Back at Prince Yi's Residence, Gu Moran barred the study door from the inside.
He sent all the serving maids and attendants away, giving them a simple reason.
"This prince is going back to sleep. Anyone who dares come in and disturb me will lose three months' pay."
No one dared come.
Everyone in the residence knew the third prince's temper: when he was happy, he might reward you with a gold ingot; when he wasn't, he might hurl an inkstone at you.
The laziness vanished from Gu Moran's face. He turned, sat down behind his desk, and pulled the system panel up before his eyes.
"Come on."
"Let me see just how this lousy book is targeting me."
Four characters appeared on the panel.
[Original story replay]
Gu Moran opened it.
Images began to scroll.
[First Son of Destiny: Ye Qingyun] [Born into a humble family, exceptionally gifted] [Betrothed since childhood to Su Yao, the prime minister's legitimate daughter] [Humiliated at the engagement-breaking banquet, he abandoned the scholarly path for martial arts and cultivated in fury. Three months later, he returned to the capital and crushed the villain's forces]
Gu Moran raised a hand and paused it.
"Wait."
"An engagement-breaking banquet?"
The system displayed additional information.
[In the original story, the host lusted after Su Yao and forced the prime minister to break off the engagement, causing Ye Qingyun to swear revenge]
Gu Moran stared at the line and let out a laugh.
"I forced the prime minister to break off the engagement? And I lusted after Su Yao? Was she studded with diamonds or something?"
"I just woke up in Su Yao's room last night."
"Good grief. Even the Heavenly Dao couldn't be bothered to lay the groundwork for its script. It just shoved the knife straight into my hand."
The system didn't respond.
Gu Moran tapped his fingertips on the desk.
"Who handed me the wine last night?"
"Why did I end up in Su Yao's room?"
"Why can't I remember a thing from the second half of the night?"
The panel paused for a moment.
[Insufficient clues]
Gu Moran withdrew his hand.
"Fine."
"I'll put that on the ledger for now."
He resumed playback.
[Second Son of Destiny: Chu Tianxing] [Successor of a divine physician, entered the palace to treat the empress dowager] [The host falsely accused him of using poison, earning a scolding from the empress dowager and a six-month suspension of his stipend]
Gu Moran paused it again.
"The empress dowager is my own grandmother!"
"Why would I try to stop the physician saving her life?"
"Did the Gu Moran in the original story have nothing but the word 'villain' left in his head?"
The system remained silent.
Gu Moran waved a hand.
"Next."
The scene changed again.
[Third Son of Destiny: Lin Yichen] [War god of the frontier. With three thousand soldiers, he defended a pass for three years and slew a hundred thousand enemies before returning to the capital in triumph.] [The host laid an ambush at the city gate. The assassination failed, and he lost one of his fiefs]
Gu Moran looked up.
"Assassinate a war god?"
"With that bunch of guards I have, who spend their days fighting roosters and walking dogs?"
The system continued to the next page.
[Fourth Son of Destiny: Xiao Jinghan] [Descendant of the previous dynasty's imperial family. After ten years in the imperial prison, he took shelter from the rain in a ruined temple upon his release and received help from a beauty] [The host suppressed him repeatedly and was ultimately made to pay]
Gu Moran rubbed the spot between his brows.
"After ten years in prison, the first thing he did on getting out wasn't eat or bathe. It was go to a ruined temple and meet a beauty."
"Has the author of this book never been to prison?"
The panel continued listing names.
[Fifth: Wang Batian] [Sixth: Pu Yunshan] [Seventh: ...]
Gu Moran was stunned when he finished reading.
Each Son of Destiny rose to power in a different way, but two things were exactly the same.
First, although they had destined beauties, wives and concubines, every one of them lived like a eunuch. They never so much as held a little hand, and none consummated their relationships even by the ending.
Second.
Every single one of them trampled Gu Moran underfoot on his way up.
Some stole women he'd slept with, some ruined his businesses, some cut off his path to official advancement, and some slapped his face.
Five million words, with twelve Sons of Destiny taking turns.
Each got a little over four hundred thousand words to trample him. It was all neatly arranged.
Gu Moran leaned back and stared at the ceiling. "Am I really a prince?"
"I'm a communal stepping stone."
A new panel appeared.
[Fortune overview]
Twelve long golden pillars stood in a row.
Ye Qingyun's, at the very front, shone so brightly it hurt the eyes.
At the very bottom beneath the golden pillars, a gray line hugged the edge.
[Gu Moran]
Gu Moran stared at the line.
"You drew me as an earthworm. Were you afraid I wouldn't understand the situation? That's downright insulting."
The system displayed an explanation.
[A Son of Destiny's fortune is deeply bound to his destined beauty] [The deeper the beauty's feelings, the greater the boost to his fortune] [Once the beauty devotes herself to him wholeheartedly, the Son of Destiny enters a state of fully unleashed fortune] [If he loses the beauty as his anchor, the Son of Destiny retains only his base fortune]
Gu Moran finished reading the lines, his fingers resting at the edge of the desk.
"So they don't rely entirely on themselves to cheat their way through."
"They rely on the women to keep them alive."
"Put bluntly, they lived off women all the way to becoming Sons of Destiny."
Gray text appeared at the bottom of the panel.
[Host's origins data: anomaly flagged. More clues required to unlock]
Gu Moran lifted his eyelids slightly.
"My origins?"
He reached out and tapped it open.
[Insufficient clues]
Gu Moran withdrew his hand, his tone growing a little softer.
"Imperial Father dotes on me, Imperial Mother dotes on me, and the empress dowager loves me too."
"Even with a start like that, he was still written into being torn apart by five horses."
"Looks like I'm not the only problem."
He dragged the panel back to the first timeline.
[Ye Qingyun expected to arrive in the capital within thirty days] [Core event: engagement-breaking banquet shocks everyone present] [Su Yao and Ye Qingyun establish their first connection of fortune]
Gu Moran looked at Su Yao's name.
Fragments of last night slipped through his mind.
The scent of osmanthus.
Overturned cups.
Her reddened eyes when she woke.
And her voice, holding back anger as she spoke the name Gu Moran.
Gu Moran raised a hand and pressed his brow.
A prompt appeared.
[View target beauty Su Yao's profile?] [Yes] [No]
Gu Moran selected yes.
A portrait of Su Yao appeared.
Her features were cool and aloof, her clothes plain and unadorned. She gave off a sense of distance just standing there.
[Name: Su Yao] [Identity: prime minister's legitimate daughter] [Associated Son of Destiny: Ye Qingyun] [Fortune binding level: SSS-grade core anchor] [Current affection for host: -47, loathing] [Current affection for Ye Qingyun: zero, not yet met]
Gu Moran stared at the minus forty-seven, the corners of his mouth curving upward.
There was nothing frivolous or flippant about it.
It was the kind of smile that came after a calculation yielded a result.
"Ye Qingyun won't reach the capital for another thirty days."
"Su Yao hasn't met him yet."
"Her affection for him is zero."
"But her affection for me is minus forty-seven."
"What does that mean?"
"It means her heart is full of me right now."
"Even if it's all hatred."
"Hatred is a kind of caring too."
The panel was silent.
Gu Moran looked up at the tightly shut study door.
He picked up a brush and wrote Su Yao's name on a sheet of paper.
As the brush tip touched the xuan paper, the system displayed one final prompt.
[Reminder: the host's current fortune value is the lowest in the entire book. Any direct conflict with a Son of Destiny will trigger the "fortune suppression" effect.] [The host is advised to adopt an indirect strategy.]