CHAPTER 2

Yibo jolted awake, a sharp pain shooting through his spine. His vision was blurry, but the bright white lights and steady beeping around his gave it away—he was in a hospital.

He tried to sit up, but was unable to do so.

"Where the fuck am I...?"

Just then, a warm hand grabbed his.

"Sweetheart, are you okay?"

Wang Yibo blinked at the person sitting on a stool beside the hospital bed. Confused. Unfamiliar face. Kind eyes.

After staring with his wide eyes, he muttered, "Who the hell are you?"

Before the woman could answer, a deep, stern voice cut in from the other side of the bed.

"Watch your language, young man. You're speaking to your mother."

Yibo just stared, brain trying to process.

His voice came out flat, "Mother? No, that's bullshit. My parents died when I was four."

The two people exchanged a tense, worried glance.

After some time, the man asked, "Yibo... are you playing another one of your games just to get Zhan’s attention."

Wang Yibo furrowed his eyebrows a little, "Who?"

"Xiao Zhan. Baby, are you okay?" The woman replied as if it is the most obvious answer.

Not understanding any of the things being said, Yibo whispered while lightly rubbing his forehead, "Right... can I get some time alone?"

They nodded, hesitantly backing out of the room and leaving him with a racing heart, a million questions, one terrifying realization:

He was not in his world anymore.

He closed his eyes for a few minutes, trying to make sense of all these things happening around him.

His head still ached. The bandages pulled against his skin. But his brain was working now. Really working.

After a sudden realization, he froze.

Hand still.

And then it hit him.

That man.

The one at the club.

The kiss.

The cold words.

"That's for all that bullshit you posted about my story, Wang Yibo."

The shove.

The fall.

"Fuck... So I called the story a trash and now I am the trash? Great. Love that for me." He whispered to himself, "Okay, okay. Think. What now? I've got rich parents. A hot main lead named Xiao Zhan who apparently I'm obsessed with. And a life that's not mine."

He stood up slowly. Stared into the mirror across the room.

"Author, wherever the hell you are... message received."

But that didn’t mean he was gonna play along. If he was stuck here, he'd flip the script his way.

Because this Wang Yibo?

He was not a side character anymore.

He went to the bed and flipped down on it. Eyes closed. Slow breathing. Both hands covering his face.

At last he sat up on the bed, running his fingers through his hair, trying to steady his breathing.

Everything was weird.

Too polished.

Too perfect.

The rich parents.

The name.

The way they looked at him like he was breakable.

And then—like a slap to the face—I all came rushing back.

"No... no fucking way."

The book—'I am the CEO's boyfriend '.

That goddam BL novel he tore apart online like a savage.

He remembered the plot clearly now.

Xiao Zhan.

Cold, gorgeous, emotionally constipated. 35.

The CEO.

He falls for his soft, sunshiney assistant—Song Jiyang.

Age 25. All blushes, stutters and "Sir, I bought your coffee with extra love."

And then... there he was.

Wang Yibo.

20 years old.

The cringe side character. The obsessed, lovesick, stalker.

Begging for Xiao Zhan’s love.

Rejected.

Humiliated.

Turned bitter.

Unhinged.

"I'm that Yibo? The fucking stalker one? The one who hurts Jiyang? The one who dies?"

Yibo stood up fast, nearly knocking over the lamp and started pacing back and forth while clutching his hair.

"No, no, no. This is some cosmic joke. I'm not dying over some BL plotline."

And worst of all.

Xiao Zhan wasn’t just the cold main lead. He was also the best friend of Yibo's dad—Wang Huang Ziteng—aka, 40-years-old dad who is married to Wang Carman Lee, the sweet, wine-sipping, yoga-practicing, protective wife who adored him.

"Oh my god... I'm in a forbidden pining trope! And I'm the tragic simp who ruins everything." He looked at the mirror, then down at his soft, younger-looking hands. "Okay, okay. Calm down. I just need to stay far away from Xiao Zhan... and Song Jiyang... and maybe rewrite my own fate before I get a villain death arc."

But one question still haunted hum: Was the author done punishing him yet... or was this just the beginning?

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