Pain!
The sharp pain coming from the back of her head made Yun Shifei feel incredibly uncomfortable.
Her feather-like lashes trembled, and she opened her eyes, only to see complete darkness.
Still alive?
Falling from over ten stories high, not dead?
Yun Shifei took a deep breath and got up.
But she faintly felt that something was wrong.
How could she possibly fall from a luxurious community into a run-down house?
Moreover, she was all too familiar with this environment.
It was the place she often lingered in her midnight dreams.
Many years later, Yun Shifei often thought that if everything in this house hadn't happened to her when she was fifteen, would she have ended up like Yun Sisi, gone to a proper university, entered prestigious offices, and perhaps Mu Chengzhu wouldn't have rejected her.
She had wished countless times to return to the past and change everything.
Unexpectedly, she really came back to this point in time!
Yun Shifei's emotions were incredibly mixed at this moment.
But she had no time to think about the bizarre phenomenon of rebirth.
She only knew one thing—she couldn't repeat her past mistakes.
Everything seemed calm now, but next, Yun Sisi would bring their parents and her friends here, only to find her, disheveled, in a room with a man.
Rumors would spread through the school like the wind.
The school, which prided itself on cultivating students' character, would expel her immediately.
In the end, she had to attend the worst high school in the city. With her already poor academic foundation, she didn't even manage to get into college, leaving her no choice but to work early.
Life was like a domino effect; such a seemingly small event completely altered her fate.
Now that she was unexpectedly back at this point, Yun Shifei's eyes turned slightly red.
But she didn't have the luxury to think too much. All that was in her head was one thought: Run!
But the door wouldn't open—it was locked?
Guess Yun Sisi did this.
She came here only because Yun Sisi lied to her, saying Mu Chengzhu wanted to see her. She came over with joy.
As a result, after stepping into the house, Yun Sisi knocked her out from behind with a blunt object. Soon after she woke up, Yun Sisi arrived, starting her smear campaign.
What a mess!
Yun Shifei thought of her past self, foolishly believing in Yun Sisi's nonsense, and felt unbelievably stupid.
She tried pushing the window.
Of course, the window was locked too, but it was just glass and easier to handle.
Yun Shifei scanned the room and ultimately picked up a nearby chair to smash the window.
Crash—
The window shattered instantly, glass pieces scattered across the floor.
She was preparing to climb out the window.
But suddenly, she sensed a gaze fixed on her from behind.
She turned around, nearly dying on the spot!
In the pitch-dark night, under the faint light of the moon filtering through the shattered window, she could barely discern the features of the room.
There stood a person behind her, out of place and eerie like a ghost.
Moreover, his gaze was so cold, utterly devoid of warmth.
It was like an icy mountain range, chilling her to the marrow.
His gaze didn't seem to be looking at her but rather studying her, like a lab rat under observation.
"Um, let's leave together," Yun Shifei cautiously offered after steadying her breath.
The boy didn't answer, still staring straight at her.
The moonlight fell on his face; it was pale and bloodless. His thin lips were faint in color, and his long lashes cast shadows under his cold eyes, resembling an enigmatic vampire.
Yun Shifei's scalp tingled. "In a while, my sister might show up. If she brings people and finds us here, it'll be trouble."
She tried her best to explain, yet the boy's icy gaze lingered unchanged upon her.
When Yun Shifei finally recalled his identity, she wasn't surprised by his reaction anymore.
She remembered his name was Cheng Lie, roughly her age, slightly autistic, withdrawn as if he were isolated from the entire world.
The children in the community called him a fool.
They even made up jokes pairing her with him, claiming they were "the most fitting couple in the world."
In her teenage years, the incident struck her deeply, causing her to deliberately avoid remembering or confronting these events later on.
That's why she hadn't immediately recognized the boy standing before her.
She vaguely recalled how this gloomy boy managed to bankrupt his once-prosperous family.
She also remembered how he watched her brother die, sent her father to prison as if it were nothing.
Thinking of this, Yun Shifei shuddered.
But at this point in time, he hadn't yet reached the level of influence he would wield later—he was still just an ignorant boy.
She had no idea how he got inside—was it purely accidental, or was he also framed?
Judging by Cheng Lie's family circumstances, it didn't seem likely he'd be set up.
"Sister, are you inside? Dad, Mom, I think I hear my sister's voice!"
Yun Sisi's voice rang out from outside the door.
"Really? Then let's go inside and check," their father, Yun Tiancheng, responded.
Yun Shifei: "..."
She hadn't even said anything just now, okay?
But she couldn't worry about that now. If she didn't leave before they got inside, it would be too late.
Just as she was about to jump out the window, she hesitated and turned back to Cheng Lie. "Are you coming or not?"
She didn't know how Cheng Lie got here, but ultimately, he had once been implicated alongside her, so they were somewhat "partners in adversity."
Cheng Lie stared at her blankly, seemingly perplexed by her words.
Yun Shifei sighed and tried to explain, "Leave with me; otherwise, bad things will happen."
As she spoke, she jumped out of the window.
She would wait for him for one minute.
If he didn't come, there was nothing more she could do.
Her current situation was precarious. Adding another person, especially someone like him, could easily lead to disaster.
Thankfully, Cheng Lie understood her words. He climbed out of the window.
Once he landed, Yun Shifei immediately grabbed him and ran.
The two of them took a long detour, finally exiting through another door in the backyard.
This house had been abandoned for years. In the past, children liked to play hide-and-seek here.
No one would've thought Yun Sisi would choose this place to wreck her reputation.
But all of that belonged to her previous life.
Now, she had finally escaped.
Escaped from that nightmare.
But she knew she couldn't fully relax yet.
Even though she had passed this hurdle, the next challenge would be dealing with her parents, who would surely interrogate her about why she'd been gone for more than an hour.
How should she respond?
Thinking of this, Yun Shifei turned to Cheng Lie. "Cheng Lie, can you help me with something?"
Cheng Lie looked at her.
Once again, that quiet, pitch-black gaze fixed straight on her, without a hint of emotion.
With eyes like those, you couldn't tell whether he was looking at you or at something else entirely.
Nor could you discern whether he truly understood what you were talking about.
But based on what had just happened, Yun Shifei knew Cheng Lie could understand what she said.
She flashed a radiant smile at him. "I don't know how you ended up inside that house, but now I'll take you home. Please don't tell your family that we were in that house together, okay? Just say... just say you got lost and happened to run into me, and I sent you home."