Xia Qingnuan

I, Aurora, last heir of the Sunstone, stood ready for my Unity Ceremony with Ethan, leader of the Stormriver, a sacred bond prophesied to secure our lands. I believed in our shared duty, even in a slowly blooming love for him. But at the altar, Ethan publically scorned me, declaring his "true love" for my trusted aide, Sylvie, shattering our alliance and the very foundation of our world. The Council, dazzled by his reckless display of power and Sylvie' s fabricated innocence, abandoned me and my lineage, allowing Ethan to devastate our Sunstone Valley, extinguishing my peoples' light and our sacred Sun-crystals. Then, as I prepared for my crucial Solar Renewal, he shattered my power core and entombed me alive in a collapsing mountain. How could the very people I was sworn to protect, including the man I considered my dearest, fall so utterly blind to a manipulative lie, sacrificing everything for a power-hungry charade? They thought they had buried a guardian, but they merely forged the Shadow. I did not die in that tomb; I was reborn as the formidable Shadow Sovereign, and now, armed with terrifying darkness, I will make every betrayer regret their choices.

I was the wife of the De Luca crime family's Underboss, a beautiful statue whose only purpose was to produce an heir. But after five years, my body had failed. The day my husband, Alessandro, told me I was barren, he also introduced me to my replacement. He called her a "vessel," a temporary arrangement, but I saw the infatuation in his eyes. He promised it was just business, but soon he was calling me a "cold statue" behind my back while spending every night with her. The ultimate humiliation came at my birthday party. When a champagne fountain shattered and sliced my arm open, he ignored me bleeding on the floor to shield her instead. In front of his entire family, the Underboss chose his mistress over his wife. He left me there, my honor shattered as completely as the glass. I was no longer just a failed wife. I was an obstacle. And in our world, obstacles are removed. But my arrogant husband didn't know his own father had a contingency plan to protect me. While he was distracted by his mistress's fake pregnancy, he unknowingly signed our divorce papers. My disappearance was no longer an escape; it was the start of my revenge.

For years, I was the perfect girlfriend, funding my boyfriend Carlton' s startup with my own money. My role was simple: be supportive, unseen, and unheard while his childhood friend, Brande, claimed the space by his side that should have been mine. On the way to a tech conference that could make his career, I saw the brutal truth I' d been denying. There, on Brande' s neck, was a fresh, dark hickey. She was curled up in his lap, her hand on his thigh, and he stroked her hair as if it were the most natural thing in the world. When I finally reacted, he called me harsh and told me to be the bigger person. Later, when I wore a dress he deemed "too much," he gave me an ultimatum. "If you walk out that door in that dress, we're done." My love, my money, my support-it was all just fuel for his ambition and their affair. I was a fool. A well-funded, supportive fool. But as I sat in the back, pushed into a corner, my shoulder bumped against his step-brother, the cold, powerful investor Harvey Hurst. And fueled by a reckless wave of defiance, I didn't pull away. Instead, I leaned into him, and for the first time in a long time, I made a decision that was all my own.

The marriage contract that would merge our two corporate empires was laid out before me. I was supposed to sign my life away to Jace Robertson, the man I had loved since we were kids. But my love had been burned away the night the chandelier fell. When it came crashing down, my fiancé didn't pull me to safety. He shoved me aside to shield my cousin, Cassidy, with his own body. He chose her. Instinctively. My own mother rushed to her side, later telling me I needed to be more understanding. "Cassidy has always been delicate, Ellie. Jace did the right thing." It was then I remembered everything. In my last life, I died alone in a cold hospital room from a cancer they found too late. Jace was on a romantic trip to the Amalfi Coast with Cassidy. My mother was at a charity luncheon. My last thought was a regret so deep it could tear a hole in the universe. I had wasted my one precious life on people who saw me as nothing more than a stepping stone. But now, I was back. The pen was in my hand, the contract on the table. Jace wanted Cassidy. My mother adored her. Fine. Let them have each other. With a steady hand, I drew a single, clean line through my name on the signature line and wrote in a new one: CASSIDY COLEMAN. This time, I would live for myself.

My fiancé, Daniel, wasn' t just late for our fifth anniversary; his assistant, Sophie, informed me he sent his apologies from a client dinner. I stood in our "Dream Home," a monument to our shared ambitions, feeling an icy premonition. Then, Daniel burst in, a raging storm, accusing me. "What did you do, Olivia?" he snarled. Sophie–his new assistant–was in the hospital, suffering a panic attack, claiming I' d threatened her. His eyes, once full of love, now burned with cold rage fueled by her lies. He seized a glass vase, shattering it against the wall, its splintering echoing my collapsing world. Pinning me against the fireplace, he threatened to destroy my career, to blackball me if I ever went near Sophie again. Later, Sophie herself arrived, dripping fake sympathy and flaunting a new cashmere sweater Daniel had bought her. She spoke of Daniel' s concern, but her words were exquisitely crafted barbs. I was left stunned, struggling to grasp the sudden, brutal betrayal. How could Daniel, the man who' d promised to build worlds with me, believe such blatant lies and turn on me so viciously? It felt impossible, yet here I was, trapped in a nightmare. Days later, finding a tiny stray kitten, Ash, brought a sliver of peace. But it was fleeting. Sophie soon appeared, hysterical, accusing me of poisoning her prize-winning Persian cat. She produced a scrap of my silk scarf, clutched in its paw, as "proof." This time, I refused to be his villain. I vowed to expose her.

My mother-in-law, Martha, was a human storm cloud, always hovering, always raining contempt on my life as a writer. When she and my father-in-law arrived for an "extended visit" for her "medical tests," the already thick air in our suburban home became suffocating. Her sharp voice, accusing me of getting lost and being "not a real man," was a familiar prick, but when she scoffed at my profession and questioned my ability to provide, I felt the familiar burn of frustration turn into a deep, internal ache. My wife, Olivia, usually my shield, tried to protect me, arguing with her mother, claiming Martha's alleged brain tumor made her unpredictable. But then, a chilling comment slipped from Martha' s lips: she asked Olivia why she hadn't called from Miami, not New York, where her business trip was supposed to be. Olivia quickly dismissed it as her mother' s confusion, but a sliver of doubt, sharp and cold, lodged itself in my mind. This wasn' t just Martha' s cruelty; something darker, more insidious was at play, shaking the very foundation of my trust. Later, my seemingly harmless neighbor, Mark, offered cryptic warnings about "protecting the throne" and people "sneaking in the back door." His knowing smirk, coupled with Martha's strange slip, began to twist my unease into a sickening suspicion. I had to know. I had to know if the quiet life I' d built, the love I cherished, was nothing more than a carefully constructed lie.

The sleek leather of my 50th-floor office chair felt real, the hum of the AC familiar. I was Andrew Scott, Wall Street rising star, not ex-con '734'. Then, the intercom buzzed. My assistant, voice tight with panic: "Mr. Scott, it's Ryan Clark...about Jenny...an accident." A physical blow. The exact same words. Fifteen years in a concrete box, the taste of stale bread, followed by the blinding Hamptons sun, Jenny-my dead wife-laughing with Ryan, their son looking exactly like him. The final memory: a dark New Jersey alley, the smell of garbage and my own blood. It wasn't a nightmare; it was my life, and it ended. But I wasn't dead. My heart pounded, not with fear for the woman I loved and our unborn child as it had before, but with a cold, hard rage. They had played their game, and I had lost everything. Now, it was my turn. And this time, I knew all their moves.

The cold gurney, the execution chamber ceiling, then a familiar, hateful face: Kevin, my ex-fiancé, the President. He was there to watch me die, bloodshot eyes, rumpled suit, looking deranged. Treason, they said. A lie so colossal it had already swallowed my father, my sister, my entire family. His whispered words were a final, chilling insult: "I found her, you know. Crystal. She was happy. You took her from me. You murdered the woman I loved." My vision blurred as the lethal cocktail burned, my tongue heavy with the truth I couldn't speak – that I' d saved Crystal, not hidden her for myself. His face, twisted with a grief entirely his own twisted invention, was the last thing I saw before blackness swallowed me. Then, a gasp tore from my lungs, and I was bolt upright in my own silk sheets, sunlight streaming into my Georgetown townhouse. My phone buzzed. Kevin. The date on the screen made my blood run cold: today was the day he was supposed to run off with Crystal Vance. My "first life" had begun its nosedive on this very day. This time, it would be different. This time, I knew the enemy. And this time, I would not be merciful.

For five years, I was Jessica Blackwood' s executive assistant. My life was a gilded cage, controlled by her tyrannical father, Arthur. My arranged marriage to Liam Walker, his Head of Security, was a cold, unconsummated sham; we were strangers under one roof. Driven to despair by Arthur' s control over her dreams of motherhood, Jess and I planned the unthinkable: fake our deaths. But the night before my staged "accident," Liam, my stoic husband, showed an unexpected vulnerability, leading to a passionate connection that upended everything. I faked my death and began our "free" life in Aspen with Jess. Then, a shock: we were both pregnant-Liam' s child for me. Our perfect escape now felt too managed, a new, subtle prison. Soon, news broke: Jess was "institutionalized" for a mental breakdown. Fury and despair consumed me. Arthur had viciously re-trapped Jess, aiming for her unborn child. A gnawing question plagued me: Was Liam part of this new cage? Was our passionate night merely a calculated manipulation? Had our defiance been utterly futile? Heavily pregnant, I vowed to return and dismantle Arthur' s empire, freeing Jess at any cost. But on my journey, my car was ambushed. The masked man was no stranger. It was Liam, revealing a shattering truth about our past and the true identity of our enemy.

Thanksgiving. I was back home in rural Vermont, sifting through our old attic, looking for ornaments. Then I found it: a Polaroid of a 10-year-old me with a boy named "Cousin Leo," a cousin I’d never heard of, who then vanished from the photo right before my eyes. My family insisted Leo was real, eagerly anticipating his arrival, but their stories about him were a chaotic mess of contradictions—tall, short, professor, contractor, living everywhere and nowhere. They had no photos, no contact info, nothing tangible. Yet, strange toys appeared, my niece claimed he visited, and an unseen voice called from our empty porch. Was I losing my mind, or were they all caught in some bizarre, shared delusion? They blamed my childhood memory gaps, conveniently dismissing the chilling inconsistencies only I seemed to see. The warm, familiar holiday turned cold, filled with an unsettling unease. As their cheerful "memories" curdled into whispers of strange encounters and empty eyes, I realized this wasn't just confusion—something far darker was at play, and I was the only one who could unearth the truth about this phantom cousin.

"The year she graduated, her parents both died in a ruthless car accident. She was forced to live under another’s roof, but her life was even worse than a servant’s. That night, she was imprisoned in a warehouse, and the thin quilt could no longer cover her cold heart. Her cousin and aunt sent a man to destroy her innocence. After she escaped by luck, she was sold to an old man as his lover. However, at midnight every midnight, a man was whispering in her ear."

As a result of a conspiracy, Leona was kidnapped. The next day, she found herself caught in a love trap set by Louis, a handsome billionaire and also an infamous playboy. Before she realized what had happened, she had already become his wife. Trapped in an emotionless marriage, she resolutely rejected him. However, when she fell pregnant with his child during her amnesia, he took good care of her and thus began a passionate love affair. When she gradually relented and gave her heart to him, a storm began to quietly brew on the horizon.

Emberly, an esteemed scientist of the Imperial Federation, took her own life after completing important research. She was reborn, and just like in her first life, she was born into a wealthy family. She could’ve lived a carefree and prosperous life. However, the babies got mixed up in the hospital and she was taken home by another family from the countryside. Her foster parents later found out the truth and brought her to her real family, but they didn’t like her. Her evil adopted sister even loathed her. She was framed and ultimately, she died in prison. But in her next life, she refused to stay a coward and swore she would take revenge on all who wronged her. She would only care about those who were truly good to her and turn a blind eye to her heartless family. In one life, she had once experienced darkness and been trampled upon like an ant. In another, she had stood on top of the world. This time, she only wished to live for herself. As if a switch had gone on inside of her, she suddenly became the best at everything she put her mind to. He won the math contest, topped the college entrance exams, and solved an age old question... Later, she garnered countless scientific research achievements. People who had once slandered her and looked down on her cried bitterly and begged her for a patent authorization. She just sneered at them. No way! This was a world without faith, but the world put their faith in her. Austin, the heir to a powerful aristocratic family in the imperial capital, was cold-hearted and decisive. He scared anyone who laid eyes on him. Unbeknownst to everyone, he doted on one woman: Emberly. Nobody knew that his desire for her grew stronger with every passing day. She brought light to his originally dull and gloomy life.

I had loved my fiancé, Dominic Watts, since we were children. Our marriage was supposed to be the perfect seal on a merger between our two family empires. In my last life, he stood outside my burning art studio with my stepsister, Julia, and watched me die. I screamed for him, the smoke choking me, my skin searing from the heat. "Dominic, please! Help me!" Julia clung to his arm, her face a picture of false terror. "It's too dangerous! You'll get hurt! We have to go!" And he listened. He looked at me one last time, his eyes filled with a pity that cut deeper than any flame, and then he turned and ran, leaving me to burn. Until I died, I didn't understand. The boy who promised to always protect me had just watched me burn to death. My unconditional love was the price I paid so he could be with my sister. When I opened my eyes again, I was back in my bedroom. In one hour, I was due at the family board meeting. This time, I walked straight to the head of the table and said, "I am breaking the engagement."

The champagne tasted like ash. My daughter, Lily, beamed beside my beaming husband, David, celebrating her university graduation-a picture-perfect moment I' d relived before. In my previous life, it was on this very day that she had shattered me, screaming, "You're not my real parents!" after draining my retirement, all to fund the biological family who' d thrown her away. That betrayal, that sickening realization of my life's savings gone, had led to my death in a car crash, a distraction of overwhelming grief. I didn' t understand how the sweet girl we had doted on for twenty-two years could be so cruel, so utterly devoid of gratitude, bleeding us dry for people who saw her as nothing but a walking ATM. But then, I woke up, back in my own bed, on the morning of this exact party. This time, there would be no selfless mother, no victim. This time, I was a survivor, and I was ready for war.

My mother' s voice, thick with religious fervor, announced her latest decree for SAT season: 100 days of no secular music, no TV, no internet. This wasn't the first time. I remembered falling down the stairs, Molly's raging accusations still ringing in my ears, right before the darkness consumed me. Now, I was 16 again, trapped in the same suffocating reality, but with the chilling knowledge of how it all ended for me. My twin sister, Molly, quickly embraced Mama's extreme rules, her 'pious' facade masking pure laziness, while I quietly perfected my escape plan. As Molly spiraled into isolation at school, earning the nickname "Amish Girl," my mother, Debra, only tightened her grip, even forbidding basic hygiene. The SAT scores revealed my 1580 against Molly's dismal 850, shattering Mama's carefully crafted image, especially on live stream. Instead of facing reality, Mama demanded I sacrifice my Duke acceptance, "for Molly's sake," a sister who had literally killed me in my past life. How could my own mother expect me to give up my entire future, again, for the one who destroyed me? Why was I back? This time, I wouldn't argue, I wouldn't compromise, and I certainly wouldn't die for their delusions. This time, I was getting out, even if it meant watching them burn their own lives to the ground.

For nearly a decade, I walked through life as Mrs. Hamilton, wife to the charming and successful Ethan. Our perfect marriage was more than a facade; it was my very existence, bound by a secret Soul Pact that determined whether I lived or died. Then, seven days before my designated survival deadline, Ethan casually dropped a bombshell: he needed a temporary divorce for his latest fling, a demanding young intern named Chloe. He offered me designer bags and an unlimited credit card, oblivious that he was asking me to sign my own death warrant, effectively sealing my fate. Chloe, triumphant and venomous, reveled in my humiliation from my very own penthouse, mocking me as "old news" while lounging in my favorite spots. Ethan, valuing his mistress's fleeting whims over my life, eagerly discarded our shared history and sent me away. The chilling countdown from the Soul Pact System inside me confirmed my imminent end-a meticulously "staged accident" awaited. How could someone mistake my life for a casual game, oblivious that his "temporary break" was my permanent end? My heart ached with the profound loneliness of carrying this fatal secret alone, a cruel irony after years of quiet endurance. I died in a fiery crash, right on schedule. But then, a cold, digital voice whispered, "System error. Collect 100 Regret Points from Ethan to be reborn." Now, an unseen spectator, my very existence hinges on the depth of his sorrow.

My hands, once horrifically scarred, were healed by a cosmic bargain: save one struggling soul, Ethan Hayes, in another reality. For eight years, I poured my life into his, turning a broken man with crushing debt into a tech titan. We built an empire, married, and for a time, I truly loved him, believing our future was forged in shared dreams. But then, the architect of his redemption became the victim of his betrayal. His intern, Chloe Vance, slid into our lives and straight into his bed. Three years of his gaslighting, hidden affairs that became blatant, and the grinding neglect slowly extinguished the vibrant woman I once was. The final, brutal blow came when Chloe, smugly pregnant, revealed Ethan had "gifted" her our vineyard estate-my home. My heart, once shattered, had simply turned to ash. I meticulously liquidated a fortune I' d fought to earn, preparing for an escape he' d facilitated with every lie and condescending guilt-gift. He bought me diamond necklaces while Chloe flaunted her presence in our penthouse. On my birthday, he cornered me, enraged, accusing me of threatening his new family, blind to the fact that his actions had already killed everything between us. He was a stranger, a ghost clinging to a broken past. I was long past anger, past pain-only a chilling resolve remained. How could he not see? How could he not understand that the woman who healed him had been destroyed by him? So, as he lunged forward, his face contorted with a fury born of his own making, I didn't resist. Instead, I calmly whispered, "Happy birthday to me." And then, with a resolute step onto nothingness, I embraced my "death," not as an end, but as a long-overdue return to the life and self I was always meant to be.

The noose bit my neck. My mission, set by a mysterious 'System' to save my dying real-life self, was to win 'absolute devotion' from four men. I'd failed. Framed by Seraphina Bellweather, the 'heroine,' my ex-boyfriend, mentor, brother, and childhood friend had all publicly abandoned me, branding me a manipulating pariah. Four years of hell followed, my attempts at escape through death repeatedly thwarted. Then came the chilling truth: fail here, and my real body would die, fueling Seraphina' s power. Imprisoned in her brutal 'wellness center,' her torturous 'treatments' slowly broke me. My heart burned with injustice. How could these men, once my world, so easily condemn me, blind to the manipulative monster orchestrating my downfall? Was I doomed to perish, or could I reclaim my fate? I refused to be her sacrifice. When they visited, seeing me as 'unstable,' I seized my chance. With a silent, deadly strike, I exposed Seraphina' s true nature and delivered a fatal blow. As they grappled with their guilt and betrayal, begging me to stay, I took my final leap-claiming my freedom, and sealing their 'absolute devotion' in death.

I, Aurora, last heir of the Sunstone, stood ready for my Unity Ceremony with Ethan, leader of the Stormriver, a sacred bond prophesied to secure our lands. I believed in our shared duty, even in a slowly blooming love for him. But at the altar, Ethan publically scorned me, declaring his "true love" for my trusted aide, Sylvie, shattering our alliance and the very foundation of our world. The Council, dazzled by his reckless display of power and Sylvie' s fabricated innocence, abandoned me and my lineage, allowing Ethan to devastate our Sunstone Valley, extinguishing my peoples' light and our sacred Sun-crystals. Then, as I prepared for my crucial Solar Renewal, he shattered my power core and entombed me alive in a collapsing mountain. How could the very people I was sworn to protect, including the man I considered my dearest, fall so utterly blind to a manipulative lie, sacrificing everything for a power-hungry charade? They thought they had buried a guardian, but they merely forged the Shadow. I did not die in that tomb; I was reborn as the formidable Shadow Sovereign, and now, armed with terrifying darkness, I will make every betrayer regret their choices.

"Until death do us part." Those were the words that had clung in the recesses of Solene's mind as she stood at the center of the altar with her soon-to-be-husband. True that she had been favored by accidents since she was still a child and that probably, one of these accidents would end their marriage early if she weren't careful. Little did she know though, that when the vows were said, her groom meant it literally. Only this time, it had a twist. A spell-binding, delightfully-inviting twist. All Rights Reserved JMFelic Books 2020 Book Cover by Whendell Souza Lira THIS BOOK IS COPYRIGHTED BY THE GOVERNMENT OF THE PHILIPPINES. THE AUTHOR HAS GIVEN MOBOREADER ONLY AUTHORIZATION TO POST THIS STORY IN THEIR APP. THIEVES WILL BE DEALT WITH ACCORDINGLY.

Mo Xuetong has lost everything. Her mother, her child, even her servants, have been killed. Betrayed, disfigured, and alone, she dies trying to destroy the people who deceived her… …and wakes up as a child again. Given a second chance, she vows to make things different. This time she will not be a naïve child. This time she is beautiful, cold, and willing to do whatever it takes to get revenge. But her plans are disrupted when she uncovers a thirty year old conspiracy that changes everything. Will she still be able to change her fate? And even if she does, will her new fate be any better, or will her hunger for revenge destroy her?