Tokyo: Are you even a proper lawyer?

Kentaro Arimura's expression darkened slightly.

Masashi Akiyama's composed yet assertive, even subtly confrontational, attitude was clearly not the kind of reaction he expected from a junior lawyer.

He was used to others' obedience and flattery, and Akiyama Masashi's calmness and persistence seemed almost offensive to him.

"The right path?" Kentaro Arimura's tone turned cold. "The right path that Attorney Akiyama refers to is to have her follow you, to expose her to the dark side of society, to deal with murderers, mental patients, and all sorts of troublesome people? To put her in danger and trouble? Is this how you take responsibility for her?"

His voice wasn't loud, but it was extremely imposing, and the air in the living room seemed to freeze.

Mrs. Arimura looked at her husband with concern, then at her daughter, hesitating to speak.

The butler and servants had already quietly retreated to a distance.

Rio Arimura's breathing quickened as she looked at her father's aggressive face, then at Masashi Akiyama, who remained sitting upright with an unwavering expression.

She was filled with self-blame and anger.

She felt guilty for dragging Attorney Akiyama into this embarrassing trap, angry at her father's complete disrespect for her choices and efforts, and even angrier at his contemptuous attitude towards Attorney Akiyama and the work she cherished.

She had originally thought that this invitation was a turning point, that her father was finally willing to try to understand her world.

But now it seems that this was nothing more than a carefully orchestrated attempt to force people to withdraw.

The father wanted to use his authority to crush her unrealistic dreams and, incidentally, give a warning to those she followed.

Masashi Akiyama felt Rio Arimura's gaze and Kentaro Arimura's aura of trying to intimidate him.

The politeness he was maintaining, which he was only barely keeping because the other party was the parent of the person he was entrusting the matter to, was quickly dissipating, replaced by a faint sense of impatience.

He didn't come here to be subjected to this kind of condescending scrutiny and questioning.

“Mr. Arimura,” Masashi Akiyama began, “I have an employment relationship with Attorney Arimura. We have a clear scope of responsibilities and a work agreement. The work she is involved in is all within the framework of the law, and I have provided her with safety guarantees and necessary guidance to the best of my ability. As for the dangers and controversies you mentioned…”

"Every profession has its risks. The key is how to manage and deal with them. If you think this job is not suitable for your daughter, as her father, you naturally have the right to offer suggestions, but the final choice rests with Attorney Arimura himself."

"The choice?" Kentaro Arimura shook his head as if he had heard a joke, his face showing a mixture of disappointment and unquestionable disapproval.

"Liyang is still young and naive, easily misled by unrealistic ideals. As her father, I have a responsibility to guide her towards a more stable and brighter future. What can she learn in that small firm, working under a lawyer who only handles difficult cases? What future can she have? It's just a waste of time and increases the risk!"

He stopped looking at Masashi Akiyama and turned to Rio Arimura.

"Rio, you heard it too. Attorney Akiyama also acknowledged the risks of work, and there should be limits to playing around. Next month, you'll come back to the company and start as an assistant in the president's office to familiarize yourself with the business. As for the young master from the Nakamura family that I introduced to you before, I've arranged to play golf with him next weekend. Get ready."

"Father!" Rio Arimura suddenly raised her head, her face pale and her voice trembling with excitement.

"I'm not going to the company! I don't want to see Nakamura! I'm doing very well working for Attorney Akiyama! I love my job! I want to be a lawyer! A real lawyer!"

"Nonsense!" Kentaro Arimura finally lost his patience, and his voice suddenly became stern.

"Look at yourself! Talking back to your father, doing this low-class job, and hanging out with shady characters! Lawyer? Do you think being a lawyer is some glamorous profession? You're nothing but a bunch of quacks who make a living by manipulating words and exploiting legal loopholes! We..."

"Mr. Arimura,"

Masashi Akiyama interrupted Kentaro Arimura before he was about to utter something even more offensive.

"Please watch your words. The term 'litigious scoundrel' is an insult to the legal profession. I understand your concern for your daughter, but expressing it by belittling her profession and making personal attacks is unwise."

He stood up and straightened his suit cuffs.

"The invitation tonight was meant to express our gratitude. But it seems we have fundamental differences in our understanding of gratitude and our expectations for the future. Continuing will only cause more unpleasantness."

He turned to Rio Arimura and saw that her eyes were filled with tears, her lower lip was tightly clenched, and her body was trembling slightly with anger and humiliation.

He softened his tone: "Attorney Arimura, I apologize for disturbing you tonight, and thank you for your hospitality."

After speaking, he bowed slightly, preparing to leave.

He has done his duty and made his position clear; there is no need for him to stay here and endure unwarranted accusations and contempt.

However, just as he turned around—

"etc!"

Rio Arimura's voice rang out.

She suddenly stood up from the sofa, a movement so sudden that it startled her mother who was standing next to her.

"Father!"

She said, "You have no right to talk about Attorney Akiyama like that! Nor do you have the right to arrange my life like that!"

"Rio! Sit down!"

Kentaro Arimura shouted sternly, for he had never been so openly contradicted by his daughter.

"I won't sit!" Rio Arimura met her father's furious gaze, and tears finally streamed down her face.

"You say I'm frivolous, that I'm immature, that I'm blinded by idealism! Yes! I may be immature, naive! But I know what's right and what's wrong! I know that the cases Attorney Qiushan takes aren't about exploiting loopholes or using empty words! He's helping those who have nowhere else to turn, fighting against those who bully others! What he taught me wasn't crooked methods, but rigor, logic, perseverance, and the courage to speak up for the weak! These may seem insignificant to you, but to me, they are a thousand times, ten thousand times more meaningful than being a puppet bird in a gilded cage, with everything arranged for me, only knowing how to drink tea and arrange flowers!"

She finished speaking in one breath, her chest heaving violently, tears streaming down her face, but her eyes shone with an astonishing light, as if something had been ignited within them.

"You...you've gone too far!" Kentaro Arimura's fingers trembled with anger.

"I think you've been completely corrupted by this person! You're spouting nonsense! Look at yourself now, you don't resemble a village girl at all!"

"What should a daughter from a village family be like?"

Rio Arimura gave a bitter smile. "Obedience, obedience, docility, living forever according to your template, marrying a husband you choose who can bring you benefits, then bearing children, being a good wife and mother, living your whole life under the title of Mrs. Arimura, until old age, until death? Father, that's the life you want, not mine!"

"What do you know about life!" Kentaro Arimura slammed his fist on the table and stood up.

"I've eaten more salt than you've eaten rice! The path I've planned for you is the safest and brightest! You're young now, and you're blinded by those unrealistic things. Wait until you've hit a brick wall, then you'll realize your mistake!"

"Then let me crash into it!" Rio Arimura's voice choked with emotion. "Even if I get hurt, it's my own choice! At least it's the path I chose, not the path of a puppet being pushed and led around by others!"

"You..." Kentaro Arimura was furious, but he calmed down instead.

He sat back down on the sofa, looking at his daughter with an almost cold expression, and said slowly.

"Liyang, you're tired. You were too emotional and said a lot of irrational things. I don't blame you."

He turned to Mrs. Arimura, who was standing to the side, completely at a loss and silently weeping, and said, "Masako, take Rio upstairs to rest. She needs to calm down."

Then, he looked at Masashi Akiyama, his tone returning to its condescending and aloof manner, even carrying a hint of expulsion.

"Attorney Akiyama, it seems that tonight is not a good time to continue our conversation. Rio is young and impulsive, and she said some inappropriate things. I apologize for that. She is not suitable to attend the following events. Sato, please see Attorney Akiyama out."

This was an attempt to forcibly separate her from Masashi Akiyama, to use parental authority to forcefully end this rebellion, and to continue to act as the master and dismiss this outsider who had corrupted his daughter.

A huge, suffocating sense of despair and anger instantly gripped Rio Arimura.

It's happening again!

Every time she tried to express herself, her father would dismiss her with "You're tired," "You're being irrational," or "You need to calm down," suppressing her with commands and arrangements, isolating her from adult settings, as if she were forever a child without judgment who needed protection and control!

And this time, he will use this method to drive away the lawyer Qiushan, whom she respects and trusts, in front of her, as if he were an insignificant salesman!

Looking at his father's unquestionable expression, at his mother's hesitant yet ultimately silent demeanor, and at the butler Sato's respectful approach to Akiyama Masashi...

Rio Arimura felt the string of obedience taut to its limit in her chest.

Then! With a "snap," it broke!

Just as Masashi Akiyama was about to give a final, polite nod and leave this unpleasant mansion...

Rio Arimura suddenly moved.

Like a small beast driven to the brink of despair, she finally decided to leap forward and charged towards Masashi Akiyama.

Before anyone, including Masashi Akiyama himself, could react.

She suddenly reached out her right hand and grabbed Akiyama Masashi's left hand, which was hanging by his side.

Masashi Akiyama stiffened almost imperceptibly. He looked down at his hand being held, then at Rio Arimura.

The girl's face was flushed red, her tears still wet, but her eyes burned with a kind of determination he had never seen before.

"Leo!" Kentaro Arimura stood up suddenly.

"Attorney Akiyama, let's go!"

Rio Arimura didn't look at her father or her mother; she simply looked up at Masashi Akiyama and used all her strength to utter those words.

Then, without waiting for Masashi Akiyama's response, or rather, she didn't dare to wait for his response at all.

She was afraid that if she hesitated, the courage she had mustered to disagree would vanish.

She grabbed his hand, turned around, and ran towards the entrance with all her might!

"Stop! Rio! You stop right there!" Kentaro Arimura roared from behind.

"Miss! Miss, please wait!"

Rio Arimura ignored everyone. She gripped Masashi Akiyama's hand tightly, pulled him through the spacious yet suffocating living room, ran across the gleaming yet cold marble entryway, and abruptly flung open the heavy solid wood door.

The crisp, fresh air of the winter night rushed in instantly, filling her lungs.

She stepped out of her house and onto the gravel driveway in front of it.

Akiyama Masashi was pulled along by her and followed her out. His steps were a little passive at first, but he quickly adjusted his pace to match her speed. The two of them ran together along the driveway toward the black wrought iron gate that was already wide open.

Behind Rio Arimura, there were her father's increasingly distant roars, her mother's tearful calls, and the anxious shouts of the butler and servants chasing after her.

"Rio! Come back!"

"Miss! Danger!"

"Stop them!"

But to Rio Arimura's ears at this moment, these sounds sounded like vague echoes from another distant world.

Her heart was pounding wildly in her chest, as if it were about to burst out of her ribs, and her blood was throbbing in her ears.

But a strange, unprecedented sense of ease and joy welled up from the deepest part of my heart as I ran, as the night breeze blew, and as the warmth of Masashi Akiyama's fingers wafted through my palm, washing away all fear, repression, and unease.

Rio Arimura, holding Masashi Akiyama's hand, ran out of the black gate that symbolized restraint and discipline, and onto the quiet street.

She never looked back.