Rise Of The Underworld King

Chapter 3

Tina sat down, rubbing her hands against her lap. Something inside her chest felt wrong, like a stone she could not put down.

Did Ethan deserve all of this? Is this really how things will end? Am I doing the right thing? Am I treating Ethan the way I should be treating him?

She turned the questions over in her head, and guilt sat heavy in all of them.

Then a knock landed on the door.

Ethan was on the sofa playing a game on his phone, his face completely unbothered, as if the last few hours had never happened at all.

Tina stopped rubbing her hands. She got up and crossed the room to the door. When she pulled it open, her parents were standing on the other side.

They stepped inside, and Ethan lifted his eyes from his phone long enough to see who had walked in. He looked at them for a while before. dropping his gaze back to the screen.

Tina's parents saw him too and her mother turned in his direction immediately.

"What is wrong with you, Ethan? Where have you been for the past three days? What exactly is your problem?"

Her father followed without missing a beat. "I don't know what his problem is. He has a very big problem, and it seems to be following him everywhere he goes."

"I have been busy for the past three days," Ethan replied, not looking up. "And I have already told Tina what happened."

Tina's mother drew herself up. "When did you tell her? Was it not today?"

Ethan nodded.

Her father looked him up and down, then hissed. "You were absent from this house for three full days and you only told her the reason today. Are you insane?"

Ethan said nothing. He looked at her father and pressed his lips together.

"I told her the reason," he said at last. "So there is nothing to worry about."

Her father looked genuinely thrown by that answer, like he had been expecting something else entirely.

He turned to Tina. "Is it true that he has already told you why he was gone?"

Tina nodded.

Her father shook his head and looked back at her. "Who told you to marry this kind of man, Tina? What has gotten into him? He is very disrespectful and he has no manners."

Her mother waved a hand. "Leave him alone and let him be. It is Tina's mistake for choosing this poor man as the love of her life. Everything is going to end now."

Then she held up her phone, showing Tina the screen.

"Anyway, this is Steven. He is the only son behind James's Group, one of the top three companies in this city. He has everything it takes to be your husband."

Ethan stopped playing his game. He pushed his phone into his pocket and started watching them.

Her father looked straight at him. "Look at his eyes. You have done nothing but waste my daughter's time. She never deserved someone like you. You are not even close to her standard."

"Just sign the divorce agreement and leave my daughter alone," her mother yelled, pointing a shaking finger at Ethan. "You do not have what it takes to be her husband. The man here is richer than you. And that is being generous, because you are not rich at all. What a poor man."

Ethan sat there looking at both of them with a small smile on his face.

"Sign the papers and get out!" her father said firmly. "You will not be taking a single penny from this family."

Ethan let out a loud laugh. "Really? Am I wasting her time? How long have I been wasting it exactly? Was it from the very day we got married? And when did you first figure that out?"

Tina cleared her throat, pulling her parents' attention back to her. "Ethan has already signed the divorce papers," she said. "And he will not be taking anything."

Her parents stared at each other, then at her. They had always known Ethan to be a man with very little, and both of them had assumed that signing those papers would be the last thing he would agree to do.

"He signed the papers?" her father asked, stepping closer to her, clearly surprised.

Tina handed the divorce papers to him. He took them and her mother crowded in beside him and they looked through the document together.

"This is truly that poor man's signature," her mother said. "He signed the divorce papers, when it should have been the hardest thing in the world for him to do. Does this poor man even have anyone to fall back on?" She laughed as she said it.

Tina laughed with her. "No. Maybe he is perfectly fine living in poverty."

The three of them laughed together.

Then Ethan stood up.

"Do not walk around thinking you are so important," he said, "and do not think for one second that everyone is desperate for a connection with your family. And if the laughter is because you are rich, just know that you did not become rich through your own hard work."

He paused, then went on. "Tina, the new talented businesswoman? Have you already forgotten that before she married me, this family was already sliding toward bankruptcy?"

"What are you talking about?" Tina shot back, her voice rising. "What is wrong with you? How dare you speak to me that way? Yes, we were heading toward bankruptcy before we got married, but the success of this business came from my effort and my effort alone. If not for me, none of it would have survived. Did you do a single thing to stop it from going under?"

Her parents nodded right along with her.

"That is the truth," her father said, nodding like a lizard. "He has no right to judge what you did. You saved the company and this poor man contributed nothing. Instead, he sat back and ate from your money."

Ethan smiled. "Is that right?"

Tina’s mother's patience snapped. "You are useless, and I will not apologise for saying so. Are you in your right mind? What exactly did you do for the growth of her business? You did nothing. If it were not for Tina, everything would have collapsed."

Tina started smiling. She felt good hearing it, proud of what her family had built. The guilt she had been carrying earlier had gone completely.

Her father pressed on. "Without Tina, how do you think that company would have grown at the pace it did? It succeeded because of her and no one else."

Ethan looked at her father from head to toe. He hissed. Then, he looked at her mother and gave a short, dry laugh. Then the laugh grew, loud and long, filling the room.

After a while,he straightened up, adjusted his polo, and put on his glasses.

"Let's see," he said, still smiling, and walked out of the house.