Humans are, after all, creatures of emotion. My parents,
who had no pre–existing affection for me, listened to his
words, then looked at the innocent and charming
Felicity. In the end, they were left with nothing but a
sigh.
In my past life, I only knew how to accept my fate. I
didn’t understand that if you weren’t born with a silver
spoon, you had to fight for what you wanted–be it
money or love. So, when I knelt before my parents,
crying uncontrollably, confessing my “longing,” they
embraced me, tears in their eyes.
“Our precious girl has suffered!”
“Mom and Dad will make it up to you a hundredfold!”
Leaning on my parents‘ shoulders, through tear–filled
eyes, I saw young Felicity.
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06:29
Even though she didn’t speak immediately, I quickly caught the flash of resentment in her eyes. Felicity looked like an innocent little rabbit, her eyes red, her
lips trembling, holding back tears.
“Mom, Dad, who is this sister?”
“Why is she calling you Mom and Dad too?” a
Just as my parents realized they had neglected Felicity and were about to comfort her, I quickly grasped
Felicity’s hand.
“This must be the sister who honored our parents in
my stead.”
“Just as my brother said, she’s a million times better
than me!”
“Even though sister’s birth mother swapped us and then
abandoned me in Maplewood to fend for myself, I know
my sister knew nothing of her eighteen years of
privilege in the Sterling family. My sister is innocent!”
“And my brother has already warned me that my sister
is the little princess cherished by the whole family,
unlike me, who never even met my birth parents…”
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06:29 C
I took a pendant from my neck. “I don’t have anything
presentable for our first meeting. This is the only
memento my Nana, who raised me, left me. I hope it
protects my sister and keeps her safe always.” Without
waiting for Felicity to refuse, I pressed the pendant into
her hand. The sharp corner of the pendant pricked
Felicity’s delicate palm. With a high–pitched shriek from
her, I preemptively recoiled two steps, falling backward
onto the floor. The pendant dropped and shattered into
fragments.
Under my parents‘ astonished gaze, I immediately knelt,
cupping the shards in my hands. My hands were soon
covered in blood, and tears streamed down my face as
I apologized incessantly. “I’m so sorry! I didn’t think this
through!”
“Even if this is my most precious possession, it doesn’t
compare to my sister, a Sterling heiress…”
My parents, their hearts aching, pulled me up. Their
voices choked with emotion. “Elara, what are you doing?
You’re Mom and Dad’s biological daughter!”
When our eyes met again, Felicity’s eyes held an
unconcealed resentment. Felicity truly wasn’t a clean
flower protected by the mud. This was perfect. It saved
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06:29
me from any useless guilt! From the moment I was
reborn, I had decided that whether Felicity was innocent
or not, I would take back everything that was mine.
Even if she truly knew nothing, I would still claim it.
Because these things were rightfully mine.
Felicity and I were swapped. Felicity’s birth mother,
pregnant out of wedlock, coincidentally gave birth on
the same day as my mother. Seeing my mother’s
expensive attire and lavish lifestyle, the woman, unwilling
to let her child suffer, stealthily swapped us when no
one was looking. She didn’t even intend to raise me;
she simply abandoned me in Maplewood. If Nana hadn’t
found me, I would probably have been nothing but
bones. Compared to Felicity’s privileged, mistaken life, I
was the truly innocent one. As for the jade pendant, of
course, it wasn’t an heirloom. It was just a cheap
trinket Ethan won from a street raffle years ago, the
only gift he ever gave me. A piece of worthless glass
that I had treasured for years. Now, it was perfectly
suited to pave my way.
My father frantically took the glass shards, calling for
someone to mend them, while my mother, heartbroken,
had the family doctor tend to my bleeding hands.
“Felicity! How could you drop your sister’s gift and
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push your sister?!”
06:29
“Is that what we’ve taught you all these years?!”
Unlike my daily humiliation and gaslighting by Ethan,
this was probably the first time Felicity had ever been
reprimanded in her life. Her face flushed with
indignation, her neck stiff, but she had no idea how to
defend herself. Dominic, who had been protecting her
from the start, finally spoke.
“Mom, Dad, you’re misunderstanding Felicity.”
“I was standing right there. I clearly saw Elara
intentionally fall and shatter the pendant herself.”
“While I don’t know why Elara would try to frame
Felicity right after coming home, I believe the house’s
surveillance cameras would have captured it.”
“After all, Elara is the kind of person who, to return to
the Sterling family, would heartlessly dump a boyfriend
she’d been with for years, her childhood sweetheart.”
With that, Dominic pulled out his phone. On the screen,
the footage clearly showed my conversation with Ethan-
the bits where I’d said “snatch my place” and “none of
your business, outsider,” edited cleverly to look
