CHAPTER 4: THE FRANTIC REVERSAL

"Evelyn? Evelyn, are you awake?"

The urgent calls, accompanied by a firm knock on the door, jolted Evelyn out of her dark nightmare.

Evelyn snapped awake, sitting up gasping on the bed, her chest heaving as two gusts of cold air flooded into her lungs with a sharp sting. Cold sweat poured off her like rain, thoroughly soaking the back of her shirt. Instinctively, she wrapped both hands tightly around her lower abdomen, digging her nails into her flesh.

Flat. Empty. There was no flesh-tearing pain, nor was there any terrifying, warm blood flowing out.

With her head spinning, Evelyn staggered off the bed and rushed straight into the attached bathroom of her bedroom. Her legs felt weak as she gripped the edge of the sink, unsteadily looking up at the large mirror in front of her.

Reflected in the glass was a young face, full of the youthful vitality of a twenty-two-year-old, with smooth skin bearing no signs of injury. She frantically felt and pressed around her flat stomach, then look down trembling at her clean, fair hands. No blood, no scars. She was no longer a soulless corpse lying in a pool of blood at the Grand Plaza.

Evelyn grabbed her phone, which was charging nearby. The screen lit up: 20:12 - Friday, June 12, 2021.

She blinked repeatedly, rubbing her thumb hard against the glass screen as if trying to erase the words, but the numbers remained still, coldly proving an absurd truth. Evelyn's pupils contracted violently, and her chest tightened.

This was the summer of 2021. It was the day before she registered her marriage to Dominic Hayes in her past life. It was also the exact day all the brutal tragedies began. Heaven had truly given her a chance to return to the starting point of her hell.

"Evelyn, the master requests you to come down to the living room immediately. He says there is a highly important matter regarding the marriage arrangement to discuss," the butler outside urged once more, his voice laced with clear impatience.

"I'll be right down."

Evelyn replied, her voice cold, hoarse, and devoid of any emotion. She splashed a handful of freezing water onto her face, staring intently at her own piercing, cold eyes in the mirror. All the weakness and resignation of her past life had died with that fall from the heights of the Grand Plaza. Now, suppressing the hatred surging through her veins, she decisively pushed open the door and strode downstairs.

In the vast living room of the Vance estate, her father—Mr. Robert Vance—sat grandly on a luxurious leather sofa. He took a sip of tea, his posture leisurely but his expression exceedingly solemn, radiating the pressure of the master of the house.

On the glass coffee table in front of him, two bright red marriage contracts lay side by side, highly conspicuous. One was from Dominic Hayes, and the other was from another great clan.

Seeing Evelyn walk down, Mr. Robert set his teacup onto the table with a dry clack. He raised his head and ordered in an authoritarian, overbearing tone: "Evelyn, sit down. I have considered this carefully. For this marriage alliance with the Hayes family, you will be the one to marry over to fulfill the old promise of the previous generation. The agreement is finalized, so prepare yourself mentally."

Looking straight at the cold face of the man called her father, a profound sense of disgust welled up inside Evelyn. In her past life, because of a ridiculous notion of "filial piety" and her desire to gain his recognition, she had obediently acted as a submissive pawn. She had accepted the burden of marrying a declining, down-on-his-luck Dominic in place of his beloved daughter, only for it to end in a gruesome death for both herself and her child. Evelyn's nails dug deep into her palms to restrain her urge to rush forward and slap that selfish face.

In this life, she would never be a puppet for him to manipulate at will again.

Evelyn did not say a word, her face frighteningly placid, like a perfectly still lake without a single ripple. She slowly stepped forward, extending her slender fingers, preparing to pick up Dominic Hayes’s marriage contract from the table. In her past life, her death was partly due to Dominic. In this life, that debt of blood had to be settled thoroughly. She would proactively step into the Hayes family once more to make him pay, piece by piece.

However, just as Evelyn’s fingertips brushed against the edge of the marriage contract paper—

"Wait!!"

A frantic, piercing shriek suddenly erupted from the direction of the staircase.

Before Evelyn could even grab the paper, a figure rushed forward like mad. Sera Vance violently snatched Dominic’s marriage contract right out from under Evelyn’s hand. Her face was flushed red and she panted heavily, but her eyes shone with an intense, desperate greed and longing. Right on her heels was her stepmother, Mrs. Fiona.

Sera clutched the marriage contract tightly to her chest, turning toward Mr. Robert and shouting resolutely: "Father! For this marriage, I will marry into the Hayes family! I want to marry Dominic!"

Evelyn's fingers froze in mid-air. She slowly raised her head, staring intently at Sera’s frenzied expression. In her past life, it was this exact older sister who had wept and desperately demanded to break the engagement with Dominic, because she disdained the Hayes family for being in crisis and decline at the time. But now... she was shamelessly fighting to claim that very marriage. That greedy look, that agitation... it was clearly not the expression of someone who had simply changed her mind on a whim.

This was completely different from her past life.

In her past life, on this exact day, just as the betrothal gifts from the Hayes family were delivered to the door, the Sterling family—the most notorious and prominent financial tycoon clan—had unexpectedly sent a marriage proposal, requesting an alliance with "the daughter of the Vance family." Seeing that the Sterling family was obscenely wealthy, Sera had immediately claimed that marriage spot for herself, throwing her teacup to the floor to humiliate the struggling Dominic while forcing Evelyn to marry into the Hayes family as her substitute.

Yet now, right in front of her, Sera’s fingers were gripping the paper so tightly that her nails dug deep into the rustling page, her knuckles turning stark white. The way she looked at the name Dominic Hayes held an eerie certainty—a manic, desperate craving that was, at the same time, frighteningly calculated. It was as if... she already knew the outcome of this chessboard beforehand. She knew that Dominic would eventually revive the Hayes Group and ascend to the pinnacle of the business world.

Sera whipped around to face Mr. Robert, flashing a thoroughly fake smile before casting a look of patronizing pity at Evelyn. "Father, I am the eldest sister. I want to bear the burden for you and fulfill the promise made to the declining Hayes family. I am willing to endure hardship. As for Evelyn... she has been sullen and clumsy since childhood; marrying her off to the Sterling family is a win-win situation for everyone."

She stepped closer, her fingers lightly gripping Evelyn's stiffened shoulder, her tone coaxing yet dripping with mockery. "Evelyn, don't blame me for taking the hard path. Even though the eldest young master of the Sterling family... is confined to a wheelchair, they are obscenely wealthy. If you marry into that family, you won't have to worry about food or clothes. With your status and capabilities, having such a comfortable place of refuge is already more than you could ask for, right?"

Evelyn narrowed her eyes slightly, her chest tightening. Something was terribly wrong. A materialistic, status-obsessed social climber like Sera would absolutely never throw herself at a man she once despised like Dominic, unless she saw a massive, guaranteed fortune in it.

But there was no time to be bewildered. She had to act. If she calmly let go right now, Sera’s suspicious nature would undoubtedly sniff out something unusual. The mask of the weak, aggrieved victim from her past life had to be put on immediately to protect herself in the shadows.

Evelyn concealed all her sharp edges. She took a swift step forward, her face flushing as she forced her voice to tremble with bitter resentment: "Sister Sera! What kind of game are you playing? Just yesterday, you were the one weeping and demanding to marry into the Sterling family, forcing me to take your place with Dominic! Now that everything is settled, you go back on your word and rush down here to snatch it away?!"

Evelyn whipped around to face Mr. Robert, dropping heavily onto her knees beside the coffee table. Thud. The sound of bone hitting the hard floor was agonizing. The physical pain kept her focused. Clutching the hem of his clothes, her tears began to stream like rain. "Father... please give me justice! I already agreed to obey you and mother to marry into the Hayes family. How can Sister Sera be so outrageous, doing whatever she pleases like this? Don't listen to her, Father... make her give the marriage contract back to me..."

The spark of suspicion in Sera's eyes vanished instantly. She smirked slightly, her familiar arrogance and triumph returning the moment she saw that the easily bullied second daughter was just as pathetic as always. To quickly end the dispute and completely cover her tracks as someone who knew the future, Sera immediately played a more drastic card. Clutching the paper fiercely to her chest, she abruptly rushed toward the living room balcony and swung one leg completely over the railing.

She shrieked frantically, using her life as a trump card to force her father's hand, while deliberately casting her eyes down to scrutinize every micro-expression on Evelyn's tear-stained face:

"If you don't agree to switch the marriage contracts today, Father, I will jump! I am the eldest daughter of the Vance family; the one who marries the heir of the Hayes family must be me! If you force me to marry into the Sterling family, I would rather die right here in front of you!"

The wind from the open balcony doors gusted in, whipping Sera’s dress wildly in mid-air. A single misstep, and she would plunge straight down onto the concrete courtyard below...