Freak Artinya

It's been five years since I started trying to win over Zachary Pierce. I even went so far as to have a child through IVF, hoping it would finally make him care. But no matter what I do, I can never reach 100 percent affection from him. It always stays at 99 percent. Sometimes it even drops lower. One day, exhausted and aching, I go looking for him. As I reach his room, I hear laughter coming from inside. "She still hasn't figured out the egg wasn't even hers. The moment the baby was born, Zach's affection score for her dropped to zero." "So what if she finds out? She should be grateful that her face looks so much like Yvonne's. Honestly, I'm done entertaining her. It's exhausting." At that moment, everything clicks. All the hope I've held onto, every sacrifice I've made, they were all just a joke. I turn away and say to the system, "End this for me. Send me to another world."

On my husband's birthday, I poured my heart into preparing a feast and selecting the perfect gift. Yet, he didn't come home. Instead, I received a picture message—a snapshot of him at the hospital, standing outside the OB-GYN ward, his hand resting tenderly on his childhood crush's belly. Beneath the photo, a message read: [The best birthday gift and a symbol of our decade-long bond.] Furious, I called her. "Don't you know he's married?" Before I could say more, my husband snatched the phone and lashed out at me. "Yvonne just wanted to share the joy of becoming a mother. Why are you overreacting? "Yvonne and I have been best friends for over a decade. Your petty jealousy is disgusting!" I once believed his busyness was for our future, but now I knew—he had been busy supporting the girl of his dreams through her pregnancy. Clutching my own stomach, I bit my lip to stop the tears from falling. Ten years of love had drained away. It was time to let go.

My sister-in-law, Sabrina Linskey, never hides her hatred for me. Yet, on my daughter Elena Satchwell's birthday, she does something I can never imagine. She gives Elena a dress, claiming she had sewn it by hand. She calls it a blessing for Elena's health and safety. I let her ease the dress onto Elena, relief washing over me as I convince myself that Sabrina finally understands the importance of upholding peace in the family. But Elena's skin begins to fester, until even the lightest touch makes her flinch in pain. That's when I realize Elena's fate has been swapped with Sabrina's son's. Mom and Dad, along with my brother, know all about it. Elena, beyond saying, eventually dies. I, too, am killed the moment I uncover the truth. But when I open my eyes again, I return to the day Sabrina arrives with that dress for Elena's birthday.

The moment my best friend dashes into the lottery shop ahead of me and rattles off that familiar string of numbers, I know instantly that she has been reborn, too. In my past life, my best friend and I were shortlisted for an interview at a Global 500 company just before graduation. However, there was only one opening available. On the day of the interview, I had a sudden urge to buy a lottery ticket, but as a result, I missed the interview, and my best friend got the job. As it turned out, I won the jackpot, totaling 50 million dollars. After graduation, I lived a carefree life, lounging at home and living off the interest. Meanwhile, after entering the company, my best friend was paid little and got bullied every single day. Eventually, she vented her anger on me and shoved me off a rooftop. I died from the fall instantly. After my death, my boyfriend covered for her, twisting the story to claim that I'd gone mad from idling too long and jumped on my own. The two of them fed on my misfortune, becoming influencers with millions of fans and raking in fortune. When I open my eyes again, I am reborn to the very day I bought that lottery ticket.

My boss has started dating, and his girlfriend is already acting hostile toward me at the first meeting. She looks me up and down and says passive-aggressively, "You're Theodore's secretary, the one he's been taking special care of?" I'm left speechless for a moment, staring at her in disbelief. I am Theodore Grant's secretary—that part is true. When I graduated, my dad deliberately arranged for me to work under Theodore to learn company management. For over a year, I have been working overtime late into the night every day, handling stacks of documents that never seem to end. Everyone says that I'm the hardest-working workhorse in the company. So, why have I gone from being a workhorse to some kind of side piece the moment my boss gets a girlfriend?

My roommate bought an antique bronze censer online. She burned incense day and night, praying to be with a wealthy boyfriend. I thought it was silly, until her face began to look like mine. Soon, she became the admired heiress, while I was left drowning in debts she had deliberately racked up. I begged her for my identity back, and she pretended to agree. However, she tricked me into giving her my bank account password and pushed me off a rooftop. I learned at that moment that the censer was a cursed relic that grants wishes by draining the life and luck of another. She could take everything from me once my life was ruined, but death was not the end for me. I woke up on the day she first got the cursed censer. The truth was every wish comes with a price, and I was going to make sure she pays.

Years after graduation, someone suddenly tags me in the class group chat. "Mr. Warren is gravely ill, Mira. Aren't you going to do anything? You really are heartless!" I only realize what's going on when I click on the fundraising link in the chat. Our high school homeroom teacher, Joseph Warren, has late-stage cancer. Thus, Lyra Fairfield, the class belle, is leading a fundraiser and patient-donor matching process. "I'll donate ten thousand dollars. My husband is the director of Waverly General Hospital, and I've already asked him to arrange a VIP ward for Mr. Warren." Right after I send that message, the group pounces on me. "Mira, you contracted an STD back then and tried to pin it on Lyra. She didn't even hold it against you, and now you're trying to steal her thunder? You're unbelievable!" "I can't believe you're still lying through your teeth during such a serious situation. You never change, do you?" Lyra immediately defuses the tension. "Mira, I don't blame you for what happened in the past, but you really shouldn't impersonate the director's wife. I've already arranged the ward and surgery, and I'm donating another 100 thousand dollars to Mr. Warren!" I'm this close to laughing out of sheer anger. She's the one who scratched her name off the diagnosis report and framed me for having an STD all those years ago. I never even confronted her about it, and now she's playing the victim? Lyra soon posts a photo in the group chat, showing off her husband's car. Yet, when I see the man in the passenger seat, I guffaw. Isn't that my husband's driver? When did he start running a hospital?

I help my students gain admission to top state art academies, yet my boss, Sebastian Emerson, withholds every cent of the pay I earned from 24 consecutive days of overtime. When I confront him in anger, he accuses me of stealing 120 thousand dollars in training fees from the students. "Honestly, being poor is no excuse for being shady. And having disabled parents doesn't give you the right to steal. "You've got two days to pay it back! Otherwise, I'll make sure you spend a few nights in jail, and I'll even inform your parents!" When a student calls, he snatches the phone and starts screaming, "There's no money! All your tuition went into buying your art supplies! If you've got a problem, go ahead and sue me, brat!" Meanwhile, Jayla Buckley, who is curled up in his arms, keeps placing order after order of Chaennal haute couture without the slightest hesitation. Watching the two of them colluding so shamelessly, I grip my attorney license in my pocket until my knuckles ache. Take it to court? Litigation? That's my arena. And I'll make sure both of them end up exactly where they belong—behind bars.

My child-free husband went back to his hometown for a funeral, and after he returned, he suddenly wanted me to have a baby. He was one of the best obgyns in the state, so he handled my IVF procedure himself. After more than 160 hormone shots, we finally heard the baby’s rhythmic heartbeats for the first time, which made my usually calm husband tear up. Soon, he tightened every part of my routine, from a strict diet to my schedule, and once my belly started showing, he barely let me get out of bed. I thought he was just being overly protective. But then, right by my ear, I heard a nasty little boy’s voice. [Which player starts their mission inside the womb? And she’s not even my mom!] [Just four more months. My dad will make sure she dies on the operating table so he can keep only his son.] [After that, he’ll bring my real mom back, and my mission will be complete!] I canceled my afternoon checkup immediately as soon as I heard this. Did the system forget to tell him that he wasn’t the only player in this world?

My family was supposed to be the richest of the land, yet I had to refund even a cheap delivery. Why? In my previous life, my housekeeper's daughter got her hands on a trading system. Every cent of money I spent would be hers. She started trying to guilt-trip me into donating to all the impoverished students in her school. It was charity anyway, so I signed a check worth 300 grand. The moment I did, that money became part of her savings, and the amount on my check was zero. Everyone called me names, called me a charlatan. Even the boy toy I spent good money on broke up with me. That girl used my money to donate to charities and became the kind and beautiful heiress. She told everyone I was the housekeeper's daughter instead. Furious, I grabbed my black card and started shopping like crazy. I wanted to prove I was the real heiress, but the balance in my account was cleared immediately. That girl then spent 1.2 million right away, like it was one dollar. She scoffed at me. "Don't try to act like you're rich when you're a broke loser. Your mother doesn't make enough as a housekeeper." The Internet decided to hunt me down. I could not handle the stress, and my mind broke. For some reason, my body withered away at a blistering rate. Before my father could save me, I drew my last breath. When I opened my eyes again, I returned to that fateful day. The day the housekeeper's daughter made me donate to the school.