He stared down at the aftermath as though the person who had just fallen wasn't a human being.
As though it wasn't his own father.
The footage left little room for interpretation.
Sergei had known all along. He had been in cahoots with Calin.
The courtroom erupted with gasps, and shouts of utter disbelief and horror.
Calin, who had spent the entire hearing pretending to be suffering from trauma and mentally unstable, suddenly snapped.
Her face twisted as she turned hysterical, lunging toward the screen from her wheelchair, screaming.
"It isn't real! Turn it off! You're all framing me! No! Impossible!"
Security rushed toward her.
Madam Ricci also shrieked, shaking her head violently.
She refused to believe it.
How could her own children do something so vicious and inhuman to their own father?
The entire courtroom descended into chaos as the judge repeatedly slammed the gavel.
"Order! Order in the court!"
Calin, who had been confident only minutes ago that she would receive a light verdict, felt her entire world come crashing down.
She knew this footage was enough to destroy any possibility of using her mental and emotional state as an excuse for her actions.
Even her own legal team was caught off guard. They had never expected Shin's side to have this final card, and for several seconds, they could only stare at the screen in utter disbelief, completely at a loss.
"Oh my God, is this for real?" Someone muttered. "How could these siblings be so cruel to their own father? Even if Master Ricci wasn't exactly a good husband, that doesn't change the fact that he raised his children in wealth."
That remark was more than enough to ignite the audience's righteous indignation.
"From the very beginning, I was never convinced she was being manipulated! Just look at all the cases piled up against her! From bullying to attempted murder, do you really believe all of that was done against her will? That's the confidence of someone who thinks she's above the law!"
"Madam Ricci, how the hell did you raise your children?" someone shouted. "Are you also their accomplice? Your husband cheated on you many times, so you must have known what was going on!"
"Calin, you beast! Don't you feel any remorse for hurting so many people? You have millions of fans who looked up to you! It's horrifying to think what kind of influence you had over them!"
"Sergei Ricci should also be investigated and jailed! How could we let a monster like him roam free?"
"If she can harm her own father, then that proves she definitely tried to kill Yeri Zhi!"
"Didn't she already have a murder case against her before this? How could you people let her settle that? All of this must have been rigged!"
More and more voices rose despite the security guards and the judge repeatedly shouting for everyone to remain calm.
Hearing the contempt and angry remarks being hurled at her, Calin completely lost control.
"What do you people know?!" she screamed, her shrill voice echoing throughout the courtroom. "Were you there when it happened?! You all just hate me and want to see me suffer because you're jealous of me!"
Her voice grew louder and more hysterical.
"You ugly bitches and pathetic poor losers who only find satisfaction in dragging other people down with you should be the ones ashamed! You come here to waste your time instead of living your own lives because you have nothing!"
"Miss Ricci, stop talking!" her lawyer urgently warned.
But Calin also turned ballistic on him.
"You're useless! You've already betrayed me! Don't think I don't know what you're doing! You've defected to Shin Keir's side! You've been working against me this entire time!"
"Miss Ricci, please calm down!"
"Shut up! You were supposed to defend me!" Calin jabbed a finger at him.
Unlike Calin, Sergei remained relatively calm, although two police officers were already standing on either side of him.
He stepped forward, facing the judge and attempting to defend himself.
"Your Honor, this isn't real! The Ricci villa stopped using surveillance inside long before it was seized by the bank. Besides, my father's personal physician is also his friend. He would have noticed immediately if there had been anything wrong with him apart from his stroke!"
Unfortunately for him, hardly anyone was listening anymore.
The jury's attention had shifted toward the chaos unfolding inside the courtroom.
Several people who had been provoked by Calin's outburst were now attempting to push past security, apparently wanting to get close enough to teach her a lesson.
Security struggled to hold the crowd back.
Calin, meanwhile, was being restrained by several security officers.
Despite her supposedly fragile condition, she was surprisingly agile and strong.
She kicked, twisted, and struggled against them while continuing to hurl curses at anyone within earshot.
"Wasn't she supposedly traumatized all this time and said to be on heavy medication?" one person finally pointed out. "It doesn't seem to be the case judging by how strongly she reacted once that surveillance footage was played."
"Yeah, I've attended all her court hearings," another person said. "It was confirmed that she suffered from PTSD and wasn't in a good mental state. Was that fabricated too?"
The murmurs spread through the courtroom.
The very defense Calin's lawyers had spent so much effort constructing was beginning to collapse right before everyone's eyes.
Amidst all of this, Shin remained seated.
He watched the entire situation with an almost detached expression, as though he had been forced to sit through an unusually noisy movie.
Yeri, sitting beside him, glanced at him. "How'd you get that footage, hmm?"
Shin's gaze shifted toward Sergei in the distance.
For once, Sergei had gotten one thing right.
The surveillance system inside the Ricci villa should have stopped functioning by the time the incident occurred.
But that was a matter already beyond human logic and reason.
As the demon emperor, Shin could travel through different points in time. Going back to that specific moment and recording what had transpired was almost laughably easy for him.
"Shouldn't you already know?"
The meaning behind his words was obvious. For someone who had once been Jewel, this shouldn't have required an explanation.
Yeri narrowed her eyes at him but said nothing.
Then, amidst the screaming and shouting, Calin's gaze suddenly landed on them.
Sitting together, calmly talking as though none of this had anything to do with them.
The sight couldn't be more infuriating.
"Yeri Zhi!" Calin's face twisted with rage.
With all her strength, Calin kicked the security guard in front of her.
Before the others could react, she actually broke free and lunged toward Yeri, her hands stretched forward, fingers curled like claws.
But Shin moved faster.
He immediately stood and stepped between them, catching both of Calin's wrists.
For the first time, she seemed to realize exactly who stood between her and the person she had been trying to destroy all along.
Calin suddenly laughed wildly, almost hysterically, as she stared at Shin with palpable hatred.
Hatred because she couldn't have him.
Hatred because of his ruthless and merciless way of destroying her.
And hatred because he wasn't even the slightest bit sorry for her current predicament.
Then her gaze shifted toward Yeri, who happened to peek out from behind Shin.
"It's all your fault! It's you who ruined my life! Are you satisfied now? You're enjoying this, aren't you? You took everything from me! Everything that belongs to me!"
Yeri almost nodded when Calin asked if she was enjoying it.
After all, she wasn't exactly a saint, and after regaining part of Jewel's memories, the malice buried within those memories had inevitably taken root in her.
"If you hadn't been so scheming and climbed your way to Shin Keir, we would've been married by now!" Calin continued. "You're the one who's greedy and vicious! A nobody like you who couldn't even get pregnant! Who gave you the right to replace me?!"
The audience immediately erupted into whispers.
Several people exchanged confused looks.
Some were shocked by the accusation, while others simply assumed Calin was talking nonsense in the middle of her breakdown.
"You took advantage of that fragile body of yours to make everyone around you pity you! Don't think I don't know what you're like at school!"
Yeri "..."
This proved Calin had been investigating her for a long time. She seemed to know about her life at school to have simply made those accusations up.
"You joined SJ Entertainment just to provoke me!" Calin continued. "You wanted to see me lose everything while you stole it from me! You intentionally hid your programming skills just to embarrass me! And anyone would have been eager to announce their relationship with Shin Keir immediately, but you intentionally hid it for so long while watching me assume I was the one engaged to him!"
Calin pointed at Yeri with trembling fury. "Yeri Zhi, you're the most vicious, black-hearted woman here!"
"Enough."
Shin's voice cut through the chaos, his expression cold. "What are you all doing, letting a criminal go crazy in the courtroom?"
Only then did additional security rush over.
They grabbed Calin and forcibly dragged her toward the side door as she continued struggling and shouting.
"Let me go! Yeri Zhi, you will burn in hell! I curse you to die a horrible death!"
Yeri "..."
The irony of those words.
Although, as a demon, hellfire wasn't exactly as frightening as humans perceived it to be. And the word curse? Well, she had been born one once.
"Don't you think dying horribly is an understatement?" she muttered.
Shin gave her a scalding look.
Calin's lawyer hurried after her, while Sergei and the rest of their legal team followed, leaving the courtroom in complete disarray.
Because of the newly presented footage and the chaos that had followed, the jury had no choice but to call another recess.
They needed time to verify that the evidence was genuine, confirm that it had not been tampered with, and conduct another deliberation before proceeding with the verdict.
Once the courtroom had settled somewhat, Yeri turned toward Shin.
"I can't believe she actually convinced herself that all of this was really some scheme I came up with. Do you think she went insane again?"
Shin considered it for a moment before simply answering, "Probably."
People like Calin, despite their entitlement and arrogance, are often cowards beneath it all.
They may appear confident when they have protection, status, wealth, and everything going according to their expectations but once everything begins collapsing, they often discover that their mental fortitude isn't nearly as strong as they thought.