Short Story

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My sister is dead. She committed suicide for a man.

When I was sorting through her belongings, I found a pair of handcuffs and some photographs.

In the photos, she was completely naked, her body covered in bruises.

A rush of blood surged through me, my whole body turned cold, and I was instantly overwhelmed by an indescribable terror and confusion.

But I didn’t know yet that the person who started all this had no intention of stopping.

And I was his next target.

On the night of my birthday, my boyfriend said he had to work overtime.

But his childhood sweetheart just posted a selfie on her WeChat Moments, holding his arm, with the caption: “No matter when, my brother will drop everything to come find me, hehe.”

My eyes burned and I couldn’t help but comment:

“What the hell are you giggling about?”

In my dreams, I kept giving myself over to wild passion with a man.

One day, I finally saw his face.

It was Li Jici, the icy Chief Justice of the Court of Judicial Review, a man said to have no interest in women.

When my brother is falsely accused, Li Jici mocks me for begging him for help—yet that very night, the man in my dreams is more passionate than ever.

Only after a drunken guest reveals the peach-shaped birthmark on Li Jici’s chest do I realize the truth: the beautiful dreams we have shared belong to both of us.

I’m a washed-up, eighteenth-tier starlet who spent three years playing the submissive role just to marry into the Jiang Family, the wealthiest clan in the Beijing circle.

My three-hundred-million-yuan ‘wedding of the century’ to Jiang Yuan, the family’s only son, instantly shot to the top of the trending searches.

However, a big shot from the metaphysics circle claimed I had the face of a concubine.

The livestream chat exploded immediately:

“That’s hilarious. It’s the year 3202-who still becomes a concubine?”

“Is it possible they don’t mean a concubine, but a mistress?”

My expression darkened. I joined the livestream and pulled out my marriage certificate for everyone to see.

To my surprise, the master simply said:

“Among the living, you are indeed the primary wife.

“But if we’re counting the dead… well, that’s a different story.”

The day my childhood sweetheart and I had our worst fight,

he slapped me for the sake of the young woman he loved.

And I, in a fit of rage, broke three of his ribs.

He screamed that he wanted a divorce, but I refused.

I thought we would keep dragging each other down like this until the day we died.

But reality proved me wrong far too quickly.

Three months later, I fell head over heels for a sweet, innocent younger guy.

He kept chasing me for an official title.

So I had no choice but to pull that familiar number out of my blacklist.

When the call connected, the young woman’s playful voice came from the other end.

“Su Yi, you’re too late. Even if you crawl over like a dog and beg for forgiveness now, Ah Xu won’t spare you a second glance.”

Faced with her provocation, I only said calmly, “Tell Zhou Xu I want a divorce.”

The next second, the phone on the other end seemed to be snatched away. A burst of rustling static followed before Zhou Xu’s voice finally came through, trembling despite his best efforts to restrain it.

He said, “Su Yi, don’t you dare.”

My elder half-sister was dying of an incurable illness.

My fiancé had just placed first in the imperial examinations.

She invited me to her house to entrust her children to my care.

After dinner, I lost consciousness.

When I woke, I was in her husband’s bed.

He slapped me several times, accusing me of scheming against him and drugging him.

My father’s wife held my grief-stricken sister and called me shameless.

I watched the three of them act out their little drama, coldly.

Fine.

Wonderful.

You could all go and die.

I was the freest child in the village.

All the other kids envied me because no one ever told me what to do.

But the truth was, my parents had divorced, and neither of them wanted me.

That was why they left eight-year-old me all alone in a mud-brick house up in the mountains.

During the day, it was all right.

But at night, the mountain wind howled, and the drunk old bachelor would reach his hand in through the crack in the window. “Jingjing, are you scared all by yourself? Uncle Dog will keep you company!”

Qi Zheng raised a hand and knocked over the insulated food jar I was offering him.

“I’ve already been forced to marry you. Do you really expect me to fall in love with you, too?”

Once that video was leaked, everyone knew: the newly risen top star had been forced into marriage, and I was the clingy leech he couldn’t shake off.

That night, after the shoot wrapped, everyone tacitly ignored the fact that I was still tied to a tree.

By the time I was rescued before dawn the next day, my legs were stiff.

I felt my way back through the dark, missed my footing, and fell off a cliff.

When I woke again, I had returned to four years earlier-and met someone who favored me openly and without hesitation.

Qi Zheng, however, was not happy about it.

When I was thirteen, in order to serve the distinguished guest who had come from afar, I smeared lard on the soles of the lead dancer’s shoes, making her slip and embarrass herself on the spot.

After that, the beauty sent to his room became me, just as I had wished.

Yet that impossibly refined nobleman merely looked me over twice, then said a single sentence that left me chilled from head to toe, as if a basin of ice water had been poured over me.

“I saw everything just now.”

I was the only child in our village with no siblings.

My classmates envied me.

“Your parents must spoil you rotten.”

What they did not know was that my status as an only child had been stolen.