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What happened next followed naturally. Huo Jiu's mother took the child back to the Su family and had him tested for compatibility while he was at the hospital for a physical examination. He happened to be a match.

Yet Huo Jiu could not accept such a cruel reality. The mother he had longed for had come looking for him in order to save someone else's life. That person was not even her biological child.

"What do you take me for? Do you even see me as a person? You're just using me as a tool to please your husband!"

"In your heart, am I not even worth as much as a dog you raised in the Su family? If you'd raised a dog for so long, would you be willing to draw its bone marrow for another dog?"

"My dad was right. You really are a heartless woman. You're not my mother! And I'm not your son. You only want to be the Su family's madam. You only want to be Su Zhuo's mother."

Overcome with emotion, Huo Jiu went berserk right in the Su family home. He smashed the wedding photo of his mother and Chairman Su, then smashed the family portrait of Chairman Su, his first wife, and Su Zhuo. His mother then slapped him across the face.

Humiliated and enraged, Huo Jiu stormed out of the house. But he accidentally fell down the stairs. When he got back up, the original Huo Jiu had become Huo Jiu, who had died from overwork.

Huo Jiu's soul spent seven hazy days inside the original body. During those seven days, he wandered the streets while merging with the body. Every night, he had nightmares.

He dreamed of the original Huo Jiu being beaten by his alcoholic father, of being mocked by the neighborhood children as a motherless wild child, and of working everywhere just to get a full meal. He dreamed of how, after leaving the Su family in his previous life, the original Huo Jiu had no money for food and nowhere to stay, wandering the streets for a full seven days. In the end, Chairman Su and his mother found him again, and with nowhere else to turn, he still agreed to donate his bone marrow.

He also dreamed of how the original Huo Jiu later became wildly jealous of everything the protagonist shou, Su Zhuo, possessed. He painstakingly plotted against Su Zhuo, deluding himself that he could steal everything Su Zhuo had. In the end, his schemes were exposed. Chairman Su drove him out of the Su family, and Su Zhuo's admirers brutally retaliated against him. He died a miserable death. Even after death, his corpse had to donate a kidney to Su Zhuo.

Huo Jiu felt like a sponge soaked in strong liquor. Every pore on his body was steeped in intense resentment, despair, and frenzied hatred. His once weightless soul became damp and heavy, so furious that he could not speak.

In the form of nightmares, he personally lived through the original Huo Jiu's hysterical and utterly isolated life, watching helplessly as he walked step by step toward death. The experience repeated itself over and over, appearing in Huo Jiu's dreams every night. He did not know how long this powerless sense of confinement would last. Until the eighth dawn after he came to this world, when he watched the sky slowly brighten at the horizon, Huo Jiu suddenly came to his senses.

The air carried a faint scent of lemon freshener. Huo Jiu slowly stood up and licked his cracked lips.

Whether it was because his soul was rejecting Huo Jiu's body or for some other reason, Huo Jiu had been in a muddled, feverish state ever since arriving seven days ago. He did not have a cent on him, had not brought any identification, and could not even think clearly. He could only rely on instinct: when hungry, he ate without paying, then washed dishes in the kitchen to work off the cost of the meal.

According to the original plot, the original Huo Jiu should have tried to earn money during those seven days. But he had no ID and was underage. None of the food stalls or small restaurants where he applied dared hire him. Every time, he was driven away after working for only a little while. After being stranded on the streets for seven days, exhausted and starving, he could only lower his head and compromise when Chairman Su and his mother found him, agreeing to donate his bone marrow.

But Huo Jiu was not the original Huo Jiu. His similar experiences let him see through the trick at a glance. Even in a big city, many street stalls and small eateries were far from formal in their hiring practices. During the busy season, when things got hectic enough that they had to call even their own elderly relatives and children back to lend a hand, there was no reason for those small vendors to refuse temporary workers who cost little per hour—or even just three full meals a day. Unless someone was interfering behind the scenes.

As for what that person's purpose was, it was not hard to see.

So when Huo Jiu was once again hesitantly dismissed by a shop owner, he asked directly, "Did someone forbid you from letting me work here? Did they threaten you?"

The elderly couple exchanged a glance, their faces full of difficulty. "We can't do anything about it either. They said you're underage. If we hired you, they'd report us for employing child labor."

Just as expected.

After that, Huo Jiu stopped trying to find work. Instead, he solved his daily meals by eating without paying and staying behind to wash dishes. At night, he found a corner in a nearby twenty-four-hour mall convenience store to sleep in. He washed up in the mall restroom.

He muddled through another seven days like that. Then Huo Jiu suddenly came to his senses.

"Since you don't want me to have an easy time..."

Huo Jiu wiped the sweat from his forehead and looked at the bedraggled boy in the mirror. Staggering, he walked out of the supermarket.

He casually picked up an abandoned piece of cardboard from the ground and entered a general store on the corner. Under the shop owner's terrified gaze, he politely requested, "Please lend me a marker."

The handsome youth had sharp features and gloomy brows. Even though his body was already extremely weak from the fever, as he leaned over the counter, he still gave off a dangerous aura that made people uneasy.

The shop owner's refusal caught in her throat, and she did not dare say it. Obediently, she took out a marker and handed it to Huo Jiu.

Huo Jiu took the pen and wrote several lines on the cardboard he had just picked up. Then he returned the marker to the shop owner and said gently, "Thank you."

Holding the cardboard, Huo Jiu staggered out of the general store. He wandered around the streets, following the crowd to the subway entrance.

It was the morning rush hour. People streamed in and out of the subway station, their hurried footsteps belonging to office workers rushing to work.

Huo Jiu looked at the busy crowd with a touch of nostalgia. Then he found a spot with an excellent view. Leaning against the wall, he raised the cardboard in his hand.

"Begging for food!

My biological mother and stepfather are inhuman. They've made it impossible for me to survive at home. I haven't had a full meal in seven days. I'm still running a high fever. I hope kindhearted people can spare me enough money for a meal to help me through this hardship, so I can buy a box of fever medicine. I would be deeply grateful."