Chapter 1

In 2014,

In the big city, the night was dark, and many people had already fallen asleep, immersed in sweet dreams. But there were also many people who were living in their own fantasies, releasing their primal desires.

Ji Anning was running desperately downstairs.

Compared to the thick carpet in the hallway and the magnificent crystal chandelier in the lobby, the decoration of the staircase was much simpler. After all, under normal circumstances, few people would use the stairs except in case of a fire.

The light in the staircase was pale, and Ji Anning’s cheeks were red from the intense running.

But Ji Anning couldn’t take the elevator. The other person was waiting at the elevator entrance downstairs. If she took the elevator, she would be walking into a trap.

Her high heels were not cooperating, and she suddenly twisted her ankle. Ji Anning gritted her teeth and took off her shoes, running down barefoot. She ran down two more floors, but suddenly heard the sound of footsteps coming from below.

Ji Anning froze and instinctively stopped.

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“Twaau wr, pbl xwpv cl wrpvykap! Mbl lmkvp yal yzz czsnjle! Fbl nyd’v awd yoyu!” G xyd’p hsknl lnbsle vbaswtb vbl pvykanypl, pvkzz lnbskdt.

Kk Gddkdt kxxlekyvlzu vwadle yaswde yde ayd cynj wr!

Fbl ayd pkzldvzu okvbswv xyjkdt ydu pswde, cwv vbl xyd’p hsknl pssd aydt swv ytykd: “Mblpl yal bla pbslp! Fbl’p wr vblal!”

Kk Gddkdt qlzv bsrlzlpp. Fbl jdlo vbyv awddkdt wrpvykap oyp y elye lde. Jwv pbl bye ds svbla oyu swv, yde vbkp oyp vbl sdzu ekalnvksd pbl nswze lpnyrl.

Fbl qkdyzzu ayd vs vbl vsr qzssa, rwpble srld y essa, yde swvpkel oyp vbl eyaj dktbv pju – pbl bye alynble vbl assqvsr sq vbl cwkzekdt.

Mbl nkvupnyrl, rszzwvle okvb zktbv, kzzwxkdyvle vbl assqvsr kd vbl eyajdlpp. Rv oyp cyal yde xlppu, okvb sdzu y qlo pxyzz piwyal rasvawpksdp vbyv zssjle zkjl lzlhyvsa assxp sa nsszkdt wdkvp.

Gryav qasx vbyv, vblal oyp ds sdl.

Gp pssd yp Kk Gddkdt ayd wr vs vbl assqvsr, pbl nwv bla qssv sd psxlvbkdt, cwv pbl eked’v pll obyv kv oyp. Fbl ldewale vbl rykd yde ayd qsaoyae, bkekdt kd vbl pbyeso clbkde y piwyal rasvawpksd.

She prayed that God would protect her and not let those people find her!

But unfortunately, God must not have heard her plea. Those people arrived just a few minutes later. They knew she was here, but didn’t immediately start searching.

They blocked the only exit and waited for the real target to appear.

The target arrived soon after – of course, he took the elevator to the top floor and then came up.

“Ji Anning, don’t hide. Come out! I see you,” he shouted, laughing.

Ji Anning knew he was tricking her. He couldn’t see her from where he was. She held her breath and shrank her body slightly. Her foot touched something cold.

Lowering her head, she saw a steel rod as long as an arm on the ground. Ji Anning silently picked up the rod and tightly held it in her hand.

Without revealing herself, the voice she was familiar with gave orders for his men to scatter and search for her. There was nowhere to hide, and in less than ten minutes, they would find her.

Meanwhile, the man continued to speak calmly: “Think about it, who are you protecting yourself for? Wen Yu? Tsk, tsk, didn’t he say that no one was allowed to touch you? Where is he now?”

Wen Yu, it was Wen Yu again!

Wen Yu, who had been pestering her for months, suddenly disappeared from school a few months ago.

Ji Anning originally thought it had nothing to do with her. She had no relationship with Wen Yu, not like the rumors said.

But now she knew she was too naive. As soon as Wen Yu disappeared, someone couldn’t wait to target her.

“I’m telling you, I don’t care about you and Wen Yu. Behave yourself, and I’ll let you be my girlfriend. Come out now, don’t be stubborn,” he said. “You slept with Wen Yu, why can’t you sleep with me?”

F*ck you! You’re the one who slept with him!

Ji Anning gritted her teeth.

As she walked by, the girls whispered and exclaimed in low voices, then looked down on her with disdainful eyes.

The boys’ gaze would intentionally or unintentionally sweep over her body, focusing on her chest, waist, and hips. They would also whisper something, sometimes bursting into laughter while glancing at her.

Without firsthand experience, one cannot know how hurtful rumors can be.

The classmates in school treat it as gossip and do not realize how much harm it can cause to the people involved.

Furthermore, some people take these rumors seriously and use them as an excuse to treat her recklessly, like the man who just approached her.

As he got closer, Ji Anning heard him say, “I knew you couldn’t resist. Who are you trying to fool? Everyone knows you’re a poor beauty charging three thousand yuan per night. How about six thousand? Or even ten thousand? Come with me.”

The voice was so close that Ji Anning held her breath and gripped the steel rod tightly.

As soon as he finished speaking, Ji Anning saw the tip of his shoe and then his face. He took a step forward and naturally glanced in her direction, catching sight of Ji Anning right in front of him.

“In…” He was about to call someone over when he blurted out, “I’ll give you a billion yuan!”

Of course, Ji Anning did not have a billion yuan. All she had was a steel rod, which she swung with all her might.

Before the young man could finish saying “here,” he was hit by the steel rod right on the bridge of his nose. Blood splattered everywhere, even on Ji Anning’s face!

The young man let out a scream and fell backward.

Ji Anning jumped off him and ran towards the stairway. But his people heard the noise and came up.

Ji Anning swung a steel rod, but the bodyguard blocked it with his arm, endured the pain, grabbed it with his other hand, and took the rod from her. Another person pressed her down.

In her struggle, Ji Anning touched a steel bar, turned around, and slapped the head of the bodyguard who held her down. The other person groaned and let go.

Ji Anning took the opportunity to break free.

But Ji Anning had nowhere to go. In the end, she jumped onto the edge of the building.

“Don’t come over! Don’t come over!” she shouted hoarsely.

But she was fierce despite her inner fear. She only had short steel bar in her hand, and behind her was a thirty-story drop. She had nowhere to go, and could only hope that the other party would suddenly have a change of heart and spare her.

That was naturally impossible.

The young man was supported by someone, his face is covered with blood, and his eyes were full of ferocity.

He felt a sharp pain in his nose, and he suspected that his nasal bone might be broken. He had also lost two teeth. At this point, he couldn’t expect him to remember his conscience. It was a fool’s dream.

“Stand still, you sl^t!” he cursed angrily and ordered, “Pull her down for me!”

The men approached, and Ji Anning retreated. She took a step back, stepped on nothing, and fell into the darkness.

People say that falling to one’s death is the worst way to die. For the person falling, the time of the fall is incredibly long, and the whole process is full of fear.

Ji Anning didn’t know how others felt, but she really experienced that long time. She didn’t want to die at all. Life was so hard, and she had worked so hard to live. How could she want to die?

If she died, what would happen to her grandmother?

Ji Anning didn’t understand how people could be so bad. She thought that Wen Yu was already bad enough, but others were even worse!

How could someone become so bad when they were clearly still a student, a classmate in the same school?

With fear, unwillingness, and anger, Ji Anning fell to her death.

Her soul left her body, and she watched as the people who killed her leave in a hurry.

The police came, collected her body and an investigation. She thought the people who killed her would be punished, but they weren’t.

Some “witnesses” emerged from nowhere, claiming that she had an argument with a client over money that night and was criticized. They all implied that she had jumped off the building because of it.

In the end, it was classified as su^c^de.

When the news spread to the school, new rumors began to circulate.

“Really shameless, a girl working at that kind of place, I heard it’s a place for entertainment with sexual overtones!”

“I heard she got into a dispute with a male customer over money?”

“What? Do you know the inside story?”

“I heard… it was prostitution.”

“Don’t you know? Three thousand yuan for one night, that price started with Wen Yu…”

The speaker spoke with great solemnity, as if he had witnessed it firsthand. The listeners were both shocked and pleased, constantly asking questions and pouring dirt on her.

Words have power, and as long as someone mentions her name, Ji Anning will be summoned there. During the time she had just died, there was a lot of talk about her all over the school. She suffered a lot when she was pulled here and there for a while.

Her grandmother also summoned her. She murmured, “Ningning, Ningning, why haven’t you come back yet?”

She was locked in the house, ate all the food in the house, and was so hungry that she banged on the door: “Ningning, grandma is hungry…”

Ji Anning was at a loss and extremely anxious. Fortunately, a neighbor heard her grandmother’s cry for help and called the police, who broke down the door and saved her grandmother from starving to death at home.

The police found that she was an old woman with dementia and was quite troublesome. At this point, a young man appeared and took Ji Anning’s grandmother away.

He was Wen Yu, the wealthy young man who was rumored to have slept with Ji Anning.

Wen Yu arranged for Ji Anning’s grandmother to be placed in a nursing home specifically for patients with dementia and then left under Ji Anning’s gaze.

Her grandmother often mentioned her name, so she was able to often linger by her grandmother’s side and accompany her. She lived like this for who knows how long until one day, she was suddenly summoned by someone else.

Her body instantly arrived at the place she would never forget in her next life – the place where she died.

In the pitch-black night, the person who killed her was pinned to the ground with his arms cut off. Wen Yu’s eyes were bloodshot, holding a steel rod – it is unclear if it was the same one as before – and brutally beat the man.

Ji Anning did not know what grudge Wen Yu had with that person, but she felt satisfied as she listened to the man’s screams like a pig being slaughtered.

Wen Yu broke the man’s leg, fractured his rib, and eventually bent the steel rod.

“With a clang,” he threw the steel rod on the ground and wiped his nose. The blood that splattered onto his hand smeared his face.

In the darkness, he was illuminated by the neon lights, making him look like a demon.

He waved his hand and his men released the person. He bent down, grabbed the person’s collar from behind, and dragged him towards the edge of the building.

He had chosen the location very accurately, the same spot where Ji Anning had fallen.

He pulled the person up and the person screamed hoarsely, “Wen Yu! Let me go! Let me go! Please!”

“She begged you too, didn’t she?” Wen Yu said. “Did you let her go?”

The person’s voice changed, “This is murder! This is murder!”

Wen Yu sneered, “Shouldn’t blood debts be paid in blood? Isn’t that how it works?”

“Are you afraid? When you forced her here, did you ever think about how scared she was?” he asked.

His tone was casual, his voice as cold as an ice blade.

“It wasn’t me! She fell on her own!” The person struggled desperately to defend himself.

Wen Yu fell silent for a moment, then laughed coolly in the darkness.

“You’re just like her,” he said.

His arm muscles suddenly tensed, and with a burst of strength, he lifted the person up and threw him outwards…

Ji Anning covered her eyes and not daring to look.

A moment later, she heard a dull thud from below, followed by someone screaming in surprise.

She opened her eyes, the person was gone, and there was only Wen Yu standing in the night.

He stood in the darkness, his forehead blowing in the night breeze. His eyes were black and dense, as if there were black holes in them.

Ji Anning was attracted to those dark eyes and couldn’t look away.

Why did he do it?

Who did he seek revenge for?

An answer was in her heart and about to be spoken.

“Quickly, leave this place,” his man whispered to him in a low voice. Downstairs, chaos had already erupted.

Wen Yu stood there for a moment, then turned and followed them away.

They pushed open the door to the stairwell and filed in, with Wen Yu bringing up the rear.

As he stepped into the stairwell, he suddenly reached back to hold the door.

Ji Anning had been floating behind him, but now she seemed to freeze in place right in front of him.

She knew that Wen Yu’s gaze was directed towards the empty and messy rooftop. But she was right in front of him, so at this moment, their eyes met.

It was as if he were looking right at her.

This young, handsome man’s thin lips moved slightly, and his voice was barely audible. Yet it made Ji Anning’s eyes widen instantly.

“I have avenged you,” he said softly. “Anning.”

His voice was as soft as a sigh.

He released his grip, entered the stairwell, and the door slammed shut with a resounding clang.

Ji Anning felt as if she had been deafened by the sound, and a great force seemed to suck her into an invisible vortex of time.

Time flew by in the vortex, and the images jumped from one frame to another like a dream.

She saw him being thrown into prison.

A young man came to visit him in prison and sneered, “What grudge did you have with the surname Zhao that you suddenly went and killed him? Luckily, you went insane and gave us the handle we needed, or else you would’ve turned the tables. Was it worth it, all for a girl?”

He looked at him indifferently.

She saw a middle-aged man silently staring at him.

“Perhaps, we have no fate in this lifetime,” the middle-aged man sighed.

He sneered, his eyes full of ridicule.

She saw him sleeping on a hard prison bed, murmuring in his dreams, “Anning, Anning…”

Ji Anning stared at him, reaching out to touch him, but her arm passed right through him.

Finally, the day of execution arrived.

He stood under the bright, blue sky, looking up at it. His brief life was about to end.

Ji Anning “embraced” him.

“If there is another life…” tears streamed down her face, “you and I…”

Can we avoid this kind of ending?

A bullet whistled by, piercing through her ethereal soul and pierced his heart.

The vortex of time suddenly roared like a tsunami, tearing apart all the images, tearing her apart too.

Ji Anning thought she was about to be scattered into pieces, but when she opened her eyes, she was back in her freshman year of college.

Nothing has started yet.

---

Sansukini: Did you cry too? I did. I remember crying a lot when I read this novel before. Some people might not like this because of the dark overtone, but it has a really good story and a happy ending. The novel is not always dark, much of it is sweet romance. These two people started off at the wrong foot because of Anning’s pride and their different social status. Fortunately, Anning gets the chance to change their ending as she was reborn.

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