The Reader A True Story Novels & Stories

I'd spent six months saving every penny for prenatal care, but the money vanished overnight. Panicking, I called my fiancé, only to see him on another woman's social media. The man's busy silhouette radiated excitement, with a luxury handbag sitting at the edge of the photo. The caption read: "Mr. Wellington is such a gentleman! Today's happiness starts with snagging the last designer bag at the boutique~" When I came out of surgery, my furious fiancé finally showed up. His first words were an accusation. "Can you stop treating me like I'm on a leash?" "My friend was feeling down, so I bought her a bag and kept her company. What's wrong with that? Why are you so petty!"

Three years after being brought back to my family, I jumped off a building. As my soul floated in the air, I wanted to see how my parents and brother, who always despised me, would break down in tears, filled with regret. But my father simply shook his head indifferently and looked at my lifeless body, saying, "How childish." My mother pressed her lips together and sighed in relief, as if a burden had been lifted. My brother stood in front of the fake heiress, shielding her from the gruesome sight of my death. Even so, the fake heiress burst into tears, prompting the whole family to rush to comfort her. I stared in stunned silence for a long time before a bitter smile crossed my face. When I opened my eyes again, I was back to the moment I was first brought home.

I caught my fiancé and the fake heiress in the act. They didn’t show an ounce of guilt; the heiress even laughed at me, full of mockery. “What I have isn’t just this,” she said. “Last year, I was bound to the Score-Boosting System. No matter what score you got on the SAT, I was always a little higher. Didn’t you notice?” “Natalie,” Vivian sneered, “as long as I’m around, you’ll never get ahead of me!” Anger surged through me. I wanted to take them down with me, but then a gas explosion struck, and the three of us were reborn at the same moment. I was welcomed back into the Sullivan family. Grandpa Sullivan declared that whoever became the SAT champion would inherit the family fortune. The fake heiress boasted proudly, “Natalie, don’t even try. You’ll always be my stepping stone!” I smiled. “If you’re always a little ahead of me, fine. I’ll just set the highest score in history.”

I had been in a secret relationship with Don Vincent Russo for ten years. The night I found out I was pregnant, he had already booked a wedding. I thought the man who had taken me in from the orphanage was finally going to give me a home. That was, until I saw the video of him kissing his first love, Sofia Costa. On my way to confront him, I was hit by a car and thrown onto the pavement. Lying in a pool of my own blood, I called him again and again. Nineteen times. When he finally answered, he was coaxing Sofia. "If it's too noisy, just turn off the phone, my principessa. Your mood matters most. "Our partnership with the Costa family depends on you." I hung up in despair. What he did not know was that not long before that, I had learned the truth. I was the real heir to the Costa family. The woman he loved… was nothing more than a fake I would tear down with my own hands.

The day I finally got the witch's potion to heal his wolf, I threw my arms around Ethan, trembling with excitement. "Your wolf can be healed. We can finally be together. Really together!" He clicked his tongue. "That eager to be marked?" I froze. What does that mean? Then laughter exploded from his phone. A group call, speaker on. "Ethan, she's even dumber than we thought! She actually went and found a cure so she could marry you. Just mark her already—she's desperate!" "Even if his wolf gets fixed, Sera's the one who deserves to be Luna. A pureblood, not some bastard whose mom slept her way into the family. How does she deserve to marry an Alpha?" Alpha? Luna? I stared at the man in front of me, the one who'd always seemed so fragile, whose wolf was supposedly so faint it could barely be sensed. He was the Alpha heir of our pack. And Sera was the stepsister who'd been bullying and tormenting me since middle school. Three years. All Ethan had to do was take a few scent-suppressing pills, and I'd fallen for every word. Everything he'd done was to keep Sera happy.

I'm the De Luca family's dirty little secret, their bastard daughter. And I was stupid enough to fall for Marco Moretti, the heir to our rivals. On our wedding day, my sister, Isabella, drugged me. When I woke up, she was wearing my dress. Standing at the altar. Becoming his wife. Heartbroken, I ran to a bar to drown my sorrow. And that’s where I discovered I was pregnant. Marco held me, crying. He swore he loved me, only me. He promised he’d divorce Isabella as soon as our child was born. But on the day I gave birth, Isabella murdered us both. Me and my baby. That’s when I finally understood. Marco would always choose a true-blooded princess of the Cosa Nostra. And me? The bastard? I was just a loose end. A problem to be erased. Then I opened my eyes. I was back. Back on the day she drugged me. Their wedding day. This time, I'm not marrying the heir. I'm marrying the Don. But first... I'm going to ruin this wedding.

I was the daughter of a crime boss in Flonio. Initially, I was supposed to reveal my identity during my wedding. But my elder brother told me that someone was targeting me and that I could not expose myself. My fiance also took this chance to take off my wedding gown and help my maid into it. My bodyguard then stole my family token. I trusted them deeply, but when the wedding ceremony started, I saw my maid with one arm around my fiance. Meanwhile, her other hand lingered between my brother’s and bodyguard’s sensitive spots on their bodies. In response to my suspicions, my maid laughed wickedly. Then, she instructed someone to break my limbs. They locked me up in the basement and forced me to watch as they got more and more intimate. In the end, they skinned me alive and broke my bones. Before I breathed my last, they left me to the beasts. When I recalled the misery of my previous life, I broke my maid’s ribs with a few punches. “You can have my fiance, but you don’t deserve my family token!”

My older brother, Ethan Earnhart, was the Alpha of the Shadow Pack. Right now, he was slicing my chest open with a silver surgical blade. Beside him, my adopted sister, Sara, had tear-filled eyes. "Elina went as far as faking her own death just to escape the loan sharks. She even used the body of a disfigured rogue." Ethan's gaze was filled with disgust. He pointed at the bruises covering my body, marks left when I was alive, and explained calmly to the young healer beside him. "Look. This is what happens to a traitor who betrays the pack and sleeps with filthy rogues. Elina, being the liar she's always been, even found a stand-in for her little performance." My wolf soul hovered beside the operating table and watched in despair as he handled my body the way one would process prey. 'Ethan, that really is me. I was trying to retrieve something you lost. That was why they–' "Check the stomach contents," Ethan said flatly as he cut open my stomach. Unexpectedly, there was no food residue. Instead, there was a single ring. It was corroded black by stomach acid, but the emblem engraved on it was unmistakable. It was the Alpha heirloom Ethan had lost five years ago. I had swallowed it just before I died. I had to protect that secret even if I were dead. Ethan's hand trembled violently while holding the forceps. He tore into my facial flesh like a madman. "Elina?"

After completing the quest, I insisted on staying in that world, foregoing the lucrative rewards. It was because I had a happy and perfect family there. My brother was a genius world-renowned scientist, and all his research achievements were named after me. My father was the world's richest man, and all his wealth was under my name. My mother was an extraordinarily talented dancer, but she gave up the stage just to spend more time with me. My family pampered me. I was the most envied pampered daughter in the world… until the day their real daughter, Carrie Langford, showed up at our door. Their love for me vanished overnight. From then on, I became inconsequential. Carrie orchestrated her own fall down the stairs, and my mother was so angry that she broke my leg. I ate a small bite of the cake Carrie threw away, so my father locked me in a dog cage for three days to dine with the dogs. He also made a golden cake for Carrie to make her feel better. Just because Carrie complained that her heart hurt, my brother dug out my heart for her and replaced it with an artificial heart. "It's just a heart. You've always been healthy. Carrie needs it more than you do." Calmly, my brother stood to the side, analyzing the data. "Don't worry, artificial heart technology is already very advanced, so the theoretical survival rate is very high. You won't die." After my soul left my body, I saw Carrie casually throw my heart into a trash can. The long-dormant system was awakened. [Would you like to take back everything you've given them, including your father's wealth, your mother's dancing talent, and your brother's intelligence, in exchange for a chance to revive?]

The Ivanovas and the Vitales are well-known aristocratic families who have maintained everlasting friendship through generations. My name is Anastasia Ivanova. I have been the daughter of the Ivanovas for twenty years, only to discover just now that I was switched at birth. When I was swept out of the Ivanova’s mansion like rubbish, Lorenzo, the youngest son of the Vitale family, firmly picked me up in spite of all objections. Lorenzo always acted cold and distant toward me. I didn’t know why he came to take me into his car at that time. He whispered in my ear again and again, ‌"I’ve wanted you for a long time."‌ He pinned me against the leather seat, making me cry until my voice was hoarse. At that moment, I finally understood his coldness over the years was not indifference but restraint. Soon after, Lorenzo overrode all objections to marry me. His parents were vehemently against me, but Lorenzo directly stripped them of power and became the youngest godfather. Scarlett Montgomery tried to stop us from getting married, but Lorenzo canceled all her credit cards and threatened to send her away. I thought we would have a happy life. Three days before our wedding ceremony, he planned to send me abroad, claiming enemies might retaliate. But, I accidentally overheard him talking to Scarlett in the hallway at night. "Thank goodness. You tricked her into leaving until after I give birth. You’re so good to me!"‌ He kissed her cheek, ‌"I don’t want Anastasia know our affair. You must keep it secret."‌ Their dialogue made me devastated. But I didn’t confront him immediately. Instead, I quietly completed my immigration paperwork as a way to make a clean break with him.