*****

Ruan Xia walked into the bathroom. Looking at herself in the mirror, she couldn’t quite return to her senses.

As a single person, she was used to admiring the beauty of others. But now, she had become the target for admiration.

This is what had happened. A week ago, taking advantage of being off from work for a week because of the national holiday, the single Ruan Xia found several novels to read. She planned on staying up all night to read them, then sleeping all day.

When she woke up, she would get takeout. Wouldn’t that be a lovely way to spend her vacation? Her friend group had gone abroad to go to all sorts of places for their vacations. But, she didn’t envy them at all. Who cares who went out during this holiday week? Home was the most comfortable place.

She had been reading a novel. It had as much as one million Chinese characters. In her opinion, although a lot of the content and descriptions for the characters’ moods had been empty filler, this hadn’t affected her enthusiasm for the novel. Thus, it was clear the author was very amazing at setting up the plot.

By the time her spirits were enlivened from reading, it was already the next day’s 5 AM. Just as she was going to get up to go to the bathroom, hypoglycemia occurred. Her vision went black, and she fell to the ground.

When she woke up again, she had transmigrated into this novel and became the supporting female character that had the same name as her.

Ruan Xia had been living with her paternal grandparents since she was a child, so she didn’t have a strong relationship with her parents. Later, her grandparents had passed away one after another. Her parents brought her back to the city. At that time, she had already started high school. At that age, it was difficult for her to become closer with her parents.

Sometimes, she would even think; just because fate had brought people together as close relatives, it didn’t mean they would become involve themselves with each others’ lives. For example, her and her parents.

Although she and her parents had tried hard to mend their relationship, reality had proved that they were more suitable for an estranged relationship.

It was probably because of this that Ruan Xia wouldn’t feel too worried about her parents if she couldn’t return to her original world.

Her parents had pensions, and she wasn’t their only child. She also had a younger brother. Since she had started college, she rarely lived at home. At this time, Ruan Xia was glad that her parents had gone against the one child policy by having a second child, her younger brother.

Her parents probably wouldn’t be able to accept that she was gone. There weren’t many parents that could easily accept their children dying before them.

With her younger brother around, even though her parents would feel sad for a long time, they wouldn’t feel crushed by bereavement.

At the moment, she had gained all the memories of the original owner of this body.

If she had to use one phrase to describe this person, femme fatale would probably be the most suitable descriptor.

The original Ruan Xia was truly stunning beautiful. At the very least, Ruan Xia had never seen anyone more beautiful than her. Without even trying, she had graceful, flirtatious bearing. She looked fresh and pure while still looking sexy.

Generally speaking, a woman that had this goddess-level beauty would have a wonderfully brilliant life.

The original Ruan Xia was the archetypal poor beauty. She was born into a family that had trouble affording food. Her father didn’t have full time employment. He would frequently go to construction sites and work as an unskilled laborer to earn his living.

As for her mother, because her mother was beautiful, her father didn’t want her to go out to work. He was worried that she would catch other people’s attention. And so, after her mother had married her father, she hadn’t done a single day’s work.

Although the mother didn’t go out to work, she didn’t do housework either. The traditional role of housewife was taken by her father. Cooking? The original Ruan Xia’s father did that. Housework? The original Ruan Xia’s father was responsible for that too. The original Ruan Xia’s mother’s only responsibility was being beautiful.

The original Ruan Xia’s mother spent her days playing mahjong and cards and dressing up while her husband worked hard at construction sites as an unskilled laborer. Her days were very comfortably and easy. It had to be said, that to a certain extent, the original Ruan Xia’s father was a good husband and man.

****

****

There were wins and losses. In short, the family of three was able to get by, but just barely. In the past, there had been occasional financial challenges, and they were able to get past them.

The original Ruan Xia was ten times more beautiful than her mother. Growing up in a household like this one and because of her excellent surface personality traits along with her beauty, everyone thought she was Ms. Perfect. Probably out of vanity, she actually passed herself off as Ms. Perfect.

She loathed her family’s way of living, and she did her best to pressure her father.

Later on, she realized that she could use her beautiful face to get the life that she dreamed of.

By a random encounter, she met her current husband.

Her current husband’s last name is Song. When the original Ruan Xia was 20 years old, the single Mr. Song was already 31 years old.

Mr. Song had started a company from scratch. In a few short years, his company was listed on the public stock market. He could be considered a highly eligible bachelor.

He caught the original Ruan Xia’s interest. During her summer break, she got a job working at the reception desk at his company. At a company celebration, the original Ruan Xia contrived a way to spend a night alone with Mr. Song.

A month later, the original Ruan Xia found out that she was pregnant, that was how she ended up marrying Mr. Song.

In actuality, the original Ruan Xia and Mr. Song didn’t have a good marital relationship. A character like Mr. Song, how could it be possible for him to not know that she had set him up. Although he took responsibility for her by marrying her and letting her become his wife, he didn’t like her. In fact, he could even be considered to loathe her.

Of course, it was unlikely that the original Ruan Xia liked Mr. Song either.

For her, that man was just a dispenser of cash.

She didn’t need Mr. Song to like her. Anyways, she was the wife of a rich man. As long as she could enjoy a wealthy person’s lifestyle, it was enough for her. As for love, she didn’t care about that at all.

And so, although they had been married for almost four years, the relationship between the original Ruan Xia and Mr. Song could be described in a few words – icy civility.

After Ruan Xia finished enjoying the sight of the original Ruan Xia’s top-level beauty, she came out of the bathroom. Using the original Ruan Xia’s memory, she called her mother.

“Mom, I’m going to come over in a bit. Pack up Little Wang’s clothes for me. I’m going to bring him back home today.”

Mother Ruan froze in surprise. “Didn’t you say that you won’t pick him up until son-in-law is back from his work trip?”

“No, I’m coming today. I booked a ticket to go to City A tomorrow. His dad is on a business trip there, and he’ll probably be there for a few more days. Our family hasn’t travel yet together. This will be a good chance to do so.”

Mother Ruan was overjoyed at the unexpected good news. “You’ve finally come around? Great, that’s how things should be. It was the greatest fate that brought the two of you together as husband and wife. Look at me and your father. Even though you father has never earned much money, he treats me very well. You’ve been married to son-in-law for a few years, but the two of you are like strangers. I feel so anxious when I see this. If the relationship between a husband and wife is bad, it’ll affect their child. Your past interactions with him, is it any different than those of a divorced couple’s?”

Mother Ruan hadn’t enjoyed taking care of daughter when she was growing up, but she was very fond of her grandson. Perhaps, it was because she was older now, or maybe it was because there was a one generation distance between them.

The original Ruan Xia was an egoistic person. Whether it was her parents or husband, she didn’t have much affection for any of them. Towards the child she had given birth to, she also treated him with indifference.

****

*****

Every time her husband went on a business trip, the original Ruan Xia dropped off her son at her parents’ home the next day and had them take care of her son. Thus, she would be free to do whatever she wanted.

When her husband was about to come back, she would go pick up her son. The original Ruan Xia didn’t have a good relationship with her husband or son, but she didn’t care. She viewed herself as the most important person and didn’t care about anyone else. And so, although Father Ruan and Mother Ruan had tried to persuade her countless times, she never considered repairing her relationship with her husband.

If she had to speak the truth and ignored what happened to the original Ruan Xia later on, she would have to say that original Ruan Xia’s life was truly very... awesome.

Because the original Ruan Xia didn’t care about anyone else, even at the end, her feelings had never been hurt.

Ruan Xia answered Mother Ruan, “En, I know. That’s why I’m going to take Little Wang to City A. Mom, I’m going to end the call here. Remember to have extra food for lunch, I’ll be over there soon to eat there too.”

Hearing these words, Mother Ruan felt even happier.

It had been a long time since her daughter had sat down with them to eat a meal. Mother Ruan immediately agreed. After hanging up the phone, she told her husband, “Quickly, go out and buy some food. Xiaxia said she’s going to come back and eat lunch with us.”

Father Ruan initially thought he must have hallucinated those words. It was only when his wife pretended she was going to smack him that he returned to his senses.

He immediately smiled and answered, “Okay! Xiaxia loves to eat my braised fish the most! I’ll go to the market now to buy the ingredients!”

Although Ruan Xia used to have ordinary looks, she chased after beauty like a dog chasing after a bone. And so, even though she was born with an ordinary appearance, she still did her best to bring out her face’s best qualities with makeup.

After a few years of experience, her ability to put on makeup was at a professional level.

Even without makeup, the original Ruan Xia’s face was breathtaking. Sitting at the vanity table, Ruan Xia looked at the table that was covered in skincare products and makeup. She calmed herself down and started applying the makeup.

Looking at this body’s face, Ruan Xia thought of the last line of a poem: beautiful whether plainly dress or richly adorn.

Over ten minutes later, Ruan Xia looked at herself in the mirror and felt very satisfied.

No matter how attractive a beauty naturally was, there was still a difference between having and not having makeup on. After she finished applying makeup, it raised up her overall beauty by several points.

Ruan Xia thought over the novel’s plot. The original Ruan Xia didn’t have any feelings for her husband and child. There was no need to think an outsider like herself would feel anything either.

Right now, she had no interest in turning over a new leaf by becoming a good mother or wife.

However, she had transmigrated here and became the novel’s Ruan Xia. Since she knew the plot, she definitely had to hasten towards things that would be most beneficial to her and avoid doing anything that would harm her.

In the novel, Mr. Song had an accident while he was away from home.

This man had died in the novel without even appearing once. His death was really too dramatic and awkward.

Anyways, he was her husband in name right now. After assessing her options based on her knowledge of the plot, she decided that it would be most optimal for her if he didn’t die.

“Hmm, saving a person’s life gets your more karma points that building a seven-floor pagoda,” murmured Ruan Xia to herself, “Mr. Song, I’ll help you out. But as for whether you’ll be able to live, that will depend on yourself.”

—

In a distant city, Mr. Song sneezed.

The assistant at his side quickly said, “Sir, do you want me to raise the temperature on the AC?”

Mr. Song’s expression remained unchanged as he turned a page in the file. In a deep voice, he answered, “Not necessary.”

*****