After Transmigrating as the Villain’s Scummy Alpha "Dainty" Wife, My Escape Failed (GL) - Chapter 3

Chi Yuan: ???

She looked around to confirm no one was there, wondering if she was hallucinating.

After a moment, the voice spoke again: [Please confirm binding, Host. If the Host refuses to bind, the transmigrated soul will automatically dissipate.]

Chi Yuan panicked and responded instantly, “Bind! Bind!”

[Ding-dong! The “Save the Villain System” has been bound. Please help the villain prevent the protagonist from rising to power. If the mission fails, the host will be forced offline. For your life’s safety, please work hard to complete the task.]

Chi Yuan grumbled inwardly: If I don’t finish the task, I die again? What kind of scam system is this?

System: [Host, you already died in your original world. The novel system pulled you here. As long as you complete your tasks diligently, you can live on in this world with a new identity. The system is at your service at any time.]

…Fine.

The taxi slowly drove into the Chi Estate. Carved railings and jade-like stonework—the magnificent architecture unfolded before Chi Yuan like a scroll. Along the way, she had communicated with the system to straighten out the general plot of the novel.

The taxi driver looked on with envy, teasing her, “I could work for a lifetime and still not afford a single pillar in your house.”

Chi Yuan sighed with equal emotion. “Reincarnation really is a skill. The original host’s starting point is a finish line others could never reach in a lifetime. With such a wealthy life, why look for trouble? Why bother?”

System: [The world of a novel revolves around the female lead; that’s how cannon fodder ‘tools’ are born. The lead’s “Everyone Loves Her” attribute isn’t something people can just avoid if they want to.]

Chi Yuan: “That sounds like some divine intervention. I thought it was weird when I was reading—the lead envies this person and frames that person, yet no one thinks her ‘pure and kind’ exterior is hypocritical? It makes no sense.”

System: [Regardless, the female lead is a dangerous person. If the host wants to complete the mission, you must ensure the lead has no chance to get close to Jiang Ci.]

In the novel, if Jiang Wan had ten chances to approach Jiang Ci, nine were for sabotage, and the last one was to mock her from a winner’s pedestal. Though, Jiang Ci never actually cared.

The car stopped at the main gate. Chi Yuan carried Jiang Ci directly into the Chi house.

It was 9:00 PM, and the house was silent. Mother Chi had gone to bed early. Chi Yuan crept back to her room, feeling strangely like she was having a secret affair.

Shaking the impractical thoughts away, she laid the sleeping Jiang Ci on the bed, only to suddenly realize the woman’s body temperature was off.

Chi Yuan reached out to touch her burning forehead and immediately picked up the bedside landline to call the family doctor.

As expected of a wealthy family’s private doctor, he arrived in less than ten minutes, white coat on and medical bag in hand. The doctor, a man in his early forties with a neat hairstyle, was dripping with sweat from his light jog over.

Seeing that the patient wasn’t Chi Yuan, he walked to the bedside with a look of suspicion.

“Miss Jiang?! What on earth is…”

Chi Yuan cleared her throat, signaling the doctor to stop talking and start treating her.

“She has a weak stomach and symptoms of a fever. Did she take any medicine she shouldn’t have earlier?” The doctor set down the thermometer and started an IV drip to stabilize Jiang Ci’s condition.

The original host had done the deed, so Chi Yuan had no idea what kind of medicine Jiang Ci had been given. She hemmed and hawed, unable to speak.

The doctor, Fang Qi, sighed softly and looked at Chi Yuan with reproachful eyes. “I’ve heard a bit about your situation with Miss Jiang. Even though your marriage wasn’t voluntary, Jiang Ci is your legal partner. Even if you don’t like her, you shouldn’t mistreat and ruin her like this.”

Chi Yuan hadn’t realized her terrible relationship with Jiang Ci was common knowledge even to the family doctor.

She rubbed her nose and could only swallow the bitter pill of the original host’s reputation. She apologized profusely and promised repeatedly not to hurt Jiang Ci before finally managing to see the doctor out.

Looking at Jiang Ci curled up small on the bed, Chi Yuan’s heart softened. She soaked a towel, wrung it out, and gently wiped the woman’s forehead.

Even in sleep, Jiang Ci was restless. She frowned and gasped weakly, her breath hot. She murmured softly, clearly suffering from a high fever.

After wiping her forehead, Chi Yuan moved down to her sweat-drenched cheeks, her neck, and her slender wrists. When she reached for a cold, sweaty palm, the semi-conscious Jiang Ci suddenly grabbed her.

“Cold… Mu Mu, it’s cold…” Jiang Ci shivered violently, repeatedly crying out that she was freezing.

Chi Yuan looked at her flushed cheeks, feeling incredibly worried. The scumbag original host really wasn’t human!

She hesitated for a moment, then nimbly kicked off her shoes and got into bed. As she touched Jiang Ci’s burning body, Chi Yuan wrapped her tightly in the quilt and pulled both the woman and the blanket into her arms.

In her feverish dream, Jiang Ci seemed to return to that scorching summer.

She had just entered the entertainment industry. The dazzling, colorful world had rewarded her years of anticipation with a new starting point: the female lead in a low-budget web drama.

Though it wasn’t a high start, it meant Jiang Ci finally had her debut.

She shared the good news with Mu Sheng with excitement, but the voice on the other end of the phone made her feel like she had fallen into an ice cellar.

“Xiao Ci, your father… he’s in prison. The Jiang family is finished.”

Five years later, Mu Sheng’s words—”The Jiang family is finished”—still echoed in her ears a thousand times during the quiet of the night, stripping away all the hope and vision of her youth.

After that, misfortune hit Jiang Ci like a domino effect.

Her father was imprisoned, her mother went mad, and the Jiang house was raided and destroyed overnight. Even her last support, Mu Sheng, had to go abroad.

Twenty-year-old Jiang Ci didn’t know how she had offended the heavens. It was as if God had gotten angry and dumped every possible misfortune onto her head at once.

Isolated, helpless, and on the verge of collapse—that was the portrait of her life, day after day. Only her mother, who was suffering from dementia in a hospital bed, was the sole motivation that kept her from giving up.

After leaving the Jiang family, she lived in a rental room less than twenty square meters. A rickety electric fan creaked overhead, and the partitioned room next door was filled with the sounds of crying children and fighting couples.

It was noisy, cramped, and suffocating.

Even in the peak of an August summer, a wind as cold as winter seemed to blow through the leaky walls, forcing Jiang Ci to curl up and hug herself.

It was that same feeling of lonely helplessness. After all these years, she should have been used to it…

However, a sudden, elegant floral scent caused Jiang Ci’s knitted brows to slowly relax. The whistling cold wind stopped, and a warm, comfortable sensation surrounded her.

A small amber desk lamp cast a soft warmth in the dim room over the two people huddling together on the bed.

A quiet, unknown variable had begun to turn the gears of the world.

The next morning, Chi Yuan was woken up by voices outside the door.

She rubbed her hair, squinting her eyes as she nuzzled against a cool, smooth surface for a while. As her consciousness cleared, she tilted her head and suddenly locked eyes with a pair of scrutinizing pupils.

The grayish-brown eyes were like beautiful but somewhat inorganic glass beads. Coupled with long, curling lashes that flickered occasionally, the gaze was pure and innocent, without a hint of embarrassment at being caught.

Jiang Ci: “Awake?”

Chi Yuan: “…Awake.”

Jiang Ci hooked her lips into a smile and tilted her chin toward the right. “Well then, Miss Chi, can you let go of my arm now?”

Huh??

Chi Yuan looked down. Sure enough, both of her hands were tightly gripping Jiang Ci’s right arm. No wonder the texture she was nuzzling earlier felt so good…

She let go and sat up abruptly.

“Please don’t misunderstand, I didn’t do anything!”

“Didn’t do anything?” Jiang Ci lifted her arm, which was slightly numb from being Chi Yuan’s pillow, and crossed her arms, tilting her head with a shallow smile. “Do you mean you didn’t drug me, or that you aren’t cheating on me by hooking up with Jiang Wan?”

Hiss— Chi Yuan couldn’t help but take a sharp breath. This woman didn’t leave her an inch of room to maneuver.

Jiang Ci was clearly patient, leaning back against the headboard to see how Chi Yuan would quibble.

Chi Yuan: “I…”

At that moment, the bedroom door was violently kicked open, and a wooden rolling pin flew straight toward Chi Yuan’s face.

Because it happened so fast, Chi Yuan couldn’t dodge in time and had to raise her arm to block it.

The rolling pin hit her arm with a thud and rolled onto the floor. Little did she know, this was only the beginning.

An elegantly dressed woman in high heels marched toward Chi Yuan with light, brisk steps. Without a word, she landed a heavy slap on Chi Yuan’s straight back.

“Spending all day out drinking and playing—now you’ve really improved! You actually know how to bring someone home to mess around!”

“If I don’t teach you a lesson today, you’ll think you’re above the law!”

Chi Yuan’s face twisted in pain. She hunched over, feeling the sting on her back, while catching a glimpse of the woman bending down to pick up the rolling pin.

…

Chi Yuan quickly jumped away, raising her hands in surrender. “Mom! Mom! I wasn’t messing around! Put the rolling pin down!”

Who was this fierce woman? She was the original host’s mother, Chi Shuangzhi—the iron-fisted matriarch of the Chi family. The playboy, domineering “Chi Yuan” feared nothing more than this “Tiger Mom” who would rather hit than talk.

Chi Shuangzhi glared, her eyebrows raised as she swung the rolling pin. She didn’t care at all that her biological daughter was yelping and wincing in pain.

“I gave you face, didn’t I? Not messing around? Then who is that on the bed?”

“Did you pick up some vixen in the middle of the night?”

“Doing this—how am I supposed to explain this to Jiang Ci?!”

“Mom!” Chi Yuan felt like the heavens themselves should be weeping for her; she was so wronged.

“Look at the bed! Isn’t that Jiang Ci? Your own daughter-in-law!” She dodged left and right, looking toward Jiang Ci for help, wanting her to speak up. Instead, she saw the woman covering her mouth, snickering with a face full of schadenfreude.

“Jiang Ci?” Finally reacting, Chi Shuangzhi looked toward the bed and met Jiang Ci’s elegant, polite nod.

The rolling pin in her hand loosened. Chi Shuangzhi looked at the woman on the bed, then at her daughter, speechless. Her expression changed like a color palette before she finally stomped her foot and reached out to smack Chi Yuan again.

Physically and mentally wounded, Chi Yuan shouted: “Mom! I told you it’s Jiang Ci, why are you still hitting me?”

Chi Shuangzhi: “If I don’t hit you, who do I hit? Speak! What are your motives for tricking Jiang Ci into coming home?!”

Chi Yuan completely broke down: “She’s my legal wife! What motives could I possibly have?!”

Author’s Note:

Mother Chi: Who told you to be a piece of work every single day…

Chi Yuan: I… I’m innocent!

Jiang Ci: Hit her, keep hitting her. I’m quite enjoying the show.