’s hand tighter, and only then did he fully come back to reality, embracing her from the front, “Thinking about something.”
His body was colder than usual. Shen Zhiyi touched his face, which was also icy, not knowing how long he’d been there.
Pei Yu lowered his eyes, took her wrist, and kissed it softly, inquiring in a low voice, “Hmm?”
The tips of her fingers curled slightly, even the kiss felt cold.
“What’s wrong?”
This Pei Yu felt unfamiliar to her.
Holding her even tighter, Pei Yu stayed silent for a while before speaking, “Was thinking about something unpleasant, do you know what this place is?”
Looking around with the help of her phone’s light, Shen Zhiyi honestly said, “It’s like a prison.”
Metal furniture, snow-white walls, no windows, just a vent.
Pei Yu seemed to laugh, or perhaps he did not. He said, “This is a solitary confinement room.”
He had spent more time in solitary confinement than he had with his mother.
