The Fake and Real Heiresses Fell in Love (GL) - Chapter 1

The moment Yao Yanyan became conscious, that was the first sentence she heard.

“…No biological relation?” She repeated, word by word, her mind numb.

“Yes, Miss Yao. Do you still need to come and pick up the paternity test report?”

The woman’s voice coming through the phone was all business, seemingly unsurprised by her stunned question. Yao Yanyan instinctively replied, “No, thank you,” and hung up.

The hand holding the phone dropped to the bed. She sat perfectly straight, her eyes wide, staring blankly ahead, her mind struggling to process everything.

Because just now, as the doctor was reading that not-too-long, not-too-short paternity test report, a flash of her future had appeared before Yao Yanyan.

A tragic future where, at the age of twenty-four, she was lying in a hospital bed waiting to die, completely alone.

At the same time, she realized something else.

The world she was living in was seemingly a female-lead, No-CP novel, and the reason for her miserable death was that she was the fake heiress, wicked female supporting character—adopted as a substitute after the real heiress was lost. The protagonist, who would return in a few years, was the real heiress.

That phone call had been the result of the wicked supporting character “Yao Yanyan” realizing she looked nothing like her parents and younger sister, so she secretly arranged a paternity test through a familiar doctor.

Yao Yanyan reviewed the original text’s account of “her own” actions and felt utterly perplexed.

With her self-awareness now awakened, she honestly felt that the original “self”—who secretly searched for the real heiress for two years, found her, failed to secretly assassinate her, and then became obsessed with provoking her—must have had a screw loose.

She felt that a normal person, unless their brain was kicked by a donkey, wouldn’t do something so stupid and malicious.

Rubbing her temples, she was about to get up when a mechanical sound suddenly echoed in her mind.

[Information transferring… Information transfer complete… Character self-awareness activation complete… System binding in progress… System binding successful.]

Yao Yanyan: “Who’s talking!” She clapped her hands over her ears in fright.

The System didn’t answer: [Hello, Yao Yanyan, I am the Life-Saving System 02. Our slogan is: A hundred years! Live to be a hundred years old!]

Yao Yanyan: “??? What?”

[Yao Yanyan, please travel to Fengkang Town to earn Cheng Xuan’s favorability. Mission distributed. Yao Yanyan, please begin execution within one day! Otherwise, Yao Yanyan’s self-awareness will be closed again!]

Cheng Xuan.

Yao Yanyan was stunned. Wasn’t Cheng Xuan the name of the novel’s female protagonist?

The real heiress, her sister who was two years younger, had been living hand-to-mouth since childhood. By the time the wealthy family found her, she had already dropped out of school for two years, as her adoptive parents forbade her to study, saying a daughter going to university was useless, and the best fortune was just waiting to be married off.

Remembering this part of the original plot made Yao Yanyan angry. It was good that she was going to Fengkang Town; at least she could keep an eye on Cheng Xuan and make sure she didn’t drop out again.

Yao Yanyan asked about what she didn’t understand: “What’s the point of earning favorability?”

The System answered her: [Because you are a supporting character, the only way to maintain your self-awareness is to approach the core of this world—Cheng Xuan—and obtain her favorability. Otherwise, you will lose your self-awareness again and follow the original Yao Yanyan’s fixed ending.]

Yao Yanyan shivered. The fixed ending? Wasn’t that an early death?

“I have to go today?”

[Yes, go today. We do not have enough energy to support your consciousness. If you arrive in Fengkang Town today, even if you don’t see Cheng Xuan, you will gain five days of self-awareness.]

My goodness.

So, Cheng Xuan was like a Wi-Fi hotspot, and she had to work hard to piggyback off the signal, right?

Yao Yanyan understood and quickly got out of bed to grab her suitcase.

Yao Wu pushed the door open and saw her sister packing.

The room was small, with Yao Yanyan’s clothes and shoes piled on the bed and floor. Two huge suitcases sat in the middle, and her sister was huffing and puffing as she stuffed clothes inside.

Yao Wu was dumbfounded. She closed the door and asked, “What are you doing? Is all this really necessary?”

Her tone was unpleasant, laced with resentment. Yao Yanyan looked at her in surprise: “What’s wrong?”

“You’re asking me what’s wrong!” Yao Wu stomped her foot. She was sixteen and had just started high school; her actions were still childish. In the original text, she was also a wicked villainess who despised Cheng Xuan as a poor person from a poor, broken place, and her ending was not much better than her sister’s.

“You’re just having a spat with Dad and Mom, and you had a bad attitude yesterday, Sis. Is it really necessary to run away from home?”

A spat?

It seemed there was such a thing. Yesterday, she suspected she wasn’t their biological child, which annoyed her. The wicked supporting character’s personality had taken over, and she deliberately talked back to her parents at the dinner table a few times.

Yao Yanyan opened her mouth, wanting to explain, but decided it wasn’t necessary.

Let them misunderstand. She had to leave today, no matter what.

Seeing that her sister completely ignored her, Yao Wu’s face flushed with anger: “Where are you going!”

“To Fengkang Town to clear my head,” Yao Yanyan said, folding a shirt.

“Fengkang Town? Where is that? Is it fun? Do they have good food?”

“It’s not fun. It’s just a small town with a lot of farmlands.”

Hearing “a lot of farmlands,” Yao Wu immediately looked disgusted: “Why go to that kind of dirty, backward place?”

She thought of something and smiled, clapping her hands: “Sis, why don’t we go to Jin City instead? A new popular online restaurant just opened there…”

“No.”

She was interrupted before she could finish.

Yao Yanyan looked up: “Yao Wu, I also advise you to change your bad habits. There are many, many things in this world you haven’t seen. It’s not all about popular online restaurants and trendy B&Bs. Not everyone lives a smooth, worry-free life. We shouldn’t wait until we’ve truly reached a dead end to understand that lesson.”

Yao Wu instantly froze. When she reacted, her face was red with anger: “I… What do you mean, Sis!”

She calmed herself down: “What does whether other people have a smooth life have to do with me! I’ll be lucky and worry-free my entire life!”

After she said that, Yao Yanyan squatted on the ground, staring at her expressionlessly.

That look seemed to see right through everything. Yao Wu’s cheeks felt hot from the gaze. She wanted to talk back but didn’t know what to say. Subconsciously, she felt her sister might be right, but she didn’t want to admit it.

“Sister is so weird today!”

Stomping her foot, Yao Wu closed the door and ran off.

Yao Yanyan looked at the closed door and continued to pack her clothes.

She hoped Yao Wu could understand.

After all, in the future, after “Yao Yanyan” died, the family would go bankrupt, and everything would be supported by Cheng Xuan. Yao Wu still wouldn’t change her habit of speaking ill of others, spending the money Cheng Xuan earned while still insulting her, which led to Cheng Xuan directly throwing her out of the house.

“You, I won’t support anymore.” Cheng Xuan had said, closing the door on her.

Yao Wu, having nowhere to go, didn’t know that being penniless could be so difficult. She couldn’t endure hardship, was greedy for food and beauty, and was useless at everything else. She eventually became a mistress to an old man in the wealthy circles and was constantly ambushed and beaten up by the legal wife.

A reader of the novel might feel a sense of satisfaction watching this plot, but as the sister who watched Yao Wu grow up, the thought of it honestly broke Yao Yanyan’s heart.

She didn’t blame Cheng Xuan for throwing Yao Wu out; Cheng Xuan had already done more than enough. All of this was Yao Wu’s own fault, that of a naive, foolish child.

So, she couldn’t waste a single moment. If she lost her self-awareness, Yao Wu would be doomed along with her.

Yao Yanyan finished packing and called the driver and bodyguard, Uncle Zheng, upstairs.

Uncle Zheng was only thirty, tall, muscular, and walked in wearing a black suit and black sunglasses in the middle of summer.

Yao Yanyan: “…”

How should she put it? Why hadn’t she found this strange before? Black sunglasses and a black suit—was that really the standard uniform for bodyguards in novels? Who wears that kind of outfit normally?

Yao Yanyan couldn’t help but ask, “Uncle Zheng, aren’t you hot?”

Uncle Zheng: “Replying to Miss, I am not hot.”

Yao Yanyan: “…You should go change into summer clothes right now, and you don’t have to keep calling me ‘Miss.'”

Uncle Zheng: “Yes, Miss.”

Yao Yanyan: “…”

Uncle Zheng ran downstairs and returned in less than five minutes, changed into a summer outfit that looked much cooler. Yao Yanyan directed him to carry the suitcases down.

Yao Wu stood at the front door. Seeing Yao Yanyan walk over without looking at her, clearly ignoring her, she puffed out her cheeks, lowered her head, and slowly filled her eyes with tears.

If Sis won’t talk to her, then she won’t talk to Sis!

Yao Wu lifted her foot to head back inside but was suddenly called.

“Xiao Wu!”

Yao Yanyan stood by the car. Under the blazing sun, her face was stark white from the light. She was smiling slightly and waving at her.

“Bye-bye. When Sis comes home, I’ll bring you something good to eat.”

Seeing Yao Wu standing motionless inside, Yao Yanyan didn’t expect a response. She got into the car, about to close the door, when she heard Yao Wu shout: “Don’t say ‘bye-bye’! Remember to come back soon!”

The car drove smoothly onto the road.

It passed through the city’s green belt, followed by an endless stretch of barren land. Fengkang Town was neither too close nor too far from Jing City. Uncle Zheng, worried about the delicate young lady getting carsick, specially prepared motion sickness medicine.

Yao Yanyan took the medicine and looked out the car window.

She had never been to a village or town before, and this was the village where Cheng Xuan lived. The thought made her inexplicably nervous.

Five days. She had to try to find her.

Yao Yanyan thought, her mind gradually sinking. She leaned against the car window and drifted off to sleep.

When she woke up again, the sky was already darkening.

Yao Yanyan rubbed her eyes: “Where are we?”

Uncle Zheng, still wearing sunglasses in the car, looked cold and indifferent: “Replying to Miss, I think we’re here.”

Yao Yanyan: “…What do you mean, ‘I think’?”

Uncle Zheng: “Replying to Miss, the navigation says we’re here, but I’m not sure.” He scratched his head after speaking.

Yao Yanyan: “…”

Didn’t that mean they were lost?

I’ll find a good day to check your credentials and fire you when all this is over.

The car was still moving. Yao Yanyan was distressed. She checked the time: 9:15 PM.

She hadn’t heard the system’s “five days” notification, proving they hadn’t arrived. If today passed and she hadn’t reached Fengkang Town, she might really be done for.

Just then, Uncle Zheng suddenly slowed the car to a stop, rolled down the window, and called out: “Hello? Excuse me, are you from Fengkang Town?”

Yao Yanyan turned her head and looked at the lowered car window on Uncle Zheng’s side. She heard the sound of footsteps approaching from a distance.

The night was deep. A blast of scorching summer heat instantly slipped in through the car window. Yao Yanyan, who had been in the air-conditioned car for a long time, was startled to realize how hot it was outside.

The air was scalding, like a large, suffocating furnace.

Uncle Zheng let out a surprised sound: “Oh dear, why are you carrying someone on your back, young lady? What happened to him?”

After asking, he didn’t receive a reply for quite a while.

After a long pause, Yao Yanyan heard a low-pitched, steady female voice from outside.

“Do you… need something?”