Chapter 2

By the time I got home, the front was already packed with people.

My uncle was sitting on my front step, smoking like he had come to collect a debt.

My aunt sat on the ground, slapping her thighs and crying, calling me a heartless ingrate.

Eric was holding his phone up and livestreaming, pointing it hard at my front door.

My mom was standing in the yard, her face pale.

She wasn’t scared. She was angry.

When she saw me come back, Eric shoved the camera toward me first.

“Everybody take a look. This is my gifted cousin. The factory had trouble, and he ran off.”

“Now he’s not even taking care of his own mother.”

I didn’t even lift my eyelids. I just asked my mom first.

“Mom, are you okay?”

My mom nodded.

That put me at ease, and I turned to my uncle.

He stubbed his cigarette out on the ground and sprang to his feet.

“You broke the factory and then just walked away like nothing happened?”

I laughed.

“You threw my paycheck at my face and told me to get lost.”

“What, now you don’t remember?”

My uncle shouted at the top of his lungs.

“I told you to get lost because I was mad! Who knew you’d be this ruthless and turn right around and wreck the factory!”

Eric jumped in immediately.

“If you didn’t have something to hide, why did the machine break right after you got kicked out? Are you really going to say you didn’t leave something behind on purpose?”

He said it so confidently.

If I didn’t know better, I might have thought I had actually done something.

I didn’t waste any words. I just opened the video.

The first clip was Eric standing in front of the control panel, pressing random buttons.

The second was him ripping off the parameter sheet on the cabinet door.

The third was him barking at the workers to back off because he knew what he was doing.

I had been working there for three years and got along well with the factory workers.

I didn’t even have to say anything. Someone had already filmed it and sent it to me.

Eric’s face turned the color of liver in an instant.

He lunged for my phone.

I swung my arm, and Eric stumbled back two steps.

When my uncle saw his son lose face, he rushed up and tried to shove me.

I didn’t budge an inch and just slapped the police report receipt right in front of him.

“The police are on their way. Blocking our door, threatening an elder, spreading lies—I’ll add up every single charge with you.”

My aunt stopped crying at once. My uncle still wanted to talk tough.

“I’m disciplining my own nephew. What can the police do about that?”

I almost laughed from anger.

“The day you threw me out, why didn’t you say I was your nephew?”

“The day you took the clients I brought in and put Eric’s name on them, why didn’t you say I was your nephew?”

“The day you stood in front of the whole factory and said I was just a dog you used to guard your machines, why didn’t you say I was your nephew?”

With those words, everyone watching started looking at my uncle’s family differently.

My uncle’s face was completely gone. He reached out and tried to grab my collar.

Just then, the police car arrived.

I didn’t argue a single word.

I handed over the videos, the recordings, and the footage of them blocking our door.

After watching everything, even the police officer’s face darkened.

“The machines in your factory are broken, go file a repair report.”

“Blocking someone’s home and threatening an elderly woman—who taught you that?”

Before they left, the police made it very clear.

If they came back to cause trouble, they’d be taken away on the spot.

My uncle swallowed all his anger and had no choice but to leave with them.

I knew this wasn’t over.

That night, Old Tom from the factory called.

“Evan, something big has happened.”

“Your uncle went crazy in the workshop, saying you got kicked out because you weren’t convinced and deliberately set a trap.”

“He also said you stole the factory’s process and clients, and that he’d mess up your job and force you back to work.”

I nodded. “It’s fine. Tom, help me pull the surveillance footage and send it to me.”