My So-Called Family

The trial for justice had begun.

The first charge against me, the defendant, was violation of the filial support law.

My mother Miranda stood at the accuser's stand, tears streaming down her face as she accused me. She claimed our family was poor, that she toiled away on construction sites just to put me through school. When she fell seriously ill, I didn't offer any help or money, nor did I visit her. In the end, her illness went untreated due to a lack of funds. She ended up paralyzed from the waist down.

She also accused me of tricking them into selling their house and pocketing the money, refusing to care for them after that. The event left them homeless and forced them to rent, while I used their money to live a high life.

After hearing all this, the crowd began to curse me furiously.

"I spit on her! How absolutely heartless!"

"What an ungrateful woman… They should have strangled her at birth."

"Those poor parents. She's so ruthless!"

I stared at them, unfazed. When I spotted my adopted sister arriving late, however, a surge of anger rose in me.

Sandy was wrapped up tight, her face covered with a mask, but I recognized her immediately. Even though I couldn't see her expression, I was sure she was being all smug under that mask. Her eyes kept meeting with my fiance Andy's, the air between them suggestive.

At that moment, Miranda lashed out again. This time, she accused me of violating the filial support law. She also claimed that Arnold had even brought her to my workplace after she was paralyzed, only for me to turn them away.

The judge's expression turned grim, his voice stern with anger as he questioned me, "Defendant, do you wish to explain yourself?"

"Just look at my memories," I answered calmly.

The staff strapped the Memory Extraction Device onto me. As the electricity buzzed, a stabbing pain shot through my head. Despite the pain, I gritted my teeth and said nothing.

Then, one word appeared on the giant screen.

"Innocent."

The crowd gasped in disbelief.

"What's going on?"

"How can it be innocent?"

Miranda looked away from the screen, a guilty conscience flickering in her eyes. Meanwhile, Andy stared at me with wide eyes in utter disbelief.

Next, my memories began to play out on the big screen.

When I was ten, my brother Carl nearly drowned while swimming in the river. Sandy's parents jumped in to save him, but they lost their lives instead. To show gratitude for their sacrifice, my parents adopted Sandy as their daughter.

From then on, the whole family treated her like their savior, giving her only the best.

But the day she came into our home, my life became a living hell. Anything Sandy liked and wanted, whether it was clothes, books, toys, or something else, I had to give up. If I refused or resisted, my parents would beat me up.

In middle school, a classmate gave me a pencil case for my birthday. I didn't want to give it to her, but my father slapped me hard.

"You ungrateful brat! It's just a pencil case. Give it to her already."

I refused, so my father tied me to a post and struck me with a stick until I was forced to let go of the pencil case in my hand.

Miranda swooped in and picked it up after she saw what happened, quickly handed it to Sandy before cradling her and gently comforting her. When Sandy saw that the pencil case was dirty, she burst into tears.

Miranda had no choice but to make a promise. "Don't cry! I'll buy you a new one. Be good, okay?"

Meanwhile, I was beaten. In the end, I passed out as my body was bruised and I couldn't even move my finger. My injuries were so severe that on the day of my high school entrance exam, I couldn't even get out of bed.

I lost my chance to attend high school.

I wanted to continue my studies, so I begged my parents to let me repeat a year.

They simply dismissed it. "What's the point of a girl studying so much? Once you're old enough, just get married!"

Miranda, annoyed, hugged Sandy and looked at me. "You can forget about it! Your grades are so terrible that you're just wasting our money the more you study. We'd rather spend it on some good food for Sandy, so she has the energy to study."