1 No More Miss Nice Girl

What did it feel like to be reborn with a second chance?

Su Qiao could testify that it felt like shit. Her head hurt. Her throat was on fire. Her eyes were burning with tears that she couldn't control. But she refused to shut them, gaze boring into the chandelier and white ceiling medallion overhead. They were solid proof that she was currently lying safe and sound in her childhood bedroom, instead of that roach-infested one-room apartment above a massage parlour in the red light district.

Just half an hour ago, she'd been sitting on a dirty floor sniffling on the phone while her manager had threatened her on the other end of the line. She'd been given an ultimatum; either take the hotel key card and spread her legs for Producer Zheng or forget about ever remaining in the industry.

Su Qiao had caved and agreed. What choice did she have? After getting disowned by the Su Family and having her reputation smeared on social media, she had bills to pay but no inflow of work. Selling herself for one measly supporting role in a web drama was something she'd have been insulted as when she'd still been the heiress of the Su Family. But she hadn't had that luxury for a couple of years by then.

But just as she'd stood up to go get dressed, her manager's scathing suggestions to find a pair of clean, sexy lingerie still burning in her ears, she'd felt the world spin and she'd blacked out…

…only to wake up in her family's manor again.

Hysteric laughter bubbled from her lips. She couldn't see herself but she didn't need to to know that she must look insane. Both laughing and crying at the same time. She could already imagine the scorn her haters and antis would write on Weibo if they could see her now.

Crazy. Insane. Ridiculous.

She'd been called many things after falling from grace.

A chiming sound distracted her from her dark thoughts. She flailed a hand next to her pillow and seized at her iPhone, which Lin Zizhou had customised for her 21st birthday. It was studded with pink diamonds, 520 in total, which was internet slang for 'I love you'. The phone had cost millions and Su Qiao had been so touched that she'd cried into his shoulder at her party.

All the other guests had cooed enviously over the 'happy couple' and had joked about them getting hitched soon since 21 was the legal age to register the marriage at the Bureau of Civil Affairs.

But just 2 months after giving her that phone, Lin Zizhou had taken it back.

"I customised this for my sweet, innocent girlfriend," he'd said scathingly without even deigning to look at her tear-streaked face. "But you've turned out to be nothing but a cruel fake."

A fake. Her fiancé, the boy that had wooed her in university and then promised to be with her forever, had called her a fake. He, like everyone else, had believed that she'd pushed Bai Meixin down the stairs in a fit of jealous rage. Su Qiao hadn't even touched her.

But it hadn't matter because no one had let her explain.

In fact, the accusations against Su Qiao had been so violent, that she had doubted herself in her previous life. Was she really as bad as they'd said? Had she hurt Bai Meixin without realising it?

But now that she had been reborn, Su Qiao knew the truth. Bai Meixin would have fallen anyway, whether Su Qiao had been there or not. Just so she could gather all the pity and attention from everyone.

Bai Meixin, Bai Meixin, Bai Meixin. The world literally revolved around her. She was the stepsister whom Su Qiao's father had brought home after remarrying, just three months after Su Qiao's mother's funeral.

Su Qiao hadn't understood why her world had to be turned on its head overnight but now she knew. This world was a work of fiction, a web novel in a different dimension. And she was nothing but a cannon fodder villainess there to make the life of Bai Meixin, the real protagonist, 'miserable'.

After losing consciousness, she'd been given insight into Bai Meixin's point-of-view, almost like the universe wanted to mock her by showing her how futile her past life had been. No matter what Su Qiao did, she would amount to nothing but the ugly wicked stepsister who was envious of the main character.

Slowly, Su Qiao pushed herself up in bed. She unlocked her phone and felt a wave of repulsion as she saw her lock screen wallpaper, which was of Lin Zizhou and herself. In the selfie, she had a cat filter on, and he was kissing her cheek as she wrinkled her nose. She had once found this shot incredibly cute but now it just made her sick.

The phone, too, made her sick. She wanted to throw it away but after suffering through so many years of hardship in her previous life, she couldn't bear to just toss a couple of million away like that. That would really be insane.

No matter. She knew what to do with it.

Her WeChat messages had been pinging all night. She opened them now, scrolling through the different groups with an impassive face. So many of these so-called 'friends' had abandoned her the second she was no longer the privileged young mistress of the Su Family. They had gone from fawning over her and chasing her footsteps to avoiding her like she had the plague.

She supposed she should be grateful for this second chance because it had shown her the true colours of the sycophants that she had foolishly surrounded herself with.

In more than one chat, people were asking her what she thought about her new stepsister. She could already imagine the hidden glee behind their messages. They sounded like they were concerned that she wouldn't be able to adapt to her new family but she knew from experience now that they were just trying to fish for more gossip. Everyone liked stories about the politics in rich and powerful families.

Su Qiao was nothing more than entertainment for them.

She ignored all of those malicious messages and moved on to the one convo she'd been looking for.

Lin Zizhou's display pic was of a kitten that he had rescued from drowning recently. Back then, Su Qiao hadn't known the full story behind his chivalrous act. But now, she knew that he'd had a serendipitous meeting with Bai Meixin a rainy Saturday just a week before Bai Meixin had moved into the Su Manor. Bai Meixin had been trying valiantly to save the kitten and Lin Zizhou had been touched by her kindness. This cold, aloof young master had leapt into the drain to fish the kitten out and sparks had flown when their eyes had met.

Never mind that he was already engaged. Never mind that Su Qiao had done nothing to deserve his change of heart.

She read through their past conversation woodenly. She'd thought that forcing herself to confront their relationship would hurt more but she only felt numb. Five years of suffering had killed the last remnants of her love for Lin Zizhou.

12 September 2021 6:05 pm

Qiaoqiao: Laogong, my dad wants us to have a family dinner tomorrow night, I don't want to :( I don't like this woman and her daughter, it's really uncomfortable having them around

Zhou: Baobei, be brave, you have to respect your father's wishes

Qiaoqiao: I know, but isn't three months too soon to remarry? Would you remarry so quickly if I died?

Su Qiao sneered at herself when she read this. Lin Zizhou hadn't even waited to break up with her before moving on.

Zhou: Stop talking nonsense

Qiaoqiao: :( can you come over for dinner? I don't wanna face them myself, please?

Zhou: …you know I'm busy this week

Qiaoqiao: It's just one meal tho…surely your brother wouldn't mind? You've been OTing so many days in a row, Laogong, you need some rest too

12 September 2021 8:17 pm

Qiaoqiao: Laogong? I'm sorry, are you upset? I didn't mean to sound like I was forcing you…

12 September 2021 11:21 pm

Qiaoqiao: Good night, Laogong, I'm going to bed now. Try and get some sleep too, okay? All the best with your project, Laogong is the best. <3

Su Qiao couldn't help but be disgusted by her own foolishness. She'd spent so many years trying to please Lin Zizhou. She'd known that he liked cute, polite, gentle girls and so she'd forced herself to hold her young mistress temper back, to pander to his needs, to be careful with his feelings.

And for what? Just to be tossed away like a rag when Bai Meixin came along.

At the end of the novel, Lin Zizhou had become the real winner. With a trophy wife protagonist heiress on his arm and the Lin family's formidable fortune in his pocket, his life was even more perfect than any of the male leads in the dramas that Su Qiao used to love watching.

But forget it. That was then and this was now. Su Qiao was back and if Lin Zizhou thought she was going to let him get his way so easily this time around, he had another think coming.

13 September 2021 03:46 am

Qiaoqiao: Forget it. Don't bother showing up tonight.

13 September 2021 04:01 am

Zhou: ?

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