Family Emotions

My wife went viral by copying someone else. After some netizens shamed her looks, she became obsessed with plastic surgery. Eventually, an illegal clinic tricked her into spending thirty thousand dollars, claiming they could make her into a celebrity. She even forced me to fund her dream by feeding our daughter pesticides. However, I knew that the clinic used implants from stolen corpses. Before long, her face would start to rot. I spent ages convincing her to choose a professional cosmetic hospital instead, saving her life. Later, though, her best friend became an internet star after undergoing plastic surgery. In comparison, my wife’s appearance had only improved slightly after the cosmetic treatment. In a fit of jealousy, she burned my daughter and me alive. “It’s your fault I couldn’t make it big! You deserve to die!” When I next opened my eyes, I returned to the day my wife asked me for money.

From as far back as I can remember, I knew my mom hated me. She gives me sleeping pills when I'm three. When I'm five, she tries pesticide instead. But I'm hard to get rid of. By the time I'm seven, I've already learned how to fight back. If she refuses to give me food, I flip the table so no one can eat either. If she beats me up until I'm on the ground, writhing in pain, I go after her beloved son the same way, leaving him bruised and bawling. That's how we stay locked in battle until I turn 12. Everything changes when my youngest sister is born. I'm clumsily trying to help with her wet diaper when Mom suddenly shoves me against the wall. The look in her eyes holds both disgust and fear. "What were you trying to do to my daughter? I knew it. You take after that monster of a father. Why didn't you just die with him?" I hold my aching head. For the first time, I don't fight back. I believe she's right. My existence is a mistake. I should never have been alive.

Habang brutal akong pinapaslang ng kriminal, ang dad ko, ang head ng Criminal Investigation Division, at ang mom ko, ang Chief Forensic Pathologist, ay nanonood sa laban ng kapatid kong si Lily Lambert. Bilang paghihiganti, ang kriminal, na dating nahuli ng dad ko, ay pinutol ang dila ko at ginamit ang phone ko upang tawagan siya. Isang bagay lang ang sinabi ng dad ko bago niya binaba ang tawag. “Anuman ang nangyayari, ang laban ni Lily ang pangunahing prayoridad ngayong araw!” Ngumisi ang kriminal, “Mukhang maling tao ang dinukot ko. Akala ko mas mahal nila ang tunay nilang anak!” Sa pinangyarihan ng krimen, nagulat ang mga magulang ko sa brutal na kalagayan ng bangkay at kinasuklaman nila ang kawalan ng awa ng killer. Subalit, hindi nila napagtanto na ang gula-gulanit na bangkay na iyon ay ang sarili nilang anak.

My daughter was violated and killed, yet her death was ruled a suicide. After seven failed appeals, I kidnapped the chief prosecutor’s daughter. I tied the chief prosecutor’s daughter to an autopsy table and publicly addressed the prosecutor’s office in a live stream. “I performed the autopsy myself. My daughter didn’t kill herself. She was murdered. “I’ll give you seven chances. Release the actual evidence and name the murderer publicly. Each time a chance runs out, I’ll remove one of her body parts.” The chief prosecutor and his wife knelt on the floor. They begged me desperately to spare their daughter. “The evidence proves your daughter took her own life. Stop this madness now and let my daughter go. She’s innocent.” Viewers in the live stream called me insane. They said I had lost my mind with grief and was taking it out on an innocent person. I ignored their contempt. With a sneer, I picked up a scalpel and pressed it against the judge’s daughter’s abdomen. “The clock is ticking. Hurry up and reveal the true murderer now.” I knew perfectly well the real murderer was watching the stream at that very moment.

On New Year's Eve, my older brother, Casper Shaw, attempted to expose me as a fraud and announced that Jenny Ford was the real heiress to the family. He pulled out a paternity test result and threw it in my face. "Open your eyes and take a look! Jenny is the Shaw family's real daughter. You're just a fake who has taken Jenny's place for so many years, yet you still have the nerve to sit here and eat New Year's Eve dinner with us!" Then, he pushed Jenny in front of us, revealing a face that looked exactly like my mom, Theresa. Everyone froze. I lunged for the report, but suddenly, a stream of floating comments rolled past above Jenny's head. [Is the female lead finally going back to her rich family and starting a sweet romance with her fake older brother?] [Not yet. Right now, they still think they're siblings. They only get together later, once the misunderstandings are cleared up.] [Am I the only one who feels bad for the female supporting character? She's the biggest victim in the whole book. She takes all the female lead's hatred that should have gone to her fake brother, and she gets treated as the fake heiress and sent to the Ford family to suffer on top of that.] I looked at Jenny's face and compared it to my own—we almost looked like twins. I checked our ID cards again, confirming that our dates of birth were exactly the same. "Seriously? Ever think that you might be the real impostor here who was switched at birth?"

After I bought my new home outright, my relatives organized a housewarming party to celebrate. During dinner, my nephew Leo suddenly said, “You’re just a spinster living alone in a huge apartment. What do you need all that space for? I happen to be getting married soon. That’s a huge deal. You should transfer the place to me. I’ll even cover the transfer fee.” I was stunned. “Are you out of your mind?” His mother Linda said, “How can you be so ungrateful? Him using your place for his newlywed life is doing you a favor. It’ll bring you good luck! Other people would jump at the chance!” The son and mother were united against me. “Anyway, tomorrow’s a great day. Grab the property deed and come with us to transfer ownership!” I rejected them without hesitation and called them crazy. Who knew they would get so furious that they would storm into my brand-new apartment and go on a rampage, smashing everything in sight. They even said smugly, “We need to show you our family doesn’t get pushed around! Go ahead and call the police! What proof do you even have that it was us?” What they did not know was that I had installed surveillance cameras on the day I moved in.

For as long as I can remember, my family and I have been living in an underground basement that's completely shut off from the outside world. My parents have told me that the zombie apocalypse is terrorizing the outside world. The air is completely plagued with the zombie virus, and we'll die if we ever leave the basement. In order to save the supplies—which are already dwindling, to begin with—I've starved myself to the point I'm all skin and bones despite being only 18 years old. When I realize that there's only one last can of food left, I leave behind a suicide note. "Mom, Dad, now there's one less mouth to feed. You'll last a few more days." After that, I slit my wrist right away. Once I'm dead, my soul phases through the thick and heavy metal door. Bright sunlight illuminates the entire world. It's a beautiful, peaceful world filled with greenery. I can even hear birds chirping in the distance. Mom, Dad, and a bunch of people are throwing a barbecue party on the lawn. The mouth-watering smell of food being grilled permeates the air. So, it turns out that the zombie apocalypse is just a lie that's designated to trap me inside the fortress. I'm the only one who has died in this sunny, peaceful world.

In the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit, a sudden power outage occurred. As the doctor on night duty, I remained calm and didn't panic, nor did I call for help. I calmly waited as the temperatures of the incubators where the babies lay slowly dropped... In my previous life, when the pediatric department lost power, I immediately switched to the backup power sources to ensure the children's safety. After doing everything I was supposed to do, I sat down to take a breather and took a sip of water. Suddenly, my coworkers rushed in, waking me up. "Dr. Luther, you're a healthcare staff, how could you kill those children?!" "You froze them to death! How vicious! You'll pay for this!" Only then did I realize that all the children had died, without exception. The police took me away. They said I was the only one in the room and they found my fingerprints on the thermostat. My son then produced a video to assist in the investigation. "She often complained about the patients being a bother and hoped they would all die." Enraged family members cornered me in an alley and tortured me for ten hours until I died. But until my last breath, I couldn't understand how the children could have frozen to death in a thermostatically-controlled environment. And why did my own son provide a fake video to frame me? Suddenly, I jolted awake. I found myself waking up on the day of the power outage.

Given a new chance at life, upon learning of my husband's supposed death, the first thing I did was to register him as dead. In my previous life, after my husband, Jonah Lloyd, learned that his elder brother, Noah, had died in an accident, he resolved to assume his brother's identity and provide for his widowed sister-in-law. All because the young widow from the city couldn't withstand the gossip of the village. As for me, coming from humble origins, even without my husband, I could survive on my own. When I heard the news, I truly believed that my husband had died in an accident. I was determined to raise our daughter with all my heart. That year, during a blizzard, while his family huddled together and celebrated in the warmth, I was out there fighting over the money after selling my body. I bled out and died in the harsh, cold night. My daughter, Tina, left waiting for me to bring back good, starved to death in the bitter winter. Only after death did I learn that my husband hadn't died. He had spent his entire life in his brother's name, protecting the widow, living to see his children and grandchildren grow old around him. And now, reopening my eyes, I had returned to the very day my husband died in an accident.

When I was ten, I accidentally overheard my mother on the phone. It seemed like she was talking about me being a switched-at-birth rich girl, and that my real last name was Gardner. The coldness and cruelty my mother had shown me all these years suddenly made sense. When I turned 11, I paid an adult to get a maternity test done for both my mother and me. The results confirmed that I was indeed her biological daughter. I kept the report to myself and pretended I was still in the dark.