"James Harrison, you scumbag!"

"Drunk every damn day—your daughter’s gone, she’s only three!"

Someone shoved him hard. James opened his eyes, dazed, skull pounding like it might split.

The stench of low-grade liquor and mildew hit him like a punch, nearly making him gag.

He yanked off the booze-soaked quilt and sat up, confused.

He looked down at himself. A ripped white tank top, army green pants that had faded with age—he looked right out of the late '80s.

The room was no better. A run-down mud-brick place, a wobbly wooden table with chipped enamel cups on top. "Work is honorable," the old red slogan on one of them read.

A woman stood by the bed, glaring at him. Pretty face, full figure, dressed in a checkered shirt straight from decades ago—yet her sharp eyes and fine features still made her stand out.

Just behind her, a teenage girl around seventeen stood quietly. Simple clothes, lovely face. Sightless eyes—she was blind.

Something about all this felt terribly familiar.

Then it flooded back, like a wave crashing down.

James grabbed his head and groaned, overwhelmed."James, you lost Nannan! Go find her, now! Bring her back!"

Sophia’s voice was shrill, her eyes were swollen red. She hit him with her fists, her whole body shaking with rage.

James just crouched there, arms around his head, not saying a word. But inside, he was a mess of emotion.

This scene—he knew it too well. It was the moment when everything in his life fell apart.

It was the summer of 1989, thirty years ago. He had gambled everything away, came home drunk out of his mind, barely able to stand.

His little daughter, just three at the time, had wandered outside to play by herself. That was when the traffickers took her. After that, she was gone without a trace.

Sophia couldn't handle it. She divorced him, lost her mind, and never got better.

Five years later, on a stormy night, she drowned herself in the river.

Even at the cremation, her eyes wouldn’t close.

Her blind younger sister, Diana, had stuck it out all those years, hustling for money and trying to afford treatment for Sophia. She ended up in the sex trade just to get by.

After Sophia died, Diana came looking for James, yelled at him like never before… then jumped off the tallest building in the city.

Everyone called James a curse. Said he brought death to every woman around him.

Time showed no mercy. When he finally saw his daughter again, it had been thirty years.

She was already a mom with three kids by then, rescued by the police during an anti-trafficking sweep.His daughter, barely in her thirties, looked like an old woman in her fifties—hair white as snow, hunched over, frail like she’d lived a lifetime of pain.

She’d been trafficked deep into the mountains, forced to live as someone’s child bride.

That family, terrified she’d run, had broken one of her legs to keep her from escaping.

“I was scum, nothing but scum!”

James Harrison pounded his fists against his own head.

He could’ve had a normal, happy life. But he ruined it all with booze and gambling.

Lucky for him, God gave him one more shot—to make things right.

“You lost our daughter—how could you even call yourself a father?”

Sophia Bennett sobbed, hitting his chest as she cried.

James’s face darkened. He didn’t answer. He just got up from the bed, walked over to the door, and grabbed the shovel leaning behind it.

“Hah, what now? You lose our kid, and now you’re drunk outta your mind, gonna come at me with a shovel?”

Sophia glared at him, wiping her tears away, her laugh hollow and bitter.

Diana Bennett, blind and helpless, stood behind her sister, anxious and stuck.

James’s chest ached. The truth was, back then he really was a good-for-nothing—lazy, drinking all day, gambling, even hitting his wife while sponging off her.

“Well, go ahead then. Swing that thing at my neck. Our daughter's gone—might as well finish me off.”Sophia Bennett was overwhelmed with anger and sorrow. She walked stiffly up to her husband, lifted her chin, and glared at him with burning eyes.

James Harrison clenched his jaws. No time to explain. He took a big step forward, wrapped her tightly in his arms, leaned in close, and whispered by her ear, “Sophia, I owed you so much in the last life. This time, I’ll make it right—double.”

Then, without waiting for a reaction, he picked up the shovel and stormed out of the house like a man on a mission.

Left standing there, Sophia was completely baffled by what had just happened. Her heart was tangled in frustration and worry. She had no clue what crazy idea he’d gotten into his head now.

But James wasn’t the same man as before. He had lived a whole lifetime once already—he knew the truth about their daughter’s abduction.

He had learned the whole story when she was finally rescued. But by that time, everything had already fallen apart. His wife, dead. His daughter, emotionally broken beyond repair. Nothing could change that.

“Albert Black.”

His grip tightened on the shovel. The name came out low, squeezed through gritted teeth.

Albert Black was the local lowlife. James’s spiral into gambling? This bastard played a big part in that.

In his last life, James's existence was a total mess, while Albert got rich, moved to the city, bought a place, and even opened an antique shop. Guy was living the good life.

That is, until thirty years later—when the truth finally came out.

The kidnapping case wasn’t even that complicated in the end.That summer, Albert Black teamed up with a few tomb raiders from out of province and dug up a Warring States-era grave near the village. He didn't do the digging himself—he just kept watch while the others worked.

Among the looted items were a few pieces considered national treasures. The city freaked out, setting up a special task force to crack the case. But those guys were smart and had Albert, a local, feeding them intel. They managed to stay under the radar for quite a while.

If it weren’t for the kidnapping case that happened later and led the police onto their trail, that tomb robbery might still be unsolved.

James Harrison’s little girl got caught up in all this for no reason. While those thieves were splitting up their loot, the kid happened to see them. She was only three—too young to understand anything—but the grave robbers weren't taking any chances. Afraid she'd say something, they just snatched her.

The out-of-towners only stayed in the city for a day before getting the hell out that same night. By the time James filed the report, his daughter was already taken out of the province. There was no way to track her down after that.

“Bang!”

James kicked Albert Black’s door open with all his strength.

Inside, Albert was shirtless, happily knocking back some cheap booze with a plate of peanuts in front of him. Even though he'd taken a small cut from the loot, it had still made him a decent pile.James Harrison burst through the door like a storm, stopping Albert Black in his tracks.

In his mind, James had never been anything more than a useless drunk who lived off his wife and beat her when he was in a bad mood.

"James, you off your meds or what?" Albert sneered at him, clearly not feeling threatened.

Without a word, James lifted the shovel in his hands and swung it hard at Albert’s head.

This scumbag had destroyed his life once—he wasn’t about to let that happen again. He was back, and this time, he was settling the score.

"Ah!" A soft gasp sounded behind them.

Sophia Bennett had followed her husband, uneasy about what he might do, and walked right into the scene of him slamming the shovel down with no mercy.

"James, have you lost your mind?!"

Blood gushed from Albert’s scalp as he slumped to the floor, dazed and bleeding.

"Where is she?" James said through gritted teeth, raising the shovel again without a flicker of emotion.

"What are you talking about? You really have gone crazy!" Panic and anger flashed across Albert’s face—the James standing in front of him wasn’t the loser he used to mock.

"Where. Is. She?"

James’s eyes were wild and red, the shovel coming down over and over. Every strike was payback for the pain he’d buried deep inside for thirty years."Stop hitting him, James! Are you trying to kill someone?"

Sophia ran over, panic in her voice, clutching onto her husband's arm.

"He’s gone mad! Sophia, your man’s lost it!"

Albert Black was scared out of his mind, nearly wet himself.

"Albert, where are those tomb raiders hiding? Spill it, or I’ll break every one of your limbs."

James’s tone was calm, but the words he said cut like a knife.

In his past life, everything fell apart—his family gone, he spiraled, opened an illegal casino, and ended up behind bars for five years.

After getting out, he turned things around, started a small clothing factory. Later on, he even saw his daughter again.

But by then, nothing was the same. The people he lost were never coming back.

Now, brought back thirty years, he might look like a guy in his early twenties, but the sharp mind and resolve that came with a lifetime of pain? Albert, a petty crook, couldn’t begin to understand that.