Chapter 202: A Dual Ending
Two weeks later, the court convened.
In Nolan's arson case, given the irrefutable evidence and the extremely negative social impact, the judge announced the verdict on the spot.
"The defendant, Nolan, is guilty of arson, disturbing the peace, and defamation. For these combined offenses, he is sentenced to five years in prison, effective immediately."
The moment the gavel fell, Nolan completely fell apart.
Five years.
The best years of his life would be spent behind bars.
Unable to accept this reality, he struggled and screamed from the defendant's seat.
"I'm innocent! Anastasia set me up!"
"Let me go! What gives you the right to judge me!"
The bailiffs stepped forward and forcibly dragged him away.
His shrill screams echoed through the solemn courtroom, sounding both pathetic and ridiculous.
Not a single member of the Stafford family sat in the gallery.
Yvette had completely disappeared after the scandal.
Keith, unable to handle the blow, had suffered a stroke and was admitted to an ordinary public hospital.
Patrick had also vanished without a trace.
Just like that, a family fell apart.
And Renee's fate had long been sealed.
After experiencing bankruptcy, being abandoned by Bradley, and becoming the target of online hatred, her mental defenses completely crumbled.
She no longer screamed or lashed out at others.
Instead, she spent her days clutching a pillow, sitting by the window and murmuring to the air.
"Caspian, do you think I look good in this dress?"
"Mom, I miss your steak."
"Anastasia, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to steal your design..."
The doctor's diagnosis was schizophrenia with severe delusions.
Her world was permanently frozen in that illusory dream from before the Stafford family's downfall.
Due to her violent tendencies and to prevent her from escaping and hurting others again, the sanatorium ultimately decided to permanently admit her to the intensive care unit for mandatory treatment.
High walls, electric fences, iron doors locked tight.
She would never step through those doors again for the rest of her life.
Yvette's life was left with nothing but darkness.
Her husband had suffered a stroke, her son was in prison, her daughter had lost her mind.
Everything she had treasured had turned to smoke.
To repay the massive debts and cover Keith's medical expenses, she had no choice but to swallow all her pride and dignity—washing dishes at restaurants, sweeping streets, doing the most backbreaking janitorial work.
Exhausted to the point where she could barely straighten her back each day, yet earning only meager wages.
The neighbors and card-playing friends who once fawned over her now avoided her like the plague when they saw her.
She had fallen from a pampered wealthy wife to the lowest rung of society.
Day after day of grueling labor and contemptuous looks from others wore down all her edges and spirit.
She could no longer stir up any trouble, only struggle to survive in life's mire.
……
When Anastasia saw all this on the news, her heart didn't ripple with even the slightest emotion.
It wasn't that she no longer hated them—she simply didn't care anymore.
To her, the Staffords were nothing more than irrelevant strangers, mere symbols.
Her future would have no intersection with theirs whatsoever.
She turned off the news and carried a bowl of freshly made chicken soup to Richard.
"Try it. I spent all afternoon making this."
Richard looked at her, his eyes brimming with tenderness.
Instead of taking the bowl, he grasped her hand.
"Feed me."
His tone carried that familiar, demanding authority.
Anastasia's cheeks warmed slightly, but she didn't refuse.
She picked up the spoon, scooped up some soup, blew on it gently, then brought it to his lips.
Meanwhile.
Yvette grew increasingly resentful.
Even though life had ground her into the dirt, the hatred she harbored toward Anastasia only grew more wildly.
Why should her family be destroyed and she end up on the streets, while that little bitch Anastasia got fame and fortune and ended up with someone like Richard?
She refused to accept it!
Even if she died, she'd drag Anastasia down with her.
She used the few thousand dollars she'd scraped together to hire a batch of cheap online trolls.
She had those trolls mass-post smear campaigns against Anastasia across major forums and social media platforms.
The content was the same old playbook.
Nothing but sob stories about how ungrateful Anastasia was, how she climbed the social ladder and abandoned her adoptive parents, how she heartlessly drove her family to ruin.
To add credibility, Yvette even attached photos of herself now—sweeping streets, picking through trash.
However, she'd vastly overestimated her petty schemes.
Those slanderous posts disappeared without a trace less than ten minutes after being published.
Richard's PR team immediately scrubbed all negative commentary and tracked down the IP addresses of those trolls.
Shortly after, Richard's legal team sent a cease-and-desist letter along with a complete financial transaction record directly to the troll farm company's executive.
That record clearly documented how Yvette had tormented Anastasia.
The troll farm's owner broke into a cold sweat after reading it.
Without hesitation, he chose to flip sides—not only immediately refunding Yvette's few thousand dollars but also voluntarily exposing all the chat logs and transaction screenshots showing Yvette hiring them to smear Anastasia.
The hashtag #FormerSocialiteHiresTrollsToSmearAdoptedDaughterBackfires shot up the trending list.
Netizens found Yvette's thief-crying-thief act utterly laughable.
[She's still at it even now? Has the old woman lost her mind?]
[She went bankrupt but still hired trolls to trash her adopted daughter? What kind of bizarre logic is that?]
[Mr. Roosevelt's team is seriously impressive. Well done!]
[Poor Anastasia, how unlucky to end up with that family.]
Public opinion completely turned against her.
Yvette's final attempt at revenge didn't harm Anastasia in the slightest—instead, she became the internet's laughingstock.
Just as the entire internet was buzzing about this, Anastasia's studio account posted a lengthy statement.
She didn't accuse or curse.
Instead, she simply recounted, in plain language, her experiences from being adopted to her final break with the Stafford family.
She wrote about her fear the first time she was taken to the hospital to have blood drawn.
She wrote about eating nothing but bread for a week to save money for Renee's medication.
She wrote about the helplessness and despair she felt when her design was stolen.
At the end of the post, she wrote: [My grievances with the Stafford family began with that blood-draw needle and will end with the court's verdict. From now on, we part ways and wish each other well. Thank you to everyone who has cared about me, and especially to the person who brought light into my darkest moments. I will walk my path forward with care.]
This lengthy post sparked a massive reaction online.
Countless netizens read it with tears in their eyes.
Compared to Yvette's hysterical ranting, Anastasia's calm, restrained narrative possessed a power that pierced straight through people's hearts.