1 Awakening

Lin Country, GSC Base Medical Department.

Qiao Yuyan removed the electrodes from her head and walked over to the EEG monitor.

“Your brain is perfectly normal,” the base doctor said, pointing to the undulating brainwaves on the display before switching the interface to pull up her cranial MRI. “No lesions, no abnormal discharges—very healthy.”

“All right, I understand. Thank you.” Qiao Yuyan thanked the doctor and turned to leave.

Stepping out of the medical department building, the electronic doors closed slowly behind her. The midsummer sun blazed overhead. She stood still for a moment, watching the base members drenched in sweat as they trained on the field, her thoughts drifting far away.

Ten days ago, during routine combat training, she was momentarily distracted and failed to dodge a teammate’s elbow strike. Her head took the full impact, and she lost consciousness on the spot.

On the way to the infirmary, a document inexplicably appeared deep in her consciousness. When she opened it, she found it was a romance novel that had just begun serialization.

The novel was only updated to chapter ten. Set in Xia Country, it told the story of Jiang Yunxi and Huo Lingchen, who had been married for seven years. Jiang Yunxi accidentally discovered her husband entangled with her cousin, Qiao Yuyan.

Qiao Yuyan came across as well-behaved and harmless in front of Huo Lingchen, but the moment his back was turned, she framed and slandered the heroine, all to steal Huo Lingchen away.

Huo Lingchen, meanwhile, showed no principles—unconditionally favoring the secondary female lead. Instigated by her, he ignored his legal wife, allowing others to slander and humiliate her.

The novel stopped at this point. In the last thousand words, Jiang Yunxi curled up in a corner, heartbroken and regretful, lamenting why she had introduced her cousin to her husband three years ago.

The absurd plot left Qiao Yuyan covered in cold sweat; she thought something was wrong with her mind.

Upon waking from her coma, she immediately had the doctors run a full physical, but all the tests came back normal.

Unable to find a cause, she tried to convince herself that it was all coincidence: her cousin happened to share the same name as the heroine, happened to marry a man named Huo Lingchen, and the secondary female lead, Qiao Yuyan, also happened to be the heroine’s cousin.

But six days ago, Huo Lingchen’s company went public. The timing and share price matched the plot exactly. Even the subsequent meteoric rise in the stock, the trend lines, seemed copied straight from the novel.

An inexplicable document invading her mind, a fabricated plot that quietly came true—one incident after another connected in her mind, and a chilling, audacious thought formed: perhaps this seemingly real world was nothing more than a fictional world penned by someone else…

“Beep… beep…”

Two alert tones interrupted her thoughts. She answered the call, and a cold, forceful woman’s voice came through the receiver: “Fable, there’s an urgent mission. The client has specifically requested you.”

“What’s the mission?” Qiao Yuyan walked to the steel-mesh fence outside the medical building, lightly leapt up, grabbed the top with her right hand, and with a push, flipped over and headed toward her dorm.

“To retrieve a file,” the other woman’s voice grew even more stern upon hearing the noise. “Why don’t you ever use the doors? Climbing walls all the time—what’s wrong with you people?”

“The door’s too far. I’m too lazy to go around,” Qiao Yuyan muttered, and seeing the other party about to lose her temper, quickly changed the subject. “Is this mission really just to fetch a file? Could it really be that simple?”

The other woman knew her temperament and didn’t press the wall-climbing issue, answering instead, “The client already hired three organizations before—every one of them failed.”

Her voice was as flat as ever, but knowing her boss, Qiao Yuyan was sure she was enjoying watching others stumble.

After all, competition among organizations was fierce. Watching rivals trip up was one of the few amusements in their otherwise dull tasks.

Qiao Yuyan whistled and pressed on, “What’s so tricky about this file?”

“The Gu Group Archives in Chenxing City, Xia Country—a classified document. The target site is heavily guarded, and the client’s intel is virtually nonexistent. The difficulty is extremely high.”

At the mention of “Xia Country,” Qiao Yuyan refused without thinking, “Not going.”

“What’s wrong?” the woman asked, surprised.

Qiao Yuyan was always fearless; as long as the pay was good, she’d walk through fire and water. Her reaction today was unusual.

“It’s nothing,” Qiao Yuyan replied casually. “I hurt my head and need to rest a while.”

“Don’t lie—I checked with Medical. You’re perfectly fine,” the woman exposed her without mercy. “Is GSC’s top hunter, Fable, afraid? Well, the last three organizations’ people were all deported by Xia’s military. If you’re worried about ruining your reputation, that’s understandable.”

GSC stood for Guardian Security Company.

An upright name, but their business scope was astonishingly broad. Not only did they provide conventional security, consulting, and risk assessment, they also had a team of professional bounty hunters who solved thorny problems for high-end VIPs.

As long as the fee was right, GSC would go all out, ensuring clients had no worries.

And Qiao Yuyan, codename Fable, was GSC’s chief bounty hunter.

“Trying to provoke me won’t work. I…” Qiao Yuyan refused to take the bait. She had no intention of getting involved in her cousin’s love life in Xia Country. She was about to refuse again when, suddenly, it felt as if something gripped her throat.

The sixth sense that had pulled her back from the brink of death countless times was now warning her—do not go against the will of this world.

She had no choice but to change her words. “Send me the information.”

“It’s already sent.” The other party hung up immediately.

Back in her dorm, Qiao Yuyan opened her computer. The mission file was downloading. She tossed her phone on the desk, pulled out the dossier the base had compiled, and frowned at the photo of the man.

Huo Lingchen, president of Xinqi Technology in Chenxing City, Xia Country—indeed handsome, but then the original author had poured every adjective of praise into his description, spending nearly a thousand words to depict his looks from every angle.

When reading the novel, she’d had to scroll for ages to get through it.

But fighting her cousin over a man? As if.

Qiao Yuyan crumpled the dossier in her hand and tossed it into the trash.

The computer chimed softly—the file had finished downloading. She opened the compressed folder and began scanning through the pages.

The cold blue light of the screen cast a chill over her face.

A moment later, her lips curled into a slight smile. She’d go, then. Running away had never been her style. She’d tried to avoid this, but there was nowhere to retreat. Since that was the case, she would no longer back down.

She wanted to see just how much control this world could exert over her.

…

Xia Country—a place bounty hunters worldwide avoided.

Though not strictly forbidden, the country’s streets and alleys were riddled with surveillance and security checks, rendering their skills useless.

At this moment, Qiao Yuyan, dressed in a white dress, stood quietly in line at the Chenxing Airport checkpoint, awaiting customs inspection.

Her gaze was fixed ahead, but her eyes were unfocused as her mind flipped through that bizarre document.

Since she’d set foot in Xia Country, another chapter had appeared in the novel.

Picking up from the end of chapter ten, the newest installment described the first meeting between the secondary female lead and the male lead.

The secondary lead wore a white dress and encountered her so-called destined man at the airport. She fell for him at first sight—only, he was her cousin’s husband.

Qiao Yuyan glanced at her own white dress.

Normally, unless required for a mission, she never wore dresses. Yet today, before departure, her boss had insisted on delivering this white dress.

She lowered her gaze, suspecting it was again the world’s will at work. In this world, everyone was a puppet manipulated by it.

Looking once more at the overly affected “Qiao Yuyan” in the document, she closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Even though she knew the secondary lead in the novel was no good, irritation still surged within her.

Her left ear’s pearl earring vibrated slightly—her teammate whispered, “Boss, are you all right?”

Qiao Yuyan shook her head gently, closed the document, and put the novel out of her mind.

She wasn’t acting alone this time—several teammates had entered Xia Country with her.

Thanks to being a native, her customs process was faster and smoother than for foreign nationals. Before long, she passed through inspection.

Qiao Yuyan dragged her suitcase to a secluded corner, sat on it, and waited for her teammates.

She rubbed her stomach. Though she’d had lunch in Lin Country before departure, fourteen hours of turbulence and terrible airplane food had left her ravenous.

It was dinnertime in Xia Country. As she pondered where to find a good meal, she suddenly sensed someone’s gaze fixed on her.

Her expression remained unchanged, still lazy and casual. She feigned indifference as she glanced in the direction of the gaze.

When she saw who it was, she froze for a moment.

Her cousin…

The beautiful woman watching her from afar, eyes locked on her, was her cousin—and the novel’s heroine—Jiang Yunxi.