"Li Shao, let's get divorced."
"Jiang Wan, stop acting like a child! You're only doing this for attention. Wan Er is my childhood friend. Of course she needs me!"
"What about me?! Aren't I your wife?!"
"Stop being so selfish!"
"What an idiot."
The irritated murmur came from a woman sprawled across a thrifted couch, her feet dangling over its torn armrest as she held her phone above her face.
Song Anli watched the scene unfold with an increasingly unimpressed expression. When the male lead finally received a well-deserved slap, she burst into laughter.
"That's right, asshole!"
She eagerly swiped to the next episode, muttering a few more colorful curses under her breath.
Somehow, Anli always found herself trapped in an endless cycle of watching ridiculous vertical short dramas after work. It had practically become a tradition: clock out, buy a beer, change into pajamas, and collapse onto the couch to watch the same handful of plots recycled over and over again.
Sometimes, she wondered whether her neighbors ever got tired of hearing dramatic arguments and exaggerated crying through the paper-thin walls of her tiny, one-person apartment.
Although, considering the guy next door brought home a different woman every other night, she figured they were even. The bastard was lucky she hadn't filed a noise complaint yet.
Her obsession with these dramas tended to come in waves. Every few months, she'd binge-watch an ungodly number of episodes, grow sick of them, and block every related account to keep them out of her recommendations.
Then, inevitably, she'd stumble across a clip on Weibo with surprisingly decent acting, and just like that, she'd get sucked right back in.
It was a vicious cycle.
And this particular drama?
Oh, it was a classic.
The husband neglected his legal wife in favor of his precious childhood friend, eventually got said friend pregnant, and then had the audacity to demand that his wife accept the woman's child as the family heir.
Blah, blah, blah. Same old plot.
Got her every time.
Anli blindly reached for the beer sitting on her low coffee table, popped the tab, and took a generous swig. She exhaled happily before settling deeper into the couch, ready to watch the next episode.
Unfortunately, the moment she tapped the screen, an obnoxious message appeared.
NEXT PART LOCKED!
"Ugh, I hate these things."
Anli clicked her tongue in irritation.
How annoying! Why did everything need a stupid advertisement nowadays? What happened to the good old days when she could watch garbage television without having to sit through thirty seconds of someone trying to sell her toothpaste?
She was just about to close the app and call it a night when her screen suddenly flashed.
!!! UNLOCK ALL PARTS WITH A MINI GAME !!!
¡CLICK HERE!
Anli stared at the flashing text.
...That looked sketchy.
Extremely sketchy, actually.
She narrowed her eyes suspiciously.
But the drama was getting good.
And she really wanted to see that bastard get slapped again.
"Ah, whatever. What's the worst that could happen?"
Without another thought, she pressed the link.
Everything went black.
▰▰▰▱
"LOADING...."
...........
Ding!
"SCAN COMPLETE ♡"
"INITIATING SCENARIO"
"TAKE ONE, SCENE ONE…"
"AND ACTION!"
Anli's eyes fluttered open.
Her vision was blurry, and a fierce pounding behind her temples made her immediately regret regaining consciousness.
"My head..."
She groaned, pressing a hand against her forehead as she slowly sat up.
What the hell happened last night?
She remembered getting home from work, opening a beer, and watching that stupid drama. After that, things were a little fuzzy.
Had she really drunk enough to black out?
Her eyes drifted toward the mess scattered around her, eventually landing on an empty wine bottle.
...Wine?
Since when did she drink wine?
Had she gotten so wasted that she'd gone downstairs and bought something she never even touched?
She'd have to ask Auntie downstairs whether she'd cleared out half the shelves in her store.
With another miserable groan, Anli climbed to her feet and began trudging toward the door, stepping over the scattered mess along the way.
She'd barely made it a few steps when her stomach suddenly lurched.
"Fu—blegh!"
Oh, shit.
The bile was coming up fast.
Anli clamped a hand over her mouth and scrambled toward what she desperately hoped was the bathroom. Fortunately, she found a toilet just in time to collapse in front of it and empty the contents of her stomach.
For the next minute, she experienced what could only be described as a personal meeting with the King of Hell.
By the time she finished gagging, her throat burned, her eyes watered, and she was seriously considering whether drinking alcohol was worth the suffering.
"Ugh... I'm never drinking again."
A familiar lie.
She flushed away the evidence of her suffering and dragged herself toward the sink, turning on the faucet to rinse her mouth and splash cold water over her face.
Unfortunately, her hangover seemed determined to break out of her skull from the inside.
Anli groaned and shut off the water, raising her head to inspect the damage.
Then she froze.
"...What?"
She blinked at her reflection.
Once.
Twice.
Slowly, she lifted her hands.
Her nails were manicured.
Not just trimmed, but professionally manicured, with a glossy finish and delicate little designs.
Anli stared.
When the hell had she gotten her nails done?
Her gaze returned to the mirror, and her confusion deepened.
No bags under her eyes.
No puffiness in her cheeks.
Not even the slightest hint of the dark circles she'd spent years cultivating through overtime and terrible sleeping habits.
The woman staring back at her looked like Song Anli.
But also... not.
This version of her looked ridiculously well taken care of. Like she'd never worked a day of overtime in her life, never cried over an electricity bill, and certainly never needed three energy shots just to survive a Monday morning.
Her skin was smooth, her complexion practically glowing, and her hair looked as though someone had spent an hour carefully tending to it.
Anli leaned closer, narrowing her eyes.
Wait a damn minute.
Where was her pimple?
The giant, angry pimple that had been sitting on the tip of her nose for the past three days?
Gone.
Not a trace.
She turned her head left, then right, inspecting herself from every possible angle.
Who was this gorgeous woman?
Because there was absolutely no way it was her.
Anli slowly reached out and poked the mirror.
The woman in the reflection did the same.
"...Am I dreaming?"
Chapter discussion