Uzumaki Family

Everything changed on my twelfth birthday. The brakes failed, the tragic crash, and the death of our parents. My brother blamed it all on me. He ruled as the mafia boss, yet all he showed me was hatred. The only love he had left was for our younger sister. He never believed how sick I became. He accused me of faking my sickness to get attention. He would turn to our sister with a gentleness I never received, he promised to save her, and he promised she would never die on his watch. My heart ended up beating inside her chest even after I died. He finally saw what was left of my damaged body after I was gone. The truth my brother never bothered to face would shatter his world.

I was suffering from period cramps, so I ordered some painkillers. I asked for a woman to deliver my painkillers to me, but a drunken man came over instead. This time, I did not call my brothers for help. I called the police instead. In the past, not only did my brothers send all of their bodyguards to me, but they also rushed back. In the process, they ended up missing the theater performance of our adopted sister, Gloria. Gloria was sad and grabbed a prop to stab herself. My brothers comforted me. “Don’t blame yourself for it. At the very least, you’re safe.” But, right after, they arranged my kidnapping and gave me over to a group of drunkards. “That was just a drunkard. You could have just chased him out. Did you have to call us? Look! Gloria’s dead now! You’re not getting out of this alive either!” When I opened my eyes again, I returned to the time when the drunkard was knocking on the door. This time, I did not call them, and my brothers got to watch Gloria’s theater performance and cheered her on. But once the performance ended, they regretted it.

My twin sister died on her 18th birthday. She died of respiratory failure in a dark corner of a hotel after being raped. Her dearest friend, Joanne Lowe, whom she always cared for and supported, turned around and anonymously spread photos of my sister being raped. I then slowly ruined the face which had so badly wanted to replace my sister with a knife. With blood everywhere, I cradled Joanne's face as if it were a piece of art and said, "My beloved sister is gone, and you people who harmed her won't be let off so easily."

All the relatives knew I had a "backward cousin." For my birthday, she gave me a grocery-store pound cake. When I ran a marathon, she presented me with a pair of worn-out canvas sneakers. At my graduate school acceptance party, she even sent a funeral wreath of white lilies with a sash that read "In Sympathy," wishing me an early departure to the afterlife. In my previous life, I slapped her so hard she tumbled down the porch steps. My brother took her side and plotted revenge, falsely reporting to the university that I had cheated on my SATs. My admission was revoked. "You're so modern. You know how things work," he sneered. "Plenty of people take a gap year. Just apply again." My father also defended her, cutting off all my financial support. "You've had so much schooling. You're so educated," he said coldly. "Support yourself." Alone in a city eighteen hundred miles from home, I fought to survive. I called my brother and my father again and again—only to be blocked. I delivered food while renting a room and studying to reapply. At my lowest, my hands were raw and cracked from frostbite, scrambling for delivery shifts at four in the morning just to earn a small bonus. Worn down by the cold and exhaustion, I suffered cardiac arrest at twenty-three and collapsed in a snowdrift in that unfamiliar city. No one ever came to claim me. This time, I chose to let it go and accepted the wreath with a gracious smile. To fully integrate myself into this family. After all, what is a moment of pride compared to a lifetime's inheritance?

Ang life trial system na “If You Think You Can Do Better, Prove It” ay sumabog sa eksena na parang isang naglalakbay na circus na nagpapangako ng magagandang bagay. Ang ideya ay plain. “Kung sa tingin mo ang buhay ng ibang tao ay magulo at tingin mo kaya mong mas gawin ito ng maganda, sige at patunayan mo. May reward na naghihintay kung magawa mo.” Bago ko mapagtanto, ang buong pamilya ko na tinuturing akong hanggal sa gitna ng palabas. Nandyan ang ina ko, nangangarap na gawin akong inahin. Ang asawa ko, na naglaan ng mga taon umiiwas sa nararapat na hati ng bigat ng pamilya. At ang anak kong lalaki, naaawa pag nakikita ako. Tinulak nila ako sa “judgement seat” na para bang kontrabida sa isang kwento. Bawat isa sa kanila ay sumumpa, sa pwesto ko, maayos nila ang buhay ko kaysa sa kaya ko. Ang pusta? Well, kung magawa nila ito, ang consciousness ko ay mabubura—mawawala, binura na parang pagkakamali sa chalkboard—at gagawin nilang personal na katulong. Dagdag pa dito, maglalakad sila palayo ng may isang milyong dolyar. Pero kung hindi nila magawa? Kung gayon ako ang siyang makakakuha ng tatlong milyong dolyar. Ngayon iyan ay pustahang kaabang abang, hindi ba?

My mother despised me because I was the unintended consequence of a one-night stand. She poured all her love and attention into her students, treating them as if they were her own flesh and blood. One day, when her favourite pupil confessed his feelings for me, she flew into a rage. She slapped me hard across the face and called me a whore. Years later, as Alzheimer's clouded her mind, she forgot I even existed, yet still remembered every single one of her precious students. The irony was that not one of them ever came to visit her in the nursing home. They all loathed her just as much as I did.

When my body was being dismembered, my fiance was helping my cousin choose her wedding dress. When he received my distress call, he said with disgust, "I hope you never come back! You can die with the bastard in your womb! Don't ever call me again. The mentioning of your name makes me sick!" After that, he found a body part of me in a water tank on the rooftop of a hotel. He thought it was a prank, so he actually ordered white lilies and candles to be delivered to my doorstep. Only when he found my head buried in the grass under his feet on the day of our wedding did he realize that it wasn't a prank.

The day that I divorced my third husband, the system told me that I had completely failed my mission. I had married three times in this world and they were all targets that were supposed to fall for me. But every single one of them chose to divorce me because of Wendy Somerfield. The system pitied me for doing my best for the past 30 years, so it asked me to target my son. It said that if my son could confidently choose me, between me and Wendy, then I could live. However, it was no exception that the son I gave birth to after 40 weeks of pregnancy chose Wendy, just like my three ex-husbands. They all even pinned the cause of Wendy's illness on me. My first husband, who was my childhood sweetheart, pretended to be softhearted, but he was actually ruthless. He actually tried to convince me to donate one of my kidneys to Wendy. My second husband, who I met on a blind date, used a scalpel to personally cut open my body. My third husband, who I fell in love with at first sight, even threatened me with my son. While spitting out blood from my mouth, I agreed to their requests with a smile. However, when they saw me being pushed out of the operating room, those people who turned their backs on me went crazy.

My daughter has leukemia and desperately needs a bone marrow donor. After a blood test, it turns out my blood type doesn't match hers. However, my husband's blood type does. This confuses me. I gave birth to her, so how could my blood type not be a match for hers? I'm puzzled by this when my long-lost best friend suddenly appears with her son, who's about my daughter's age. She wants him to do a blood test to see whether it matches my daughter's.

After failing the mission, the System gave me one final chance, and to succeed, I had to give birth to a child. The System promised that if the baby were born safely, it would reveal the truth to my target and give me one last glimmer of hope. However, six months into my pregnancy, just when things seemed stable, I was dragged onto an operating table in the middle of the night by my husband and family. My husband stopped the anesthesiologist from giving me any pain relief. “Let her feel the pain,” he said coldly. “We need to keep the kidneys as fresh as possible.” My parents instructed the doctor to draw my blood. “She’s the same blood type as our precious girl. Let’s take some for backup.” Even my childhood friend, the boy who had always been by my side, was the one to slice open my abdomen.  They wanted my kidneys to save my sister, who was dying from kidney failure. No one believed I was pregnant. No matter how much I begged, they went ahead with the operation, tearing me open. The baby couldn’t survive, and I died on that operating table. However, as my soul began to fade away, something strange happened. Those who had murdered me—my husband, my parents, my so-called friend—they all lost their minds.