Mu Yue had dinner at home that evening. Not knowing what to make, the housekeeper simply prepared hot pot. There were four different soup bases: classic spicy beef tallow, sour fish soup, mushroom broth, and congee. The square compartments were filled with neatly arranged fresh ingredients. The moment the aroma wafted out, Mu Yue’s appetite was instantly whetted.
The hot pot and ingredients were all portioned for one person, with the amount of each dish adjusted according to Mu Yue’s preferences. The main focus was on having a wide variety. The character card ate as well, but whenever they were at home, it never sat at the same table as Mu Yue.
Mu Yue swished slices of meat in the pot while watching a movie she had picked out to accompany her meal. From time to time, her phone received messages of congratulations and invitations to various events.
In the past six months, she had spent at least several million yuan at quite a few luxury brands. Whenever they held holiday events, they would basically invite Mu Yue to attend. Aside from the brands, even the property management company was holding an event—a Mid-Autumn Festival barbecue party.
Mu Yue had no real interest in it. She might go to watch a fashion show or something similar, but she would pass on dinners and social gatherings. Most of them were merely business networking. She received money every day and was not running a business, so there was no need for her to attend such functions.
However, Mu Yue did not plan to stay cooped up at home during National Day. She disliked dragging things out, so she had already sent the system buddies to investigate the Locksmith Kid’s background. He was from City A and was nearing forty. He was single, though he had once had a wife and child; the marriage had ended in divorce long ago. At present, he was in prison.
The Locksmith Kid was a habitual offender. He had not been trained by any professional gang of thieves—he had taught himself. He had been stealing small things since childhood and had quite a criminal record. However, he was crafty: every time he stole, he kept the amount low, usually only around a thousand yuan. Naturally, his prison sentences were never very long. The male lead called this “the way small-time people survive.”
Mu Yue thought he was nothing more than a rat. Rats were timid and did not dare commit major crimes, but they were also good at hiding. When the male lead met him, the rat was on the run, having been unwillingly dragged into a case involving a huge sum of money. Both the authorities and the underworld wanted to find him—and the stolen money.
After hearing the rat talk about missing his wife and daughter, saying that in the beginning he had only wanted to buy his daughter a birthday present, the male lead accepted him and helped him through the crisis. The rat was so grateful that he later went to work under the male lead.
When Mu Yue read that part of the plot, she merely let out two mocking chuckles. Oh, how pitiful that divorced old thief was. If he truly cared about his wife and daughter, why had he repeatedly stolen things and ended up in prison? Since he had perfectly good hands and feet, why not get an honest job? If he did not want to do that, then he could just forget about having a family.
Things turned out almost exactly as she had guessed. Putting him in prison ahead of time was not a foolproof solution. Mu Yue glanced at the time. He would be released before the New Year.
This should be the very occasion when someone took a fancy to his skills and asked him to join in on a major job. Then something would go wrong, and he would go on the run, eventually meeting the male lead.
Mu Yue swished a slice of lamb through the pot, thinking about whether she should deal with the rat immediately or wait until he was released from prison.
As for Wen Yuanting, the carjacker fleeing after the robbery and crashing into him was only the first factor. The second was that his younger sister was one of the women in the male lead’s harem. Her character setup included having an older brother who was in a vegetative state.
After doing it once, she had grown familiar with it. Mu Yue was already a seasoned hand at stealing the male lead’s opportunities.
Judging from the original plot, the younger sister was probably driven into a corner, which gave the male lead an opportunity to take advantage of her.
Mu Yue had heard a thing or two about Wen Yuanting's family back when she was in the club. They were not especially wealthy, but they were still better off than most ordinary families. They owned a martial arts school and a small restaurant, with his father running the school and his mother managing the restaurant.
It was manageable when only Wen Yuanting himself got into trouble. But after both of his parents suffered accidents in succession, along with a few unreliable relatives and other complications, expecting a girl who was still in high school to shoulder the burden of the entire family would have been extremely difficult.
And reasoning backward from there—
Mu Yue popped the lamb, drenched in sauce, into her mouth. It was incredibly tender and juicy. As she chewed, she put down her chopsticks and picked up her phone, sending Wen Yuanting a message:
[Have your whole family buy insurance. They should all get accident insurance and medical insurance.]
Wen Yuanting had already returned home. Carrying a pile of newly purchased clothes and enduring the strange looks from his entire family, he was sweating profusely at the dinner table, desperately trying to find a topic that would save him from being teased or interrogated, when Mu Yue's message came through.
Wen Yuanting immediately picked up his phone. His expression grew tense when he saw that the message was from Mu Yue, and his brows drew together even more after he read its contents.
Mrs. Wen lightly kicked her husband and nodded toward their son. His younger sister covered her mouth to hide a laugh, while Gu Dad tapped his bowl and deliberately said, “Don’t play with your phone while you’re eating.”
“Just a second.” Wen Yuanting had no time to pay attention to the silent exchange between his family members. All his attention was focused on Mu Yue’s message. What did she mean? Could it be that something would happen to his family after what happened to him?
Wen Yuanting originally wanted to type out a question and send it to Mu Yue, but then he remembered that it was dinnertime. He deleted the long string of text he had already typed and sent a simple “Okay” instead. He would wait until after dinner and ask her about it properly.
There was no harm in buying accident and medical insurance. It was hardly a major issue. But the fact that Mu Yue had specifically told him to buy them made it difficult for Wen Yuanting to feel at ease, and he spent the entire meal distracted and preoccupied.
Seeing him like that, his family found it even more amusing. None of them had any idea what he was actually worrying about.
After seeing Wen Yuanting’s reply, Mu Yue knew that the matter of insurance was probably settled. Ordinary insurance still wouldn’t be enough, though. If they wanted greater security, they would also need commercial insurance. Commercial insurance was a little more expensive, but they could choose a plan with suitable coverage.
With insurance payouts, even if something happened to Wen Yuanting’s family later, his younger sister would not be driven into a corner. She would not need to sell the martial arts school, the restaurant, or the house to fill the bottomless hole created by her family’s medical expenses. Since she would no longer be left without options, why would she need to be “rescued” by a piece of trash like the male lead?
Without the male lead being able to play the role of savior, this link in the chain would be broken.
Unless the male lead dared to openly bully a young girl through underhanded methods and force her to become his dependent. But if he did that, he would no longer deserve to be the male lead. Even in a wish-fulfillment harem novel, the male lead could not be portrayed as such a despicable, utterly shameless person—
At least, not on the surface.
After dinner, Wen Yuanting called her on voice chat to ask about the insurance.
Mu Yue thought for a moment before saying, “I read your fortune. After something happens to you, something will happen to your family as well. Your younger sister will be driven into a corner and, for your sake and your family’s, end up with a piece of trash who has more than a dozen women.”
Wen Yuanting listened, stunned. His first reaction was that this couldn’t possibly be true—but Mu Yue would never joke with him about something like this. There was nothing funny about it. And despite how absurd it sounded, he had a feeling that what Mu Yue said might actually be true.
The thought immediately kindled a ball of fury in Wen Yuanting’s chest. He hurriedly said, “I know this may be a little presumptuous, but Junior Mu, would it be convenient for you to meet me?”
Mu Yue had only recently finished eating. She had already been planning to take a walk to help her food settle, so she checked the map and chose a spot by the river that was within a reasonable distance for both of them.
Wen Yuanting naturally agreed. He had grabbed his father’s car keys and was about to leave when, just before opening the door, he suddenly glanced down at his pants. They were completely lacking in style and far too casual—an old pair of sweatpants, at that. He hurried back to his room, took out the casual outfit he had bought that day and had the sales clerk put together, and changed into it.
When he came out of his room, his parents and younger sister were all sitting on the sofa, their eyes turning toward him in unison.
Wen Yuanting said, “Uh... I’m heading out for a bit. Is there anything you want me to buy? I can bring it back later.”
“If you have somewhere to be, then go,” his father said.
“Nothing for me. You should save where you can and spend where it matters,” his mother added.
His younger sister looked him up and down. “Brother, did you even look in the mirror? You didn’t cut the tags off your clothes.”
“Huh?” Wen Yuanting tugged at his shirt and felt around for the tag. His sister couldn’t stand watching him fumble around, so she took a pair of scissors and cut it off for him. Then she made him lower his head and tidied his hair, clicking her tongue as she said, “Don’t go looking this stupid when you get there. Be careful she doesn’t reject you.”
What was she even talking about? Wen Yuanting couldn’t explain himself in just a few words, and he was afraid of keeping Mu Yue waiting, so he hurried out.
The moment the door closed, the three people inside immediately started gossiping.
Mu Yue arrived at the river first. It was bustling at night, especially with all the people out walking their dogs. Mu Yue hadn’t even activated the limited-time Forest Princess ability, yet she still attracted the little animals. She had only been sitting there for a short while when no fewer than five dogs came over asking to be petted, each one wagging its tail like a propeller.
The four system buddies kept picking holes in them from inside the system space. That one’s coat wasn’t shiny enough, this one wasn’t fluffy enough, and so-and-so hadn’t had a bath that day. Another one had tiny eyes and couldn’t compare with them at all!
When Wen Yuanting arrived, Mu Yue was surrounded by a Samoyed and A-Zhu. One kept pushing its head toward her hand while the other was trying to jump all over her. Their owners had sweat beading on their foreheads, their gritted expressions making it look as though they were silently cursing their disobedient children.
Mu Yue spotted Wen Yuanting from a distance as well. He had run all the way there, wearing a gray hooded sweatshirt and a pair of flax-colored casual trousers. He had long legs and a straight posture, without the slightly hunched, dispirited air common among many men. His whole appearance was crisp and neat, and he looked anything but bulky.
Wen Yuanting was carrying two drinks, neither of them overly sweet. Mu Yue stroked the heads of the two dogs and told them she was leaving. Only then did they finally obey their owner, walking away while looking back every few steps.
Wen Yuanting put a straw in Mu Yue’s drink for her, then took out a wet tissue and handed it to her. He waited until she had cleaned her hands before passing the drink over.
He was rather considerate. Mu Yue accepted it, and the two of them walked slowly along the riverside. Wen Yuanting still hadn’t decided where to begin asking questions when Mu Yue suddenly said something astonishing.
“I’m going to this prison tomorrow. Do you want to come with me?” Mu Yue lit up her phone. Displayed on the screen was a location somewhere outside A City.
Wen Yuanting nearly sprayed out the tea he had just sipped. After coughing several times, he asked, “What is this?”
“The current location of one of the robbers.” Mu Yue took a sip of her tea, her tone perfectly calm.
Wen Yuanting was stunned. “But, but I haven’t…” He hadn’t given Mu Yue any more information about the robbers. How had she known in advance?
Mu Yue stopped and leaned against the railing along the riverbank, looking at him with an amused yet knowing smile. “Otherwise, why do you think you came looking for me?”
Wen Yuanting’s heart gave two heavy thumps. A string of plot details from the novel exploded through his mind, and even his breathing became unsteady. He was now incredibly grateful that he had asked Mu Yue for help that night. This time—this time, perhaps he could really escape that strange repetition.
“Whew!” Wen Yuanting let out a breath and tightened his grip on the cup. “I’m going!”
“Fine.” Mu Yue glanced at the veins standing out on the back of his hand and reminded him, “Keep squeezing it and it’ll burst.”
Wen Yuanting came back to himself and quickly loosened his grip, only to blush deeply in front of Mu Yue once again.
“Right, Junior Mu, about that insurance matter you mentioned today…”
Mu Yue didn’t explain in detail. Instead, she spent ten points in the shop to buy a dreamscape item. She didn’t even need to describe anything herself. As long as she copied that passage from the original story into it, the item could recreate the scene in a dream.
She put on a mysterious expression. “You’ll find out tonight. Just go home and get some sleep.”
Wen Yuanting seemed to think of something and lowered his voice to ask, “Junior Mu, are you from the Xuanmen?”
Xuanmen? Mu Yue nearly burst out laughing. How had this kid suddenly switched himself into a fantasy setting? Still, she thought the idea was rather entertaining, so she merely smiled and said nothing.
Wen Yuanting’s face lit up with amazement. But before half a second had passed, worry suddenly replaced his astonishment. “Will doing this cause you any harm, Junior Mu? What should I do?”
“Doing it once in a while won’t,” Mu Yue replied casually.
Wen Yuanting nodded solemnly and committed her words to memory. After returning home, he searched through quite a bit of related information and novels, eventually arriving at what seemed like a fairly reliable conclusion: people who cultivated spiritual practices needed merit or faith.
He found the idea very convincing. Yet not long afterward, he recalled the expression on Mu Yue’s face by the river—clearly one of barely suppressed laughter—and belatedly realized that Mu Yue had teased him once again.
Alone in his room, Wen Yuanting felt his face heat up again. It had to be Zhao Yang. Hearing him go on and on every day about all those novel tropes had rubbed off on him. How could reality possibly be that fantastical?
Still, it was strange that Mu Yue had known about it in advance. Then again, wasn't it strange that he himself had been repeating the past ten years?
Early the next morning, Wen Yuanting woke drenched in sweat, his face streaked with tears. He gasped for breath, anger and despair still lingering in his eyes. How could this have happened? Why?
"Brat, are you awake yet? Didn't you say you were heading out today? Don't tell me you're going to be late!" His father's booming voice came from outside the door.
Ignoring everything else, Wen Yuanting hurried to his feet, opened the door, and threw his arms around his father.
"Dad," he called, his body trembling.
His father was thoroughly disgusted. "Get off me, get off me! What's gotten into you this early in the morning? Look at you, soaked in sweat. Go wash up before you stink the place out!"
The father in his dream, who had gone to compete despite his age for the sake of his son and sick wife, only to be seriously injured in the end, overlapped with and yet felt utterly separate from the loud, healthy man before him. It was not until his father roughly shoved him away that Wen Yuanting finally came back to himself.
It was only a dream. It wasn't real. It couldn't be real. This was probably just a case of dreaming about what had been on his mind during the day... right?
"Right?" he asked Mu Yue in the car, his expression tense.
Mu Yue looked at him in surprise. "I was just messing with you. You actually believed me?" Of course it was true. But saying so would probably scare this idiot half to death, and he had already suffered enough. Better leave it alone.
At that, Wen Yuanting let out a long breath of relief. It was good that it wasn't real. Even so, the dream remained painfully vivid in his mind. Seeing Mu Yue's relaxed profile, his thoughts became even more tangled.
"What are you spacing out for? Do you need your senior to fasten your seat belt for you?" Mu Yue asked, breaking through his daze.
When Wen Yuanting saw her actually lean toward him, he hurriedly said, "N-no need. I can do it myself."
Mu Yue smiled, started the engine, and set off following the navigation.
Wen Yuanting had driven over today, but Mu Yue had told him to leave his car in her parking space. She, meanwhile, was driving a new car: a Cullinan SUV she had won through a sign-in lottery a few days before the National Day holiday. When she had won it, it had come with a premium custom-order service. All Mu Yue had to do was enter a description, and the system would generate it.
The interior had been customized entirely to her specifications, and Mu Yue liked it immensely. She had originally planned to buy an SUV anyway. Her sports car only had two seats, which was inconvenient whenever she wanted to take more than one passenger, such as when everyone from the dorm went out for a meal. With this new car, a few extra people would be no problem.
Still, compared with driving herself, Mu Yue preferred relaxing in the back seat.
With that in mind, she said to Wen Yuanting, "Senior, you wouldn't mind occasionally being my driver, would you?"
“Of course not.” Wen Yuanting had been hoping for a chance to repay Mu Yue, and even his usually impassive face showed the hint of a smile. His tone was relaxed. “In the past ten years, I may not have accomplished much else, but I’ve certainly gotten good at driving. Even a luxury car like yours doesn’t intimidate me, junior.”
That was a rather dark joke. Mu Yue remembered the reincarnation data Wen Yuanting had sent her. In the later iterations, Wen Yuanting had stopped trying to evade the collision. Instead, on New Year’s Day, he would drive alone and confront the people in the car that had hit him head-on.
But the outcome remained the same. No matter how skilled he became, he was still the one who lost. Besides all the various accidents, the criminals had weapons too.
Wen Yuanting was far more resilient than Mu Yue had expected. The car accident had not left him with a fear of vehicles. On the contrary, he had taken the initiative to learn and practice driving. After repeating the same year ten times, someone with a weaker mentality might have become twisted long ago.
Yet from the few times Mu Yue had interacted with him, Wen Yuanting seemed perfectly normal. He was active and enthusiastic in his club, joked around with people, and did not carry himself like someone weighed down by bitterness and resentment.
Perhaps that was one of the reasons he remained trapped: he refused to accept his fate and was unwilling to admit defeat.
Mu Yue looked at Wen Yuanting a couple of times. “Then it’s settled. Whenever you’re free, you have to come whenever I call.”
Wen Yuanting bowed his head. “At your service, Miss!”
“Very good.” The atmosphere in the car was relaxed, and Mu Yue was in a good mood. Even the National Day traffic no longer seemed quite so irritating.
After two hours, they finally arrived at the prison. Whether it was identifying a suspect in a criminal case or visiting an inmate, there was a set procedure to follow. An application and appointment had to be made in advance, along with proof of identity and one’s relationship to the inmate. The prison then had to approve the visit. Under normal circumstances, Mu Yue would not have been able to meet him so quickly.
But she had a cheat.
Regardless of how she had managed it, she and Wen Yuanting were still able to meet Rat in the visiting room.
Mu Yue did not sit down. She simply stood there, observing Rat. He had no impression of either of them. Hunched over, he approached them with an ingratiating smile, frantically racking his brain to figure out whether he had foolishly stolen from them at some point. Though the two were young, it was obvious that they were not people he could afford to offend—especially the young girl.
The moment Rat drew near, Wen Yuanting’s pupils widened for an instant, and his hand unconsciously clenched into a fist.
It was that face!
He remembered now. He had no idea which iteration it had been, but every time he had collided head-on with that car, he had seen this man sitting in the passenger seat.
The man’s appearance was utterly ordinary, without any distinctive features. Wen Yuanting could never have described him from memory; at most, he could have given an approximate age. But now that the man was standing right in front of him, those memories, once shrouded in fog, suddenly became crystal clear.
Mu Yue saw Wen Yuanting’s expression and knew that this was the Rat they were looking for. She immediately used the item she had prepared from the beginning. Without saying a word to Rat, she grabbed Wen Yuanting and left.
“Huh?” Rat scratched his head, completely baffled. Who were these two people? They had appeared out of nowhere and left just as suddenly.
How strange.
After they came out, Wen Yuanting still had his fists clenched. Gritting his teeth, he said, “It was him! He was sitting in the passenger seat at the time!”
“Mm, I know.” Mu Yue gave Wen Yuanting’s tense back a reassuring pat. “Let’s get in the car first.”
“All right.” Wen Yuanting glanced back at the prison gates before getting into the car. It was only then that he became aware of the place on his back where Mu Yue had patted him. It seemed to retain the lingering sensation of her touch, making it impossible for him to ignore.
On the way back, Mu Yue planned to have the systems retrieve data on the other inmates at that prison. She didn’t need anything detailed—just their faces. Wen Yuanting had recognized the man in the passenger seat, so perhaps he could identify the driver as well.
Rat had only been roped into the scheme at the last minute. The others might not be so lucky. If they followed the trail from him, there was a chance they could expose the entire gang of robbers.
Well, she had committed another minor breach of the rules. On the day before New Year’s, she had informed the police that these people were planning to commit a crime during the New Year celebrations. That counted as making a small contribution to atone for it.
Throughout the entire drive back, Wen Yuanting remained dazed. He was stunned that he had managed to meet one of the robbers so quickly, and even more stunned by the extent of Mu Yue’s influence—he had just looked up the procedures for visiting an inmate in prison.
He had no idea what Mu Yue would do next, but in his heart, he already trusted her completely.
What would Mu Yue do? Nothing at all. The bad-luck talisman would take care of everything on its own. The talisman was just as cheap as ever, but when used on a supporting character, its effects were far more powerful than when used on the male lead.
It had nothing to do with her, of course. Whether Rat ended up breaking a hand or a foot, it would all be an accident.
Once Wen Yuanting had come out of his daze, he found himself unable to sit still. He desperately wanted to do something for Mu Yue. Since there were still two hours of driving left on the way back, he suggested that he officially start working for her that very day.
Mu Yue switched places with him. Wen Yuanting then asked about her preferences and whether she wanted to have dim sum for breakfast. He knew of a restaurant that served excellent morning tea.
Seeing how eager he was to treat her, Mu Yue simply went along with it. The restaurant’s morning tea really was excellent, with every dish well above average. The roast squab, beef rice rolls, and fish congee in particular gave Mu Yue a pleasant surprise.
After they had eaten their fill, Wen Yuanting declared that he was at the young miss’s disposal and could do anything she ordered—not just serve as her driver.
Mu Yue first had Wen Yuanting identify the inmates at that prison again. Through him, she confirmed that the driver was among them as well.
After marking the driver’s identity, Mu Yue told the systems to keep an eye on his release date, then dismissed Wen Yuanting. His part was more or less over. From then on, she could simply enjoy her vacation.
That evening, while Mu Yue was playing a five-person team game with the four systems, she received the results of the day’s efforts.
[Villain points +400!]
Mu Yue glanced at the prison surveillance footage the systems had retrieved. Rat had slipped and fallen while taking a shower, and the fall had been serious. Not only had he broken his hand, but two of his fingers had also been disastrously caught in the drain outlet and broken. Even after they were reattached, they would never regain their former dexterity.
All his cellmates could do was laugh at him. His meal ticket was broken this time—his special skill was useless now.
With all the points collected, the male lead had already lost this member of his protagonist team.
The mouse might not look like much, but it played a pretty significant role in the original story: helping the male lead steal the villain’s incriminating evidence, picking the lock when the male lead was arrested, and even creating the romantic thrill of locking the male lead and one of the heroines together with no way to get out.
But now, all of that was gone.
Oh, right. Had the male lead finished recovering?
