Cheng Ji continued speaking.

“Young Master, while you passed out earlier, I took a set of meaningful photos of you and even recorded a short video. It’s nothing special, just your lower half paired with your handsome face. I think I did a good job, fresh and clear. You are a person of status, so I assume you wouldn’t want these photos and videos online.”

“So, I’d like to make a deal with you. The reason I taught you a lesson today is that you made a mistake. Given your character, I think you might make the same mistake again in the future. To remind you to be more careful, to avoid impulsive actions, and to prevent you from taking revenge on me or the waiter from earlier, I’ve decided to temporarily keep these photos and videos.”

Cheng Ji put his hands in his pockets to show he had a phone.

“I kept the waiter’s contact information. If you make any suspicious moves, he can call me anytime, and I can post these photos online anytime, anywhere. For the sake of your good reputation, I suggest you be careful.”

Qi Beisong whispered, “I won’t let you off.”

Cheng Ji smiled. “Oh, by the way, while I was taking the photos, I also captured my fishnet stockings.”

He raised one foot. “Hey, did you see my toenails? I can’t believe I painted them red! Qi, you’re about 1.85 meters tall, maybe taller, with such a big build, how could you be beaten and crawling all over the floor by someone wearing fishnet stockings and red toenail polish? It must be fake, but even if it is, it doesn’t sound too good, does it?”

“So don’t say anything rash,” Cheng Ji patted Qi Beisong’s flushed face, gently and considerately.

“Alright, you’ve learned your lesson. I’m leaving, and we may never meet again. Don’t worry, I didn’t tighten the rope on your hands too much. If you’re skilled enough, you should be able to free yourself within half an hour. If not, I’ll call someone to help you.”

Cheng Ji waved goodbye but suddenly returned, grabbing a coat off the back of the sofa. “It’s too cold outside. I’ll borrow your coat for a bit and return it to you later.”

“Didn’t you just say we may never meet again?” Qi Beisong asked, “How come you’re still here?”

Cheng Ji tilted his head and thought for a moment. “Why don’t you give me an address, and I’ll mail it to you.”

“I’ll kill you.”

“Childish, Young Master Qi, you really are childish.” Cheng Ji put on the coat and buttoned it up.

The temperature outside had dropped below zero, yet he still had to walk through the snow in ragged clothes.

He felt a business card in the coat pocket, from an innocent businessman with a phone number and detailed address.

“Then I’ll send the coat to this brother and ask him to pass it on to you. I’m off now.”

After walking a few steps, he pulled out his wallet from the inside pocket and tossed it to Qi Beisong, along with a condom. He searched through it again and found another condom, throwing it as well.

“Not bad, you’re quite something,” he smirked, his tone like a fifty-year-old lecher.

After confirming there was nothing else, he bade farewell but returned a few steps later to ask, “Have you seen my shoes?”

Qi Beisong, furious, spat.

Hmm, where’s my other shoe? Cheng Ji looked around the room and found one, but the other seemed to have disappeared.

Actually, the other shoe had been accidentally kicked under the bathroom sink. The sink was deep and wide, with no light shining under it. Cheng Ji glanced over hastily but didn’t notice the shoe in the corner.

He sighed, clutching the single shoe and walking barefoot through the bathroom window, retracing his steps.

The original plot had already collapsed, and the plot administrator had disappeared. No one knew everything he had done, not even Shen Zimo, who had been saved, or Qi Beisong, who had been beaten. He was very satisfied with that.

The only thing he wasn’t happy about was walking barefoot on the snow, which made both his feet turn pale and blue.

The blue wasn’t a problem, but if they turned purple, he’d have to amputate them.

It was already past eleven at night, and the lavish and decadent sounds of the Shuiyue Mountain Resort were slowly reaching their peak. However, the small room where the employees rested was still quiet. Le Le, apparently with nothing to do today, was sitting inside playing with his nails.

When he heard someone enter, he complained, “Cheng Cheng, where have you been? You’ve been smoking for almost half an hour. Manager Zhou has come to ask twice. I’ve been covering for you.”

“Uh,” Cheng Ji rubbed his feet. “Thanks.”

Le Le looked up in surprise, then asked, “What happened to your face?”

“Uh,” Cheng Ji acted innocent.

“You’ve got blood on your face.”

“It’s not blood,” Cheng Ji said. “It’s lipstick.”

“You’ve got lipstick under your nose,” Le Le frowned.

Cheng Ji wiped with his cold, shaking fingers. “I slipped on the stairs earlier and fell.”

Le Le was furious. “You, of all people, don’t fall until today, of all days. Look at you, you look like a ghost. Do you still want to work?”

Cheng Ji decided to back off. “I don’t really want to.”

Le Le asked, “What about your mom? Can you pay the medical fees tomorrow?”

Cheng Ji opened his coat and said, “My arm and knee are scraped too. Even if I want to work, I can’t. It’s not pleasant for the customers to see either.”

Le Le, seeing the bloodstains on his leg, looked helpless and asked, “Does it hurt?”

Cheng Ji said it was fine.

Le Le asked again, “Where did you get this coat from?”

Cheng Ji couldn’t exactly admit it was Qi Beisong’s coat, so he dodged, “I fell over there earlier and couldn’t get up. A customer passed by, helped me up, and even lent me the coat to wear.”

“Which staircase?” Le Le asked.

Cheng Ji casually pointed. “Over there.”

Le Le said, “That’s the fire escape. How would a guest go through there?”

“Maybe he was also going out for a smoke,” Cheng Ji said.

Le Le didn’t ask any further. He felt the fabric and lining of the coat, then turned up the collar to inspect it, saying, “Hurry up and return the coat, but be careful not to stain or damage it.”

Cheng Ji asked, “Why?”

Le Le said, “You don’t know quality, but I do. This coat is custom-made from Europe, worth at least tens of thousands of euros. Even if you and I were sold together, it wouldn’t be worth as much.”

Cheng Ji raised an eyebrow, remaining silent.

“Which big spender would lend you such an expensive coat? Maybe they’re setting you up,” Le Le said. “Hurry and return it before things get complicated.”

Cheng Ji responded with an “Oh” and started walking out, then turned around and asked, “Le Le, have you seen my phone?”

Le Le, irritated, said, “You’ve been all over the place today. We’re not allowed to bring phones to work, so we put them and your coat at the front desk. How could you forget this?”

Cheng Ji nodded and said, “I want to go back and check on my mom. If Manager Zhou asks again, could you cover for me?”

“It’s fine, go ahead. You don’t look so great, and I’ll feel better once you leave,” Le Le waved him off.

Cheng Ji said, “When I leave, if anyone asks about me, just say we’re not close. Got it?”

Le Le stomped her foot. “What’s wrong with you today? Are you crazy?”

Cheng Ji smiled and turned to leave, but Le Le suddenly called out.

“Are you Cheng Ji?” Le Le asked. As soon as the words left her mouth, even he felt they were a bit random.

Cheng Ji was 19 years old, quiet and introverted, even a little cowardly and depressed. He came from a poor single-parent family, his father had passed away, and his mother was seriously ill. He had to drop out of school, and the weight of life’s pressures inevitably shaped his personality in this way.

But the person in front of his had bright eyes, and when he smiled, he looked energetic. He stood so straight, even slightly leaning back, exposing his handsome jawline.

Despite the heavy makeup on his face, he still looked quite charming, with a clean expression that had a touch of cleverness.

Le Le was puzzled.

Cheng Ji smiled, “I’m leaving now. See you.”

He had to leave, and the sooner, the better.

He also had to return Qi Beisong’s coat. As for the claim that this exquisite coat was worth tens of thousands of euros, it might as well have been worth more than a few hundred dollars—it didn’t matter; he had just stolen a few hundred thousand right in front of the person. He was in deep trouble.

As he passed the front desk, he handed the coat back to the staff and mentioned it belonged to Room 388’s guest, asking them to return it in half an hour.

“Why wait half an hour?” the front desk staff asked, confused.

Cheng Ji blinked and said, “You could take it now, but they’re busy inside. It wouldn’t be good to interrupt.”

The front desk understood.

Cheng Ji reminded, “Please make sure to keep it safe, don’t let anyone steal it.”

The front desk leaned in and asked, “Where are you from? I’ve never seen you before.”

“I just arrived today. I haven’t seen you either,” Cheng Ji leaned on the marble counter, propping his chin with a mischievous smile. In his previous life, he had been a handsome young man, and he believed his charm hadn’t faded, even under this guise.

The front desk staff sighed, “I knew it. You gays shouldn’t be wearing this kind of makeup. Don’t say I taught you.”

Cheng Ji slipped and almost fell.

The front desk staff said, “Hurry up and remove that makeup. Trust me, you look a hundred times better without it. Don’t mess yourself up, you look like a flamingo.”

Cheng Ji grudgingly took off the makeup and hurriedly put on his own clothes—sweatpants and a down jacket—and made a quick escape from Shuiyue Mountain Resort.

Outside, a row of taxis were waiting. Cheng Ji opened the door of the front car and sat down.

The driver asked, “Where to?”

“Wait a moment,” Cheng Ji said. “Drive down the mountain first.”

He quickly began checking his phone, from contacts to photos, from call logs to messaging apps. Three minutes later, he turned off the phone, took out the SIM card, and stuffed it into his pocket.

“Fourth People’s Hospital,” he said.

This was the hospital where Cheng Ji’s mother was staying. He had seen photos of her medical records, unpaid bills, and the doctor’s contact information on the phone.

The patient was in Ward 12, Bed 37, the neurosurgery department, currently in a deep coma, completely unconscious.

The taxi traveled along the mountain road, and although there were streetlights on both sides, it still felt dark and deep, with no clear end in sight.

Cheng Ji pressed his forehead against the car window, feeling the vibrations and subtle sounds, and suddenly thought that this might be the cost of disrupting the main plotline: a cold winter night escape, hurried and in a panic.

Snowflakes floated and hit his face. The north wind blew, bone-chillingly cold. The red clouds hung low, locking the mountains and rivers in shadow, while the sparse trees were withered and barren.

The driver was listening to the radio, and the Peking opera was playing the part where Lin Chong flees at night. Cheng Ji almost suspected the plot administrator was still watching him, secretly mocking him.

“This is Li Shaochun, he sings so well, with so much charm,” the driver commented. “I love his style.”

Cheng Ji smiled and thought, how could there still be Li Shaochun in this third-rate world? Was he written into the story or automatically generated by the system?

What he didn’t know was that since the plot had collapsed, this world had become disconnected from it. The characters were still the same, but the story had diverged greatly.

The driver looked at him through the rearview mirror, instinctively sensing that he was no good. His words carried a hint of mockery, saying, “Hey, why don’t you let me turn off the radio? How can someone like you appreciate traditional opera?”

Cheng Ji replied, “A hero with an empty heart, unable to wield a sword to fight injustice, betrayed and facing life and death separations—that’s hard to appreciate.”

The driver was momentarily stunned, unable to respond.

Cheng Ji quietly said, “Lin Chong’s wife was driven to death by a government official. Do you know how I died?”

In the dead of night, deep in the mountain forest, the driver was so scared by his words that his hair stood on end. “You young man, don’t talk nonsense, aren’t you still alive?”

“So don’t ask. Luckily, I’m still alive,” Cheng Ji said.

The driver glanced at him in the rearview mirror, his heart pounding, then quickly turned his head away.

“Could you lower the volume of the radio? I need to rest,” Cheng Ji said.

The driver quickly tuned the radio to a channel that played soft music late at night and asked, “Is this okay, brother?”

Cheng Ji nodded and closed his eyes for a short nap.

He was truly exhausted, and also very hungry. His empty stomach ached faintly, and his joints felt as though they had been crushed.

He had been in this body for less than two hours, and he had already pushed it to the limit. If the original owner still had any awareness, he probably wouldn’t know how to hate him—perhaps he would point at his nose and scold him bitterly.

When he woke up, he took the original owner’s ID card from his inner pocket.

The photo was stiff, with no life in his eyes—though, of course, the police officer’s photos were always stiff.

He was born in May, the brightest and most beautiful season of the year, but unfortunately, life had been too harsh on him, making it difficult to live.

His registered address was Worker’s New Village.

It must have been an old housing complex built in the 1970s or 80s, a welfare apartment assigned by the original owner’s family’s workplace. The house was probably from his deceased parents, or maybe even his grandparents, and from the time they received the house, they never moved.

“19 years old,” Cheng Ji whispered.

In his previous life, he was already 24 when he sacrificed himself, so he had lived five more years than this young man.

“Why didn’t you want to live?” he asked softly. “Why would you give your body to a stranger?”

Yes, he realized now—the original owner had left on his own accord, without any attachment.

He was a mediocre, insignificant supporting character, with only five lines of dialogue, and not even a proper name—just “Cheng Ji.”

After the main characters finished their five lines of dialogue, they had their happy ending. As for him—where would he end up? Would he die or continue struggling to stay alive?

“What do you want me to do for you?” Cheng Ji murmured.

I saved a person for you—are you happy?

I even beat up a spoiled young master for you—are you satisfied?

I’ll live more freely for you—will that do?

Cheng Ji gently rubbed the abrasions on his knuckles, promising himself he would go through with it.

There was only one thing he couldn’t do: his physical condition.

Cheng Ji decided that starting tomorrow, he would run five kilometers every morning. He had to improve his physical fitness. How could a life without the ability to fight be satisfying?