*
Not long ago, after Shen Sixing finished gathering with a group of overpowered sons-in-law from those “chasing their wives after burning down the bridge” stories, he had gloomily declared that he never wanted to leave the house again.
That gathering had been nothing short of a grand theatrical performance. Every single person had his own brand of obsession and devotion, along with a dash of wicked charm and arrogant eccentricity.
This time, however, it was Shen Yi’s turn to socialize after the New Year.
As for why it was Shen Yi rather than anyone else?
Probably because Wen Ya felt that, apart from herself, the others were all varying degrees of abnormal.
Only Shen Yi was still more or less capable of going out and meeting people like a normal person.
All the adults were in the main room, while several visiting girls had gathered in another room, chatting together.
Shen Yi pushed open the door. The hinges let out a creak.
In an instant, the girls inside, each with her own distinctive style, turned to look at her.
For a moment, Shen Yi felt as though she had wandered into the heavenly court. Light filled the room, falling on each girl and refracting into different colors. They looked like characters who had stepped out of entirely different stories, only to be casually tossed into the same room by fate.
The girls sat in their chairs and turned their heads toward Shen Yi in unison. Several pairs of eyes stared straight at her.
Shen Yi moved over to an empty chair, sat down, and greeted them.
The room immediately grew lively.
“Are you Aunt Wen Ya’s daughter?”
“I’ve heard about your mother for ages. Apparently, she’s incredibly amazing. It’s just that her judgment in men isn’t very good.”
The corner of Shen Yi’s mouth twitched.
Poor Dad.
In only a few days, he had been thoroughly looked down upon by everyone in the village.
“Haha…” All she could do was give a dry laugh and try to change the subject. “How are you planning to spend the rest of your vacation after the New Year?”
“Vacation? I don’t have a vacation. I’m leaving for the city in a few days. Honestly, I don’t want to go back.” One girl spoke first, listlessly tugging at a loose thread on her sleeve. “I’ve gotten used to raising pigs in the village, and then all of a sudden, a bunch of people show up and tell me that I’m actually the true heiress who was switched at birth. Are they kidding me? Now they want me to return to my real family. Where were they all those years ago?”
“So your family has a fake heiress too?”
“Yeah.” The girl wound the loose thread around her finger, then unwound it again. “It’s so annoying. Tell me, isn’t this just getting in the way of me feeding the pigs?”
“What about you guys? Do you have anything planned after the New Year?”
Shen Yi had yet to recover from the staggering revelation that this girl was apparently the protagonist of a true-heiress story when she answered instinctively, “Nothing much. I’m going back to school after the New Year.”
The true heiress immediately asked, “How are your grades?”
Shen Yi said, “I got full marks in every subject this time.”
“Oh, then you’re about as smart as Shi Qing.” The girl glanced toward her. “She’s brilliant too. She gets full marks every time.”
Shen Yi followed her gaze.
The girl wore a classic pair of faded jeans, and her hair was tied up casually, with a few wisps falling beside her face. Her expression was cool and detached.
“Shi Qing is amazing. She’s just very low-key.”
Shen Yi studied her, wondering if Shi Qing was the heroine of some story about a girl with countless hidden identities.
The true heiress continued chattering. “Once I return to the wealthy family, I can already imagine those spoiled rich kids looking down on me the moment they see me, calling me some bumpkin from the countryside. That kind of dialogue is so boring. What did rural people ever do to offend them?”
The girl was lively, and even her manner of speaking was naturally hilarious. Shen Yi couldn’t help laughing. “If you really can’t stand them, you can come to me for help.”
“What, you can beat them up for me?”
Shen Yi said, “No problem—as long as you have the money.”
“Then forget it…” The true heiress sighed. “I don’t have any money. Don’t scam a poor person.”
Shen Yi burst out laughing.
“What about you?” Shi Qing, who had been listening from the side, finally spoke. She, too, was wondering what kind of person Miss Wen Ya’s daughter was.
“You must have something special about you, right? Miss Wen Ya is extraordinary. When she left the village back then, all the elders were discussing where she would ultimately end up.”
Who would have thought that, in the end, she would marry and have children with such an unremarkable man?
Shi Qing had grown up listening to stories about the other girl. She couldn’t help feeling that it was a bit of a shame.
Something special?
Shen Yi countered, “Then what about all of you?”
Shi Qing answered frankly, “I have many identities and skills. I can hack, I know medicine, and I practice martial arts. I’m also a core member of several organizations and factions.”
“Me, me, me!” A girl with twin ponytails raised her hand and bounced over eagerly. “I can hear animals talk! But the villagers all say I’m crazy, and that studying has fried my brain.”
“What about you? What about you?”
The girls crowded around Shen Yi.
They looked at her expectantly, hoping she would reveal some earth-shattering secret.
Shen Yi suppressed her astonishment as she thought to herself:
Was this really not some kind of Disney princess gathering?
The only difference was that these weren’t princesses. They were protagonists holding a convention.
“I…” Aside from knowing that she was a lost true heiress, Shen Yi genuinely couldn’t think of anything special about herself.
What was special about her?
Was it being the lost daughter of a billionaire family, or repeatedly traveling back to the moment of her death?
Under the girls’ bright, eager gazes, she suddenly realized what made her different.
Shen Yi said, “I have a System.”
She had only gotten halfway through the sentence when she remembered that the System was already gone.
So she corrected herself. “I mean, I used to have one…”
“It helped me with a lot of things.”
Now that she had free time on her hands, everything in her life seemed to go especially smoothly.
Only once in a while did Shen Yi think of the System.
Across the long years, the only one that had accompanied her through every road she had traveled was It.
The air fell silent for two seconds.
“Wow!” The girl with twin ponytails was the first to shriek. “Seriously? A System? The kind that gives you missions, hands out rewards, and talks to you?”
“What did it look like? Could it talk?”
“Did it banter with you? The Systems in so many stories are hilarious!”
The girls fired off questions one after another, their eyes filled with curiosity and excitement.
“No, no, it wasn’t amusing at all. We didn’t interact much, and we rarely chatted,” she said with a smile, spreading her hands. “As for now… It’s gone.”
Beyond the window, the distant ridgeline was shrouded in twilight. Returning birds skimmed the treetops before vanishing into the horizon.
“But I feel that my life is going very smoothly now.” She drew her gaze back and her voice grew a little lighter. “Maybe It’s still helping me, or maybe I’ve simply been lucky. Either way, I’m still grateful that I got to meet It.”
Whether it was those days with the Song family in her previous life or every step she had taken after being reborn—
She wasn’t grateful for the suffering, but she was grateful for the encounters.
The good and the bad alike had ultimately pushed her toward this happy ending.
Standing at the end of the story and looking back,
everyone she had met had left a mark on her life.
Whether painted in bold, vivid strokes or sketched lightly and briefly, it had all come together to form the ending she had now.
“That’s wonderful.” The girl with twin ponytails rested her chin in her hands, her eyes full of envy. “People with Systems really are different. It feels like everything in their lives is bound to go smoothly. I’m so jealous of you.”
Shen Yi smiled. She didn’t tell her that even with the System, not everything would go smoothly.
As twilight settled in, everyone gradually drifted away in pairs and small groups.
Shen Yi remained where she was, watching them leave.
A breeze swept over from the mountains, carrying the scent of pine needles and damp earth.
Shen Yi lifted her head.
The wind brushed past her ears.
It was like the System’s final whisper.
It said, 【I wish you happiness.】
