2026

I am a sickly, frail, spoiled drama queen.

One night, as I was once again willfully demanding my Butler come and coax me to sleep, a stream of Bullet Comments suddenly appeared before my eyes: “The horror boss is outside hunting Players and having the time of his life. He doesn’t have time to tuck you in and coax you to sleep.”

“She’s just a human being kept as a pet in a castle by a horror boss. She actually thinks she’s some kind of Young Lady.”

“Once the big boss meets the clever and witty Female Lead, he’ll grow disgusted with this delicate, spoiled drama queen. He’ll use all sorts of perverted methods to torture her before eating her piece by piece.”

Terrified, I hid under my covers, trembling uncontrollably.

The next second, a cool hand gently pulled back the duvet. A voice, gentle yet tinged with a faint, chilling coldness, drifted down from above me: “Master, what’s wrong?”

The celebrity Zhu Yuan is dead. I still hate her. She always made me feel as wretched and hidden as a rat scurrying across the street.

And yet, I found her third gift. It was a plain music box sitting in the hospital corridor.

I casually handed it to the child in the neighboring bed.

She was dying, too.

While exploring Devil City with the Decoding Science Program Team, I was looking straight into the camera, talking absolute nonsense with a straight face.

“The recent buzz surrounding the Man-eating Snake incidents is all fake. These are just ordinary Sand Snakes.”

The next second, the ground beneath us gave way, and the entire Program Team plummeted into a pit of snakes.

The princess ran away with her lover, leaving me behind with a male concubine and orders to impersonate her.

Terrified of being exposed, I had no choice but to play the part as convincingly as possible.

By the time the princess returned, I was pregnant.

She looked at me in shock. Why didn’t you use the male concubine I gave you? Do you not like him?

I was stunned.

If that’s the case, then who was the man making me beg for mercy every night?

Just as I was preparing to flee, that person returned in the middle of the night. Wait… why are there two of them?

Chi Ye, a young master from the elite Beijing Circle, had just been rejected after a public confession.

I eagerly squeezed through the crowd, hoping to scavenge whatever was left behind.

I was just waiting to pick up the 999 roses he didn’t want anymore so I could sell them.

Suddenly, Danmaku appeared before my eyes: [What are you doing picking up flowers at a time like this? Go pick up the man!]

[What a money-grubber. She only has eyes for cash; she completely missed Chi Ye’s handsome face.]

[Lin Ran is so stupid. You and Lin Wan are twins; don’t you know how to play your cards right using that face?]

[If you land Chi Ye, you can scavenge every trash can in the luxury districts within a fifty-kilometer radius. Isn’t that better than slaving away at a milk tea shop?]

My hand, which was reaching for a rose, froze.

I looked up at Chi Ye and asked, “My sister and I look exactly the same. How about you date me instead?”

In Jiangnan, the Shen Family possessed a secret technique passed down through generations: the ability to embroider a person’s final appearance before they died.

For thirty years, my father embroidered for the powerful and elite, never once making a mistake.

That was until he died in his embroidery room, and on the Death Portrait before him-depicting a face bleeding from every orifice-was me.

A plague had infected the entire city.

Everyone was suffering from a persistent high fever, gradually losing their ability to work.

I, however, posted on Weibo: “Doesn’t matter. I’ll take care of it.”

The next second, I was dragged onto the trending searches and bombarded with insults.

What they didn’t know was that I was the sole Earth Master successor, and the one who started this plague in the first place.

During the year our love was at its peak, the young general whose name shook the borderlands used all his military merit to petition my Imperial Father for my hand in marriage.

But three years later, a woman arrived at our door clutching a child, weeping and begging me to take them in.

My husband claimed he had simply had too much to drink and made a terrible mistake.

My mother-in-law said that since I had already ruined my husband’s career prospects, I could not go so far as to sever his bloodline as well.

My closest kin advised me to be magnanimous, telling me that this was simply how every mistress of a household in the capital lived.

Only my sister, with whom I had never seen eye to eye, patted my back and told me: “In the past, you let your Imperial Brother make your decisions for you.” “Later, you let your husband make your decisions for you.” “Now, it is time you learned to grow up on your own.” “After all, you have a little girl of your own now.”

I looked down at the tiny daughter in my arms, who was still sucking on her fingers.

I understood that if I were weak, my daughter would never know how to be strong.

If I were easily bullied, my daughter would never know how to be independent. This time, it was my turn to act.

I can see the final moments of the deceased through their eyes, a gift that has helped the government solve countless cases.

Everything changed when the body of a drowned man was brought in.

Looking into his eyes, I saw him strangling me just before he died.

And on those hands, he was wearing the Jade Bracelet that had been buried with me.

My lady was injured and lost her memory. She forgot everyone, yet she remembered my husband.

My husband was once a beggar.

During a heavy winter snowfall, he lay by the roadside, covered in blood and filth.

Passersby all steered clear of him, but my lady alone ordered her carriage to stop and took him in.

From then on, he stayed in the manor to tend the horses for her.

My lady often visited him under the pretext of checking on the horses.

I saw the deep, lingering affection in their eyes with my own.

But how could a young lady of her status ever marry a horse slave?

Heartbroken, she told him:

“I cannot marry you.

“But I will find someone to take care of you in my stead.”

My lady personally betrothed me to him.

Later, the lowly horse slave found his way back to the imperial capital and reclaimed his identity as a prince.

I, in turn, became his legitimate consort.

On the day of the investiture, I was waiting.

I knew.

Sooner or later, my lady would come back to reclaim what was originally hers.