Category: English

While reconciling the year-end accounts, I noticed something wrong with the company ledgers. After working overtime to fix it, I found an extra penny in the account. I stayed up for another three nights redoing the books, only to discover that the new secretary was transferring a penny into the company account every single day. When I confronted her, she said, “I just saw you staying up late every day crunching numbers, and the money wasn’t adding up. I wanted to help.” The boss defended her, saying, “Harper is just trying to be nice. Stop being so aggressive.” Under the collective condemnation, I became the villain who bullied my coworkers. I was fired from the company and smeared online during Harper’s livestreams. Tortured by the backlash, I spiraled into depression and took my own life. When I opened my eyes again, I was back to the moment the accounts didn’t add up. 1 Staring at the extra penny on the spreadsheet, I furiously smashed my mouse, turned around, and yelled at the rest of the office. “Who the hell is sending a penny to the company account every single day? “With inflation this high, wouldn’t you rather save that penny to buy your own coffin?” My coworkers stared at me, jaws dropping. I suppose that’s the collective silencing effect you get when the usually quiet person suddenly explodes. After a moment, my coworker Kyle Morgan burst out laughing. “Whoa, Chloe, did you eat gunpowder for breakfast? “Did you get rejected on another blind date? You can’t just take it out on us!” Kyle, who had been here for three years, fancied himself a comedian and loved making fun of my failed dates. I kept a straight face and demanded strictly: “Kyle, did you transfer this cent into the account? “It might just be a penny, but it throws off the accuracy of our financial data. The books won’t balance, the company’s audit will be screwed, and none of us will have an easy holiday season!” I admit I was exaggerating a little. But hearing that he might be held responsible, Kyle instantly dropped his goofy smirk. “Chloe, it wasn’t me, I swear.” I ignored him and swept my gaze over everyone else. “Whoever did this knows exactly who they are. Don’t force me to audit the data line by line. “I’ll give you three seconds to step up and admit your mistake. Otherwise, whatever massive fallout this causes, you’ll be the sinner of the whole company!” Just as I started counting down, the company’s new secretary, Harper Evans, burst through the door in a panic. “Chloe, I-I’m so sorry, I sent the money.” As she apologized, she didn’t forget to pass out the Starbucks coffees she was carrying to everyone. “I know we all get sick of the free coffee in the pantry, so this is on me. Please, don’t be shy!” There’s a saying: you can’t bite the hand that feeds you. After receiving Harper’s coffee, everyone’s faces softened into smiles. “How much was this? I’ll Venmo you.” “You’re too sweet. You buy us coffee every other day, I feel bad taking it!” “Harper, your family must be loaded! An intern’s salary is barely enough to cover all these treats!” Harper smiled and waved her hands. “It’s no fun drinking alone. It’s only happy if we all drink together! “And don’t worry about my wallet, it can handle it.” In less than a month since joining, Harper had maneuvered her way into everyone’s good graces with these petty favors. Holding his coffee, Kyle made a passive-aggressive jab. “Harper, if only everyone were as easy to get along with as you. Some people have been here for five years and still haven’t integrated into the team.” Harper blinked, asking with spectacular tone-deafness, “Who? Is it someone I know?” The people around them covered their mouths, snickering. This exact scene had played out countless times in my previous life. 2 On Harper’s first day, Kyle was the one tasked with showing her around. Surprisingly, they found a lot of common ground. For example, they shared a shocking synergy when it came to making fun of me. When I was working late on the year-end books and found the discrepancies, I pulled three all-nighters to recalculate the accounts. I worked until my hair was practically falling out, only to discover that Harper had been transferring a single penny into the account every day. Faced with my confrontation, she cried and said, “I just saw you staying up late every day crunching numbers, and the money wasn’t adding up. I wanted to help.” All my coworkers took her side. “Newbies are bound to make mistakes. Harper is already trying so hard.” Even the boss chimed in: “Harper was just being kind. Don’t be so aggressive.” Under their relentless accusations, I was branded a workplace bully and subsequently kicked to the curb. No severance package. The boss even withheld my last month’s paycheck. Then, Harper started livestreaming online, smearing my name, while my boss and former coworkers jumped in to testify against me. I was officially labeled a toxic workplace abuser. Right at that time, my mother back in our rural hometown fell seriously ill and desperately needed money for treatment. I was being doxxed online, and the hundreds of resumes I sent out vanished into the void. Because we didn’t have the money, my mom missed the optimal treatment window. Shortly after, my dad passed away with her. Tortured by depression, I committed suicide. When I opened my eyes and saw the extra penny tacked onto the long string of numbers in the ledger, I just exploded. You either erupt in the silence or perish in it. So in this life, I chose to erupt, and then obliterate the disgusting clique led by Harper and Kyle. 3 After passing out the coffees, Harper noticed she was one cup short. She pressed her hands together pleadingly and walked up to me. “I’m so sorry, Chloe. Here, you can have my cup.” I followed her gesture and pressed her firmly into my desk chair. “Alright. Whoever caused the accounting errors is going to be the one responsible for finding and fixing them.” Harper stared at the accounting software, totally bewildered, looking like she was about to cry. “Chloe, I majored in secretarial studies… I don’t know how to do this…” I cut her off. “That’s fine, you can learn. “Since you have the time to meticulously transfer a penny every single day, you must be extremely interested in the company’s financials.” With that, I stretched my arms and started packing up my personal belongings from the desk. Kyle frowned and challenged me. “Chloe Bennett, you’re just bullying the new girl. How can you hand off such an important task? What if something goes wrong?” He made it sound so noble. But I had long seen through his shit-stirring nature. The best way to deal with someone like him is to drag him down into the mud too. So, I pulled his chair over. “Kyle, aren’t you Harper’s mentor? Perfect, you two can study the ledgers together.” Harper’s eyes suddenly welled up with tears. “Chloe, I know you don’t like me. I’m just a new intern, I haven’t even passed probation, so I wouldn’t dare say anything if you bully me. But Kyle is a senior employee. He has so much on his plate already. How can you dump your work on him? “I can work overtime every day, but Kyle has a kid at home. He needs to go back to his wife and child. Could you please not drag the people around me into this? If you have a problem, just come at me!” Harper’s feigned resilience drew everyone’s sympathy—and their collective resentment toward me. “Chloe, you can’t just use your seniority to bully Kyle and Harper. Even I can’t stand watching this!” “Seriously. She just sits in the corner all day with a sour face. If you didn’t know better, you’d think the company owed her money. Such a buzzkill.” “We’re all busy. Even the newbies have a lot on their plate. Someone is just using this as an excuse to pawn off her workload. Real calculated.” Not too far away, the corner of Harper’s mouth twitched up into a faint smirk. If this were the past, I definitely wouldn’t have irresponsibly handed off my duties to someone else. But in my previous life, the moment people started criticizing me, the boss fired me under the pretext of workplace bullying. I will never forget that ugly, hypocritical face. At the end of the day, he just wanted to fire me without paying severance. A company like this wasn’t worth another ounce of my energy! “Alright. Since all of you want to speak up for them, you can do the work. “I’ve been working overtime for nineteen days straight trying to reconcile these accounts, practically on the verge of a heart attack. And the reason there are constant discrepancies is because she keeps wiring a penny every day. I’m no saint. I refuse to accept this kind of sheer stupidity that almost cost me my life. “Don’t just stand there making cheap comments. Whoever supports them, feel free to pitch in and audit the books!” I rolled up my sleeves, looking like I was ready to brawl. “What’s all this noise? Are you done working?” The boss, Mr. Thorne, walked over with a dark expression. Harper’s eyes sparkled with tears. “Mr. Thorne, it’s all my fault. Chloe gave me her work because she trusts my abilities. I shouldn’t have declined.” The other coworkers chimed in, instantly painting me as the villain who bullied the new girl. I waited patiently for them to finish before speaking. “Why are you all so focused on me handing off the work, but totally ignoring the fact that she maliciously wired money into the account every day and sabotaged my job? “The workplace isn’t her mother. Shouldn’t she take initiative to fix the problems she caused?” After Mr. Thorne figured out the situation, he started playing peacemaker. “Alright, alright. Chloe, I know you’ve been working hard lately. I’ll give you a half-day off sometime.” I had worked three unpaid weekends in a row, and Scrooge Thorne couldn’t even bear to give me a single full day off. Before I could respond, Harper quickly interjected. “Mr. Thorne, Chloe has been working so hard. Give her more time off! I’ll cover her overtime!” The boss beamed, praising her as the most outstanding employee he had ever seen. At the same time, he didn’t miss the chance to throw shade at the “poor attitudes” of certain veteran employees. Harper smiled and turned to the rest of the office. “You guys don’t have to come in this Saturday. It’s mostly just sending out client materials anyway. I’ll handle all of it.” Naturally, the others felt a little embarrassed to agree. But then she added, “I’ve been interning here for a month now. Just consider it a test. I want to prove my worth. “Please, give me a chance!” With a wave of his hand, the boss approved it. After he left, the coworkers swarmed Harper, praising her to the skies. Kyle even explicitly called her a kind-hearted angel. Harper pulled out a little notepad, meticulously writing down everything they needed help with. “Chloe, do you still need me to help check the accounts?” Harper made a lap before stopping in front of me to ask. Kyle scoffed sarcastically. “You’re going to help her? Don’t bother. If something goes wrong, she’ll just blame you.” I calmly countered, “So, you wouldn’t blame her, right?” Kyle looked at me like it was obvious. “She’s offering to help out of the goodness of her heart. Regardless of the outcome, that intention alone deserves gratitude.” His buddy Derek Fisher agreed, “Exactly. Not like some people, who won’t even lift a finger to help grab a package.” Harper looked overwhelmingly touched, swearing on the spot that she would handle all their tasks perfectly. I felt a bizarre urge to laugh, but held it in. A weirdo who had enough free time to wire a penny into the company account exactly on schedule every day—I wasn’t holding my breath for her competence. Let’s let these people truly experience Harper’s “kindness”! 4 During my rare weekend off, I bought a comprehensive full-body health checkup package online for my parents back home. They were reluctant to go. “Sweetheart, why are you wasting your money on this? Use that five hundred dollars to buy yourself something nice to eat. “Be safe living alone in the city, don’t skimp on food and drinks. If you’re short on cash, don’t be afraid to ask us.” Hearing my parents’ voices, my emotions completely broke. I covered my mouth, sobbing until I couldn’t catch my breath. My parents were farmers. They worked themselves to the bone year-round, barely earning enough to scrape by. But they were only ever stingy with themselves. In my past life, when my mom was diagnosed with terminal cancer, she refused to waste money on treatment. After she died, I found their entire life savings hidden under their bed back home. My aunt told me it was the dowry they had painstakingly saved up for me over their entire lives. Even the living expenses and medical bills I had wired them later on were in there, completely untouched. “Mom, Dad, I’m doing great in the city. You’re the ones pinching pennies all year. “You have to go to this checkup. It’s already paid for and non-refundable.” After catching up with my parents, I wired some money to my aunt. “Auntie, please take my parents to the city for their checkups this weekend. “Oh, and the checkup was sixteen thousand, not five hundred. Don’t let that slip, okay?” With my parents’ health checkups arranged, a huge weight lifted off my chest. After all, being reborn wasn’t just about revenge—the most important thing was my parents’ health. 5 Time off is always brief. Soon, the dreaded Monday arrived. But I knew there were people dreading it far more than me. The first was Derek, who was the first to arrive at his desk. The moment he opened his laptop, he froze. Harper had deleted all the draft copies of his design blueprints, leaving only the final version. Suppressed with rage, Derek asked her, “Harper, what the hell? I just asked you to send the final version. Why did you delete all the others?” Harper smiled. “Your desktop was way too cluttered, and you were running out of storage. What’s the point of keeping the old drafts? “Derek, I’m not trying to nag, but you really need to develop better organizational habits. Keep your desktop clean!” Derek had a meltdown. “But the client just emailed me! They want to choose between the first two initial drafts. “Wait, they should still be in the recycling bin.” Derek frantically opened his trash bin, and his expression instantly spiraled into sheer despair. Harper looked a bit sheepish. “Um, I emptied the recycling bin while I was at it.” Derek’s vision went black. He looked like he was about to pass out. Meanwhile, I strolled past him, holding my coffee, looking refreshed and radiant. “Derek, what’s wrong? Somebody help, Derek is dying!” Harper grabbed a massage gun off a desk and jammed it right into Derek’s philtrum. The next second, Derek resurrected on the spot. “Ahhh! That hurts like hell!” I sat quietly at my desk staring at spreadsheets, but I was practically bursting a lung trying not to laugh. “Harper, is there something wrong with your brain?!” While howling in pain, Derek tore into Harper. She pulled out a little handkerchief and apologized, sobbing pitifully. Derek just got angrier. “Cry, cry, cry, that’s all you know how to do! If apologizing worked, we wouldn’t need prisons for murderers, would we?” Excellent. It seemed our office finally had someone capable of rational thought. I twirled a pen in my fingers and continued enjoying the show. Shortly after, the others trickled into the office. Kyle walked in just in time to hear Derek cursing. He marched right up and punched Derek in the shoulder. “Why the hell are you yelling at her? Can’t you see Harper’s crying?” Derek started venting his misery. “I revised those drafts so many times they were unrecognizable, and now the client suddenly wants the very first version. I don’t even remember what the original looked like!” Kyle sighed. “I’m not trying to blame you, man, but you should back that stuff up. You left it on the desktop, Harper thought it was trash and cleaned it up for you. That makes sense, doesn’t it? “Forget it. She’s just a new girl fresh out of college, don’t hold it against her. I’ll help you redraw it later.” Soothed by his buddy, Derek’s anger gradually subsided. But this was only the beginning. That afternoon, Kyle was dragged into a meeting room by the department manager, who had just returned from vacation. The manager screamed at him for two solid hours. “What happened? What did Kyle do to get ripped a new one?” Everyone was eating up the drama. The unofficial group chat was flooded with hundreds of messages in minutes. And none of them realized that Harper, who had excused herself to the bathroom, had been missing for half an hour.

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My sister and I were bound to the Doomsday Supermarket System. I sourced the inventory, she ran the storefront, and together we saved countless human lives struggling to survive in the apocalypse. Later, my sister announced she was dating the warlords of the four major survivor factions. Because of this, she was willing to abandon our modern life and stay in the wasteland forever. And then, she conspired with them to trick me into returning to the apocalypse. She stood by and watched as her “husbands” strapped me to a table, cracked my skull open, and dissected me. When I asked her why in absolute despair, my sister just looked at me with innocent eyes. “Harper, my husbands said that if they can just extract the System from your brain, they can use its infinite modern supplies to unite the wasteland.” “This is the only chance to save this broken world. You wouldn’t refuse to make a tiny sacrifice for the greater good, right?” Just like that, I died on a cold operating table. But when I opened my eyes again, I was back on the exact day my sister declared she was staying in the apocalypse. 1 “Harper, I’m not going back. I want to stay here.” “I’m already with Asher and the others. We’re going to get married, and I want to give each of them a child.” I froze, looking down at Chloe’s flushed, bashful face. What did she just say? Waves of agonizing pain crashed against my skull, feeling exactly like a scalpel was being driven right through the center of my brain. “Harper, what’s wrong? Do you have a headache?” Chloe reached out with a look of deep concern to touch my forehead, but instinct took over and I slapped her hand away. “Don’t touch me!” Chloe looked immediately wronged. “I know you’re mad at me, Harper. After all, we promised we’d head back home in a few days.” “But am I not allowed to change my mind? I like it here! Plus, I’ve found true love. Asher, Wyatt, Caleb, and Declan—all four of them treat me like a queen. They truly love me!” “You’re my sister. Shouldn’t you be happy for me?” Hearing those exact words confirmed it. I had been reborn. I was bound to a dimension-hopping System in the first place, traversing different worlds to complete missions, so being reborn wasn’t entirely shocking. But the moment I remembered exactly how Chloe had tortured and killed me in my past life, a venomous hatred boiled over in my chest. In my previous life, Chloe had pulled this exact stunt. Once our mission was complete, she claimed she was madly in love with the four warlords and wanted to stay behind for love. I tried to talk her out of it, but she wouldn’t listen, so I eventually left alone. Not long after, the System relayed a message that she was begging to see me. Terrified that she was in danger, I abandoned my current mission, took the massive penalty, and rushed back to the wasteland to save her. The moment I stepped out of the portal, her four men ambushed me. They strapped me to an operating table and ripped me apart. Meanwhile, Chloe stood just a few feet away, watching with dead, apathetic eyes. I screamed at her, asking why she lied to me. She just blinked, looking like an innocent little fawn. “Harper, my husbands said that if they can just extract the System from your brain, they can use its infinite modern supplies to unite the wasteland.” “This is the only chance to save this broken world. You wouldn’t refuse to make a tiny sacrifice for the greater good, right?” “You’ve always spoiled me. Just think of this as doing me one last favor! You want me to be happy, don’t you?” Happy, my ass! She had access to the System too, yet she hid that fact from Asher and his crew, painting a massive target on my back instead. I never could have imagined that the biological sister I had protected and pampered my whole life could be so utterly depraved and selfish. Fine. She wants to stay here? I tried to stop her last time. This time, I wouldn’t even try. In fact, I was going to fully support her. I’d even leave her a nice little parting gift! I took a deep breath, forcing down the urge to strangle her right there. I smiled and took her hands. “Chloe, why would I be mad? You’ve found men who truly love you—four of them, no less. Of course I won’t stand in your way.” “If you want to stay, then stay.” Chloe’s eyes lit up. She shook my arms excitedly. “Really?! Harper, I knew you were the best sister in the world!” Suppressing a wave of nausea, I subtly pulled my hands away and put some distance between us. “However, if you’re staying, I have one condition.” 2 Chloe blinked, looking slightly confused. “What condition?” “I want to watch you get married.” I paused and didn’t miss the immediate flash of joy on Chloe’s face. It seemed she was desperate to lock those four men down. Well, as her big sister, it was only right that I gave her a push. I continued: “I know it’s a bit rushed, but I’m leaving soon, and we probably won’t ever see each other again. I want to see you in a wedding dress, marrying the man… men… of your dreams.” “Let’s throw a wedding, okay? Do it for me.” “Besides, I have a very special gift I want to give you on your big day.” Chloe was beyond thrilled. She praised me to the heavens, then turned and sprinted out the door. “I’m going to go ask them right now!” I smiled and waved her off. At the same time, I called out in my mind. System, can I revoke Chloe’s access to the sub-system? A few seconds later, the System’s cold, mechanical voice echoed in my head. [Affirmative.] I nodded, sitting back in my chair with absolute peace of mind. Chloe was never supposed to have a System. I was the only one officially bound to the Multiverse System. Every time I finished a mission in a different dimension, I could return to my home world to rest before my next jump. Unfortunately, after one of my runs, Chloe overheard me talking to the System. She begged and pleaded to come with me on my dimension-hopping missions. “Harper, didn’t you promise that whatever you have, you’d share with me?” “I just want to keep you company while you work! Why won’t you let me?” Nothing I said deterred her, and eventually, I caved. After consulting the System and ensuring it wouldn’t violate any core protocols, I had the System split off a sub-node and bind it to Chloe just to keep her safe. In my past life, when I left the wasteland, I didn’t revoke her sub-system because I was worried about her survival. And how did she repay me? By selling me out to be butchered. She probably felt invincible because she had the System backing her up, which gave her the audacity to betray me so ruthlessly. But now. The second I leave this world for good. That system is coming right back to me. 3 It didn’t take long for Chloe to run back in, her face flush with afterglow. She wiped her slightly swollen lips with a smug look. “Harper, I’m going to be so happy. You see? All I had to do was give them a few kisses, and they agreed to everything!” “We set the wedding for three days from now. How does that sound?” I told her it sounded perfect. “By the way, such a massive celebration should be shared with every survivor in the wasteland so they can give you their blessings.” “Doesn’t Caleb have a tech guy who’s a master hacker? You should have him broadcast your wedding live across the globe. Let the whole world worship you.” Chloe bit her lip, squirming a little. “Well… I’d have to ask their permission first. I mean, I don’t really mind either way…” I knew she was already sold on the idea. Ever since she arrived in the wasteland, she had used the supplies I procured to play the glorious savior, which was exactly how she caught the attention of the four warlords in the first place. Someone as vain and attention-hungry as her could never resist an offer like that. Knowing the hook was set, I smoothly changed the subject. “Chloe, did you ever tell Asher and the guys about the System?” Chloe froze. A flicker of panic flashed across her face. But it only lasted a second before she put her innocent mask back on. “No, of course not. Why would you ask that?” “Don’t worry, Harper. Even after you leave, I’d never expose our secret.” I lowered my eyes and smiled, saying nothing. Her micro-expressions gave it away. She had absolutely told them. And she had specifically only told them that I had a System. Otherwise, in my past life, they wouldn’t have ignored her completely and gone to such great lengths to lure me back. Unbelievable. She had been plotting against her own flesh and blood this entire time. Since she could push me toward a gruesome death without a shred of guilt, she couldn’t blame me if my wedding gift turned out to be a little unpleasant. Three days passed in a flash. Bright and early, Chloe dragged a group of people into her room to do her hair and makeup. Maybe the impending wedding had inflated her ego, because she completely dropped her sweet facade. She aggressively swatted the makeup artist’s hand away. “Do you even know what you’re doing?! Why aren’t you using concealer?!” “Riley, I know you’re just jealous that I’m marrying Asher! You’re trying to make me look ugly on purpose!” The girl named Riley awkwardly set the makeup sponge down and explained softly: “That’s not it… When everyone was fleeing the infected zones, no one prioritized packing cosmetics…” “I had to beg every girl in the compound to scrape this much together. It’s not going to be like the old world. You’ll just have to make do…” Furious, Chloe swept the entire vanity of makeup onto the floor, sneering. “This is my one and only wedding! I am not ‘making do’!” I watched the drama unfold with cold detachment. She was riding the high of having a System, acting like she was a god among insects, hurting people simply because she could. The harder she flexed her power now, the harder her downfall would be once I left. The thought made me smile. I quickly stepped out of the room. I needed to go check if the hacker had the global broadcast ready. I couldn’t let anything ruin my grand finale. But as luck would have it, I bumped right into Asher, who was carrying a wedding dress. 4 I frowned and instinctively turned away, pretending I hadn’t seen him. But Asher called out to me. “Harper!” He jogged over, presenting the wedding dress to me like he was offering up a sacred treasure. “Harper, look at this. Beautiful, isn’t it? Declan and I scoured the ruins for days until we finally found a bridal boutique that hadn’t been looted.” “I looked through hundreds of them, but this one felt the most perfect. What do you think?” He paused, his eyes locked onto mine, swirling with manufactured affection. “I think… if you wore this, you would look absolutely breathtaking.” “Harper, stay here with us. Please? You know I’ve always been in love with you. Sure, Chloe is great and all, but… she doesn’t hold a candle to you.” “Harper, I will do everything in my power to give you the world. Just stay, please?” I took three steps back and genuinely dry-heaved. It was stomach-churning. In my past life, right before I left, Asher had pulled me aside to make this exact same sickly-sweet confession. Back then, I didn’t understand his ulterior motives, so I just strictly rejected him. Looking back, it was obvious. They knew I had the System, and they were desperate to keep their golden goose from flying away. He didn’t love me for a second. He loved the limitless modern supplies he could extract from me. After all, in my past life, he was the first one to swing a bone saw into my skull. To prove his “devotion,” Asher practically threw the pristine wedding dress onto the dirty floor. He rushed forward, trying to hold me. “Harper, are you okay? Are you sick?” Swallowing my nausea, I looked him dead in the eye. “I’m fine. Just ate something bad.” “By the way… do the other three feel the same way you do?” Asher’s eyes lit up. He nodded frantically. “Of course they do! If you’re willing to stay, we’ll do whatever you want! Anything!” “What about Chloe? What happens to her?” Asher froze, a look of extreme awkwardness washing over his face. “Chloe… well, she’s your sister. We’ll make sure she’s taken care of.” “Harper, honestly? I’ve only ever treated her as a substitute for you…” As he spoke, he stepped closer and closer to me. I smiled. Because I could see my dear sister standing right in the doorway, witnessing the entire exchange. Asher kept going. “Harper, you have to—” Suddenly, Chloe’s furious shriek tore through the hallway. “What the hell are you doing?!” 5 I took two steps back, thoroughly satisfied. Chloe walking out right then wasn’t a coincidence; I had specifically commanded the System to time it perfectly. I let Asher get close for the sole purpose of letting Chloe see it. Her possessiveness and paranoia would ensure she gripped those four men in a death lock. I looked at Chloe, painting a mask of perfect apology on my face. “It’s nothing, don’t misunderstand. I tripped and almost fell, and Asher was just catching me.” “You guys probably have a lot to talk about, so I’ll stop being the third wheel.” I patted Chloe’s shoulder with a bright smile and walked away. Not even a minute later, the door to my room was violently kicked open. “Harper! What the hell were you actually talking to Asher about?!” I shrugged innocently. “Nothing, I already told you. I almost fell…” Chloe angrily cut me off. “Liar! I already asked the System! It told me you purposefully got close to him and baited him into saying he loved you!” “Harper, how could you try to seduce my man just because you’re jealous of me?! You’re a psycho!” I couldn’t help but sneer in my head. What an idiot. Did she really think her sub-system would give her playback logs without my direct authorization? I fired back: “Chloe, if you’ve already asked the System, how can you stand there and shamelessly blame this on me?” “You know exactly what happened. Asher cornered me and told me I was prettier than you. Isn’t that right?” “You bitch!” Furious and humiliated, Chloe pulled a spiked combat whip straight out of her quantum storage bracelet and slashed it toward my face. I simply stepped to the side, grabbed the whip, and yanked hard. Chloe stumbled and face-planted onto the floor. “Every single item in that quantum bracelet was bought with my credits. I didn’t give it to you so you could use the weapons to throw a tantrum.” I looked down at her pathetic, sprawled form and scoffed. “My dear sister, I was doing you a favor. I was testing your men’s loyalty, and how do you thank me? By accusing me of seducing them?” “Look at the results. A tiny bit of bait, and Asher showed his true colors instantly. The other three wouldn’t fare any better. With you acting like this, how could I possibly feel safe leaving you here alone?” Chloe’s pupils contracted. She glared at me, pure panic bleeding into her eyes. “What are you saying?! Are you backing out?!” “Harper, you promised me! You said you’d let me stay! My wedding is literally about to start. Are you trying to drag me back to the modern world?!” She scrambled backward across the floor, shaking her head wildly. “You don’t understand anything! They do love me! Asher was just joking around, why are you taking it so seriously?!” “They love me! They got on their knees and begged me to stay! They cried for me! How could I abandon them?! I’m never leaving!” “Here, I am the queen of the wasteland! I have access to the highest tier of luxury and power! If I go back home, I’m just an ordinary nobody… I won’t go back! I won’t!” Looking at Chloe’s borderline psychotic breakdown, I laughed out loud. Just as I thought. No matter how much she played the role of a hopelessly romantic girl blinded by love, it couldn’t hide her rotting, selfish core. She didn’t stay for love. She stayed for the intoxicating high of being worshiped and handed a life of absolute privilege with zero effort. I just wondered if she’d be able to handle the impact when she fell from that pedestal. I walked forward and gently smoothed down Chloe’s messy hair. “Who said I was taking you with me?” “Relax. I never go back on my word. Since I promised to let you stay, I’ll respect your choice.” “And don’t forget, sister, I promised you a grand wedding gift. It will stay by your side and protect you in my place.” Chloe’s eyes sparkled greedily. She immediately grabbed my hand. 6 “What is the gift? Give it to me right now!” “And don’t bother coming to the ceremony later. This is my wedding. All the attention should be on me.” “Just give me the gift now, Harper!” I chuckled. She was terrified I would steal her spotlight, yet absolutely shameless about demanding free handouts. Unfortunately for her, the universe doesn’t hand out free lunches. I nodded, pretending to agree, but then asked: “But if I don’t go, who’s going to be your maid of honor?” “Oh, never mind. You have Riley, don’t you.” Right on cue, Riley knocked on the open door, her face a mask of total apathy. “Chloe, it’s time to change into your dress. The wedding is starting.” Chloe shot Riley a dirty look, then glared back at me. Finally, she nodded reluctantly and gave me a hushed warning: “We’ll talk about the gift later. When you come to the ceremony, make sure you stand in the back!” Chloe snatched the wedding dress from Riley’s hands, intentionally shoulder-checking her as she stormed out of the room. As I prepared to follow, I noticed Riley glaring daggers at Chloe’s retreating back. I raised an eyebrow. Right. Before Chloe showed up, Riley was Asher’s girlfriend. I didn’t know why Chloe was in such a frantic rush, but she had aggressively bumped up the ceremony timeline. By the time I reached the main square, Chloe had already exchanged vows with the four warlords. One by one, the four men leaned in to kiss her. Ugh. Eye bleach, please. I jogged forward and interrupted them. Looking extremely annoyed, Chloe stepped forward, throwing her arms out like a mother hen shielding her chicks, tucking the four massive warlords behind her. “Harper, what are you doing here…” I scanned the perimeter. This was a joint wedding for the leaders of the four major factions. Every prominent figure, captain, and survivor who could make the trek was in attendance. With the stage set, I projected my voice clearly: “Everyone here has bought supplies from me at some point, right? I’m sure you’ve all been dying to know where I source my inventory, and where I hide my stockpiles…” Hearing this, Wyatt immediately stepped forward in a panic. “Harper, wait—” I cut him off. He was terrified. They were all terrified that if the public learned the truth about the System, it would completely shatter their monopoly on power. After all, they only became the supreme warlords because of the infinite supplies Chloe and I pumped into their camps. But I was going to rip the curtain down and watch the dogs tear each other apart. I smiled, patted Chloe’s shoulder, and continued: “I know Chloe has told the four of you that she gets her supplies from me, and she even told you that I’m bound to a cosmic System, right?” “But did you know… she has a System too?” Chloe’s smug expression disintegrated instantly. She stared at me in absolute terror. “Harper…” Hilarious. Now she remembers to call me by my name? Being the magnanimous older sister I am, I clamped my hand over her mouth.

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Preston Sterling, the notorious billionaire heir of the Manhattan elite, was famous for his twisted obsession with crossdressers. He publicly made a wild declaration: “If someone is willing to transition just for me, they will share my multi-million dollar empire.” Upon hearing this, my brother’s heart fluttered with temptation. He immediately applied a coat of fiery red lipstick, ready to show off his skills. Out of the goodness of my heart, I advised him against it. I told him those guys play sick and twisted games, and he shouldn’t ruin his bright future. So, my brother obediently gave up. But the very next day, the billionaire heir announced his new male-model boyfriend, sharing all his assets with him. In a fit of rage, my brother sold me off to a human trafficking ring in the Appalachian backwoods, where I was abused to death. When I opened my eyes again, my brother was smearing on that same red lipstick, itching to try his luck. “Nora, do you think I can successfully win over the billionaire heir?” I smiled, turned around, and pulled out a sheer, see-through camisole he had hidden at the bottom of his trunk. “The heir has seen it all. Brother, if you want to win, you’re going to have to be a lot sluttier than that.” 1 My brother finished applying his lipstick, admired himself in the mirror for a moment, then put down the tube and turned to face me. “Nora, do you think I can successfully win over the billionaire heir?” In my past life, my brother asked me this exact same question. What did I say back then? “Oliver, Preston Sterling’s circle is completely twisted. I don’t want you taking that risk. I’m terrified something bad will happen to you, and I don’t want to lose my brother.” At that time, I was genuinely terrified for him. He wasn’t just anyone; he was my brother, my family. The sick games Preston’s crowd played were infamous, even to someone completely outside their upper-crust circle like me. I had even heard whispers of a twisted party game they called “Russian Roulette,” which involved Hollywood starlets, Instagram models, and high-end escorts. Even though my brother couldn’t get pregnant, if he truly entered that world, there would undoubtedly be even more depraved games waiting for him. I warned him about the severe consequences, crying and begging him to stop. So, my brother gave up. Who could have predicted that the very next day, Preston Sterling would publicly announce his boyfriend and fulfill his promise, sharing his entire fortune with him? When my brother saw the news, he shook with absolute fury. He raised his hand and slapped me hard across the face, knocking me to the ground. “This is all because of you! If you hadn’t scared me with all that garbage, the one standing next to Preston right now would be me! The one sharing his wealth would be me! “Nora Vance, you ruined my life! You made me lose everything!” To get his revenge on me. Under my brother’s scheming, I was sold to human traffickers deep in the Appalachian backwoods, where I was eventually abused to death by a pack of miserable, aging bachelors… The horrifying memories of my past life wrapped tightly around me, making my body tremble uncontrollably. But my brother was still entirely immersed in his sweet dream of winning Preston Sterling’s exclusive favor, completely oblivious to my distress. He asked again, urging me to answer: “Say something, Nora! Is this look going to work or not?” I took a deep breath, forcing myself to calm down. Glancing at my brother’s fiery red lips, I curled my lips into a smile, walked into his room, and dug out the sheer, see-through camisole he had secretly hidden at the bottom of his trunk, handing it to him. “Just a fiery red lip isn’t going to cut it.” “The heir has seen it all. Brother, if you want to win, you’re going to have to be a lot sluttier than that.” 2 My brother seemed surprised by my bluntness. A hint of shyness flashed across his delicate, effeminate face, and he hesitated to take the camisole. Hah, so he still knows how to be bashful? “Hurry up and try it on,” I urged, pushing the silky fabric closer to him. My brother seemed a little uptight. “Right now?” “Of course right now! Didn’t you ask me to help you check your look?” I scanned him up and down. “You’re not actually shy, are you? If you’re this embarrassed in front of me, what are you going to do when you’re face-to-face with Preston Sterling? Men don’t like coy and hesitant.” My brother took a deep breath, as if gathering all his courage, and snatched the camisole. “I’ll go change.” Moments later, my brother stepped out, wearing practically nothing. I had to admit, the secret stash of clothes he had collected was off-the-charts scandalous. Clutching the hem of his tiny skirt, my brother asked uncertainly, “How is it? Will this work?” I shook my head. “The outfit works, but you don’t. Oliver, you need to be more confident, more liberated. “Give me a little sway, let me see.” At first, my brother was extremely self-conscious, but after swaying his hips a few times, he found his groove, and his movements grew bolder. Honestly, it was pretty damn sexy. I praised him relentlessly. “Oliver, you are absolutely on fire! Preston Sterling is going to fall head over heels for you!” A smug look crossed my brother’s face, and the more he danced, the more into it he got. Until a sharp gasp pierced the air. “Ah!” My brother panicked. Mom and Dad had returned home at some point. My brother had been too absorbed in his dancing, and I had been too absorbed in watching, so neither of us heard them come in. “Nora Vance, what on earth are you doing?” My mom glared at my brother with sheer disgust, then sharply reprimanded me. “Who told you to bring this kind of trashy woman into our house? Tell her to get out right now!” She turned to look at my dad. His eyes were glued to the sight, which only infuriated my mom further. She stormed forward, grabbed my brother’s arm, spun him around, and delivered a vicious slap across his face. “Get the hell out of my house! Nora, if I ever catch you hanging around this kind of unpresentable trash again, I’ll…” “Mom!” I stepped forward, fighting back a smile. “Look closely, that’s Oliver!” The fury on my mom’s face didn’t fade; she still wanted to keep scolding me. It took her a delayed second to process what I had just said, and then she froze. The next second, her shocked gaze landed heavily on my brother. Unbelieving, she gasped, “What?” My dad finally recognized my brother’s heavily made-up face. After a moment of stunned silence, he stormed forward, shaking with rage. “Oliver Vance, what is this… what the hell are you doing? Dressing yourself up like this, are you… are you out of your damn mind?” It was as if the sky had fallen on my mom. “Oliver, who told you to dress like this? Take it off right now!” As she spoke, she lunged forward, clawing frantically to rip the wig off my brother’s head. Our family ran a decent-sized business. My parents had always preached that my brother would inherit the entire family empire simply because he was the son. And now… They were finally reaping the ultimate reward for their golden-boy syndrome. 3 “Mom!” My brother dodged, but my mom still managed to yank the wig off his head. He was biologically a man, after all, naturally stronger than my mom, and his temper flared up instantly. Pushing my mom away, my brother puffed out his chest, tilted his chin up, and declared loudly, “Since you’ve both seen it, I don’t need to hide it anymore. “It is exactly what it looks like. I don’t want to be a man. “Ever since I was little, I felt like I was supposed to be a woman. I was just too scared to tell you because I knew you’d react like this. “Well, I’m laying it all out right now. I want to be a woman!” “Shut your mouth!” My dad tossed aside all his dignity, stepping up to deliver another heavy backhand to my brother’s face. I guess he felt the blush on my brother’s cheeks wasn’t heavy enough. Having been slapped twice, my brother’s cheeks were burning red, giving him a weirdly unique, tragic sort of beauty. “Why are you hitting me? I have human rights! I get to decide how I want to live my own life!” My brother bent down to pick up the wig my mom had thrown on the floor. “From now on, I’m going to be a woman!” My mom’s legs gave out, and she swayed, nearly collapsing. Watching my brother put the wig back on with a seductive, sensual flair that even my mom couldn’t rival… She completely broke down, sobbing uncontrollably. My dad roared, “Shut up! Look at this fine son you’ve raised for me!” My brother completely let loose, swaying his hips and rolling his eyes. “I seriously don’t get why you guys are overreacting. If I become a woman, does that mean I’m no longer your child?” Tears streamed down my mom’s face. “How is that the same? A son suddenly turning into a daughter—who can accept that? Besides, if you become a woman, what happens to our family? When you take over the company later, who’s going to respect you?” My brother scoffed dismissively. “I don’t give a damn about our little family business anyway. Just give it to Nora. “Besides, me doing this is actually for the good of the family. “Haven’t you seen the news Preston Sterling put out? As long as someone can win his heart, they get access to all his money. Who cares about our family’s chump change?” “Preston Sterling?” My dad’s tone immediately grew serious. In his eyes, Preston Sterling was a true titan. Normally, my dad couldn’t even get close enough to see the back of Preston’s head. If there was truly a chance to get close to Preston, or even just graze the edges of the Manhattan elite, the Vance family’s social standing would skyrocket. My dad was instantly tempted, though he still doubted my brother’s capabilities. “You? Preston Sterling has seen it all. Are you that confident he’d even look twice at you?” My brother gave a haughty hmph. “Why wouldn’t he?” I had been watching the drama unfold from the sidelines and chimed in at the perfect moment. “Preston will definitely fall for Oliver. Dad, didn’t your eyes just glaze over when you looked at him a minute ago?” My dad: “…” A flash of deeply uncomfortable embarrassment crossed his face, and he shot me a blistering glare. My brother’s cheeks flushed. He glanced at my dad but stayed quiet. My mom’s expression was grim, but it was a different kind of grim than her earlier breakdown. Earlier, before she realized it was my brother, she had flawlessly demonstrated what toxic female rivalry looked like. This family of three was honestly hilarious. They usually acted so loving, with my parents pouring all their devotion into my brother. Now, just because he put on a dress, they were falling apart like loose sand. I kept my mouth shut and continued enjoying the show. My dad was still uncertain. “Are you really confident you can win over Preston?” My brother crossed his arms and shot me a look. I immediately piled on the flattery. “Absolutely! Dad, look how sexy and alluring Oliver is right now! Preston will love it. “Honestly, if I were a man, I’d fall in love with him too. “Ugh, suddenly I feel like a total failure as a woman. I’m not even half as charming as my brother. “Right, Mom?” My mom furrowed her brow, shooting a cold glare at my brother’s outfit, then glared at me before steadying herself. “We’ll talk after you actually manage to win Preston over.” 4 In my past life, my parents genuinely didn’t know about my brother’s hidden desires at first. But once he set his sights on winning Preston over, he started dropping hints, and they eventually figured it out. Yet, not only did they not blame my brother, they blamed his transformation entirely on me. They claimed I had failed as a sister. They argued that since they were always busy working, I was the only one with free time at home. The fact that I didn’t spot his tendencies early on and correct him meant it was entirely my fault. My mom had even confronted me with red, teary eyes: “Did you purposely hide this from us? Nora, I never realized you were so calculating! You wanted your brother to become a woman so you could destroy my only son. That way, all the family inheritance would go to you. Is that what you’ve been plotting?” Later, when Preston Sterling officially announced his boyfriend, my brother flew into a violent rage. My parents dumped all the blame on me, pushing my brother into a psychotic frenzy. He directed all his vengeance at me, selling me off, which led to my gruesome death. When I died in my past life, hadn’t my own flesh-and-blood parents been the ones handing him the knife? I had already experienced their toxic favoritism in my last life, so in this life, I genuinely didn’t care anymore. I wouldn’t let it touch my heart. But I absolutely had to get my revenge. After my brother touched up his makeup and left the house, my parents called me into the study. “You knew about your brother being like this, didn’t you?” my mom asked coldly. In my memories, my mom had always been icy toward me, even projecting her twisted sense of female rivalry onto her own daughter. When I was little, all I wanted was to behave well and earn my parents’ love, but my mom would just look at me with the coldest eyes. “We’re both women here. Don’t think I can’t see right through your little tricks. “Being this manipulative at such a young age… having a daughter really is just birthing a rival for myself. “But it’s obvious your dad isn’t buying your act, so put away your little schemes.” Even though my dad only valued my brother, he wasn’t as viciously critical of me as my mom was. To him, my existence just meant setting an extra plate at the dinner table. It wasn’t like he couldn’t afford to feed me. Plus, when I got married in the future, he figured he could probably cash in on a hefty dowry or business connection. This was the toxic household I was raised in. The irony was that our family’s “empire” wasn’t even that big. We were squarely upper-middle class at best, yet they acted like royalty. Now that my brother had turned out like this, even though my dad wanted to use him to climb the social ladder and latch onto Preston Sterling, deep down, he still couldn’t accept that the son he had raised had suddenly changed so drastically. “Earlier, you kept speaking up for your brother. I know what you’re plotting,” my dad said heavily. “Nora, you’re a girl. Eventually, you’ll marry out of this family. What’s yours, I’ll give to you, but don’t go eyeing things that don’t belong to you.” “You’re just trying to piss me off into an early grave!” My mom glared at me like I was her sworn enemy. “Since you were a kid, you’ve opposed me at every turn. You fought me for your dad’s affection, and now you’ve convinced my son to change his gender. How exactly have I wronged you for you to treat me like this?” “…” If this were my past life, I might have argued back, asking how she could think such things about her own daughter. Now? She could think whatever the hell she wanted. Even if she died of sheer anger, I wouldn’t shed a single tear for her. I just couldn’t comprehend her twisted logic. What kind of garbage was filling her head? “Mom, Dad, are you saying you don’t agree with Oliver being with Preston? Why didn’t you say that earlier?” My dad’s breathing grew heavy. “Latching onto Preston Sterling would be incredible, obviously. But I only have one son. Naturally, I want him to be a normal man and take over the family business.” My mom’s tears started falling again. “Your dad is right. I only have one son. If he turns into a woman, are you expecting me to have another baby at my age?” “Then I’ll go tell Oliver you guys don’t support him,” I said, turning to walk out. My dad stopped me. “Let’s wait and see. If your brother really bags Preston, we’ll wait until he gets the money, and then force him to change back. Either way, my son is absolutely not going to be a sissy!” “Alright, I’ll keep my mouth shut for now.” Yeah, right. 5 Back in my room, I called my brother and asked where he was. Pinching his voice to sound softer, my brother whispered, “I got a tip that Preston is partying at a VIP club tonight. I have to go show my face so he remembers me.” It was obvious that my brother was totally committed now. He was determined to win Preston over and wasn’t even trying to hide it anymore. I glanced at my closed bedroom door and lowered my voice. “Good luck, Oliver! Mom and Dad just told me they still oppose you doing this. You have to lock Preston down ASAP. Otherwise, if Mom and Dad think about it overnight and decide to lock you up, you’ll lose your chance completely.” A heavy exhale came through the phone. “Those two dinosaurs are going to ruin everything. But I can’t guarantee I’ll win Preston over tonight.” “True. There are tons of people trying to get into his good graces just like you. You’re not exactly the most unique one out there, so it’s not a sure bet you’ll catch his eye,” I said, sounding dead serious. Honestly, even if my brother did manage to catch Preston’s eye, it would only last a day or two. My brother didn’t like hearing that. “Didn’t you say I just needed to be slammier? Am I not slutty enough right now?” “But Preston has no shortage of slutty people throwing themselves at him.” Hearing this, my brother realized I had a point. He sounded lost and asked me to think of a solution for him. Since my parents were so dead set on their son coming home to inherit the “throne,” then why not… “Oliver, if you were willing to undergo gender affirmation surgery for Preston, he would definitely remember you.” The only reason my parents favored him was because he had a penis, right? Given a second chance at life, I was going to cut off their “roots” directly. “Gender affirmation surgery?” My brother clearly sounded intimidated. “I don’t have to go that far, do I?” “If you don’t make a real sacrifice, how are you going to make Preston look at you differently? Brother, do you actually want to win him over or not? Preston is gorgeous, elite, and swimming in billions. Are you really going to sit back and watch a catch like him fall into someone else’s lap?” Silence on the other end of the line. I pushed harder, striking while the iron was hot. “Besides, haven’t you always wanted to be a woman? Once you actually transition, it’ll be too late for Mom and Dad to stop you. “But hey, it’s your body, your choice. I’m just pointing out the fastest route. It’s up to you if you want to take it. “Just don’t blame me for not helping you when someone else ends up by Preston’s side…” Before I could finish, my brother slammed the hammer down. “I’ll do it! I’ll get the surgery! For Preston, I’m willing to do anything!” He hung up the phone and didn’t come home that entire night. 6 The next morning, my brother strutted into the house looking ecstatic, practically shoving the hickeys on his neck in my face. Suppressing the nausea churning in my stomach, I asked, “You got Preston?” He hadn’t even had the surgery yet. I guess he actually had some skills. My brother flipped his wig, his face radiating seductive charm. “I publicly confessed my love to Preston last night, right in the middle of his party.” He was beaming, chattering away non-stop. “You have no idea. When I first walked in, there was already no room left next to Preston. Those twinks were so desperate they refused to even go to the bathroom. “It was my first time, so I didn’t know the ropes. I should have worn an adult diaper. Next time I’ll wear one so I don’t have to leave my seat either, otherwise someone snatches your spot the second you stand up. “But my grand public confession really grabbed Preston’s attention. You should have seen the looks on those other bottoms’ faces—pure envy and jealousy. They were just mad they didn’t have my guts. “I even have a video. I’ll send it to you.” My brother was treating me like his best girlfriend, holding absolutely nothing back. I received the video on my phone and tapped play. In the video, a few fresh-faced models in scandalous outfits were performing a raunchy dance on stage when my brother suddenly ran up. The music cut off. My brother grabbed the mic, staring straight at Preston Sterling, who was lounging in the VIP booth with people draped over both arms, and screamed, “Preston, I love you!” After a brief, stunned silence, the entire club erupted in wild cheers. More accurately, they were all living for the drama. Looking deeply and affectionately in Preston’s direction, my brother shouted even louder, “Preston, I’m going to get gender reassignment surgery just for you! Will you wait for me?” The crowd’s screaming grew deafening. Preston remained seated in his booth, still flanked by his companions. He let his gaze sweep over my brother with a look of immense amusement, a half-smile playing on his lips, but he didn’t say a word. The video ended there. My brother excitedly pumped his little fists. “Nora, did you know? Preston ignored me the whole night, and I thought my confession totally bombed. But after the party ended, Preston specifically asked me to stay behind. And he…” At this point, my brother looked down shyly. “He took me last night.” “…” I opened my mouth, let out a dry laugh. “Congratulations, Oliver.” My brother bit his lower lip, seeming slightly embarrassed, but blurted it out anyway. “Nora, I’ve decided. I’m absolutely getting the surgery.” I smiled. “Then you’d better hurry up and book the appointment.” 7 My brother rested at home for three days before venturing out again. My parents actually thought he had given up on becoming a woman and felt quite relieved during those three days… Even though they mourned the loss of the Sterling family connection, keeping their precious son intact was more important. Little did they know, the moment my brother walked out the door three days later, he completely vanished. He wouldn’t pick up their calls. So, they naturally turned to me. “Where did your brother go?” He’s a grown man; am I supposed to babysit him 24/7? Besides, he didn’t tell me what he was doing before he left. Even though I knew perfectly well he had flown out of the country for his surgery. But I wasn’t going to say a word. “Oliver didn’t tell me. How am I supposed to know where he went?” My mom panicked. “Did he change his mind again? Is the Vance family bloodline really going to end here?” My dad’s face darkened instantly. “What the hell are you talking about?” Terrified that my dad might go out and father an illegitimate son, my mom ordered me to go out and find my brother. Ever since I was reborn, I had barely left the house, spending all my time mapping out my plans. Now, it was finally time to step out. Although I wasn’t part of Preston’s elite circle, the drama of my brother getting gender reassignment surgery just for Preston had blown up so massively that I got dragged into it. People were starting to recognize me as Oliver Vance’s sister. “Nora Vance, do you remember me? We went to the same college.” The man standing in front of me was Carter Hayes, a regular in Preston’s circle. I was absolutely positive that Carter didn’t know I existed back in college. Sure, I was pretty, but college was full of pretty girls, and I definitely wasn’t at the top of the food chain. But gaining access to this untouchable circle through my brother’s infamy was a massive advantage for me. I feigned surprise. “You remember me?” Carter nodded. “Of course. And I also know you’re Oliver’s sister.” I knew it. The second my brother publicly confessed to Preston and announced his surgery, the vultures in that circle had thoroughly investigated our family background. I was probably somewhat infamous in their crowd now, though most of them probably didn’t know my name. They just referred to me as “the sister of the guy getting his dick chopped off for Preston.” I wasn’t quite sure what Carter’s angle regarding my brother was, so I just kept a polite, smiling face. Carter smiled with perfect gentlemanly charm. “Are you busy? If you have time, let me buy you a coffee? Consider it catching up.” I wasn’t about to let an opportunity like this slip away. I gladly accepted. “Sure.” In the coffee shop, Carter and I sat across from each other. He started with some light college nostalgia before effortlessly steering the conversation toward my brother. “Is your brother really going under the knife for Preston?” I nodded with a smile. “It’s true. He’s already flown out of the country. He even has the surgery booked.” Carter let out a sharp chuckle. “Looks like your brother is deeply smitten with him.” He looked at me intently. “What are your thoughts on all this?” I wasn’t sure why he was asking me this or what kind of answer he was fishing for. Carter didn’t beat around the bush; he put his cards on the table. “Your brother is a pretty hot topic in our circle right now. A lot of guys want a taste of something fresh.” I already knew their crowd was full of degenerates, so hearing this didn’t shock me at all. “So what you’re saying is…” Carter smiled, maintaining his gentlemanly facade. “Oliver is your brother. What could I possibly be implying?” He had practically spelled it out. Now it was up to me to make a choice. “Even though my brother is devoted entirely to Preston, if I stepped in, he’d probably listen to me.” I paused, then rephrased. “I will definitely make sure my brother listens to me.” Carter nodded in satisfaction, looking at me with absolute approval. “You’re a smart woman. I like that.” It seemed I needed to officially register my own company before my brother recovered. The only problem was my lack of startup capital. My family wasn’t poor, but with my parents’ extreme favoritism, they would never give me serious money. Carter seeking me out for a partnership meant I needed to sell my brother for a very good price. He sold me out in my past life. Why couldn’t I sell him out now?

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My company was facing a temporary cash flow issue, and the construction payout we owed had to be delayed by a month. I called in the girl I had been financially sponsoring for years. She was the crew foreman’s daughter, working as an intern at my company after graduation. I told her gently, “I won’t be able to make the transfer on time this round. It might be delayed by a month. Please give your dad a heads-up so he doesn’t worry.” But the very next day, the workers trashed my office. They screamed, “You swore up and down we’d get paid, and now the project’s done, you claim you’re broke!” I looked at the girl. Crying, she said, “All I know is the company is out of money right now and you can’t pay. I can’t lie to them. This is about my personal integrity.” 1 My office was completely trashed by the workers. I had just gotten back from a business trip and walked through my front door when I got the news. By the time I rushed back to the company, my office was a disaster zone. They couldn’t break the heavy mahogany desks, so they had just shoved them out of place. Smaller things—mugs, folders—lay shredded and shattered across the carpet. Computer monitors were smashed into jagged spiderwebs, scattered everywhere. The moment everyone saw me, it was like they found their anchor. My employees rushed toward me. “We couldn’t stop them, Ms. Vance. All three security guards got beaten up.” “They smashed my laptop, too. All my data was on it.” “A whole week of number-crunching, completely down the drain.” …… Before I could even speak, people started pouring out of my office. A dense crowd of dozens of men, swarming toward us like a dark, aggressive storm cloud. They had come straight from the construction site. They were still wearing their hard hats, their flannels and boots splattered with dried cement. They had been working under me for three years. In my memory, they had always been cheerful, simple, and hardworking folks. Now, their faces were hardened with rage. Some were even gripping crowbars and shovels. I couldn’t fathom what could possibly justify this kind of violence. A second later, one of the workers answered my unspoken question. Taking a massive stride forward, he yelled, “So you’re just not gonna pay us?!” He reached out to grab my arm but was swiftly blocked by the staff standing around me. Pinned to the ground, he still struggled, reaching out for me with wild eyes, looking like he would tear me apart just to get an answer. His actions instantly ignited the fury of my own employees. “You really trying to hit our boss?!” “You think we won’t fight back just because we haven’t thrown a punch yet?!” The guys on my team instinctively stepped up. The two groups stood locked in a tense, explosive standoff, neither side willing to yield an inch. Only then did the foreman finally step forward. He took a drag from his cigarette, frowned, and bellowed, “Quiet!” The restless workers instantly fell silent. I hadn’t interacted with him much. My only real memory of him was visiting his house last year. It was a rundown, two-room cabin. He had bowed repeatedly, thanking me endlessly: “Thank you so much for sponsoring my daughter all these years, Ms. Vance. She only made it to college because of you.” Now, he stood up perfectly straight. That timid, grateful image was completely gone. He looked down his nose at me and said, “You told us the second the project wrapped, we’d get our money. Now it’s done, and you’re saying you’re broke.” “If that’s not a scam, what is?” 2 The moment the words left his mouth, the rest of the crew echoed him. “Yeah, what is it if not a scam?” “My whole family is counting on that paycheck!” “Scammer! Liar! Fraud!” But I never said I wasn’t going to pay. I said it would be delayed by a month, at the absolute latest. Almost instantly, I knew exactly where the miscommunication happened. Suppressing my boiling frustration, I turned to my assistant. “Bring Chloe out here.” Hearing his daughter’s name, the foreman took another drag of his cigarette. Those eyes locked onto me. “Let’s keep things separate. Why are you dragging Chloe into this? We’re talking about you withholding our wages.” Chloe Henderson arrived quickly. I swallowed my temper and asked, “What exactly did you tell your dad?” The second the question dropped, she burst into tears. “I just said you can’t pay them right now.” “I can’t lie to people. The company accounts are empty.” I was so angry I could barely stand. This was an issue that should have been handled by our finance and PR teams, but I trusted her. I thought that if the news came from her, the workers wouldn’t panic. That’s the only reason I asked her to deliver the message. I had funded her education for five years. She was the foreman’s daughter. It was the one task I thought was absolutely foolproof. And yet, she managed to completely butcher the message. She was still crying. The workers all knew her, and a few spoke up to comfort her: “Don’t cry, Chloe. We know you’re just looking out for us.” Gripping the edge of a desk to steady myself, I looked at Chloe, keeping my voice dangerously low. “What exactly did I say to you? I said it would be delayed by a month at most. I said the money would be paid.” Through her tears, she argued back, “But you can’t pay them right now.” “I can’t lie. That’s a matter of personal integrity.” 3 I grabbed the shattered remains of a glass mug next to me. Smash! The glass exploded against the floor, and whatever fragile grip I had on my sanity shattered right along with it. I pointed a shaking finger at Chloe. “Personal integrity?! The entire company is on the hook for your ‘integrity’!” “You couldn’t even handle one simple task. What did I say, and what did you say? I said I would pay.” “How the hell did you translate that?” Chloe sobbed, defending herself, “Just tell me, which part of what I said was a lie?” “Go outside and ask any contractor in Seattle! Who doesn’t experience delayed payouts? I asked for one month. One single month!” Blood rushed to my head. I surged forward, raising my hand. For years, I had treated her like a little sister. I never expected her to be this ungrateful and treacherous. Before my hand could fall, her father grabbed my wrist. His eyes widened in fury. “You lay a hand on my daughter?” I yanked my arm free and sneered at the crowd of men. “Our cash flow is tied up right now. But I will pay you. One month, tops.” They started muttering to each other. “She’s not refusing to pay? Just a month late?” “Our old bosses used to make us wait six months minimum.” “A month? That’s actually pretty good…” …… They were all from Chloe’s hometown. Three years ago, when I first stepped into their rural county, the locals brought me fresh fruit. When Chloe handed me an apple, I noticed dirt caked under her fingernails. Seeing me stare, she awkwardly wiped her hands on her shirt. “I washed them, I promise.” Because of that one moment, I made up my mind to help them. The men in her town didn’t have specialized skills; they only had their brute strength. I instantly covered their travel and housing expenses and brought them on my payroll. The average daily wage for a laborer in Seattle was $200. I bumped it to $250 for them. I provided iced water in the summer heat and hot catered lunches every day. I personally checked the quality of the food before truckloads were sent to their sites. I never imagined that a mere one-month delay would cause them to bypass a simple question and go straight to destroying my office. Even after I clarified the situation, the tension in the room didn’t ease much. “She’s lying. She’s just trying to buy time to skip town.” 4 That sentence was like a drop of water in boiling oil. The momentarily quieted workers instantly erupted again. Amidst the chaos, someone shouted at Chloe, “Chloe! We only trust you. Tell us, is she gonna pay or not?” I stared at Chloe. She sniffled and answered, “Uncle Dan… right now, the company really can’t pay.” It felt like my chest was stuffed with cotton. The employees surrounding me couldn’t take it anymore. “Chloe, just answer this: has Ms. Vance ever missed a payment in three years?” Hundreds of these men had worked for me for three years. The second a project wrapped, I had payroll cut the checks. We were always the fastest payers in the industry. This was the first time a payment was ever delayed, and they instantly turned on me with pure malice. The foreman’s eyes locked onto me, and in a split second, he laid down the ultimatum. “Sorry, Ms. Vance. I’ve got hundreds of mouths to feed. I can’t afford to wait.” “Either you pay us right now, or we keep tearing this place apart.” “We’ll sit right outside your front doors. Let’s see you try to close any new business with us out there.” My vision swam with dark spots. Three years. Even if you feed a stray dog for three years, it won’t bite you if you miss a single meal. But just for a one-month delay, they were backing me into a corner. Nobody in the entire city of Seattle treated their crews as well as I did. They were just bullying me because I was a woman, and they had the numbers. I had been up all night working, hadn’t eaten breakfast, and now I was dealing with their violent extortion. I could barely stand, but in that moment, total clarity washed over me. If a dog bites, you get a new dog. Especially when ordinary laborers were a dime a dozen in this city. I braced myself against the desk and asked, “How much? Name the number.” “$650,000.” Seeing my expression shift, he quickly justified it. “Look, we’ve got hundreds of guys who worked straight through for four months. We all rely on this money to survive.” “You have to understand—” I cut him off. “Save it.” I took a step forward, and instantly, a group of workers boxed me in, as if terrified I was making a run for it. “I’m going to my office to make some calls.” It was only when I stepped inside my private office that I saw just how viciously they had destroyed it. Files were strewn everywhere. My drawers had been yanked out and dumped. Important documents had been ripped to shreds. I waded through the wreckage and stood by my desk. I picked up my phone and started making calls, standing right in the middle of the ruins. “Mr. Davis, it’s Jessica. Do you have a minute this afternoon?” “Sarah, hey, I need to ask you a huge favor…” “Brenda, it’s me…” …… Twelve phone calls. That’s what it took to scrape together the cash. I had never bowed my head to anyone in my life, but today, I bowed it over and over. Through the shattered glass walls of my office, I could see my employees looking down, unable to bear watching me. The workers, however, stared at me with predatory eyes, like wolves waiting to tear a chunk of flesh from my bones. I transferred the money, down to the exact cent, and walked out holding my phone. “Every last penny is there. Check it.” 5 The foreman verified the transfer. He looked up and scoffed, “See? You had the money. Why make us go through all this trouble?” I ignored his bait and brought up something else. “The police are on their way. We’re tallying up the property damage. You’ll be paying for that.” They must have anticipated paying for the damages when they started smashing things. Though a few looked angry, nobody said a word. While we waited for the cops, Chloe suddenly spoke up. “Jessica, just let them go. The next project is starting soon, every second they stay here is a loss of money for them.” I glanced at Chloe out of the corner of my eye. A few workers thought she made sense and shifted on their feet, ready to leave. My assistant, Emma, seeing how pale I looked, handed me a cup of hot water. I took a sip before I finally spoke. “You don’t need to go back to the site.” The foreman snapped his head toward me. “What’s that supposed to mean, boss?” “You’re all fired.” Flick. A lighter sparked, and cigarette smoke plumed into the air. Through the haze, the foreman stared at me. “Ms. Vance, we’re halfway through the build. Kicking us out now is just bad business, don’t you think?” Chloe looked at me pleadingly. “Jessica, they’ve been with you for three years.” Holding my warm cup, I looked her dead in the eye. “You too. You’re an adult now. Pack your things and move out of my house tonight.” She clamped her mouth shut. In the dead silence, the foreman aggressively threw his half-smoked cigarette onto the floor. “Who the hell do you think you are? People have been trying to poach my crew for months anyway. I quit!” The floor was littered with shredded paper. His cigarette landed right on a pile. A small patch began to smolder, smoke rising quickly. I tilted my cup and poured the hot water directly onto the embers. The water sizzled, instantly drowning out the spark and killing the smoke. I looked the man in the eyes. “Get the hell out.” 6 They all left in a hurry. That very night, I stayed up hiring a brand new crew. Because I offered a premium day rate, I filled the roster incredibly fast. The new foreman promised me up and down that there wouldn’t be a single hiccup. By the time I finished the paperwork, the sky outside was turning gray with dawn. My house was exactly as I’d left it, which is when I realized Chloe hadn’t come home all night. The moment I walked into the company lobby the next morning, Chloe was waiting for me. She handed in her resignation letter and came to say her goodbyes. Uncharacteristically, she was wearing a brand-new designer outfit, the logos loud and flashing. My eyes fell on the bag draped over her arm. An $80,000 Birkin. Bright purple crocodile skin. Not exactly a young girl’s aesthetic. Every wealthy, prominent man in Seattle was either a widower who stayed single, or married with kids Chloe’s age. I had sponsored her for five years. I watched her transform and grow step by step. No matter how hardened I felt, I couldn’t help but ask, “Where did you get the bag?” She stammered, “Jessica, that’s really none of your business.” None of my business. When she first went to college, I was the one who drove her there. I bought gifts for her roommates so she wouldn’t feel left out. Every major choice in her life had my backing. And now, it was none of my business. My face went cold. “I asked, where did it come from?” Seeing me push, she threw caution to the wind. “My boyfriend bought it for me.” I pointed right at her. “He buys you something like this, and you don’t know what you’re going to have to trade for it?” Chloe looked annoyed. “Trade what? He gave it to me because he likes me.” Things are never that simple. At her age, buying each other iced coffees was one thing. Dropping eighty grand on a purse meant he wanted something in return. She kept going. “Jessica, you sponsored me all these years so I could make money, right? Well, now I have money.” “Do you even know how much this bag, these clothes, cost?” Did I support her for all those years for this? I sponsored her because, years ago, she looked at me with tears in her eyes and said, “I get good grades. I just want to go to school.” Now, she was smugly showing off her designer clothes, asking me, “Do you know how much this costs? It’s worth years of my salary.” I casually picked up the coffee cup next to me and dumped it directly over her head. It still didn’t feel like enough. I grabbed a Sharpie from the desk, seized her bag, and yanked it toward me. “What are you doing?!” She panicked, trying to block me, but the black ink streaked violently across her arm and onto the leather. She completely ignored herself, frantically trying to wipe the ink off the Birkin. “Are you crazy?! What is your problem?!” I ignored her, tossing the marker onto the floor. I walked back to my desk and wrote out a check. My head was pounding. I pressed a hand to my temple and held out the check. She instantly went silent. The sharp clack of her heels echoed in the room. She snatched the check from my hand, placed the ruined Birkin on my desk, and sneered, “Jessica, you really look down on me now, don’t you?” I kept my hand to my head and didn’t answer. She pressed on, “Everyone has different goals. I don’t think I did anything wrong.” She actually believed she was right. “Chloe,” I said. I forced myself to stand and walked slowly toward her. Ever since they smashed my office, a suffocating anger had been building in my chest. I raised my hand and slapped her hard across the face. Smack! She clutched her cheek just as the office door swung open. No one outside dared to look in. Everyone in the building knew how much I valued Chloe. I had taught her almost everything hands-on. I had been desperate for her to learn the ropes and stand on her own two feet. I had no idea how she had turned into this hollow, greedy shell of a person. Holding her cheek, Chloe let out a cold laugh. “Jessica, every single cent you spent on me all these years, I will wire back into your account. Just you wait.” She turned and stormed out. Emma tentatively poked her head in. “Boss, are you okay?” I dragged my feet back to my desk. That scribbled-on Birkin felt like it was mocking me. I grabbed it. With a heavy thud, I chucked it directly into the trash can. At the same time, my vision went completely black, and I collapsed.

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My friends always told me that I treated Carter too well, and that was exactly why he took me for granted. “If you just gave him the cold shoulder and made him feel a little threatened, let’s see if he’d still dare to act like this,” they’d say. So, during our latest fight, I didn’t back down. A week later, he took the initiative to make peace. A bouquet of flowers, a home-cooked meal, an apology. I thought this was his way of changing. That is, until I accidentally saw the text message she sent him. She said: [Go apologize to Harper. [Be a good boy.] 1 When I stepped out of the shower, Carter was on the phone. He said, “Yeah, don’t worry, I know.” With that, he hung up. The smile on his face hadn’t faded yet, and his mood was noticeably brighter than when he had first shown up at my door. I stopped drying my hair, a sudden knot forming in my chest. It couldn’t be helped—when you know someone intimately, all it takes is one sentence to plant the seed of suspicion. There was nothing inherently scandalous about what he said. But his tone was way too obedient. It was like a rabid dog that had just had its fur petted down. It was completely unlike him. So, I couldn’t help but ask, “Who was that?” “What?” “Who were you just on the phone with?” Carter’s expression cooled slightly. “No one.” He added, “You must be hungry! Go dry your hair, I’m going to start cooking.” With that, he walked into the kitchen. His phone was left sitting on the coffee table. It sat there like a massive temptation. I couldn’t resist. I picked it up. The first thing I checked was the call log. The most recent entry: Mia Brooks. I froze. Mia? Why would it be Mia? “What are you doing?” Carter’s voice suddenly cut through the air. I looked up. Our eyes met. His face was dark, his gaze freezing cold. He took a slow step toward me. “What are you trying to find? “Harper, let me ask you, what exactly are you looking for?” He snatched the phone from my hand and shoved the screen in my face. “Checking to see who I was on the phone with? Yeah, exactly, I was talking to Mia. And? Harper, do I have to report every single person I speak to? Do I need to give you a daily quota of my calls and texts?” He straightened up and tossed the phone roughly onto the sofa. His voice was icy. “Go ahead. Search it all you want.” Carter was angry. His fury was laced with a thinly veiled disappointment. His intense reaction left me frozen in place. My mind was a chaotic blur for a moment until the heavy silence settled between us, and clarity slowly returned. Why did I check Carter’s phone? Because of his gentleness. Because of his obedience. That wasn’t Carter’s personality. He had always been reckless, arrogant, and cocky, even when talking to me. He didn’t do soft words. He didn’t do sweet and gentle. My friends never understood it: “How do you put up with him?” I would just smile and say, “Because I know him.” I knew exactly what tone of voice he used when he realized he was wrong. I understood what his face looked like when he was implicitly backing down. I never needed him to say the actual words; I understood him perfectly. So, when he softened his attitude for someone else… how could I not get suspicious? Meeting Carter’s glare, I picked up his phone again. Over his sharp scoff, I tapped into his text thread with Mia. Their most recent conversation was from 2:00 AM last night. [Mia: Haven’t you made up with Harper yet?] [Carter: Yeah.] [Mia: What is wrong with you? Didn’t I tell you to go apologize?] [Carter: Stay out of it.] [Mia: Carter, go apologize.] [Carter: You don’t get it! Mia, she’s not like you.] [Mia: Of course she’s not like me. That’s why you love her and not me, right?] Carter hadn’t replied to that message. After a three-minute silence, Mia sent two more texts. [Mia: Go apologize to Harper.] [Mia: Carter, be a good boy!] 2 My friends always lectured me: “You treat Carter way too well. You can’t be like that with men, or they’ll push their limits and take you for granted.” At first, I brushed it off. I always believed that when two people are together, there’s no need to keep score of who gives more and who gives less. As long as the relationship was stable and conflicts were resolved, what did it matter who apologized first? Until a month ago. I had gone to a spa with my coworkers after a long shift. Before going, I texted Carter. He didn’t reply. Half an hour later, he kicked open the door to our private massage room. His face was like thunder. He waved his hand aggressively, pointing at the three massage therapists. “Get out! All of you!” Then he glared at me. “Are you leaving or what?” The awkwardness. The sheer humiliation. I wished the floor would swallow me whole. My coworkers were baffled. “Your boyfriend? Why would he disrespect you like that?” Yeah. I didn’t understand it either. “I never embarrass you in public, why would you do something like that to me?” I asked him later. He just sneered. “You care about your dignity? Hiring a male masseuse—you’re really getting wild these days, Harper!” “I already explained it to you. All the female therapists were booked, so we took whoever was available.” “Oh, so they just happened to run out right when it was your turn?” “Yes! They just happened to run out!” “Do I look like an idiot?” My friends tried to comfort me: “He just cares about you. You know how men are—possessive!” But I knew that wasn’t it. Over the last six months, the way Carter looked at me had become increasingly critical. A simple sentence or an innocent gesture could trigger his temper. He was lashing out at me more and more frequently. And time after time, I was the one forced to swallow my pride and beg for peace. I was exhausted. Drained. So this time, when we fought, I packed a bag, left the house we had bought for our upcoming wedding, and moved back into my own apartment. What caused the fight this time? Catching a cheater. The wife of Carter’s childhood best friend came to me, devastated, saying her husband was out partying at a club every night. She asked me to go with her to confront him. Her mental state was terrible, and I was worried about her, so I went. Her husband was there. My fiancé was there, too. The man who, half an hour earlier, had texted me saying he was working late at the office, was sitting in a VIP booth, accepting a shot of tequila from a woman. I didn’t lose my temper. Before I even had the chance to get mad, he exploded. He was absolutely furious. “What the hell are you doing? Harper, do you physically ache if you don’t cause drama for one single day? If you want to act crazy, do it by yourself—why are you dragging other people into it?! Do you have any idea how much of a psycho you look like, running around acting paranoid every day?!” Under the dim, amber lights of the club, I stared at him for a long time. I didn’t say a single word. I turned around and walked away. Even then, I was still trying to protect his pride. I didn’t want to scream and shout in public, right in front of his friends. But I had finally had enough of his baseless rage. It had been a week since I moved out. We had been in a cold war for a solid seven days. He hadn’t sent me a single text or made a single phone call. Until today, when he suddenly showed up at my door. Holding a bouquet of flowers, he said, “Stop being mad. It was my fault!” He bought a bunch of groceries to make my favorite dishes, claiming he was cooking tonight. Carter was a great cook. But aside from holidays and big dinners with friends, he rarely ever cooked. Watching his back as he stood at the counter deveining shrimp, my heart—which had been a chaotic mess for a week—finally settled. It was really that simple for me. As long as he bowed his head just once, everything in the past could be wiped clean. We had been together for almost ten years; what was there that we couldn’t overcome? But now, you’re telling me you didn’t come here on your own. You came because someone else told you to. Be a good boy? Since when did Carter Hayes ever listen to anyone? 3 “Last winter, on that crowded downtown street. A red car blocked the lane, and you literally used your truck to ram it out of the way. The car alarms, the crowds screaming, me begging you to stop. I asked you, ‘Carter, can you please just listen to me for once?’ Do you remember what you said?” “What is your point?” “You said, ‘No!’” Carter’s face looked dreadful. He had always been like this—a violent temper, explosive at the slightest spark. I was furious with him that day. At first, I tried to pull him back. “Don’t do this, I’ll call a tow truck. Let someone else handle it.” He didn’t listen. He just kept inching his truck forward, crushing the bumper. “Carter, that’s enough!” He stepped on the gas. A crowd gathered. People were pulling out their phones to record. Someone was calling the cops. I grabbed his arm, my eyes welling with frustrated tears. “Can you please just listen to me, just this once?” He stared straight ahead, completely deadpan. “No!” That was the kind of man he was. Yet Mia typed one sentence: [Carter, be a good boy.] And he immediately bowed his head. 4 I couldn’t help but ask, “If Mia hadn’t told you to be a good boy, would you have even come looking for me?” Carter took a deep breath, his fists clenching tight. “Harper, stop trying to pick a fight out of nothing!” “So, Mia tells you to obey, and you obey. Is that it?” “Harper, I said that’s enough!” “Is it true?” “Yes! So what?!” Carter violently swept the water glass off the table. It shattered against the floor with a loud crash. He glared at me, his eyes burning with a rage that looked like he wanted to swallow me whole. “You just have to make everything sound filthy, don’t you? You think Mia and I are screwing around? If we were, why the hell would she tell me to come apologize to you?! If you don’t have a brain, keep your mouth shut! You’re paranoid and delusional every single day. Sounds to me like you don’t even want to get married anymore!” “Then let’s not!” “What did you say?” I stood up slowly, my hands trembling violently from the adrenaline rushing through my veins. “I said, the wedding is off. Let’s break up!” Carter lunged forward, backing me up until I stumbled. He gritted his teeth, his voice a low, lethal growl. “Say that one more time.” “I said…” “Shut up!” Panting heavily, Carter brutally kicked a small footstool out of his way. I flinched, biting the inside of my cheek to suppress the scream threatening to tear out of my throat. Carter pointed a finger at me. “Harper, don’t you dare regret this!” He stormed out, slamming the front door so hard the walls shook. The apartment was a wreck. I sank to the floor, burying my face in my hands, and finally broke down sobbing. 5 Between Carter and me, I was the one who chased him. In high school, he was the coolest, most untouchable guy in our grade. I confessed my feelings to him. He tugged at the lanyard holding my student ID. “Harper? Sorry, I don’t date losers with bad grades.” Because of that one sentence… For a solid year, I studied until I bled, clawing my way into the elite AP classes that had previously seemed impossible for me. I found him again. “Am I allowed to date you now?” He gave a half-smile, lazily spinning a pen between his fingers. “Date? Sure. Let’s date.” Dating Carter was exhausting. With his toxic temper, he could piss off a saint. At first, I always felt like he didn’t actually like me that much. Like I was just the girl who chased him, and he just happened to be bored. During one of our fights, I screamed that exact thought at him. Carter’s eyes went completely red. “Out of a graduating class of five hundred kids, why the hell do you think I knew your grades were bad?! Harper, are you an idiot?! Do you honestly think I just say yes to anyone who asks me out?!” Carter’s love was buried incredibly deep. You had to dig for it, carefully uncovering it piece by piece. Once upon a time, I used to find joy in that process. But as the years dragged on, the digging just left me exhausted. I thought to myself: Whatever. I’m done. Three days after I told Carter we were over, my friend Riley threw a birthday party and invited me out for dinner. “Is Carter going? Because we broke up. If he’s going, I’m staying home.” “Why are you guys fighting again?” “It’s not a fight. It’s over for real this time.” “Alright, alright! He said he’s busy tonight anyway. You have to come, or I’m genuinely going to be mad at you!” Riley swore up and down that Carter wouldn’t be there. But when I walked into the private dining room, not only was Carter there… Mia was there too. Mia was sitting at the very back of the room. Carter was standing up, leaning over to hand her a strawberry smoothie. Mia looked up and gave him a soft, sweet smile. Carter noticed me walking in. He gave me a single, indifferent glance before looking away. I turned around to leave, but Riley grabbed my arm. “Don’t cause a scene. I’m the birthday girl, can’t you just give me this one night?” The room was filled with friends we had known for years. Walking out and ruining the vibe for everyone wasn’t something I wanted to do either. So, I stayed. I sat closest to the door and designated myself the karaoke DJ. Every shot or drink my friends handed me, I downed without hesitation. I noticed their hesitant, awkward glances, but I didn’t say a single extra word. Later in the night, for some inexplicable reason, the group started chanting for couples to do cross-armed shots. The two other couples in the room did it while everyone cheered. The only ones left were me and Carter. People started pushing him and pulling me, insisting we couldn’t ruin the game. Riley whispered to me, “Come on, just meet halfway and let it go. Look, we built the staircase for you guys to step down from. Just raise your glass, and he’ll definitely come over.” I froze for a second. Suddenly, I realized that my “breakup” was just being treated as a temper tantrum by everyone around us. They always said: “You two are exhausting. Every time you fight, you act like the world is ending, and we stress out for you. Then the next day, you’re back to being inseparable.” It was the boy who cried wolf. I had said it so many times, no one believed me anymore. I couldn’t help but look across the room at Carter. He was sitting there with his eyes lowered, completely expressionless. Someone tried to physically pull him up, but he shoved their hand away with an annoyed ‘tsk’, looking incredibly irritated. He turned his head to the side. Mia was sitting right there. I watched Mia tilt her chin up slightly. Reading her lips, I saw her say: “Go.” Two seconds of dead silence. Then, Carter picked up his shot glass and stood up abruptly. He walked toward me, staring at me with a heavy, suppressed look in his eyes. He looked like a man being marched to the gallows. I laughed. Suddenly, the whole thing felt incredibly pathetic. I dodged the arm Carter was extending toward me, tilted my head back, and downed the liquor in my glass in one gulp. “You guys have fun. I’m heading out!” Carter’s face instantly plummeted into a terrifying scowl. He glared at me with pure venom. I turned around, pushed the door open, and walked out. The exact moment the heavy door clicked shut behind me, I heard the sharp, violent sound of a glass shattering against the floor.

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I got kidnapped. I told the traffickers, “You can sell me, but I get to pick the buyer, and I keep the money.” The home I meticulously chose was perfect. The guy was a domestic abuser who had already beaten three wives to death. I was number four. The first time we met, he smiled so happily. I was even happier. Finally, I could beat someone to a pulp without holding back. I was at the mall, sipping an iced coffee in the air conditioning, when an older woman approached me and begged for a favor. I could tell at a glance she was up to no good, but I went with her anyway. Mostly because my days were agonizingly boring, and I had nothing to look forward to in life. On the road, she kept making up excuses about why we hadn’t reached our destination yet. I just looked at her and smiled. When I was shoved into the back of a van, I didn’t struggle. When I was locked in a dark room with a few other girls, I didn’t cry. They looked at me like I was a monster. I looked at them like they were useless garbage. If they had the energy to sit around and cry, why weren’t they thinking of a way to escape? Was every path truly blocked? Or had they just weighed the pros and cons and decided to sit around daydreaming, hoping some knight in shining armor would swoop in and save them? I smashed the boarded-up window open with one punch and told them to jump. Instead, one of the girls started screaming at the top of her lungs. I backhanded her across the face. “Idiot.” The kidnapped girls cowered in the corner, sobbing. The ringleader of the trafficking ring came storming in, cursing his head off. Just as he raised his hand to slap me, I caught his wrist and drove my fist squarely into his gut. “Argh—!” A pathetic shriek ripped from his throat. I grabbed him, flipped him over my shoulder, and slammed him onto the floor. I planted my foot firmly on his chest. I heard the distinct, satisfying crunch of ribs breaking. “Ah! God, it hurts, it hurts…” So human traffickers feel pain too. I figured since their consciences had been eaten by dogs, they’d be numb to it by now. A few more of them rushed into the room, men and women. A punch here, a kick there, and I dropped them one by one. They were genuinely, pathetically weak. I dug through their pockets, pulled out their cash, and tossed it to the cowering girls. I raised an eyebrow. “Are you leaving or not?” “Aren’t you coming? Come with us.” I shook my head. Leave? Leave and go where? Back to that massive, empty house? Without my mom, without my little brother, what was I going back for? For these girls I had met by chance, I had done all I could. Whether they made it back safely, whether they called the cops, whether the police caught these scumbags—none of that was my problem anymore. So, as the battered traffickers scrambled to escape, I followed them and hopped right into their van. “…” They stared at me in absolute terror. “Drive. What are you looking at me for? Aren’t you traffickers? Don’t you want to sell me to recoup your losses?” They didn’t dare kick me out, so they gritted their teeth and slammed on the gas. I found it exhilarating. I screamed happily out the window, “Faster! Go faster! Did you not eat breakfast? Or did I not hit you hard enough?” I curled my knuckles and rapped them hard against the driver’s skull. Thump, thump, thump. He literally cried while driving. The other traffickers clutched their seatbelts, pale with terror, shivering like leaves. It wasn’t that they hadn’t tried to ditch me; they just failed. Every time they tried to make a run for it, I hunted them down with perfect precision. “Please, boss, your majesty… we’re begging you, just let us go.” “It’s easy to summon a demon, but hard to send it away,” I smiled. “Want me to leave? Sure. Find me a buyer. Find me a family.” “Just make sure it’s somewhere with pure, old-fashioned folk customs.” … They stared at me in pure horror. They probably thought I was severely brain-damaged. “Deep in the mountains, off the grid, where the cops don’t care. I want to find a place where I can really let loose and practice my combat skills. “Also, I get to pick the buyer, and the money goes into my bank account. Whatever he pays you, you have to match it. You tricked me into coming out here, so you owe me compensation.” The traffickers nodded furiously like bobbleheads. I picked the buyer myself. Deep in the Appalachian backwoods, where they had electricity but no paved roads. It was a two-hour hike just to reach a dirt road where you could catch a rickety local bus. I chose the man myself, too. He looked thick and rugged, standing about five-foot-nine, looked to be in his forties. Rumor had it he had already bought three wives, and he had beaten all three of them to death. That was exactly how the traffickers pitched him to me. To him, they pitched me like this: College student, virgin, very gentle personality. When he looked at me and smiled, he was practically drooling. I looked at him and smiled back. I smiled even brighter than he did. I had to suppress the overwhelming urge to crack my knuckles. They haggled over the price. Eventually, the man agreed to pay five thousand dollars. The traffickers matched it with another five thousand. Ten grand total. I deposited it in the bank myself. As for the traffickers, I tied them all together, locked them in a motel room, and called the cops on them. I took a bus to the rural town alone, carrying only a backpack. When the man saw me, he looked shocked. “Just you?” I nodded. “I’m hungry. Buy me some food, then let’s go home.” My willingness completely stunned him, but the confusion in his eyes was quickly replaced by sheer, creeping joy. After all, I looked fantastic. Pale, soft, delicate, completely helpless, and easy to push around. The man blinked, then grinned. “Alright, I’ll buy you a couple of hotdogs.” I ate my hotdogs as we boarded the rattling local bus. The bus twisted and turned through the mountain passes until it finally stopped at a dirt intersection. “Alright, wifey, we’re here. Get off.” I followed him off the bus and stared up at the steep, winding, rocky mountain trail ahead. I furrowed my brow, softening my voice to sound delicate and whiny. “I can’t walk up that. Carry me.” If he didn’t carry me, I wouldn’t mind unleashing a full MMA combo on him right now. My hands were already itching. The man carried me on his back, trudging up the mountain, panting heavily, sweat pouring down his neck. I enjoyed the scenic mountain views and casually mapped out potential escape routes, just in case. When we stopped to rest, he looked at me, hesitating. “You’re walking the rest of the way yourself.” “?” I raised an eyebrow, looked at him, and suddenly burst out laughing. While he was still staring at me in confusion, I drove my fist straight into his stomach. He howled, stumbling backward a few steps. When he regained his senses, he roared in fury, “You crazy bitch, I’m gonna beat you to death!” Beat me to death? So when he swung his heavy fist at my face, I caught his wrist, flipped him over my shoulder, and slammed him into the dirt. Before he could even process what happened, I rained punches down onto his gut, one after another. “Why do you think I let you buy me? Because I’m lazy and entitled! I came to your house to be pampered! You can’t even carry me up a damn mountain, what use are you?! You pathetic piece of trash.” The angrier I got, the faster my fists fell. At first, he was still cursing and screaming, but eventually, he just started begging for mercy. “Stop hitting me! Stop hitting me!” I finally got tired. I sat down on a nearby rock and glared at him coldly. He lay on the dirt like a dead dog. I stood up and kicked his leg. “Get up. Carry me up the mountain.” “…” The path up the mountain was treacherous. I was actually a little worried he might try to throw me off a cliff, so I unclipped one of my backpack straps and wrapped it twice around his neck like a leash. “If I die, you die with me.” They say a man with nothing to lose fears no one. But I was someone who didn’t even care if I lived or died. Even though the man was hissing in pain with every step, he didn’t dare complain, let alone try anything funny. I didn’t even have to look at him to know his eyes were burning with pure, murderous hatred, plotting how he was going to make me suffer once we got home. The deeper into the mountains we went, the more excited I felt. When we entered the village, the locals—young and old alike—stared at me the way leeches smell blood, or wolves see meat. They greeted the man with drooling grins. “Hey Cletus, is this your new wife?” “Real tender. Mighty pretty.” “Cletus, you know the old rules, right…” The older women looked at me with deep disdain, as if I were something filthy. The younger ones just looked at me with numb, hollow pity. The little kids ran behind us out of curiosity, asking, “Uncle Cletus, is this your new wife?” Cletus’s house was noticeably nicer than the rest of the village. While others lived in rundown wooden shacks or trailers, his house was built of solid stone and brick, with a massive yard. An older woman in a floral blouse walked out. Seeing Cletus carrying me, her face twisted in anger. “What’s this? She ain’t got legs? You have to carry her?!” Cletus set me down. She was clearly used to ruling the roost. Cursing under her breath, she marched up to me and reached out to pinch my arm. “Listen here, you little—” I grabbed her wrist and, with a quick twist, dislocated her arm. “Ahhhh—!” A scream like a slaughtered pig echoed through the yard. Cletus barely had time to yell “Mom!” before I had already raised my hand and slapped her across the face a dozen times. I beat her until her face was bruised and swollen, effectively shutting her up. “You fucking—” Cletus snarled, lunging at me. I shoved his mother aside and smoothly executed a flawless beatdown on him, making absolutely sure I broke at least one arm and one leg. “Ah! Ah! Stop hitting me!” Cletus’s pathetic wails were even louder than his mother’s. The village kids who had followed us to watch the show stood frozen in utter shock. One of them yelled, “Cletus is getting beat up by his new wife!” Cletus’s father was the third person to try his luck. He charged at me swinging a rusted machete. I kicked the blade right out of his hand, followed it up with a few rapid-fire punches, and fractured his old bones. I watched the family of three huddle together in the dirt, shivering and groaning in agony. Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted two little heads peeking out from the doorway. I curled my finger at them. “Come here.” They were two incredibly skinny, frail little girls, probably around ten years old. They were actually very pretty, with huge, terrified eyes full of caution. “Do you know how to cook? I’m hungry.” They nodded frantically. “Go fry me six sunny-side-up eggs. “And listen to me, little ghosts. You better be good. Because I don’t just beat them. I’ll beat you too.” When I go crazy, I run over everyone equally. I don’t discriminate by age or gender. The two girls were terrified of me, but they were even more terrified of Cletus and his parents. So, right in front of their eyes, I gave Cletus and his parents another brutal kicking. “Remember this. From now on, I run this house. Now go make my food.” The closed front gate did nothing to stop the prying eyes of the village. People were peering through the cracks in the wood; some were even climbing up to look over the stone wall. Seeing me sitting in a chair like a reigning queen, while Cletus and his parents cowered in the corner shivering, someone yelled out, “Cletus, you absolute coward! Hit her!” “I’m telling you, these women need to be beaten! You beat ’em a few times, and they fall right into line…” So annoying. They were so loud I couldn’t even properly savor the post-beatdown dopamine rush. I picked up a sharp stone from the dirt and flicked it hard. “Ow! My teeth, my teeth…” A man clutched his bleeding mouth, screaming in pain. Someone saw me flick the stone and pointed a shaking finger at me, screeching, “It was her! Cletus’s new bitch threw that rock…” “Bubba, get in there and beat that bitch to the ground! You can’t let her disrespect our whole town!” Fueled by the rage of losing his teeth and the egging on of the crowd, Bubba let the adrenaline go straight to his head. He vaulted over the stone wall and charged at me. “I’ll kill you, you dirty whore!” I had actually held back on Cletus’s family. I figured I wanted to beat them up for fun every single day, so I couldn’t kill them all at once. But seeing the righteous indignation of these backwoods villagers, I knew my days here wouldn’t be boring. So I didn’t hold back on Bubba. I drove my fist straight into his face. Teeth and blood sprayed across the dirt. The crowd yelling “kill her, beat that bitch to death” instantly went dead silent. “Stop hitting me, stop hitting me…” Bubba slurred his pleas, dropping to his knees and slamming his forehead against the dirt repeatedly. So men really do feel pain. When they realize they can’t win, they really do beg for mercy. “Mayor Caldwell is here!” Someone bravely jumped down from the wall and scurried over to unlock the front gate. Mayor Caldwell was a scrawny, dark-skinned man in his sixties. He walked into the yard with his hands clasped behind his back, exuding authority and fury—though he kept a safe distance from me. “So you’re Cletus’s new wife? You’ve got some nerve, causing a scene in my town…” “Are you afraid to die?” I asked the Mayor, flashing him a bright, ecstatic smile. “Because I’m not.” Being challenged so brazenly, the Mayor’s wrinkled face twitched in rage. His absolute authority in this holler could not be challenged by a mere woman. He rattled off a string of names. “Take her down.” A dozen rugged men rolled up their sleeves and marched toward me. I literally squealed in excitement. “Come at me all at once!” This time, I didn’t pull my punches. Watching them drop to the dirt one by one, my adrenaline spiked higher and higher. Finally, the last one collapsed, sobbing and begging me to stop.

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After my system romance mission failed, I returned to my original world. I got married and had a child. Until seven years later, the System tracked me down— “The mental state of your original target is highly unstable. “And your first child is crying, demanding to see you. “Host, could you go back and take one last look?” 1 I hadn’t been in contact with the System for years. When it finally reappeared, my husband, David, and I were walking back from the amusement park with our son. Noah was tugging at my hand, whining for McDonald’s for dinner. I was just about to scold him and tell him he’d had enough burgers for the week, when— Suddenly. A familiar electronic hum echoed in my ear. Then came the System’s robotic voice. “Host, long time no see.” It looked at our happy family of three and seemed to choke up, unsure of how to begin. “It’s like this. “Do you remember that novel transmigration mission from years ago? “Ever since you left, the target’s mental state has been steadily deteriorating. He’s incredibly unstable now. “And the son you gave birth to back then… he’s crying and demanding to see you. “Could you… go back and check on the two of them?” 2 I froze. To say I had forgotten that part of my life would be a lie. Back then, I had been diagnosed with terminal cancer. I had less than three years to live. During the most agonizing phase of my treatment, I was bound to this romance System. I was pulled into an angst-filled, second-chance romance novel. My mission was to win the heart of the devoted second male lead. As long as he abandoned his entanglement with the male and female leads and agreed to marry me, my mission would be a success. I would be allowed to stay in that world in that body forever. If I returned to my original world, I didn’t have much time left anyway. So, I cherished the opportunity. When Arthur was ultimately rejected by the female lead, Chloe, I stayed by his side. I comforted him. I kept him company. Slowly. His cold demeanor toward me softened into something gentle and attentive. Later, after a messy, drunken night, I got pregnant. I thought that was it. I thought we were going to get married. But his tone suddenly turned ice-cold. “Samantha. “You come from nothing. I can’t marry you yet. “Have the child. Once he grows up a bit and the family officially accepts him, then we’ll get married.” 3 That was my first child. I named him Leo. I poured all my blood, sweat, and tears into raising him. The Sterling family was a billionaire dynasty. They controlled dozens of publicly traded companies and had their hands in countless industries. Arthur was the eldest son. Even though I was looked down upon, Leo, as the eldest grandson, was highly valued by the entire family. Almost every week, he was chauffeured back to the family manor so his grandparents could dote on him. By his first birthday, his first trust fund had already been established. When he was three or four, I was still used to calling an Uber to take him out, but Leo could already distinguish between the bespoke leather interiors of a Rolls-Royce and a Bentley. When he was five or six, I held him in my lap and tried to teach him basic addition and subtraction. He suddenly threw his pencil down. He looked up at me. “I’m going to inherit the company anyway. What’s the point of learning this?” … I never expected words like that to come out of a little child’s mouth. That day, I gave him a long, stern lecture. Leo threw a massive tantrum and cried. Unable to watch, Arthur intervened and took him back to the main estate. The father and son didn’t return to our apartment for a long time. The next time I saw them, months had passed. I had packed a homemade lunch and went to the estate to pick Leo up, planning to apologize and tell him Mommy had been too harsh. Instead, I watched him step out of a sleek black luxury SUV. His left hand was holding Arthur’s, and his right hand was holding the hand of a woman in designer heels. In his sweet, childish voice, I heard him say: “Chloe, you should marry my dad! “My mom and dad aren’t married anyway, so you can marry him!” 4 I stood frozen in place, clutching the lunchbox. Chloe was the female lead of this world. After going around in circles, she had come back. She tilted her head, sneaking a glance at Arthur, and smiled. “Why? Don’t you want your mommy and daddy to be together?” Leo hesitated. “But… Grandpa and Grandma don’t like my mom. “And Dad doesn’t like her either.” Arthur remained completely silent. His expression was blank. He didn’t say a single word. —I really should have seen it coming. I had just been harboring a pathetic, naive fantasy that things would somehow get better. But they didn’t. The devoted second male lead would always be drawn back to the female lead. Even the child I gave birth to was no exception. It made me look like an absolute joke. I didn’t speak to anyone. I just turned around and walked away. That night, I rebooted the System. “I forfeit this mission. “I want to go home.” 5 The System was utterly shocked by my decision to quit. “Host, why? “Even if the target won’t marry you, you can just wait it out. “As long as he doesn’t marry anyone else, you can stay here indefinitely.” I thought of the way Leo had looked up at Chloe. I let out a self-deprecating laugh. Honestly, with the female lead back in the picture, given Arthur’s personality, he would undoubtedly choose to be with her eventually. I might as well return to reality. Who knows, if I catch my cancer early enough, I might be able to squeeze out a few more years. Seeing my resolve, the System’s usually flat, mechanical voice let out a heavy sigh. “Understood. “Give me a moment, Host. I’ll submit an appeal to my superiors and see if I can help you out.” When it returned, a full night had passed. This time, the System’s volume was noticeably louder. “Host, my appeal was approved! “You can go home. You’ll return to the exact moment you first transmigrated here. “I pooled all the mission points you earned here, plus some of my own personal savings from past jobs… and bought you a perfectly healthy body. So when you go back, your cancer will be completely cured. “Don’t worry.” I was stunned. I asked instinctively, “You used your own points? Won’t you get in trouble?” The System hummed dismissively. “It’s fine. “We’re supposed to build good relationships with our Hosts anyway. “If I ever need a favor in the future, I might have to bother you.” 6 True to its word, after I returned to the real world, the System cured my cancer. I lived life like a normal person. I met a man I loved, and who loved me. And I had my second child. The System never appeared again— Until today. Its tone was incredibly defeated. “The main issue is that the kid, Leo, is showing severe signs of walking down a dark path. He’s thirteen now. “But his mindset is bizarrely mature and detached. He’s completely isolated and has no friends. “We’re terrified he’s going to grow up into a major villain. “So we want to beg you, Host… Could you please go back and just keep him company for one month?” I thought back to the day I abandoned the mission. If the System hadn’t used its own points to petition its superiors for me, I might not even be alive right now. So, even though I deeply, truly did not want to return to that world. I decided to say yes. “But,” I said. “I have to discuss this with my husband first. “After all, I’m married now.” The System immediately agreed. “Yes, of course. “I’ll wait for you.” My husband, David, knew all about this chapter of my life. He was an architect. He was also my boss. Before we officially started dating, I had confessed the entire story of my transmigration to him. So when he heard the word “System,” he didn’t look surprised. He just stopped chopping vegetables. He looked at me, his breathing hitching slightly. “Sam, you’re going back? “Will you… not come back?”

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After a massive fight with my billionaire parents, they cut off my allowance. Out of spite, I hooked up with the CEO of my dad’s biggest rival company. He was famously known as Manhattan’s untouchable golden boy. He spoiled me and was incredibly generous, but the one thing he refused to give me was a real title. When his friends asked, he casually shook his head— “Marriage requires equal social standing. “Harper comes from nothing; I’d never marry her. “But as a canary to keep in a gilded cage, she does nicely.” I sneered coldly in my heart. My dad had already lost his patience with my stubborn streak. Not only had he caved and decided to hand the family empire over to me, but he was also preparing to set me up with a billionaire heir of his own choosing. 1 By our third year together, I had actually started to fall for Carter Vance. On our anniversary, I specifically took the day off from my university classes. Using my scholarship money, I bought him a limited-edition watch as a gift and secretly sneaked into the VIP lounge of his favorite club, wanting to give him a huge surprise. But the moment my hand touched the door handle… I heard the sound of him and his friends laughing inside. Someone brought me up. “Carter. “You haven’t actually caught feelings for that broke college student, have you? “You even rented out a downtown gallery space for her. That real estate is not cheap!” … My heart slowly leaped into my throat. The gallery? For an art student without financial backing or industry connections, even with a strong portfolio, hosting a solo exhibition was practically impossible. I had mentioned it to him in passing once… I didn’t expect him to actually remember. I gripped the gift bag tightly in my hand. Just as I was about to burst into the room and give him a massive hug— The next second. I heard Carter’s icy, cynical voice. “Oh, please. Feelings? “It’s just a few hundred grand. Just a way to amuse a naive girl who’s never seen the real world.” The room erupted into laughter. One of his friends even started clapping. “…Throwing money around is definitely the easiest way to handle these pretty, powerless girls. “And here I thought you were actually planning to marry her.” I heard the clink of Carter picking up his whiskey glass. His tone grew completely indifferent. “Marry her? “Marriage requires equal social standing. “Harper’s background is trash. But as a canary to keep in a gilded cage, I don’t mind funding her lifestyle.” 2 I looked down at the gift box in my hands. The watch was around five thousand dollars. It was nothing compared to the priceless timepieces in Carter’s collection. But it was bought with every cent of the academic scholarship I had earned. Now, it just felt laughable. The gentleness and pampering I thought were real… Were nothing but a disguise hiding his deep prejudice and arrogance. The truth was, from the very beginning, he had always looked down on me because of my “status.” The warmth that had just blossomed in my heart slowly turned to ice, frozen over by disappointment and anger. I smiled bitterly and placed the watch inside a storage locker in the hallway outside the lounge. Carter. Consider your wish granted— We are done. After leaving the club, I caught a cab back to my dorm. I usually spent most of my time living at Carter’s penthouse. Now, it was time to pack up and move my things back to campus. Just as I reached the entrance of my dorm building. My phone rang. It was an unknown number. When I answered— It was my dad. “Sweetheart. “It’s been two years. Are you still mad at your old man? “If you want to study art, then study art! Dad will buy you a gallery, I’ll hire world-class masters to tutor you… “You’re a pampered heiress, you’ve never had to lift a finger. You must be suffering so much out there on your own.” Hearing my father’s voice so suddenly, the tears instantly fell. The regret peaked in my chest. Why was I so stubborn back then? Just because I wanted to major in Fine Arts instead of Business, I had a catastrophic fight with my parents. Out of spite, I ran away from home and blocked all their numbers. My parents probably assumed my spoiled temper wouldn’t last long in the real world. They figured I’d come crawling back eventually. But neither of us expected it to take this long for them to track me down again. I wiped the tears from the corners of my eyes and steadied my breathing. I gave a soft, small hum. “I was too rebellious. “Dad, I’m done throwing tantrums. “Can you guys come pick me up and take me home?” 3 The drive from their estate to my university wasn’t short. But my dad hung up the phone and practically flew here. It only took him thirty minutes. My mom and our head housekeeper, Martha, came along too. When my roommates saw the gleaming Rolls-Royce parked outside the dorm, followed by my parents dripping in quiet luxury, their jaws hit the floor. “Harper, your family is this rich…? Were you just slumming it for the life experience?!” My mom took one look at my cramped, shabby dorm room. Her reaction wasn’t far off from my roommate’s. “Harper, what kind of life have you been living?! “Why do you barely have any skincare products… could you not even afford the basics?” The truth was, the vast majority of my things were still at Carter’s penthouse. I opened my mouth. But I decided to swallow the truth. Carter’s father and my dad used to be bitter rivals. They actually grew up together as best friends, but a brutal battle over a massive corporate merger years ago caused a permanent rift between them. I’ll admit it. The first time I met Carter, aside from the fact that I was genuinely struggling financially… I also approached him out of spite against my parents. I played the role of an innocent, naive little flower. I lured him into letting me stay by his side. But I foolishly thought that after two years… We had actually developed real feelings. I had even planned to confess my true identity to him tonight. Instead, he hit me with a brutal reality check. His actions proved that my fantasies about him… Were nothing but a pathetic illusion. 4 While I was lost in thought, my dad was busy stuffing my meager belongings into the trunk of the car. He turned around and awkwardly patted my head. He looked like he wanted to say something, but was hesitating. “Harper, you really want to pursue art, right? We won’t interfere anymore…” “It’s fine.” I looked up. I cut my father off: “I’ll join the company.” Honestly, the moment I picked up his phone call, I had already made up my mind. My parents only had one child. The Sterling Empire needed a successor. Our business spanned the entire globe; we were apex predators in the industry. Could they really hand an empire like that over to an outsider? My father had only forced me to study business because he had to consider the legacy. I was just too immature back then. I thought my hobbies and dreams were more important than anything. Thinking about it now… I love painting. But I can easily pursue it in my free time. It doesn’t conflict with taking over the family business. I smiled and hugged my dad’s arm. “Dad, I fully realize how naive my old mindset was. “But I know absolutely nothing about the corporate world right now… “I’ll probably have to start from the very bottom.” I might not know business, but I wasn’t stupid. If I truly wanted to take the reins of a global enterprise, I needed a massive amount of theoretical and practical experience. Having a seasoned mentor was an absolute necessity. My dad glanced at me, stunned for a second. Then, a huge smile broke across his face. “I’m too swamped with the new quarter to mentor you personally. “But don’t worry. “I’ll find you a tutor to teach you the ropes.” He paused, as if a brilliant idea just struck him. He added confidently, “Don’t worry, you two will definitely hit it off.”

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My mother once spent fifty million dollars to build a secluded, fully immersive nineteenth-century estate in the remote mountains of Montana. She did it to convince my father he had lost his mind and slipped through time. It was her revenge. Years prior, when my father tried to file for divorce, he had hired people to expose her affair online, nearly driving her lover, Joshua, to a nervous breakdown. So, my mother trapped him. Once inside her twisted historical replica, my father was sold into the estate’s darkest quarters—an underground parlor catering to the depraved fantasies of the ultra-rich. When he tried to run, they shattered his leg. For three years, he was forced to live as an indentured servant. A slave. Three years later, my mother finally pulled off the mask. She stood over him, looking down at his broken body kneeling on the floor, and smiled. She asked him how it felt to be nothing but a dog for all those years. She asked if he had finally learned his lesson. My father pressed his forehead against the hardwood. His voice didn’t carry a single tremor of emotion as he whispered, “Whatever my Lady commands.” My mother froze for a fraction of a second, but then her smile returned, smug and satisfied. I threw myself into my father’s arms, sobbing uncontrollably. He held me tight, his tears dropping hot and fast into the crook of my neck. He whispered that he was so sorry, that he had to leave me soon, but that he would make sure everything was taken care of before he did. 1. I thought he was just talking out of grief. After all, anyone who had survived what he just went through would be pushed to the edge. I clung to his neck with a death grip, choking on my tears. “Dad, where are you going?” He didn’t answer right away. He gently wiped my cheeks with his calloused thumbs before speaking in a voice so soft it felt like a ghost. “You might not understand this, Fallon.” “I was written into this world. I was bound to a System, sent here with one directive: to help your mother build her empire.” “Now that her company has gone public, my assignment is over. I can go back.” “I wanted to wait until you were grown, but now…” He trailed off, unable to finish the sentence. I was eight years old. I didn’t understand what he meant by being “written into this world,” or what a “System” was. But I understood one thing with terrifying clarity. If he left, I would never see him again. “Can I come with you?” I begged. My father opened his mouth to speak, but the sound of footsteps echoed behind us. My mother walked in. She was still wearing the elaborate, corseted Lauran gown she had worn for her grand reveal, holding her iPhone like she had just stepped off a movie set. “The car will be here any minute.” She placed a hand heavily on my father’s shoulder. Her tone was unnervingly gentle, sickeningly sweet. “Simon, I haven’t forgotten how you supported me when I had nothing. As long as you don’t cause any more scenes, I will never let anyone take your place as my husband.” “Go home. Learn to get along with Joshua. We can go back to being the loving family we used to be.” My father lowered his head and bowed his shoulders. His eyes were as dead and empty as a dried-up well. There was absolutely nothing left behind them. “Rest assured. This servant knows his place.” The black SUV arrived. My father limped toward the passenger door. He moved agonizingly slowly, dragging his shattered leg behind him. The sole of his shoe scraped against the pavement, a dry, grating sound that made my chest ache. My mother glanced back at him, her gaze faltering for just a second. I grabbed a fistful of my father’s jacket and trailed behind him. He used to walk so fast. I always had to jog to keep up. He used to turn around, walking backward with a huge grin, calling out, “Hurry up, Fallon!” Then he would wait for me to crash into his legs and scoop up my hand. Now, he could barely stand straight. We arrived at the Chicago estate. Joshua was standing on the front steps, holding a six-month-old baby in his arms. Joshua was my uncle. My father’s own younger brother. He had moved into our house three years ago. He wore the finest designer clothes, drove the best cars, and had the household staff calling him “Sir.” The baby, Toby, was his and my mother’s illegitimate son. Joshua’s eyes swept over my father, a mocking smile playing on his lips. “Welcome home, brother.” My father looked at the baby in Joshua’s arms. His hands, hanging limply at his sides, curled into tight fists. But his eyes remained a void. Slowly, his knees buckled, and he dropped to the ground. “This servant greets the Master.” Joshua froze. When the shock wore off, a cruel, breathless laugh escaped his lips. My mother’s face darkened immediately. “Simon, you’re home now. You don’t have to play the servant anymore.” Joshua’s smile vanished, a flicker of raw hatred flashing through his eyes. “Yes, ma’am,” my father replied, his voice painfully submissive. My mother sighed, rubbing her temples. “Let’s just go inside.” The moment we stepped into the grand foyer, I saw my grandparents sitting in the living room. My grandfather was flipping through a copy of Forbes. My grandmother was pouring tea. The coffee table was adorned with an elaborate fruit platter, heavily featuring imported strawberries—Joshua’s favorite. Joshua handed the baby to a nanny and hurried over to the sofa, looping his arm affectionately through my grandmother’s. “Mom, Dad. Look who’s back.” Upon seeing my father, my grandmother slammed her porcelain teacup down onto the glass table with a sharp clack. Her face was a mask of cold disgust. “You caused enough of a scandal three years ago. Now that you’ve crawled back, I expect you to keep your head down.” “Because of your little stunt, the internet is still calling Joshua a homewrecker. You’ve dragged the Garrison family name through the mud!” My grandfather didn’t even look up from his magazine. He just casually turned the page. “If you were half as understanding as Joshua, you wouldn’t have ended up in this pathetic state.” I stood next to my father, my tiny fists trembling. I wanted to scream. I wanted to tell them that he had been locked away in a nightmare for three years. That his leg was broken. Why wasn’t anyone hugging him? Why wasn’t anyone asking if he was okay? But I swallowed the words. The last time I said something bad about Joshua, my grandmother slapped me across the face. She called me a feral brat and said my father had poisoned my mind. Beside me, my father dropped to his knees again. “This servant begs for forgiveness.” The living room fell into a suffocating silence. My grandmother scoffed, rolling her eyes. “Oh, please. He’s just playing the victim to get sympathy.” My mother stepped forward, patting my father’s trembling shoulder. “Mom, Dad. Simon has been out there for three years. He hasn’t readjusted yet. Give him time.” She turned to me. “Fallon, take your father up to your room so he can rest.” “Okay,” I whispered. I grabbed my father’s ice-cold hand and led him up the sweeping staircase. From the living room, my grandmother’s voice drifted up, sharp and grating. “Don’t coddle him, Laura. He’s always been painfully stubborn. Ignore him for a few days and he’ll snap out of it.” I closed my bedroom door. The moment the lock clicked, it was just the two of us. Instantly, the cowardly, vacant look in my father’s eyes vanished, replaced by a razor-sharp clarity. He dropped to his good knee and cupped my face in his hands. “Fallon. Give me your smartwatch.” I blinked in surprise, but quickly unbuckled the pink watch and handed it over. He dialed a number from memory. It picked up on the second ring. “Victor.” I knew that name. Victor was my father’s private wealth attorney. “I need you to set up an irrevocable trust in Fallon’s name. Transfer everything—the real estate, the equity, the liquid cash. All of it.” “And Victor… start preparing Fallon’s immigration papers. Get her out of the country.” When he hung up, my father pulled me into his chest, burying his face in my hair. His embrace felt exactly the same as it always had. Warm. Safe. Home. 2. That night was the first time in three years I slept without waking up crying. But when I opened my eyes the next morning, the bed beside me was empty. “Dad!” I panicked, my voice shaking as I sprinted barefoot out into the hallway. “Ahhh—!” A blood-curdling scream erupted from the master bedroom. It was Joshua. Seconds later, Toby’s high-pitched wails pierced the air. Joshua stumbled backward out of the bedroom, clutching Toby to his chest in pure terror. Blood was dripping down the baby’s arm. “Simon! Please! If you want to kill someone, kill me! Don’t hurt Toby! He’s innocent!” My heart plummeted into my stomach. By the time I reached the doorway, my mother had already sprinted out of her home office. My grandparents were practically falling over themselves as they rushed up the stairs. My father stood inside the bedroom, his face deathly pale. A bloody fruit knife lay on the carpet at his feet. He looked at the crowd gathering in the hall, his voice weak and desperate. “I just came to tell him breakfast was ready. I didn’t…” Smack. My grandmother’s hand collided with my father’s face. His head snapped to the side, a red welt instantly blooming across his cheek. “You psycho!” My grandmother shrieked, her hand still vibrating in the air. “That is your brother’s child! How could you?” “What kind of monster did I give birth to?!” My grandfather stood rigidly behind her, his voice dark and heavy. “You tore this family apart three years ago, and on your first day back, you try to commit murder. Do you have any humanity left?” My mother finished inspecting Toby’s arm. She turned to look at my father. Her eyes were overflowing with disgust. “I thought three years in the Colony would have taught you some humility. I didn’t realize you were still this venomous.” “It seems you need another tour.” At the mention of “the Colony,” the dam finally broke. Stark, unfiltered panic seized my father’s eyes. He threw himself to the floor, crawling on his hands and knees to grab the hem of my mother’s slacks. His eyes were completely bloodshot. “Laura, please. You have to believe me.” “I only came up here to tell him breakfast was ready, I swear to God I didn’t touch the knife—” “If it wasn’t you, then who? You expect us to believe your brother stabbed his own baby?” my grandmother roared. “Do you think we’re stupid?!” Joshua took a step back, clutching Toby tighter, tears streaming down his flawless face. “Mom, Dad… please, don’t yell at him…” He lowered his head, his voice shrinking into a pathetic whimper. “It’s all my fault…” I stood there, watching my family tear my father apart, my entire body violently shaking. “It wasn’t my dad!” I lunged forward, throwing my arms out wide to shield him. “My dad would never hurt anyone! He’s never hurt a fly!” My mother looked at me, then down at my father. Her expression was unreadable. Then, Joshua spoke up, his voice dripping with faux-concern. “Do you think… maybe his mind finally broke?” He shot my father a pitiful look. “I mean… after three years in a place like that…” My mother flinched. My grandmother latched onto the idea instantly. “Yes! He’s sick in the head! No sane person would do something like this!” “He can’t stay in this house,” my grandfather declared. “Send him to the hospital for a psychiatric evaluation. If he’s crazy, lock him up in an asylum before he kills us all.” My father dragged himself forward on his bad leg, his knuckles turning white as he gripped my mother’s pants. “Laura. I’m not crazy. I swear to you, my mind is fine.” “Just let me stay with Fallon. I’ll do whatever you want. I’ll be whatever you want.” My mother stared down at him, her face completely blank. “Take Toby to get stitched up,” she ordered the room, her voice devoid of emotion. “I’m taking him for an evaluation.” The fragile light left in my father’s eyes extinguished in an instant. He crumpled, his body collapsing against the floor like a puppet with its strings cut. “Dad! Dad—!” I screamed his name, shaking his shoulders with all my tiny might. He didn’t move. My grandmother nudged his ribs with her shoe. “Stop faking it. Get up!” “Don’t touch him!” I shrieked so loudly it echoed off the vaulted ceiling. My grandmother jumped back in genuine shock. “Have you lost your mind?!” Her face turned a mottled purple. “Is this how your father taught you to speak to your elders?” “You don’t even treat him like your son!” I sobbed, the words ripping out of my throat. “You only love Joshua! You never loved him!” “You little—” My mother stepped back into the room. She knelt beside my father and pressed two fingers to his neck. All the color drained from her face. “Call a doctor.” She stood up, her voice cracking with sudden, raw panic. “Call a fucking ambulance! Now!” At the hospital, they rushed him straight into the ER. It felt like a lifetime before they finally moved him to a private room. The attending doctor stepped out, giving my mother a look I couldn’t quite decipher—a mix of pity and profound judgment. “The patient’s physical condition is catastrophic. He is suffering from severe, prolonged malnutrition and bodily trauma.” My mother stood in the fluorescent hallway, her face unreadable. I ran into the room. My father was lying in the hospital bed, IV lines snaking into his bruised arms. He looked like a ghost. He weakly lifted a hand and wiped the tears from my cheeks. “Don’t be scared, sweetheart. Dad’s okay.” He looked past me, his gaze landing on my mother standing in the doorway. He softened his voice. “Fallon, go wait outside for a minute. I need to talk to your mother.” I didn’t want to leave. But I forced my feet to move. I didn’t close the door all the way. Through the narrow crack, I watched my father look at the woman who had ruined his life. His eyes were steady, unyielding. “Laura. I’m sending Fallon out of the country.” 3. “Are you insane? She’s eight years old.” My mother’s voice rose, laced with the indignant anger of someone who wasn’t used to being defied. “Is this another one of your tantrums?” “I’m not throwing a tantrum.” “I can accept sharing a life with Joshua. I will keep my head down, play my part, and never betray you.” He said it with a chilling emptiness, like he was reciting terms and conditions. “But Fallon is not growing up in that house.” As he spoke, he pushed the blankets aside. Barefoot, he stepped onto the cold linoleum floor. His bad knee buckled, and he dropped to the ground. “I am begging you. Let her go.” He pressed his forehead to the hospital floor. My heart shattered into a million jagged pieces. “Dad,” I whimpered through the crack in the door. My mother stared at him. Her eyes were dark, her lips pressed into a thin, white line. “Fine. She can go abroad,” she finally said, her voice sounding hollow, as if coming from very far away. “But you are staying.” I couldn’t take it anymore. I shoved the door open and sprinted inside. “I don’t want to go!” My father looked up, his eyes tracing the tears streaming down my face. He reached out and pulled me into his chest. He was so thin now. His collarbones dug painfully into my cheek, but his warmth was still there. “Be good, Fallon.” He patted my back, slow and steady, just like he used to when I had a nightmare. A few days later, they discharged him. Back at the house, Joshua and my grandparents treated him like a ticking time bomb, fully buying into the narrative that he was a violent schizophrenic. My father spent almost every hour in my bedroom. He held me. He read me stories. But a heavy, suffocating dread sat in my chest. At the dinner table, he would keep his head down, chewing his food with agonizing slowness, refusing to make eye contact with anyone. One evening, my mother set her fork down and cleared her throat. “The company’s tenth-anniversary gala is this weekend. Joshua will be attending as my plus-one.” “There will be a lot of press there. I have to think about Mercer Holdings’ public image.” A fleeting look of triumph crossed Joshua’s face, though he quickly masked it. He lowered his head, his voice a perfect pitch of feigned innocence. “Laura… won’t it look bad if Simon isn’t there?” “Whatever you decide is fine,” my father interrupted quietly. My mother looked at him, her mouth opening as if to argue, but ultimately, she said nothing. The night of the gala, the house was entirely empty except for my father and me. The late afternoon sun spilled through the floor-to-ceiling windows, painting the plush carpets in strokes of gold. My father was sitting on the sofa, a needle and thread in his hands, carefully stitching up a tear in my favorite stuffed rabbit. I rested my chin on his knee, watching his deft fingers work. “Dad? Do I really have to leave?” I asked softly. His hands stopped. The needle hovered in mid-air. “I don’t want you to leave either,” he murmured, his voice so fragile it felt like a heavy breath would shatter it. “But I don’t have the time to watch you grow up anymore.” “Why don’t you have time?” “Because Dad has to go back home.” He said it so casually. Too casually for a goodbye. I sat up straight and looked him dead in the eye. “Can’t you take me with you?” “I would give anything to take you with me. But the System won’t allow it.” He offered me a broken, bitter smile, and reached out to smooth my hair. “Don’t worry. I’ve arranged everything with Victor. He’s going to take very good care of you.” “He’ll handle your schools. He’ll manage your trust. When you grow up, you can come back if you want, or you can stay over there forever. It’s your choice.” “Study hard. Eat well. Sleep well.” “Don’t trust people so easily.” “Never let anyone make you feel small.” “And if anyone ever bullies you—” He choked on the words. His eyes grew bright and rimmed with red, but he refused to let the tears fall. Crash—! The front door was violently kicked open. A group of unfamiliar men stood in the entryway. The guy in the front wore a distressed leather jacket. A jagged scar cut violently across his face, running from his eyebrow down to his cheekbone. Behind him stood three absolute mountains of men. “Who are you?” my father demanded, a tremor finally breaking through his voice. “What do you want?” The scarred man grinned, revealing a row of yellow, smoke-stained teeth. “Someone paid us good money to take the man of the house on a little trip.” His predatory gaze slid from my father’s face down to me. The way he looked at me made my blood run cold. I squeezed my father’s hand. He squeezed back, pushing me behind his body. “I’ll go with you,” my father said, his voice dropping into a dead, terrifying calm. “Just don’t touch my daughter.” The scarred man tilted his head, sizing him up. “Fair enough.” He flicked his wrist. Two of the giants lunged forward. One of them grabbed my arm, ripping me away from my father. The other pulled out a roll of duct tape and zip ties. In seconds, my wrists were bound, and a piece of tape was slapped brutally across my mouth. “Mmph—!” I thrashed wildly, but I was just a little girl. My struggles meant absolutely nothing to them. “Fallon—!” My father surged forward, but the scarred man slammed a hand into his chest, shoving him back. “Easy now,” the man sneered. “You cooperate, and we won’t lay a finger on the kid.” “What exactly do you want from me?” 4. They shoved me into the coat closet. When I finally woke up, it was the next day. The internet had exploded. #LauraMercerHusbandCheats #BillionaireCEO_Betrayed #SimonGarrison Three trending hashtags dominated every social media platform. The views were in the billions. Attached to the articles were blurry, highly explicit photos of my father and several strange men in a hotel room. His shirt was ripped open. His face was angled perfectly toward the camera. The comment sections were a bloodbath. “Laura gave him everything, and this is how he repays her?” “Cheating with men? Disgusting. He’s damaged goods now.” “Divorce him and leave him with nothing.” “Poor Laura. Built an empire just to be backstabbed by a leech.” At 10:00 AM, Laura Mercer held a live press conference. She stood at the podium in a razor-sharp charcoal suit. Her eyes were perfectly red-rimmed. Her voice was masterfully hoarse. “I want to thank everyone for respecting my family’s privacy during this time.” She bowed deeply to the flashing cameras. “Regarding my husband’s actions… I prefer not to comment extensively. He was with me when I had nothing. We survived a lot of hardships together. This was likely just a momentary lapse in judgment.” “I have decided to forgive him.” “After all, he is the father of my child.” The live chat erupted. “Laura is a saint!” “She’s taking him back?! She’s too pure for this world.” “Absolute queen behavior.” “Simon doesn’t deserve her!” I locked my phone screen. I looked up at my father, who was sitting quietly by the window, staring out at nothing. A few days later, the news cycle moved on. The house returned to a suffocating peace, as if the destruction of my father’s dignity had never happened. Once my visa for London was approved, my father took me to the airport. He handed my suitcase to the man standing next to me. “Take care of her, Victor.” “I will,” the lawyer replied. Victor was in his late thirties, a stoic, quiet man who radiated reliability. “Take care of yourself.” Victor took my hand and led me toward the security gates. As I boarded the plane, as the engines began to roar, I could have sworn I heard my father’s voice. It didn’t come from the terminal. It felt like it was echoing out of the empty air. “System. Please. Take me home.” “Goodbye, baby girl.” “Daddy loves you.”

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “445301”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

I’ve always been able to see the words. They hover in the air, glowing like neon dust, scrolling endlessly across my vision from the moment I first opened my eyes. For a long time, I couldn’t understand what those frantic, floating symbols meant. Until the afternoon my mother suddenly collapsed beside her easel, her face draining to the color of crushed chalk. In that terrifying instant, the phantom words snapping through the air sharpened into brutal clarity: [CRITICAL WARNING! She’s been painting straight through the night for a week! Her heart is giving out!] [Oh god, her four-year-old is just standing there… She doesn’t know she’s watching her mother miss the golden window for resuscitation…] [By the time the neighbor finds them, it’ll be too late. Poor little Remi is going to end up in the foster system.] [And Vaughn Croft? That visionary, untouchable Hollywood director will die never knowing Camille had his child. He’ll never know she literally worked herself to death trying to keep them afloat.] I scrubbed the tears from my cheeks with the back of a paint-stained hand, a single, fierce thought anchoring me: I will not let my mother die. And I am not going to any place called a foster system. You adults always try to bury the truth, hiding behind your pride and your secrets. This time, I was going to do the talking. Three days later, amidst the chaotic, screaming throng of a major Los Angeles film set, I shoved my way through a sea of crew members. I stopped dead in front of a towering man glaring at a playback monitor. Pulling every ounce of air into my tiny lungs, I screamed, “Daddy! Mommy is dying, and you have to save her right now!” 1 From a very young age, I knew my world was built differently from everyone else’s. Where other kids just saw a blue California sky, I saw a canvas layered with translucent, scrolling comment bubbles. My mother, Camille, was a gentle, fiercely talented painter. She used to brush a thumb over my cheek and call me her perfect little muse. Whenever I zoned out, tracking the invisible text floating across the ceiling, she thought I was just lost in my own vivid imagination. She even painted me like that once—eyes wide, staring at a secret universe. I was never daydreaming. I was just trying to decipher the noise. Camille had taught me well; at four years old, I could already read far beyond my age. Today, she wasn’t herself. She was slumped against her heavy wooden easel, clutching her chest, her skin alarmingly ashen. I tugged at her paint-splattered jeans, begging her to lie down, but she just offered me a frail smile and stroked my hair. “Just a little longer, Remi,” she whispered, her breath shallow. “If I can just finish this commission, we can pay for your preschool tuition next season.” Right then, the pastel words floating above us turned a violently flashing crimson. [Red alert! This is it! The female lead’s heart is failing from absolute exhaustion!] [Look at her little girl… she has no idea what’s happening. This is shattering me.] [Camille, drop the damn brush! Money isn’t worth your life! Remi needs you!] [Where the hell is the male lead? Oh, right. Two hours away in Burbank shooting his new blockbuster, drowning in awards, completely clueless that the love of his life is slipping away.] Panic seized my throat. I grabbed the hem of her shirt, pulling hard. “Mommy, stop! I don’t want to go to school! Go to sleep!” Camille bent down, her eyes swimming with a hazy, terrifying tenderness. She opened her mouth to speak, but before the sound could form, her eyes rolled back. She folded in on herself, hitting the hardwood floor with a sickening thud. “Mommy!” I dropped to my knees, screaming, shaking her limp shoulders with all my meager strength. She didn’t move. She didn’t even twitch. The blood-red text practically blinded me now. [No, no, no… the tragedy arc is starting. Little Remi is going to sit with her mother’s body until the neighbor walks in tomorrow.] [This part of the story ruins me. Her only inheritance is going to be that hidden photograph. Camille dies without ever seeing him again.] [I hate this! If Vaughn had just swallowed his pride and looked for her, Camille wouldn’t be living in this rundown apartment!] Vaughn? The name rattled something loose in my memory. Leaving my mother’s side for only a second, I dragged a stepping stool to her nightstand. I reached for the polished walnut box she strictly forbade me from opening. Inside lay a single photograph. The man in the picture was strikingly handsome, his jawline sharp, his dark eyes staring into the camera with an intense, unguarded warmth. The invisible chorus supplied the context instantly: [Yes! That’s him! Vaughn Croft! The prodigy director! Remi’s biological father!] [Looks like a prince, acts like a coward. How could he let Camille suffer like this?] [Look at him, Remi! Memorize that face! He is the only one who can pay those hospital bills!] I stared at the photograph, burning every angle of his face into my mind. Daddy. If you had enough money to make movies, you had enough money to save my mother. 2 Mrs. Higgins from down the hall heard my screaming and found us. She called the ambulance, and by some miracle, we made it to the ER in time. The doctor said it was acute myocarditis. She survived the initial crash, but her immune system was decimated. She needed immediate, intensive care, or her heart would simply stop. Mrs. Higgins emptied her meager checking account to cover the admission fee, but as she stared at the staggering string of zeroes on the estimated treatment invoice, the lines around her mouth deepened into canyons. I knew she couldn’t afford this. We couldn’t afford this. While she stepped out to the cafeteria to buy me a juice box, I slipped out of the chaotic waiting room and walked through the sliding glass doors into the biting evening air. I had to find him. But I was four. How was I supposed to navigate Los Angeles to find a famous movie director? I stood on the edge of the roaring boulevard, entirely overwhelmed. The floating words above me were panicking even harder than I was. [Where is she going?! Does she even know where Vaughn is?] [I know! The paparazzi just leaked photos! He’s shooting ‘The Endless Dark’ at Blackwood Studios!] [Someone tell Remi! It’s an hour drive! Does this baby even have money?!] I reached into the pocket of my overalls. My fingers brushed against a crumpled twenty-dollar bill Camille had given me earlier for emergency snacks. I mimicked the adults I’d seen on TV, stepping to the curb and thrusting my little arm into the air. A yellow cab pulled over. The driver rolled down the window, looking around for an adult. “Where to, kiddo? Where’s your mom?” I shoved the wrinkled twenty at him, reciting the location from the glowing text above. “Blackwood Studios, please. My daddy is waiting for me.” The driver looked at me, then at the twenty, and chuckled softly. “Listen, half-pint, twenty bucks isn’t gonna get you all the way to Blackwood.” Tears pricked my eyes. My lip trembled. [Help her! Oh my god, use his name!] [Remi, don’t cry! Tell him your dad is Vaughn Croft and he’ll tip him huge!] I tipped my chin up, widening my eyes to their maximum, tear-filled capacity. “Please, sir. My daddy is the famous director, Vaughn Croft. If you take me to him, he’ll give you a hundred dollars. I promise.” The driver blinked, startled by the sheer conviction in my tiny voice. He sighed, unlocking the back door. “Alright, kid. Let’s see if this Hollywood fairy tale is real.” Blackwood Studios was a sprawling, chaotic labyrinth. It was louder and dirtier than I had imagined, swarming with extras in intricate armor and grips hauling heavy lighting rigs. The driver was kind enough to walk me past the main gate, asking a security guard where The Endless Dark was shooting before pointing me in the right direction. I marched on my short legs through the maze of trailers and cables. The invisible text acted as my GPS. [Turn left at the craft services table! See that massive white tent?] [Look for the guy screaming behind the monitors! The one who looks like he wants to murder the lighting crew. That’s your dad!] [Go get him, baby! We’re rooting for you!] I spotted him instantly. He was wearing a dark baseball cap pulled low, a headset slung around his neck. He was aggressively gesturing at an actress, his brow furrowed so deeply he looked terrifying. He wasn’t smiling like he was in the hidden photograph, but there was no mistaking that face. The set was so loud no one noticed a small child slipping past the barricades. I took a massive breath, filled my lungs, and screamed over the noise of the production. “Daddy!” It was as if someone had pulled the plug on the entire soundstage. The silence was instantaneous and deafening. Dozens of heads snapped in my direction. The angry director froze. He slowly pulled the headset off, turning to look at me with profound irritation. I didn’t flinch. I held his dark, heavy gaze, and yelled it again, letting the raw terror of the day finally break my voice. “Daddy! Mommy is dying! You have to give her the money to fix her heart!” A pin drop could have echoed across the lot. 3 Vaughn Croft finally looked at me. Really looked at me. His gaze was sharp enough to cut glass, sweeping over my face as if trying to solve a sudden, infuriating puzzle. “Whose kid is this? Where is production?” he barked, his voice thick with annoyance. “Get her parents. Now.” A young assistant—I later learned his name was Benji—rushed forward, crouching down to gently grab my arm. “Hey there, sweetheart. You can’t be on the hot set. Where’s your mom?” I violently yanked my arm away, planting my sneakers firmly into the dirt. I pointed a small, shaking finger right at Vaughn. “He is my dad!” Whispers erupted around the stage like a lit fuse. The staring eyes felt heavy and suffocating. Vaughn clearly felt the shift in the atmosphere. He cursed under his breath, stood up, and closed the distance between us in three long strides. He towered over me, a dark eclipse blotting out the studio lights. He crouched down so we were eye-to-eye. Up close, his eyes were devoid of warmth. “Listen to me, kid. This isn’t a funny prank. Who told you to come here and say that?” “My mommy’s name is Camille.” I dropped the name into the quiet space between us like a grenade. I watched the exact moment the shockwave hit him. His pupils blew wide. The devastatingly composed mask he wore cracked straight down the middle. Looking at his face was like looking in a mirror—we shared the same nose, the same stubborn set of our jaws. He stared at me for what felt like an eternity. He didn’t blink. He hardly breathed. The text bubbles above us were going absolutely feral. [HE IS SPIRALING! Look at his hands! He’s literally shaking!] [Camille is his Achilles heel. I told you!] [Deny it now, you coward! She is a carbon copy of your face!] Vaughn’s eyes mapped every inch of my features, desperate for a flaw in the logic, desperate to prove I was a lie. Instead of speaking, he suddenly reached out and scooped me up into his arms. He spun on his heel and strode purposefully toward a massive black trailer parked on the edge of the lot. His chest was hard against my cheek. He held me tightly, but it was stiff, awkward—nothing like the soft, enveloping warmth of my mother’s embrace. “Vaughn?” Benji called out, jogging after us in a panic. “Wrap for the day. Send everyone home,” Vaughn threw over his shoulder. He stepped into the trailer and slammed the heavy door shut behind us. 4 The trailer was eerily quiet, a stark contrast to my tiny, cluttered apartment filled with the smell of oil paints and lavender. Everything here was sleek, monochromatic, and smelled faintly of expensive cedar and cold rain. Vaughn set me down on a pristine leather sofa. He retreated a few steps, creating a physical barrier, and sank into the chair opposite me. He pulled off his cap, running a shaking hand through his dark hair. The irritation was entirely gone from his eyes, replaced by a turbulent storm of emotions I couldn’t name. “Where is she?” His voice was a ragged whisper. “Where is Camille?” “At the hospital. The big one downtown,” I answered, my small hands twisting the fabric of my overalls. “Mrs. Higgins said her heart is broken and it costs too many dollars to fix it.” “Who the hell is Mrs. Higgins?” “She lives downstairs.” His jaw tightened as his brain worked overtime, trying to process the wreckage of the last five minutes. [He believes her! But he’s paranoid. He’s going to look for a trap!] [Remi, you have to hit him with something only he would know! Give him the secret!] [Wait, I remember the lore! Camille has a faded scar shaped like a star on her inner wrist from when they rescued a cat in college!] A secret. I met his intense, searching gaze and took a deep breath. “Mommy has a star on her wrist. Right here.” I pointed to my own arm. “She told me Orion put it there. A stamp… so he could always find her in the dark.” Orion. The floating words above me paused for a fraction of a second before exploding into a blinding flurry. [OH MY GOD. ORION! That was his nickname because he used to stargaze with her!] [That was their secret language! He is absolutely devastated right now!] [Our girl is a genius! Finish him, Remi!] Vaughn’s entire body violently recoiled, as if I had reached across the coffee table and struck him. The cold composure he had been desperately clinging to shattered completely. His hands, resting on his knees, balled into tight fists, the veins standing out starkly against his knuckles. He stared at me, his mouth opening and closing, but no sound came out. The silence stretched, thick and suffocating with the ghost of a woman he hadn’t seen in five years. Suddenly, he vaulted out of the chair. He began pacing the narrow floor of the trailer like a caged animal. He snatched his phone from his pocket, his thumb moving frantically over the screen. “Benji,” he barked the moment the line connected. His voice was pulled tight, vibrating with an edge of absolute panic. “Call Mercy General. Now. Find out if a Camille… if Camille is admitted there. Drop everything! I need her chart, her room number, her doctor—everything! Call me back!” He hung up, the trailer descending back into a graveyard silence. He didn’t sit down. He stood by the window, his back facing me, staring blindly out at the studio lot. I couldn’t see his face, but I could see the rigid tension in his shoulders, the way his chest hitched unevenly. Even at four years old, I knew what grief looked like. He was hurting. 5 Less than ten minutes later, his phone violently shattered the quiet. He practically lunged for it, hitting speakerphone in his haste. Benji’s voice echoed through the space, laced with deep hesitation. “Vaughn… I found her. She’s in the cardiac ICU at Mercy. Brought in a few hours ago. The diagnosis is acute viral myocarditis with severe heart failure.” Benji took a shaky breath. “Vaughn, it’s really bad. They’ve already issued a critical condition notice. They don’t think she’ll make it through the night.”

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