Mu Yue is actually 28 years old, but right now she's living as a 17-year-old in the second half of her final year of high school. Though she aced the national college entrance exam back in her original life, being suddenly thrown back into exam preparations has her a little flustered. After all, it's only human nature to forget all the knowledge you learned in school once you step out of the campus.
The next monthly mock exam is coming up next Friday, leaving her with barely any time to spare.
Worse still, the university the real daughter of this world is supposed to get into is just as prestigious as the top 985 universities in Mu Yue's original world, and she only has this single semester to cram for it. The only small consolation is that both her and the original host of this body are science stream students.
If she fails to get in, she won't be able to claim the identity she's supposed to earn, and that would mean her whole mission is a failure. She already asked the systems about the consequences, and there's no dramatic death penalty for failing -- she would just be sent back to her original world without any rewards or compensation.
If she has to go back empty-handed, she can't speak for anyone else, but she definitely won't be able to accept it.
It's just a matter of grinding and studying hard? That's her specialty! She's going all in! But before drawing up her study plan, she still needs to fix her study environment first.
She turns on her phone, stares at the screen, and frowns deeply. She orders a light breakfast and a new phone for flash delivery, and that simple operation alone makes the phone freeze four times.
While waiting for her food to arrive, Mu Yue gets up to wash up. She glances in the mirror, takes a close look at her face, and realizes it's not completely unfamiliar at all. It's three or four points similar to her own face, but the original host was so sallow and emaciated that she didn't notice it at first glance.
At half past eight, Mu Yue has finished her breakfast and got her new phone. The nurse comes in to give her an IV drip, and other patients start to arrive in the ward.
The original host had a fever and a cough that dragged on and developed into pneumonia. The tests and hospital treatment have already cost her 2000 yuan, which has drained every last penny she had.
Her uncle's family knows she's in the hospital, but none of them have even called her. It's obvious they don't want to spend a single cent on her. Similar things have happened several times before. Not to mention taking care of her, once she gets home she'll even get scolded for making a big fuss over a minor illness, saying she could have just taken some pills instead of wasting money staying in the hospital.
She's already on her third day in the hospital. Her symptoms have improved a little, but she hasn't fully recovered yet, and she needs to get seven full days of IV drips. The drips are scheduled for the morning and afternoon, each lasting about an hour and a half, and she can leave once they're done. The original host had nowhere else to go, so staying in the hospital felt better than going home.
Mu Yue has no intention of lingering in the hospital any longer. She taps on her phone, picks a five-star hotel not far from her school, mutters the hotel's name to herself, and uses her experience voucher. The next second, a detailed order receipt pops up on her phone screen.
Less than a minute later, the hotel calls her. A pleasant-sounding female voice comes through the line, "Hello, Ms. Mu. Welcome to Dianyun. I am Lina, your personal butler at Dianyun, and I am at your full service."
Mu Yue says, "I'm currently at the Central Hospital. I need a car in an hour and a half."
"Of course," Lina replies. "May I ask what type of vehicle you prefer, Ms. Mu? If it's convenient for you, you can enter your room number in our Dianyun app, where you can view all our vehicle options and other service offerings. Of course, you can also just tell me your preferences and needs directly, and we will do our utmost to accommodate you."
While Lina was introducing the services, Mu Yue had already finished downloading the Dianyun app on her new phone, which ran perfectly smoothly. She had never heard of Dianyun Hotel in her original world, so she figured it must be a unique establishment in this merged world.
The app interface is elegantly designed, and all the services available to customers are clearly laid out.
For the transportation service Lina just mentioned, it clearly marks all the vehicles in the garage and which ones are currently in use. In addition, you can check which chefs are on duty that day, what their signature dishes are, and what the premium special ingredients are. Extra paid services are also clearly labeled, and you can even switch your personal butler in a second, which is extremely convenient.
Mu Yue skims through the app briefly and says to Lina, "Just get me a car with great ride comfort. For lunch, I want Chinese food, something light but not bland. I don't have any food allergies. Also, help me hire a short-term personal assistant, working for a week to a month. I hope to meet them before I finish my lunch. The pay will be calculated by the week, 15,000 yuan a week."
When they hear the words "personal assistant" and "15,000 yuan", the other people in the ward can't help but glance at Mu Yue. One person who has been sitting by the side playing games with their hood on since they came in even rolls their eyes. What a load of nonsense. This high school girl who can't even afford anything but free paper cups by her hospital bed, hasn't had a single family member to keep her company for three days, and has been surviving on two-yuan porridge for every meal is saying she's going to hire an assistant and pay 15,000 yuan? That's ridiculous.
"Alright, no problem at all," Butler Lina responds to all her requests one by one. Mu Yue doesn't have any other needs for now, and she hangs up after Lina finishes saying a string of pleasant well-wishes.
The assistant is a necessity. Right now, Mu Yue is still recovering from her illness, so she shouldn't be running around taking care of trivial, tiring things. The most important thing for her is to get proper rest. But that doesn't mean she can slack off entirely.
Her heavy study goals are hanging over her, and she badly needs a tutor. That's the task she's going to leave to her new assistant. She also hasn't forgotten the messy situation with the original host's family, the ones who took advantage of her, so those matters will need to be handled too.
Mu Yue pays no attention to the stares from the other people. Once her assistant arrives at noon, she will have them handle the discharge procedures and transfer her to a private hospital with a single room, where the quiet environment will be much better for studying.
As for right now, she still has a while before her IV drip is done, so she goes through the original host's memories. The original host's grades were very average. Except for Chinese, where she could occasionally score over 90, she failed every other subject. Her total score in the final exam last semester was only 338. That's not the original host's fault at all -- she didn't not want to study, she simply had no way to focus on it. Being able to get that score was already the best she could do.
The student ranked 100 places above her in the school exams got a score of 437.
The easiest subjects to boost scores quickly are Chinese and English. Mu Yue simply searches online for the ancient poems and essays that are required recitation for the national college entrance exam to familiarize herself with them, and starts studying on the spot.
Patient in bed 3 is an eight-month-old baby who just arrived today. The nurse is trying to insert an indwelling needle into a vein on the baby's forehead, and the baby is wailing at the top of its lungs. The family members and the nurse are all crowded around, and soon half the ward is packed. Zhang Hua, who was playing games, has no choice but to move over to the side near Mu Yue.
That's when he catches sight of the new phone Mu Yue is using -- it's that well-known expensive brand, and from the looks of it, it's the latest new model. He's been craving that phone for ages, he heard it runs games incredibly smoothly, it sells for 17,000 yuan, and with the headphones and charger added on, it costs nearly 20,000 yuan. He cranes his neck to peek at what Mu Yue is doing on her phone, and wonders to himself, how did this person suddenly get so much money?
That's right, Zhang Hua knows Mu Yue. He doesn't know her full name, but he knows she's from the class next door. He and Mu Yue were assigned to the same exam room because their total scores were at the bottom of the ranking. After seeing her many times, he has a clear impression of her -- she never looked rich, in fact she looked poorer than the students who were on financial aid.
Zhang Hua finally caught a glimpse of Mu Yue's phone screen. She wasn't scrolling through videos or playing games at all — she was staring at the lines of the hardest ancient poem to memorize. What a total poser! There were no teachers or parents around to watch, who on earth was she showing off for? He himself had skipped a whole week of classes by faking a family emergency, using his grandma's supposed illness as an excuse to get leave, so he just assumed Mu Yue was doing the exact same thing.
We're all slackers here, he thought. Why is she cramming poetry out of nowhere when there's not a single other teenager in this ward? Wait a second... is she pretending for my benefit?
Ugh, typical girls. Zhang Hua immediately adjusted his stance, striking what he thought was his coolest, most charming pose. Just you wait, I'll knock her socks off.
Mu Yue had no clue what absurd thoughts were swirling through the guy next to her, and didn't spare him a single glance anyway. She finished reciting the first poem to herself, then moved on to the next one.
Ten minutes later, the driver texted to say he had arrived at the hospital entrance. A quick call followed right after, asking for Mu Yue's instructions — should he wait outside, or did she have other arrangements?
There was still a little IV fluid left to drip, so Mu Yue said, "I'm in Ward 17, Bed 1, Third Floor, No. 1 Inpatient Building."
It wasn't long before two staff members from Dian Yun showed up. They greeted her with warm smiles. "Hello, Miss Mu. What can we do for you today?"
The second those words left their mouths, everyone else in the ward turned to look over again.
The two young attendants, one man and one woman, wore formal work uniforms under matching black overcoats. Both were very presentable: the man was energetic and sharp-featured, the woman had a soft, gentle smile and neat, polished makeup. They had divided their tasks perfectly — the man was ready to carry any luggage, and the woman was there to help support Mu Yue if she needed it, a thoughtful arrangement given that Mu Yue was a young girl in a hospital setting. A single suite at Dian Yun cost 58,000 yuan a night, and the seven-day experience card Mu Yue had used was far more expensive than the 100,000-yuan voucher she could have gotten from a check-in perk. She had spent hundreds of thousands of yuan all at once, so this level of attentive service was only to be expected.
Escorted by the two attendants, Mu Yue left the ward quickly.
As soon as she was gone, the other people in the room started chattering. They were still hung up on what Mu Yue had said earlier about hiring an assistant and paying 15,000 yuan a month.
She really does seem to be loaded, they thought. Maybe when she comes back later this afternoon, we can pitch our unemployed relatives and friends to her. Who cares if it seems pushy? Is being polite worth passing up a chance to make good money? A girl her age probably doesn't know how to say no anyway. If we're bold enough, maybe she'll actually hire someone we recommend.
Zhang Hua felt so restless his skin crawled. It had taken him a whole hour to finally admit Mu Yue wasn't putting on an act — she really was just focused on studying. Now that he'd seen actual staff from a luxury hotel come pick her up, his curiosity was through the roof. He said a quick word to his grandma, then hurried out of the ward after her.
Mu Yue was walking slowly, so Zhang Hua caught up to the three of them in no time. He pretended he was just heading out himself, trailing a little ways behind them at a casual distance.
When the group stepped outside, a luxury sedan pulled over. The driver hopped out to open the car door for Mu Yue. One of the two attendants cupped a hand over the top of Mu Yue's head to keep her from bumping it on the door frame, while the other gently helped her settle into the back seat.
The car sped off and vanished down the road. Zhang Hua frantically pulled out his phone, looked up the car model online, and gaped at the 3 million yuan price tag. He swore under his breath in shock, then excitedly opened his group chat to share everything he'd just seen with his friends. Running into a real-life "rich young heiress" who even went to their school, in the class right next door? That was the kind of juicy story that got overworked, burnt-out senior year students all riled up.
Over at H City No. 7 High School, it was the break between classes when everyone was supposed to do group calisthenics. The second Zhang Hua sent his message, the guys' group chat blew up. Before they even finished their calisthenics routine, one of his friends who knew people in Class 12 ran over to grab a classmate from that grade to ask if there was a girl named Mu Yue who was out on sick leave at the hospital.
"Yeah, what's up with her?" the student they asked first looked confused, then immediately perked up with gossip.
By the time the bell rang to end the break, the rumor that Mu Yue was a secret wealthy heiress had spread all through both classes. But most of the students in Class 12 had been in the same homeroom as Mu Yue since their first year of high school, and they knew exactly what her family situation was. She was an orphan whose parents had both passed away, and she'd been living with distant relatives who didn't care about her — how on earth did she suddenly have all that money?
Back when Mu Yue had just arrived at Dian Yun to meet the assistant Lina had found for her, the rumors at school had already spiraled into every possible wild claim.
There were three female candidates for the assistant position. It wasn't that male assistants were unqualified, but Lina had taken Mu Yue's age into consideration. She was only seventeen, almost eighteen but still technically a minor. If she hired a male life assistant, even the tiniest unexpected incident could get both Lina and the hotel in huge trouble. There was no reason to take that unnecessary risk.
All three candidates were highly professional. Mu Yue picked one named Qianqian. As soon as the decision was made, she laid out the day's tasks clearly. First, she told Qianqian to go to the mall next door and buy two sets of clothes for her, with a 50,000-yuan budget. It was still chilly in March, so that budget wouldn't get her ultra-luxury designer pieces, but it was more than enough to buy high-quality, comfortable outfits.
The second task was arranging a transfer to Private Mingde Hospital, a fancy medical facility that had popped up in dozens of popular novels. The upfront deposit for her stay there was 20,000 yuan. After paying for those two things, the 100,000 yuan she'd had left was down to just 10,000 yuan for emergencies.
Her last request was to find a tutor. She wanted the lessons scheduled for weekends and after evening self-study sessions, and ideally, she could meet the tutor that very same day.
That afternoon, the nurse pushed her cart into Ward 17, finished hanging IV drips for the patients in Beds 2 and 3, and was just about to leave when Zhang Hua couldn't hold his question in any longer. "Hey, where did Bed 1's patient go? Did she get discharged already?"
The nurse said, "Oh, she got transferred to another hospital."
"Transferred?" the family member of the patient in Bed 3 blurted out, unable to hold back their surprise.
"Yeah, I think they took her to Mingde Hospital."
Everyone in Ward 17 froze for a second. After a beat of silence, they started gossiping again, half regretful that their shot at currying favor with the rich girl had slipped away. Zhang Hua felt a little disappointed too, but he quickly got excited again and posted the breaking news to his group chat. Mingde Hospital, the famous private facility in H City, charged 3,000 yuan a day even for a standard shared room, and single cost twice that — more expensive than most five-star hotels.
Mu Yue was already at Mingde Hospital at that moment, going through a full round of new checkups. There were no queues at all, so all the tests were done in no time, and the private room they'd arranged for her was very nice and comfortable.
Mu Yue was impressed with how efficient Qianqian was — all three tasks she'd assigned earlier had been completed. The tutor she'd contacted was already on his way over. Since she was stuck with the IV drip and had nothing else to do, she might as well make use of the time to study.
As soon as the tutor arrived, Mu Yue asked him to start the lesson right away, going over math first. She told him to start from the very first year of high school curriculum, and that she would take a test covering all the content they went through that night.
The tutor heard her request, adjusted his glasses calmly, and jumped straight into the lesson. He was clearly a seasoned professional who'd dealt with all kinds of students before.
During the class, her phone kept pinging with nonstop messages, and several calls came in, but Mu Yue ignored all of them and flipped the switch to full silent mode.
Off in a corner, the Academic Ace System that had just hit a huge win peeked out quietly. The Yellow Chick stared at Mu Yue studying intently even with an IV stuck in her hand, its little round eyes going wide. It covered its beak with its wings, then zoomed back to the system's game room where the Pink Fox, Lucky Cat, and Little White Bear were all sitting around a table. It was teary-eyed as it said to them, "Guys, we've got it! This time we really hit the jackpot!"
"She's studying again, she even hired a tutor already! Waaa she's the most efficient host I've ever seen in my entire life!"
