Chapter 112: Charity Foundation |
The pigeon leg in Shi Rang's hand dropped onto his plate with a clatter.
The regional director... of the Charity Foundation... in the Second District?
As someone who had been in the workforce for years, Shi Rang understood exactly what that meant.
The Charity Foundation was a global organization and the largest orphan support agency in the world.
Not long ago, the news reported that the number of beneficiaries of the Foundation had surpassed fifty million. Their official website published dozens of unique thank-you letters every single day.
Naturally, it was fundamentally a for-profit enterprise. Relying on subsidies from various districts and making a fortune by issuing support loans to orphans, it possessed a massive number of subsidiaries covering every aspect of civilian life. Even the refrigerator in Shi Rang's apartment was manufactured by one of their companies. It was undoubtedly one of the most famous and lucrative corporations in the entire world.
Shi Shixin was the regional director, or rather, the regional managing director, of such a super-corporation.
It was a position of overwhelming power and unimaginable wealth.
Shi Rang was left numb by this sudden revelation. He did not even react when the final appetizer was served—a massive lobster sashimi platter over a meter long that had to be placed on a specially made wide dish. He mechanically forked a piece of the lobster meat and chewed it, but it tasted like ashes in his mouth.
Later, he finally grew utterly disheartened, choosing to live as though he were an orphan raised solely by his grandparents, devoid of a father and mother.
The revocation of his residency permit was inextricably linked to Shi Shixin, but that was mostly due to the hidden pitfalls laid down by the convoluted bureaucracy of the Tenth District.
Shi Rang had never imagined the man wielded such immense power.
When he first made up his mind to find Ying Shang at all costs, he had briefly considered contacting his family. However, that impractical thought had only surfaced because he truly had nowhere else to turn for help.
He simply had no idea if they actually possessed that level of capability.
No wonder his grandparents always had a proud gleam in their eyes whenever they mentioned Shi Shixin, and reprimanded Shi Rang for any complaints he made about his father.
It was because Shi Shixin was a "successful man," a "social elite."
The swallowed lobster meat stirred an uncomfortable chill in Shi Rang's stomach. As expected, just the thought of that man made him feel sick.
When he first heard the news, a fleeting sense of warmth had washed over him, but it was instantly extinguished by the revulsion that had accumulated over the years.
They said blood was thicker than water, but whatever affection existed had long been destroyed in the past. He was no longer a child who held expectations for his parents or yearned for familial love.
But just as Shi Rang tried to halt his train of thought and simply finish his meal in peace, he thought of Ying Shang.
This also meant that the orphanage Ying Shang frequently mentioned was a property under the corporation Shi Shixin worked for, and it might have even been directly managed by him.
However, Shi Shixin was no "philanthropist."
The financial aid was real, and the Charity Foundation did establish many monetary awards and grants, but those support loans had once been a crushing mountain weighing down upon the married couple.
A terrifying question spread from that icy knot in Shi Rang's stomach: did Shi Shixin know about his marriage to Ying Shang?
The light in Shi Rang's eyes vanished for a second, swiftly replaced by the same absolute darkness that had surfaced when he attempted to kill Heart Fist. Nothing could drive him to madness more than the one he loved getting hurt.
Could it be that man's doing? Could he have used his influence across various sectors of society, or even the anomalous world, to drag Shi Rang back under his control? Just like how he used to dictate every decision Shi Rang made, ruin every friendship he formed, and belittle every minor success he achieved—was he now trying to destroy the hard-won happiness Shi Rang had found after regaining his freedom?
If it was him... if Ying Shang's disappearance was truly Shi Shixin's doing... he would commit patricide!
Two crisp clinking sounds echoed beside him. It was Deacon Huo, lightly tapping the rim of his plate with a fork. "The main course is here, Shi Rang. Do not miss out on the fine food."
The presence of an outsider helped Shi Rang claw back a shred of rationality.
He broke free from his turbulent emotions and resumed his line of thinking, his clenched fists slowly relaxing.
If Shi Shixin was genuinely in trouble because Shi Rang had run away from home, just as Deacon Huo claimed, and had failed in his desperate attempts to find his son to salvage his own interests, then he probably would not have been able to uncover his undocumented marriage to Ying Shang either.
Even the Management Authority had not found out, or perhaps they simply did not care—meaning the likelihood of Shi Shixin being the culprit was extremely low.
Yet there definitely had to be some sort of connection here, an obscure thread that tied him, Ying Shang, Shi Shixin, and the Management Authority together.
Or perhaps it was just a coincidence.
A coincidence that could be exploited.
Shi Rang picked up his knife and fork once more. The lingering fury and the dull pain in his palms caused his hands to tremble slightly. "I am already twenty-eight, approaching thirty. If I am not mistaken, he is also nearing sixty. Why is he in such a rush to drag me back?"
"It is all because of the 'fraudulent subsidy' scandal at the Charity Foundation a few years back," Deacon Huo replied.
Deacon Huo's tone had become distant when speaking of Shi Shixin, which suited Shi Rang perfectly.
Waving his fork over the sequentially served main courses, Deacon Huo precisely skewered a piece of chicken that rested at the very top of a towering, spire-like arrangement.
After that piece was removed, the remaining chicken pieces quickly shifted positions to form a slightly smaller tower, with savory sauce slowly cascading down from the peak.
"That crackdown scrubbed the Charity Foundation clean from top to bottom. Shi Shixin narrowly escaped because they could not find any concrete evidence, but he was inches away from being ousted. It was only through sheer luck that no one else was capable of taking over the regional director role, allowing him to secure the position. However, with that kind of history hanging over his head, everyone wants to kick him while he is down. They are clinging stubbornly to the claim that he funneled the embezzled funds to his only son so he could live lavishly abroad. They keep attacking him over it, and as long as you remain missing, that narrative cannot be broken. He has been living with his tail tucked between his legs these past few years, having a genuinely miserable time."
Shi Rang sneered. "Miserable? Sitting on mountains of gold and silver, he has no right to complain about being miserable."
"Exactly, he deserves it."
Deacon Huo raised his glass toward him.
The two clinked their glasses and downed the fruit wine in one gulp.
The low-alcohol beverage soothed his nerves, and Shi Rang finally opened up. "Why did the organization take notice of him? Is it because he is highly influential?"
"Because he is terrified. If it were a normal corporation, they would not enact any substantial punishment on a top executive like him, but the Management Authority does not care about such things..."
"The Management Authority?" Shi Rang froze in the middle of stirring his curry. As he lifted his eyes to look across the table, the curry on his plate and clinging to his spoon turned completely invisible. "Does the Management Authority have ties to the Charity Foundation?"
"Their facilities are scattered everywhere across the globe. With so many structures and employees, coupled with those private armies, they burn through money at an astronomical rate. Casually selling scraps to the Alliance cannot fill that massive deficit. They have to rely on a vast number of front companies to rake in cash, and the Charity Foundation happens to be the biggest operation among them. Whoever dares to touch that slice of the pie will face the unforgiving wrath of the Management Authority's council."
Shi Rang's entire worldview was upended once again. He took a moment to digest the succession of bombshell revelations before deducing, "Is the organization planning to exploit Shi Shixin's weakness and turn him into one of our own?"
"No, no, no," Deacon Huo said, wagging his finger. "Not recruit, but use. It is a rather complicated matter to explain. Today is mainly about enjoying a good meal, not discussing formal operational plans, so we can talk about it later. Our primary objective right now is to see if we can help find your wife. As for Shi Shixin, we are merely using him like a dog. Once he outlives his usefulness, we will cast him aside."
Shi Rang used to detest such slick diplomatic rhetoric, but Deacon Huo's conversational pivot was incredibly smooth, with every single word striking right at the depths of his heart.
No one disliked hearing what they wanted to hear; they only hated it when the flattery and pandering were directed at someone else.
When Deacon Huo first appeared, Shi Rang had used his Sensing ability on him, only to discover that the man seemed to be nothing more than an ordinary person, which had left him perpetually puzzled.
Now, he finally understood exactly how the man had managed to secure the position of Deacon. He was genuinely impressed.
Spurred on by the alcohol, he took the initiative to offer Deacon Huo a toast.
The two of them enjoyed each other's company immensely. For the rest of the meal, they dropped all talk of missions and plans, simply chatting while they ate.
Having built up so much pressure for far too long, constantly struggling to conceal the truth from different people, Shi Rang had finally found someone he could speak openly with during this dinner. He poured out everything—how he had been kept in the dark all these years, searching desperately like a madman while enduring endless scorn and cold shoulders. There were even things he shared that he had never once told Xu Yijun.
There were many things Shi Rang had been too afraid to confide in his friends out of fear of damaging their relationship, but it was surprisingly much easier to open up to Deacon Huo, a man he had only recently met.
After all these years, he had finally found a sympathetic ear.
However, he still retained enough rationality to know that his two deepest secrets could never be spoken aloud.
His relationship with the Ascension Society was, and always would be, one of mutual exploitation.
They had nearly finished the main courses and had talked at length, yet the desserts were nowhere to be seen. The delay dragged on so long that even Shi Rang started to think the kitchen was being terribly slow.
"Why is it taking so long..." Deacon Huo also began to grow impatient.
At that moment, Shi Rang heard the chime of wind bells coming from the direction of the entrance. Ever since the gauze curtains had been drawn shut, this was the very first time he had heard any noise from anyone other than the waiters.
"Welcome," someone greeted.
"What kind of restaurant is this...? The name is so bizarre. How come I have never seen it around here before?" a voice asked.
"Would you like to dine here?"
Deacon Huo also heard the commotion at the door and furrowed his brows. "A new customer. That is not something you see often."
Shi Rang asked, "Does the restaurant accept walk-ins like that?"
"In their eyes, anyone capable of walking through that door is a diner worth serving," Deacon Huo replied.
Shi Rang acknowledged this with a hum. With a mere thought, he pushed his Anomaly Sensing to its maximum precision, extending his perception outward.
His intangible senses pierced through the gauze curtains and locked onto a signal source near the entrance: [Yihai-05 "Negative Review Juror" Dedicated Communication Device #0039]