Perfect Crime

Using an alternative account, I secretly join a cycling group chat that my husband, Liam Johnson, is in. One day, an announcement is made in the group chat. "We'll be organizing a weekend mountain biking activity with an overnight stay, with two people sharing a room. To add some excitement, we'll be drawing lots for room assignments." I can't really understand it. Curious, I ask, "What if a man and a woman end up drawing the same room?"

The first thing I do after coming back to life is swap out every single pair of my husband, Augustin Reed's boxers for those in black. In my past life, my sister-in-law, Sephine Fidel, cheats right under our roof on my brother, Jonah Merrick. And when I catch her and tell Jonah the truth, she turns it all on me. Then, two pairs of men's black boxers, not Augustin's, appear in my bedroom. I try to explain, but Augustin slaps me across the face and calls me a whore, while Jonah looks at me like I'm filth. "I know you hate Sephine. You've never shown her any warmth since she married me, but I didn't think you'd sink this low to cheat in your own house and frame her for it…" He disowns me while Augustin files for divorce. I remember stumbling onto the streets in a daze, only to get run over dead by a speeding truck. When my eyes snap open, I wake up to the day Sephine brings her lover into our home.

On the seventh day after my daughter goes missing, I kidnap an entire kindergarten. I lock away all 27 students and two teachers in a classroom. I tell the police that if they can't find my daughter, I will kill a kid every 30 minutes. The principal falls to her knees, wailing and begging, "It's not my fault that your daughter is missing. Why should other children pay for it?" I glance at my watch. "29 minutes left. Find her." I know she's in this kindergarten.

My entire family could hear my thoughts. In my previous life, I was switched at birth with Victoria Harrington. I was reunited with my family 18 years later. It was the early 1920s, when owning a bicycle or a radio was still rare for most families. I had always dreamed of having one of those precious things. However, after I came home, Victoria would constantly brag right in front of me. "Mom told me that I'm the only one who deserves this fancy watch," she said with a sweet smile. "And look at this gorgeous bicycle Dad got me for my birthday! Oh, and when I mentioned wanting a radio, Daniel bought it for me immediately." Then came the real knife twist. "I know you're their biological daughter, Bernice, but let's be honest. When it comes to love, I'm their real daughter. Daniel definitely prefers me as his little sister too." Her words ate at me. I could not stop the bitter thoughts that flooded my mind about my parents and brother. The problem was that my family could hear every single one of those thoughts. Slowly, they began to resent me. Eventually, they threw me out into the cold, and I died alone in the winter streets while Victoria lived happily within the warmth of their love. When I opened my eyes again, I realized that I had been reborn. As I watched Victoria putting on her usual show, my thoughts took a delicious turn. 'Victoria thinks that Mom is such a cheapskate for only buying her a cheap watch instead of something expensive. She even calls Dad stingy behind his back because he didn't get her a pricier bicycle.' 'And she constantly complains about how ugly and crude Daniel is, saying that he embarrasses her. I wonder if I should share these thoughts with my family?'

The Beast Nation sent our royal family two beast slaves as a token of goodwill after they were defeated. My concubine-born younger sister took the tall and upstanding white tiger with piercing eyes, leaving me and the dying merman to look at each other. In my previous life, I took the merman as my personal bodyguard and trained him out of compassion. I spent a fortune to treat his injuries, and I even bought his slave contract at the price of ten cities and set him free. He also took great care of me, staying by my side day and night. I thought we were both in love, so I turned down dozens of marriages and stood by him with all my heart despite everyone's loud disapproval. However, when the beasts attacked again and threw my sister and me into the surging river, I frantically pleaded with the merman to save me, only to be violently slammed under the water by his massive tail. I watched helplessly as he carried my sister away. I realized at that moment that he had only given himself to me to save his own life. He had remained loyal to me even after regaining his freedom because he wanted to see my younger sister. I struggled in the filthy river, eventually suffocating as my lungs filled with mud and sand. When I reopened my eyes, I was transported back to the day of the beast slave selection. Looking at the dying merman, I covered my nose and taunted, "Where did this dead fish come from? It reeks!"

I get sent away to the countryside because my parents fear that I'll use my privileged background to lord over others. In turn, they're taking in Tina from that family to the city for her upbringing and schooling. In the countryside, I get up at 4:00 am daily to feed the pigs, then it's a grueling three-hour trek through the mountains to school. I'm also barely surviving due to constant malnutrition. I reach out to my parents for a mere 300 dollars for tuition, only for them to accuse me of spending recklessly. In the meantime, they're donating an entire building just to secure a spot for Tina at her preferred school. I finally make it into Tina's high school and earn a guaranteed university admission spot, only for my parents to order me to hand it over to her as they unleash their fury on me, yelling, "You're clearly bad to the bone, always trying to take things that belong to Tina." "Tina almost gave up on life because of what you did. You're indebted to her for the rest of your life." They, using their parental rights, forfeit my guaranteed university admission spot to fulfill Tina's wish. They then transfer all company shares and real estate to her for her future security, while the whole family makes arrangements to move abroad together. I take in everything before me, no longer feeling hurt. I calmly pack my belongings and walk away from the place where I don't belong.

On my 50th wedding anniversary, I took my worn, crumbling marriage certificate to City Hall to renew it. The clerk glanced at it—and froze. “This certificate is fake. Our records show you’ve never been married.” I stared. “Impossible. I’ve been married to Damien Slater for fifty years.” The clerk pulled up his file. “Well…Yes, Mr. Slater is married—but his wife’s name is Vanessa Grant.” Vanessa. His widowed sister-in-law. A military doctor who’d spent decades living among the troops. My hands shook as I returned home and confronted Damien. He didn’t even try to deny it. “I’ve treated you well all these years. Isn’t that enough? Vanessa is my true love. I only ever wanted her—our children, our life.” My son counseled me and said, “To spare your feelings, my parents kept it a secret their whole lives. You’re getting old now. What more do you want?” Only then did I learn the truth. The child I had raised with my own hands was never mine by blood. Decades ago, Vanessa and I gave birth on the same day. To ensure her child would grow up with intellect, privilege, and a future that I could provide, Damien switched our children. My own son? Damien drowned him in the pond the moment he drew breath. And I—fool that I was—raised Vanessa’s boy as my own. I even got him all the way to Claremont University. The truth broke me, and I collapsed. When I opened my eyes again—I was back. Back to the day I went into labor.

My husband, Clement Norman, promised to make up for our missed honeymoon. It was five years late, but I was still excited. I got ready and really looked forward to it. But right before we boarded the plane, I realized there was someone extra in our group—Clement's childhood friend, Madison Bowen. He explained half-heartedly, "Madison's never been abroad before. I figured we could bring her along." I wasn't thrilled, but when I spoke up, he made it sound like I was being dramatic. "Are you jealous of our relationship because you didn't grow up with a proper family? I see her as a sister. You wouldn't get it—you grew up an orphan." I chose to stay quiet, not wanting to ruin our honeymoon. But we encountered an avalanche halfway through the trip. My leg got stuck deep in the snow, and I couldn't move. And the first thing Clement did was grab Madison's hand and run. He didn't even look back.

After the plane crash, I rejected the captain—my brother-in-law’s—final life jacket that he had as he handed it to me. Instead, I allowed myself to plunge a hundred meters from the sky. In my previous life, I had survived after accepting his life jacket. But he died a tragic death in the crash. After his death, I was consumed with guilt. My husband proposed to take care of two households at the same time so that he could look after his sister-in-law. Out of guilt, I reluctantly agreed to his proposal. I even had to give up my only chance of getting promoted to department head of the hospital to my sister-in-law, upon my husband’s insistence. When I was seventy years old, I suddenly saw my brother-in-law, who was supposed to be dead, show up in front of me. He said to my husband, “Bro, thank goodness you came up with that fake-death plan back then. I was drunk and caused the deaths of all the passengers after the plane crash. If not for that plan of yours, as the captain, I certainly could not have escaped scot-free and would have been sentenced to prison for life! “It was too bad we had to keep her in the dark for her entire life.” After a lifetime of sacrifices, I was so furious that I nearly passed out upon hearing my brother-in-law’s words. When I opened my eyes again, I was back on the day of the plane crash.

In my previous life, I was eight months pregnant when my mother-in-law and husband forcibly dragged me to grab decorative gift boxes from the Christmas tree. I told them there was nothing inside, but my mother-in-law slapped me across the face while my husband pulled me into the crowd. A stampede broke out. They clutched their gift boxes and fled to save themselves, while my child and I were trampled to death. They eagerly tore open all the gift boxes with high hopes, only to find exactly nothing, just like I'd warned them. But as I lay dying, I noticed something in the final gift box. A Black Widow spider with an hourglass pattern on its belly crawled onto my mother-in-law's hand. This spider carries deadly venom. Anyone bitten either dies or suffers permanent disability. When I open my eyes again, I'm back on Christmas Day. This time, watching my mother-in-law and husband gear up to fight over those Christmas gift boxes, I won't try to stop them!