Misunderstandings

While I waited at the hospital for my follow-up appointment, a live broadcast of a celebrated director accepting an award overseas played on the giant screen.

During his acknowledgments, he said nothing and placed a call in front of the entire world.

Then my phone rang…

In college, I once “bought” myself a girlfriend.

If she agreed to be with me, I would cover her family’s medical bills.

Humiliated, the brilliant scholarship student from a poor family stayed with me for four years.

Then my family went bankrupt.

When I broke up with her, she was as cold as ever. She did not ask me to stay—not even once.

Years later, I was serving fruit platters at a karaoke club to pay off my family’s debts. She had become a CEO and was dating the handsome star from our class.

She asked me, “Do you regret it?”

“No.”

“Well, I do.”

My family had three daughters, each lovelier than the last.

When we came of marriageable age, suitors nearly wore our threshold smooth.

Even the Emperor decided to interfere.

He insisted that one of us marry the great general, Xie Yuan.

Father and Mother could do nothing but sigh.

My two elder sisters exchanged uneasy looks, so I rose with righteous resolve.

“What’s there to worry about? Marrying a general would be glorious, and I might even get to ride a great stallion!”

“If neither of you will marry him, I will.”

Later, Xie Yuan pinned me in his arms and coaxed me again and again:

“Are you shirking again, Mianmian? Why won’t you ride your great stallion tonight?”

I spent ten years loving my childhood friend, and he spent the same ten years finding me unbearable.

Then one day, I finally had my way with him—and left two hundred yuan behind.

Humiliated beyond measure, my childhood friend hunted for me everywhere.

But I made sure he never found me.

I hid from him for three years, until my father died and left me with no family.

His parents told me, “From now on, our home is your home, and that boy is your big brother.”

I looked at the face that went mad with shame and fury the moment he saw me, and called out brightly, “Hello, Big Brother!”

I’ve always been absurdly confident.

When the system told me to win over the male lead, I said it would be a piece of cake.

He rejected me, begged me to torment someone else, and claimed he wasn’t good enough for me.

Clearly, he needed a guiding partner he couldn’t chase away.

I succeeded—until the system returned and announced his affection score was zero.

Apparently, I’d fallen for an extra with the male lead’s exact same name.

[Infinite scenarios + mild horror + lighthearted + special advantage + no fixed romantic pairing + scenarios + wish fulfillment]

Lin Yinxi has been killed by monsters ninety-nine times in a women’s dormitory.

The hundredth time she opens her eyes, her phone vibrates before she can even try to escape.

Someone with a rabbit profile picture adds her to a strange group chat.

[Women’s Dorm Building 1 Flayer Work Assignments]

Every member is a monster that has hunted her down in the dormitory before.

[Rabbit Keeper: The socially anxious Organizer is working on the fifth floor. Other staff, please do not disturb her.]

[Flayer 003: Szzzz… New colleague, remember to claim your starter pack…]

[Prop Maker: Time for some pics!]

Only then does Lin Yinxi realize that every move those human-hunting monsters make is visible in the group.

And she has been mistaken for a humanoid entity and brought into the group to work.

So Lin Yinxi joins more and more entity group chats. She lurks to steal intelligence and uses stickers to chat with the entities and maintain her disguise.

One tiny slip, and she’s dead.

As the conversations go on, Lin Yinxi discovers that the groups she enters are increasingly high-level. Little by little, she draws closer to the entities’ management.

Entity: We’ve been chatting for so long. Want to meet offline?

Lin Yinxi: Taking a break from the internet. Do not disturb. Thanks.

A second later.

Her phone vibrates again.

[Stop pretending.]

[I’m right behind you.]

P.S. The scenarios combine puzzle solving, battle royales, death games, rules-based horror, urban legends, role-playing, eerie cultivation, containment-center-style settings, and more. There are a lot of elements.

My family has one enormous, very public secret.

Ever since she was born, my mother has been bound to a system: the Beauty System.

Apparently, if she ever drops out of the top three on the Beauty Ranking of the Four Seas and Eight Realms, she will die.

At first, neither of my parents was remotely worried.

With Mother’s looks, holding her place for another few hundred thousand years would be no trouble at all.

But sometimes the unexpected arrives without the slightest warning.

When my parents joyfully welcomed their first child, a floating Beauty Ranking of the Four Seas and Eight Realms appeared out of thin air beside the bed.

And there, in first place, was my eldest brother, whose name had only just been decided: Zhou Yi.

My parents were a little bewildered, but didn’t think much of it.

Until they had their second child.

My parents and big brother once again greeted the new baby with delight.

Once again, the ranking appeared in midair.

First place changed hands again.

It now belonged to my elder sister, Zhou Er.

That was when Father panicked.

He moved out of their bedroom that very night.

For several years afterward, he didn’t dare set so much as one foot inside after sunset.

Every evening, they would hold hands in the corridor, gazing at each other as they lingered over their farewell.

Then my brother and sister would each take one of them by the hand and escort them to their separate rooms, with my parents looking back every few steps.

They pined so badly their eyes practically glowed green, but at least Mother’s life was safe.

On my wedding night, Yuan Zhi called me a beautiful idiot and said she had no idea what Yuan Lang saw in me.

Ridiculous.

I was fair-skinned and lovely, clever and quick-witted.

That was jealousy talking!

After a night’s sleep, I was still indignant.

I shook Yuan Lang awake bright and early and whined about what she had said.

Yuan Lang watched me through narrowed eyes for a long while.

“Mm.

You certainly are.”

I’d had a crush on my best friend’s stiff, proper little brother for years.

To look younger, I always wore fresh, barely-there makeup and bright, cheerful outfits whenever I saw Jiang Heng.

He never so much as batted an eye.

Then came the bachelorette party before my best friend’s wedding.

With my hair in big, man-eater waves, a bodycon skirt, black stockings, and red-soled heels, I cut completely loose.

Afterward, I took my hopelessly drunk best friend home.

The door opened.

Jiang Heng and I stared straight at each other.

The sweet-girl act I’d kept up around him for years shattered on the spot.

Feeling guilty, I turned to leave.

But Jiang Heng, always so cool and scrupulously polite, raised a hand to block the doorway.

“It’s late, Qingzhou.

Why don’t you stay the night?”

The day after our wedding, my husband went to the city for work and was killed by a falling billboard.

The CEO of the company responsible came to discuss compensation.

I said I was struggling to make ends meet.

He transferred me three million yuan.

I said I had nowhere to go.

He gave me a luxury apartment.

I said I didn’t want to stay a widow.

He gave me a handsome young man.

The morning after we slept together, he came to see me.

I was about to thank him when his expression changed.

“What is my brother doing here?!”