Chapter 1: Am I Your White Moonlight? (1)

【Mission failed for Host 0368. Deducting one thousand Points.】

【Automatically deploying to next world. Please confirm identity.】

【Character locked in. Deployment complete.】

“Host, you’ve already failed seven worlds. If you fail again, not only will you go bankrupt, you’ll be fired and exiled from the Three Thousand Worlds.” The System pulled up the display. The tycoon who once commanded millions of Points now had to weigh every purchase before buying even the cheapest Item.

In the Scum Abuse Department, Jiang Ning had been a force to be reckoned with, ruthless and efficient. She could clear missions quickly, but her methods always went sideways, so much so that the scum she tormented would sooner die than turn over a new leaf. Whole worlds were deemed unsellable and pulled from circulation, which meant no performance Points either.

So upper management finally decided to transfer her to the Redemption Department. So many people had applied for that department that only one mission remained: a task where the Female Lead must never shed a single tear.

Jiang Ning’s specialty had always been making scum cry until they questioned their existence, crushing them into despair until it felt like staring into an abyss. Her first instinct upon the transfer was to refuse outright.

She didn’t even bother seeking out the Female Lead. She just drifted through the Small World until she died of natural causes or got recalled by the Main System. The result: the Female Lead wept buckets, and Jiang Ning ended up paying through the nose until she was broke.

“What was the Original Host doing?” Jiang Ning gazed down at the river beneath the bridge, its surface mirroring the glittering city in a hazy, almost unreal blur.

【The Original Host is committing suicide. A year ago, her parents died in a car accident that was engineered. She trained in classical dance and knew nothing about business administration, and no matter how she struggled, she couldn’t turn the tide. Yesterday, the executive the company had been grooming was poached, a devastating loss, and now the company is on the verge of a hostile acquisition.】

Jiang Ning rubbed her temples in mild exasperation. In a situation like this, forget helping the Female Lead. It would be a miracle if she didn’t start crying first.

Going by past experience, the Female Lead was bound to have a tragic background, abandoned by everyone, bullied by all. To keep her from crying, Jiang Ning would need real power to shield her and keep her protected.

But this time it was a broken pot paired with a broken lid. Two disaster cases, mirror images of each other, neither in any position to look down on the other.

【No, Host, you’ve got it wrong. The Female Lead is the daughter of a wealthy dynasty. Doting parents, privileged upbringing. She’s far better off than you.】

“Then why would she need me?”

【Because matters of the heart are impossible to predict.】 The System had been trying to sound profound, only to stumble straight onto one of Jiang Ning’s landmines.

The tall woman gave a small nod, then stepped up onto the railing’s edge. Just as she was about to leap, ready to follow the Original Host’s wishes and move on to the next world, someone seized her from behind in a crushing embrace.

“Don’t do anything rash!” The stranger held on with everything she had, her voice trembling, terrified that one loosened grip would mean losing her forever. Jiang Ning’s whole body went rigid at the sudden contact. When struggling got her nowhere, she said coldly, “Let go,” and reached back to pry the person off, only to feel those arms tighten around her.

Jiang Ning couldn’t stand being touched. She knew the woman was probably trying to save her life, but she still recoiled from a stranger’s hands. She applied force, and heard a pained cry from behind her, yet the grip never loosened.

【The Female Lead has cried once. Sadness level: five stars. Deducting one hundred Points. Host is advised to soothe her emotions.】

Jiang Ning froze. She glanced at her dwindling Points balance, gave a silent sigh, and stopped struggling.

“You can let go now.”

Her tone was so level that it gave nothing away. Lin Yiren hesitated, then released her, though she stayed rooted at her side, eyes locked firmly on Jiang Ning.

Neither of them spoke. Jiang Ning gazed into the distance, chestnut curls lifted by the evening breeze, her features softened by a hazy beauty that made her seem almost gentle. Lin Yiren’s heart ached, swelling with a discomfort so sharp she could have cried.

She tilted her face up to the sky and blinked furiously. If she hadn’t come back to the country today, would she never have seen Jiang Ning again?

Such a wonderful person, and she had actually been thinking of ending her own life.

【The Female Lead is about to cry again. Host is advised to take timely measures.】

Jiang Ning had stayed silent because she’d been combing through the Original Host’s memories. The Female Lead’s hesitant, searching gaze suggested she recognized the Original Host, but the memories showed no trace of any connection between them.

Watching tears pool and swirl in Lin Yiren’s eyes, Jiang Ning patted her pocket, then handed over a tissue. Her voice gentled. “Don’t cry.”

“Tears don’t suit your eyes.” Jiang Ning studied Lin Yiren’s reddened rims, bright and glistening with an unselfconscious charm, and stated it as plain fact.

Whether it was for the Points or for something else, Jiang Ning simply couldn’t bear to watch the Female Lead cry. Meeting her eyes always left an uncomfortable ache in Jiang Ning’s chest. That was the real reason she’d avoided contact with Female Leads in the past.

Lin Yiren was startled by the remark. The grief that had filled her heart a moment ago was suddenly replaced by astonishment that the woman she’d been yearning for had actually spoken to her. She accepted the tissue, flustered, with a hidden flicker of joy underneath.

But remembering how Jiang Ning had just tried to end her life, Lin Yiren still felt a chill of lingering fear.

She assumed Jiang Ning had no idea who she was, and hesitantly began, “The night sky is really beautiful tonight, actually.”

So the Mortal Realm was still worth staying for.

Hearing the unspoken meaning beneath Lin Yiren’s words, Jiang Ning leaned against the railing without answering, watching the ten thousand lights of Jiangcheng. Once upon a time, she’d felt there was a lamp lit somewhere for her too. But she’d been drifting too long now, and there wasn’t much she expected from anything, or clung to anymore.

On that point, at least, she and the Original Host felt exactly the same.

“It’s late. You should head home.” Jiang Ning noticed someone glancing over from a distance. Someone was waiting for Lin Yiren, most likely.

Lin Yiren shook her head. She looked at Jiang Ning’s profile, still not directly asking what had happened. She’d already received the news, and she stubbornly refused to leave. “Could we talk for a bit? I’m feeling a little down.”

Jiang Ning had graduated years ago. Her crimson lips pressed together, lending her features a cold, hard edge that made her look difficult to approach. Two buttons of her white shirt were undone at the collar, baring pale collarbones, while a black pencil skirt hugged her hips. The simple outfit looked striking on her, full-figured and curvy, carrying the mature allure of a grown woman. Her high heels had been slipped off and set aside.

Lin Yiren was an adult too, but she’d been raised in a protective bubble with little exposure to the world’s rough edges. In her white sundress with only her ankles showing, her voice still carried a young girl’s softness, so calling Jiang Ning “big sister” wasn’t much of a stretch.

Jiang Ning spared her a glance. No response, no retreat. She fished a pack of cigarettes out of the bag discarded on the ground, tapped one loose, and clamped it between her lips. The faint glow of the lighter made Lin Yiren stare blankly.

It felt, somehow, a little too cool. A little too worldly.

What was even more worldly was what came next. Jiang Ning took a drag, turned her head, and blew the smoke toward Lin Yiren with a soft laugh. “Still want to chat?”

With her high-bridged nose and beautiful eyes lending her an extra touch of allure in the haze, the intimidating aloofness about her softened around the smile at her lips.

That originally frigid aura turned downright bewitching in Lin Yiren’s eyes, yet somehow Jiang Ning felt even harder to approach now.

Lin Yiren didn’t like smoking, or the smell of it. She knew perfectly well Jiang Ning was doing it on purpose, but she pretended not to notice, standing her ground without moving an inch, her expression earnest. “I do.”

Jiang Ning gave her a sidelong look and chuckled. She leaned back against the railing, moving her cigarette hand to the right, a little further from Lin Yiren, and listened as the girl recited troubles that, in Jiang Ning’s eyes, hardly qualified as troubles at all.

“We have a dog at home called Black Knight. Every morning he scratches at my door, so loud, and I just don’t want to get up.”

“The housekeeper always sets out a glass of milk with breakfast, but I never grew any taller.”

“The osmanthus in our yard gets scattered all over the ground when the wind blows. It always makes me hate leaving home, but I have to go to school anyway.”

Lin Yiren’s voice was soft, unhurried, like she was reciting poetry. Her long black hair draped over her shoulders, making her look small and endearing, her sundress fluttering in the breeze like something out of many a fond dream.

As she spoke, she tried leaning against the railing the way Jiang Ning did at first, but she wasn’t tall enough, and the pose was flatly uncomfortable. She turned to face the water instead, resting her hands on the rail, sneaking glances at Jiang Ning’s profile now and then.

Jiang Ning took one drag and then went still. The ash burned longer and longer, stubbornly refusing to fall, until at last, when Lin Yiren finished, Jiang Ning simply opened her fingers and let the cigarette drop into the water, vanishing without a trace.

“What do you think would happen if I jumped from here?” Jiang Ning said it with a smile, the kind of words that made Lin Yiren’s nerves shriek. Watching the girl’s body snap taut, the amusement in Jiang Ning’s eyes deepened by a fraction.

“You’d miss tomorrow morning’s sunrise. You’d forget every beautiful thing you ever had. You’d lose your way in the silent dark.” Lin Yiren fought to keep her voice from shaking, desperately hoping the despair would fade from Jiang Ning’s eyes.

“Forgetting… wouldn’t that mean forgetting the pain, too?” Jiang Ning seized on a single word and held on, turning her body the way Lin Yiren had, gazing down at the ink-black water. Her voice was low, almost like a sigh.

“Don’t fixate on the things that hurt you. You have to understand, only love and beauty endure.” Lin Yiren tensed at Jiang Ning’s slightest movement, and only relaxed enough to continue when she saw nothing more was coming.

“Look. Yesterday is already over.” Lin Yiren pointed at the clock face atop a high-rise not far away, its hour, minute, and second hands all resting precisely on twelve. A double meaning, deliberate.

However well Lin Yiren tried to hide it, Jiang Ning could still hear the fear beneath that forced calm. The girl’s soft voice calling out big sister struck straight at the most tender part of the heart.

It was summer, but the riverside was still chilly at midnight. Jiang Ning looked Lin Yiren up and down, noted the fine goosebumps the wind had raised on her bare arms, and realized the girl was cold.

Then, to its genuine astonishment, the System watched Jiang Ning actually accept the mission. Judging by her earlier attitude, she’d been less than thrilled with this world. Jiang Ning hated complications. Anything that could be solved with power and connections, she refused to handle by hand. Staying in this world meant fulfilling the Original Host’s wish, helping her claw the company back. The System had already braced itself for a transfer to the next world.

And yet, somehow, Jiang Ning had actually been talked out of it.

Since she’d been confirming the mission with the System, she hadn’t reacted to anything around her. Just as Lin Yiren was sinking into dejection, a finger suddenly tilted her chin up.

Jiang Ning studied the flicker in Lin Yiren’s eyes, the way the girl watched her as warily as a fawn. The smile at her lips grew a shade more genuine. “Little one, from what you’ve been saying, you really do seem troubled.”

“Why don’t you take me home with you, and tell me all about it properly?”