Chapter 1745: Diary

"Check, please!"

Li Shangfeng placed his chopsticks on the intact table and said to the waiter nearby.

The waiter, holding a tray, was stunned in place. Hearing Li Shangfeng's call, he walked over as if waking from a dream and began to settle the bill.

"Sorry for the expense," Chen Ling sat by the clean, bright window and smiled slightly at Li Shangfeng.

"Boss Chen has been so kind to my sister and me, it's only right... only right."

Li Shangfeng squeezed out a smile while handing over the money with trembling hands.

Neither Li Shangfeng nor Li Wanhua noticed that someone was missing from Chen Ling's side, as if it were meant to be that way.

They stood up naturally, laughing as they walked through the orderly restaurant lobby. Just as they were about to head straight home, Chen Ling spoke proactively:

"You two go back first, I have something to take care of."

"Ah... oh, alright!"

Li Shangfeng nodded repeatedly.

Li Shangfeng naturally wouldn't ask more, and took Li Wanhua home.

"What a rip-off high-end restaurant, so expensive... This meal makes my heart bleed!!" Once they were far away, Li Shangfeng grabbed his chest with one hand and said with extreme heartache.

"Look at how stingy you are!" Li Wanhua pouted. "Treating Boss Chen to a meal, of course, we had to eat the best... Besides, didn't we get to taste the abalone and lobster? It was all thanks to Boss Chen."

"That's true..."

Li Shangfeng licked his lips, as if savoring something.

A moment later, a look of confusion appeared in his eyes, and he said uncertainly:

"Abalone and lobster... hmm... what did they taste like? Why don't I have any memory of it?"

"Now that you mention it, I don't seem to remember clearly either... I just feel like I've forgotten something important?"

"Damn, this was a huge loss! Spent so much money and didn't even remember what the abalone and lobster tasted like!"

“……”

……

On the deserted street.

A figure in a vest moved at high speed.

At this moment, Li Laide was already four or five blocks away from the Comet Restaurant. He was confident that at this distance, even Chen Ling couldn't forcibly rewind him back.

Li Laide was never one to admit defeat or accept his fate. Knowing he couldn't escape Chen Ling's side with his own strength, he planned to use external forces to help him break the deadlock...

From the moment Li Shangfeng asked Chen Ling if he wanted to go out for a meal, he had already planned his escape strategy in his heart.

Therefore, he deliberately made his stomach growl, silently pushing Chen Ling to agree.

At the Comet Restaurant, he claimed he needed to go to the bathroom, which he did, and he didn't do anything out of the ordinary along the way... The only thing he did was deliberately slow down, take a detour, and let the surrounding diners see his face clearly. He also asked multiple waiters for the direction of the bathroom with a bad attitude to deepen their impression.

In the end, he successfully attracted the people from Chengtian Prefecture as he wished. This move of "driving the tiger to eat the wolf" allowed him to successfully escape.

"Not a total loss..."

Li Laide looked at the gold bar in his chest and muttered to himself.

Although he had escaped, Li Laide didn't let his guard down. He kept taking detours through the district, sometimes using "Face Stealing" to hide and disguise himself. He played this game of chess with the void for several hours until the sun was about to set. Confirming that even if someone were tailing him, they couldn't keep up, he headed in a certain direction.

When Li Laide stood in front of an inconspicuous residential house, the pitch-black night had already shrouded the earth.

Sparse, weak lights shone through the windows of the house, dispelling a corner of the surrounding night... It wasn't the bright light of electric lamps, but the cheaper kerosene lamps.

The flickering light shone on the bedroom curtains, and vaguely, one could see a shadow sitting in a wheelchair, lost in thought.

Seeing that shadow, a complex emotion welled up in Li Laide's deep blue eyes. He walked silently to the window, skillfully pulled back a corner, and looked inside through the narrow gap in the curtains...

It was a woman with the same slightly curly hair as Li Laide, except her hair wasn't pitch black, but an unhealthy pale, cascading down her back like a waterfall.

Under the lamplight, a three-dimensional and exquisite Western face was almost flawless, her skin exceptionally fair. Although there were shallow marks left by the years, she still looked like a work of art carved by a master craftsman.

She gently tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, and her other hand stroked an old, yellowed diary. Her lake-like deep blue eyes were filled with unspeakable sorrow and longing.

"Mother..." Li Laide looked at the figure and muttered to himself.

As his mother slowly closed the diary, a line of fluent, elegant English on the cover shone under the kerosene lamp:

——【Rider·Li】

It was Li Laide's old diary.

For a long time, Li Laide had spent his time in school bullying and violence. He hadn't told his mother about these things, but instead hid everything in his diary late at night. He had clearly hidden this diary in a secret compartment under his bed; he didn't expect his mother to have found it.

Li Laide knew what was recorded inside, and he knew how heartbroken and guilty his mother would be after seeing it. He looked at the diary silently for a long time, then turned and walked toward the front door of the house.

Ding-dong—

The moment the crisp doorbell rang, his mother looked up sharply.

She trembled slightly, her hands gripping the sides of the wheelchair, and she rushed toward the door, her deep blue eyes filled with tension and anxiety.

When she hurriedly opened the door, there was no one outside... only the stars in the sky, twinkling silently.

His mother frowned slightly. She lowered her head slowly, and a gold bar was lying quietly at the door.

She was stunned.

Her pale hair fluttered in the breeze. After a long time, she tremblingly picked up the heavy gold bar... Under the gold bar, there was a note with a line of elegant, beautiful handwriting, the same as on the cover of the diary:

"Live well, get your treatment, Mother."

The moment she saw this line, her eyes began to tremble, and tears couldn't stop flowing from her eyes.

She looked up, stared into the empty night, and shouted loudly:

"Laide! I know you must still be here!"

"Mom knows everything now... Mom knows why you killed those people. It's Mom's fault; I should have taken better care of you and not let them bully you..."

"Mom doesn't blame you for killing people; Mom is just worried about you... With so many people hunting you, these days, hiding and living in fear, you must have had a very hard time..."

"But even so, you still secretly leave money at the door every month. Although I never see anyone when I check the door, I know it must be you... You don't see me because you're afraid those people will find me and use me to deal with you."

"But Laide..."

"Mom really misses you."