(Note: all characters in this story are eighteen or older.)
Handsome guys and beautiful girls, check in here~
Please leave your brains behind, keh keh keh~
"You mean I transmigrated into a book, a novel called The Fake Young Master Slaughters Everyone After Rebirth? And you're the Gossip System bound to me, called [Guagua]?"
"Yes, host."
"Oh, my god!" Lu Chi threw his head back and wailed.
"As an eighteenth-tier celebrity, I finally fucking landed a chance to go on a dating show, date my goddess face-to-face, and see my popularity explode overnight-and now I've transmigrated into a book?"
"Can you send me back, OK?"
Guagua said, "Host, you've already kicked the bucket in the real world. Going back is impossible. You can only live your life here. Of course, if you want, you can still be a minor celebrity in this world."
Lu Chi fell silent for three seconds.
He quietly put away his nonexistent tears.
"Then who did I transmigrate as? Don't tell me I'm the reborn fake young master who slaughters everyone?"
"No, host. You transmigrated as the real young master!"
"Ah... the real young master?" Lu Chi threw his head back and roared with laughter. "You damned system, you're not lying to me? I really became the real young master? Then why the hell would I bother being a celebrity? Isn't being a wealthy family's young master and inheriting a vast fortune way better?"
The system pressed a hand to its forehead. "Uh... host, you should sort through the plot before you start daydreaming."
"Honey, our son lives somewhere like this? Sob, sob, our poor son! What sin could have brought this on...?"
In a dilapidated alley in the slums on the western outskirts of Jing City.
Supported by two bodyguards, the wealthy socialite Pan Feng, ordinarily an elegant woman, held her nose as she stumbled along the dusty, uneven bluestone path.
Her custom black fish-patterned Balenciaga heels were scuffed and peeling, and the bun on her head had gone slightly askew.
Lu Yuanqing surveyed the rundown surroundings, the anger inside him rising wave after wave.
"That damned Li Chunhua! If it weren't for her, how could our son have suffered like this!"
Li Chunhua had been the Lu family's nanny eighteen years ago.
Egged on by someone, she had carried her employer Lu Yuanqing's three-month-old son-the present-day Lu Chi-out under the pretext of taking him for vaccinations, then abandoned him somewhere remote.
Fortunately, Lu Chi's time had not yet come. A childless couple who collected scrap found him and took him home to raise as their own son.
As luck would have it, the scrap collector's surname was also Lu. Over the years, the couple would rather go cold and hungry themselves than leave Lu Chi without food or clothes.
As a result, at eighteen, Lu Chi was tall, handsome, fair, and clean-cut, nothing like a child raised by scrap collectors.
Sadly, his adoptive parents had passed away in an accidental car crash when Lu Chi was sixteen.
Had Lu Yuanqing and his wife not come looking, Lu Chi would probably have had to walk alone through this vast world.
"Son, we're your biological parents. The nanny lost you eighteen years ago. We've had such a hard time searching for you!"
"That's right, son, I'm your dad! Sob, sob!"
"I'm your mom! Sob, sob! My poor son!"
Having spent a minute taking in a whirlwind overview of the plot, Lu Chi was now being tightly embraced by the dignified, richly dressed middle-aged couple before him.
The two were crying rivers of tears and snot, looking utterly miserable.
If he hadn't known the plot, Lu Chi would surely have been moved to a blubbering mess by them.
After struggling for twenty years in his previous life, he had still been a nobody of an eighteenth-tier celebrity. Now he was a wealthy family's real young master.
A vast fortune was his for the taking. Who wouldn't set off firecrackers to celebrate?
But Lu Chi couldn't!
According to the plot, the moment Lu Chi returned to the Lu family, the reborn fake young master, Lu Jiyang, would target him and trip him up in every way, openly and in secret.
Before long, Lu Chi would become someone despised by everyone, even dogs, with countless labels slapped onto him.
Things like [gambler], [thief], [liar], and [scumbag] who got a girl pregnant.
There were also [country bumpkin], [scheming bitch] coveting the family fortune, and [pathetic wretch] always putting on airs!
...In short, the Lu family practically wanted to cover him in labels from head to toe.
The labels were nothing. Worst of all, less than a year after he returned to the Lu family, Lu Jiyang framed him, and Lu Yuanqing beat him savagely before making him kneel in the courtyard as punishment.
A torrential rain happened to fall that night, and he developed a high fever. The Lu family said he was faking it, and no one cared for him.
While he was barely conscious, Lu Jiyang lured him away and killed him, staging it as suicide by hanging.
Just thinking about all this chilled Lu Chi's heart to the core.
"What bullshit wealthy family, what real and fake young masters? Can't you just give me the money and let me live on my own? Why do I have to be some damned young master?!"
Quietly pushing away the two older people sobbing before him, Lu Chi gave an awkward smile. "Uncle, Auntie, I think you've got the wrong person."
As he said this, a sudden, inexplicable pang struck his chest.
"Hiss..." Could this be the original owner's lingering resentment?
Since I transmigrated into the book, the original owner must have croaked. Otherwise, how could I have gotten in?
The original owner really had been rather unlucky. He had died because he learned that his biological parents were coming to find him and that he would no longer be living all alone.
Overwhelmed with excitement, he had died suddenly.
Pan Feng took a tissue from a bodyguard and dabbed at her tears, sorrowful yet elegant.
From the Chanel handbag she carried, she took out a stack of paternity reports. Every one clearly showed that Lu Chi was her son! Her biological son!
"Chi, Mommy knows you've suffered out here all these years. Your dad and I came today to take you home to enjoy a good life. You won't have to drift around anymore."
Lu Chi shook his head.
[A good life? More like suffering! The fake young master Lu Jiyang is waiting at home. That vicious dumbass is like a venomous snake, itching to eat my flesh and suck my blood the moment I return! A good life? Like hell!]
[That's right, host. As soon as you return, Lu Jiyang will deliberately trip you up to make everyone hate you.]
[Then I'm not going back. I'd rather keep living in the slums... Ugh, but these slums stink so badly! Σ_(꒪ཀ꒪"∠) Blegh, I can't stand it either!]
Lu Yuanqing looked around in astonishment.
Who was talking?
Pan Feng found it strange too.
Clearly, no one had spoken just now, so why did she seem to have heard voices?
Had longing for my son made me so ill that I'm hearing things?
"Uncle, Auntie, I..."
Lu Yuanqing grew angry. "Child, we're your parents! How can you call us Uncle and Auntie? Call us Dad and Mom!"
Lu Chi smiled helplessly. "Dad, Mom, I don't want to go back. I'm used to living alone. If you really can't bear it,
"Why don't you give me some money and let me live on my own? Don't worry, I'll visit when I have time."
Pan Feng threw her arms around Lu Chi, her body trembling as she cried.
"Silly child, what are you saying? Now that we've found you, how could we bear to let you stay out here on your own? Be good and come home with us. Your five older sisters and your younger brother are all looking forward to seeing you!"
Lu Chi sighed helplessly.
[Yes, five biased older sisters are waiting for me to come home so they can put me in my place and make their darling little brother Lu Jiyang happy!]
Lu Yuanqing stared blankly at Pan Feng, just as she turned to look at him.
They had heard the voice again. It was Lu Chi's voice.
But Lu Chi's mouth clearly hadn't moved.
Could that have been his inner voice?
The couple looked at each other again in utter shock.
Just then, a clatter of footsteps rang out.
A thunderous roar came from the alley.
Everyone present was left dumbfounded.