When I was seven years old, my father began subjecting me to extremely strict parenting. Not only did he withhold any support for my food, clothing, housing, or daily necessities, but he even charged me for drinking water in our own home.

As a child, I endured relentless suffering and bullying. When I was critically injured by a vehicle that broke the law, I was severely injured, and my father refused to save me.

Only after my death did I learn the truth that he already had a son somewhere out there. Everything he did to me was meant to drive me to my death.

After rebirth, I no longer adhered to rules nor endured silently.

Exploiting the fact that I was still a minor, I stabbed his secretary, bullied my classmates at school, and even set a fire on campus to force my father to give up on his brutal methods.

When I grew up, I took everything he owned and sent him to prison.

Only then was my revenge completed.

When I was bullied at school, my father sat inside a luxury car, watching with cold indifference.

“Your inability to build good relationships with your classmates is your own failure. You should reflect on yourself,” he said.

When I scavenged recyclables on the streets daily just to afford a single dinner roll, he mocked me.

“You’re already in elementary school, yet still can’t think of a way to make money better than picking up scraps. You deserve to starve to death.”

Even after I was struck by a car that ran a red light and left me critically injured, requiring surgery, he still refused to help.

“You failed to pay attention to traffic safety yourself, and you can’t even afford surgery. Your life is doomed.”

Thus, under the guise of grooming an heir, my father let me, his only daughter, die in the hospital hallway.

Only after death did I learn that his secretary had already borne him a son long ago. His so-called strict parenting was merely an excuse to push me to my death.

When I opened my eyes again, I had been reborn on the very day he began implementing the strict parenting style.

…

My father was a live-in son-in-law who married into wealth.

When I was four, my mother passed away due to illness, leaving the vast family fortune to my father and me.

The death of a nationally renowned local entrepreneur drew widespread public attention. My father’s heartfelt eulogy during her funeral painted a moving final chapter onto her short yet brilliant life.

He also knelt before my mother’s coffin and vowed never to remarry, swearing to raise me properly and nurture me into an entrepreneur as successful as she had been.

This deeply emotional farewell even made headlines in newspapers and television broadcasts at that time, becoming a tale fondly discussed by the people over meals.

Back then, I believed that if my mother had been loved so deeply, then she must have been incredibly happy.

And as their only child, I would surely be protected just as well by my father.

However, starting from the third year after my mother’s passing, I never again received a single penny from this family until the day I died.

“Remember! Everything in this world comes with a price. There’s no such thing as a free lunch.

“You will one day reclaim from me everything your mother had left you. Only when you understand that nothing comes easily will you learn to cherish it, and only then will you appreciate my good intentions.

“So, starting today, I will no longer provide you with any material support. You must earn everything yourself. Even if that means a sip of water, you must find a way to obtain it on your own. Do you understand?”

I was only seven years old then, and could not comprehend the cruelty hidden in his words.

Later, when he truly cut me off from everything, did I finally realize the kind of hell I had entered.

No new clothes, no more soft and comfortable bed, and no food to fill my stomach.

I even got my own dedicated water tap, fitted with a meter, and each month I had to pay the nanny, Nancy, for my water usage.

At first, I thought this was merely a sudden educational experiment on my father’s whim.

However, when I suffered from stomach cramps induced by extreme hunger and eventually collapsed, nobody came to my aid. That was when I realized my father truly intended to let me fend for myself to the end.

How could a young child possibly know how to earn the means to survive?

No amount of my wailing could sway him in the slightest.

Facing starvation, I desperately sought ways to feed myself. At my lowest point, I even rummaged through trash bins for discarded leftovers.

Such behavior was hard to conceal. Even though I deliberately chose hidden trash bins far from school, I was still discovered.

My brief life was thus accompanied by bullying throughout, up until my death.

Children’s malice was often purer and more unrestrained, yet it cut deeper. They didn’t perceive it as offense or harm, but merely a game.

They called me a garbage-eating trash bin and formed a group that took pleasure in tormenting me. They even assigned someone to block my access to the school toilets.

I relied on collecting recyclables for money, yet time and again, my earnings would be snatched away by older students.

I cried to my father for help, only to receive his cold rebuke.

“Why do they target you and not others? Why can’t you build a good rapport with your classmates?

“Why don’t they bully me, but instead single you out? Ultimately, it’s your social skills that are flawed. If you can’t even deal with something this trivial, then you’re not qualified to inherit anything your mother left you!”

One day, I was hit by a car that ran a red light and was thrown more than a hundred feet away. When the hospital called him, not only did he refuse to sign the surgery consent form, but he also refused to pay a single cent of medical expenses.

“She’s almost an adult. She should take responsibility for her own actions.

“If she still needs her parents to cover her medical bills, then what’s the point of continuing such a failed life?”

I once naïvely believed this was his way of training me. Though I harbored resentment, I never truly hated him.

After my death, however, I discovered he had long had a son eight years younger than me; a b*stard born to him by his secretary.

The “strict parenting” was never imposed on that b*stard son of his. He was given a fairytale-like childhood, where a single ordinary dinner cost more than I earned in a year of scavenging.

As for the harsh discipline forced upon me, it was nothing more than a scheme to wear me down to death so that he could clear the way for that b*stard.

The eulogy he delivered at my mother’s funeral had put him on a pedestal, leaving him in a tough spot. If I didn’t die, that son of his would never be able to step into the spotlight.

Now, I had been reborn, back to the day my father stood before me and eloquently declared that he would begin his so-called strict parenting.

As I watched him solemnly expound his grand principles, I severed the last trace of father-daughter affection in my heart.

Afraid to kill me outright and invite public condemnation, he resorted to this roundabout tactic to exhaust me to death instead.

Unfortunately for him, I was someone who had already died once. Everything I had endured back then had long since crystallized into searing hatred after my death.

Now that I had been given a second life, I would no longer subject myself to living in humiliation and blind obedience.

“These are the challenges you’ll face from now on. I won’t offer you any help. You have to depend on yourself, and nobody will support you.

“You’re almost eight. If you can’t even manage your own survival, you’re destined to be a failure. Do you understand?”

My eyes brimmed with a mix of confusion and understanding, to which I nodded obediently.

Satisfied with my bewildered expression, he patted my head and turned around toward his study.

As the door to his study closed, the confusion in my eyes slowly faded, replaced by bone-chilling coldness.

‘If you’re so eager for me to yield to that b*stard, then I won’t even give him any chance to enter the arena.’

After all, the only way to prevent being suckerpunched was to keep the opponent out of the ring.

In the days that followed, I began collecting scraps for money based on memories from my past life. I worried daily for a single dinner roll, and occasionally feigned breakdowns and sobbing to confuse my father.

Seeing me faint from hunger twice in just one short month, my father began to let his guard down a little around me.

Right at the moment his vigilance was at its weakest against a seven-year-old child, I delivered him a gift that nearly broke him.

…

For an entire week, I scavenged for recyclables day and night. Even on weekends, I rummaged through trash bins at the residential entrance late into the night.

My father paid no mind. To him, I was simply terrified of starving. Working myself so desperately was merely my way of trying to fill my stomach.

To keep the money from being snatched away by the older students that my father had arranged, I deliberately took half a day off on Friday afternoon and sold off the scraps I’d painstakingly gathered.

In just one week, I managed to save a whopping hundred dollars.

Clutching the crumpled bills, I first bought a switchblade from a street vendor. Then, I raced to a family restaurant for a hearty meal of pot roast before bringing home a large bag of dinner rolls.

Over the weekend, I stayed in the villa, living off dinner rolls and cold water while reviewing my schoolwork.

Nancy was my father’s informant. She wouldn’t offer any help, and neither would she interfere much with my actions.

As noon approached, the doorbell rang.

I “sensibly” beat Nancy to open the door, and saw a woman in a business suit waiting outside.

Big, wavy curls paired with a silver blazer and a fitted pencil skirt; black stockings hugging her long legs, finished off with stilettos. No wonder she had completely enchanted my father, so much so that he’d sacrifice his only daughter to pave the way for her out-of-wedlock child.

“Ma’am, may I ask who you’re looking for?” I asked politely as I looked up.

As she looked at me from above, her fake smile couldn’t hide the disgust and loathing in her eyes.

Then again, it was only a natural expression to show toward an obstacle for your future child.

“Little girl, don’t call me Ma’am. Call me Miss.”

Smugly, she looked down at me and said, “I’m here to deliver documents to your father. Is he home?”

She wasn’t surprised at all by my shabby clothes, clearly aware of my father’s ill treatment of me.

I shook my head. “My father went to work. He’s not back yet.”

“Oh? Then may I come in and wait?”

Though she asked, she had no intention of waiting for permission and moved to walk past me and into the house.

I blocked her path and held out my hand. “Ma’am, the entry fee is five dollars.”

She froze for a moment, seemingly remembering something. A vague smile flickered across her face. “Little girl, didn’t your father teach you manners?”

I shook my head again. “No. He only taught me to be self-reliant.”

She dropped her act and rolled her eyes at me. “You little money-grubber. Just you wait till your father gets home. He’ll hear all about this.”

With that, she shoved me aside and strode right in.

Nancy clearly knew her and greeted her respectfully, “Hello, Ms. Powell.”

She nodded in acknowledgement. “I’ll wait for Mr. Stone in the study.”

“Ma’am, wait!”

Hearing the childish cry behind her, impatience finally flashed across the woman’s face.

She turned around. “I’ve told you. Are you ever going to…”

Before she could finish, a switchblade was already plunged into her lower abdomen.

She stared blankly at the blade protruding from her stomach, then looked at me. Her eyes were filled with confusion and shock, a total disbelief at what she was seeing.

Quickly, I pulled out the switchblade protruding from her stomach and stabbed her twice more in the same spot.

With a serious expression, I looked up into her eyes and said, “Ma’am, no money, no entry!”