No one had expected it.
Shen Yonggui and Wang Dezhen really had beaten Shen Yunzhi so brutally.
People always said even a vicious tiger wouldn't eat its own cubs.
Even when they hadn't known Shen Yunzhi had been switched at birth, they had treated her like this.
One look at the scars on Shen Yunzhi's arms was enough to imagine how horrific it had been back then.
[That burn scar is too big to be from an ordinary cigarette. It might have been one of those old tobacco pipes.]
[...Getting burned with one of those would hurt a lot more than a cigarette.]
[And I spotted three or four burn scars at a glance. This was clearly deliberate!]
[I don't even dare count how many whip scars there are.]
The scars on Shen Yunzhi's body shocked the viewers.
Everyone could clearly see that Shen Yonggui and Wang Dezhen had treated Shen Yunzhi badly.
Shen Yunzhi shouldn't have needed to bare her scars like this.
Yet Jiang Yunli and Ji Nanxian had played off each other, one playing bad cop and the other good cop.
They had forced Shen Yunzhi to reveal these wounds just to prove how miserable her life had been.
Shen Yunzhi had been smeared for so many years, yet she had never used these scars to prove how badly she had suffered.
Jiang Yunli, on the other hand...
She probably hadn't even lived in Caoli County for a year, yet she was desperate to tell everyone how miserable she had been.
The squeaky wheel really did get the grease.
All these years, everyone had felt sorry for Jiang Yunli, who had lived as a wealthy young lady for fifteen years, only for one sudden upheaval to reduce her to such circumstances.
Yet few people felt sorry for Shen Yunzhi, who should have lived like a princess but had instead suffered years of abuse.
[Whenever it's about a Biological Daughter and a fake daughter, I'll side with the Biological Daughter without question. Even if the fake daughter didn't know, she still benefited! The fake daughter never has the right to say it's unfair!!]
[Exactly. Isn't it the same principle as children born within marriage versus children born out of wedlock? No matter how miserable the latter are, I just can't sympathize with them.]
[Looking at it this way, whether all that dirt on Shen Yunzhi was true or false, I honestly understand it now.]
[Weren't people bashing her for ignoring her adoptive parents and throwing them out when they came to see her? If I finally got out of that situation, I'd seriously kill those two!!]
The tide in the livestream finally swung entirely to one side.
People were either bashing Jiang Yunli and Ji Nanxian.
Or feeling sorry for Shen Yunzhi.
Jiang Yunli's die-hard fans and the couple's shippers were helpless.
[Just bash Ji Nanxian and leave it at that...]
[Yunli didn't know Shen Yunzhi had suffered so much either...]
They barely managed to stumble through those two lines of explanation before a flood of comments swept them away.
It scared them into silence.
[What kind of people still like Jiang Yunli and Ji Nanxian?]
[Why are there still paid posters here? Do they think ordinary viewers are idiots?]
Earlier, when public opinion of Shen Yunzhi had turned around, these people had labeled everyone praising her in the comments a paid poster.
Now the tables had finally turned.
During an earlier livestream, Shen Yunzhi had accidentally revealed the scars on her arm.
But only An Zhizhi had seen them.
At the time, Shen Yonggui had been about to hit Shen Yunzhi, and Jiang Yunli had deliberately knocked into the cameraman and his camera.
Jiang Yunli hadn't noticed the scars on Shen Yunzhi's arms then.
Yet that coincidental turn of events suddenly set An Zhizhi's mind racing now.
An Zhizhi could hardly believe Jiang Yunli could be so vicious. She sucked in a sharp breath, pointed at Jiang Yunli, and said,
"So you deliberately knocked the cameraman over earlier because you didn't want the livestream viewers to see the scars on Shen Yunzhi's arms!"
Jiang Yunli: "????"
She was being falsely accused!
Desperate to explain, Jiang Yunli said, "I didn't!"
An Zhizhi said, "Then tell us why you did it!"
"..." Jiang Yunli was instantly at a loss for words.
Her motives back then hadn't been innocent to begin with.
And the scene before her had left her mind blank.
She couldn't come up with an explanation on the spot.
Now Jiang Yunli had gotten a taste of how Shen Yunzhi felt when she framed her.
She truly couldn't defend herself.
The persona Jiang Yunli had put on before had already all but collapsed.
Everyone also knew she was a scheming hypocrite.
Jiang Yunli had originally wanted to use Shen Yonggui and Wang Dezhen to salvage her reputation.
Who knew Shen Yunzhi had this move up her sleeve?
It had only made Jiang Yunli look worse.
Jiang Yunli's mind went numb.
Any words she could offer seemed pale and powerless.
Only one thought filled her heart.
It's over.
[Holy shit! So Jiang Yunli knew how much Shen Yunzhi had suffered?!]
[Then what the hell was that act just now???]
[She was using Shen Yunzhi to make herself look better!]
[The more unfilial Shen Yunzhi looked, the more handing over that bank card would show how filial Jiang Yunli was, and how she repaid cruelty with kindness.]
[Wow, just wow. That's vicious!]
[Doesn't Jiang Yunli love putting on an act? Why isn't she keeping it up now?]
It wasn't just people online criticizing them now.
Even people at the scene couldn't stand watching anymore.
Chi Zong addressed Ji Nanxian with outright sarcasm. "They drove your precious Jiang Yunli into depression, after all. Of course, this little bit of abuse Shen Yunzhi suffered is insignificant. How could her suffering possibly compare to your Yunli's physical and mental health?"
"..." After struggling for a long time, Ji Nanxian finally managed to force out, "...That's not what I meant."
But when he saw Shen Yunzhi slowly lower her sleeves to cover the scars on her arms, he was once again speechless.
...How was he supposed to know Shen Yunzhi had suffered so much?
Shen Yunzhi was always so wild and full of energy. He couldn't tell at all.
He had thought everyone abused by their family of origin would be like Jiang Yunli.
Shen Yunzhi patted her cuffs and gave a hollow smile. "I'm not like certain people, getting all indignant when they accuse me of not giving them money. It's easy to talk when you're not the one suffering. They beat me like this back then, and now I'm supposed to give them money for their old age? I, for one, can't do it."
"If village officials hadn't come to their door back then and threatened them, saying that if I was ever found beaten to death by Shen Yonggui and Wang Dezhen, it would be treated as murder, I'd probably have died long ago."
Saying these things before could never have been as convincing as saying them now, after revealing solid evidence.
There really were many cases like this in underdeveloped areas.
Favoring boys over girls and refusing to send girls to school were among the milder ones.
There were plenty who killed babies as soon as they saw they were girls, then made it look like an early death.
Hearing Shen Yunzhi say this, Wang Dezhen and Shen Yonggui still had the nerve to argue.
"W-we never went to school. However our families raised us back then, of course that's how we'd raise the next generation!"
Shen Yonggui could only stammer in agreement. "R-right! Besides, aren't you perfectly fine now? You just have a few scars. It's not like you died..."
Before you continue