Free Web NovelChapter 217: Chapter 217: You Are the Female Lead
Jiang Qingli froze.
At such a close distance, even her slightest movement couldn’t escape the eyes of the male holding her.
The young man gently caressed her face and asked in a low voice, "What’s wrong?"
The girl lowered her head, tugging and shaking his sleeve. "I’m craving the red bean soup you make. The kind I used to drink all the time..."
It had been a long time since he’d seen her act so coquettishly. Baili Jing’s expression softened. "Alright, I’ll go make it."
He stood up as he spoke, and Jiang Qingli breathed a sigh of relief.
The next second, she heard him add in a low voice, "If you run into trouble, don’t try to handle it all by yourself, okay?"
Jiang Qingli’s eyes shot up, but he just smiled, placed a light kiss on her cheek, and turned to go downstairs. fгeewёbnoѵel.cσm
The mechanical voice went silent for a moment, but the instant Baili Jing’s lips left her skin, it started clamoring again:
[Hello? Can you hear me? Host? Host?]
CLICK. The door closed.
In the silence, Jiang Qingli touched the back of her hand to her slightly warm cheek, then picked up her fruit juice and took a couple of sips.
The mechanical voice, as if feeling it had been too informal, cleared its throat and said properly:
[Greetings, Host. I am Sub-System 030, under the ’HE’ System. Can you hear my voice?]
Jiang Qingli lowered her eyes, took a small sip of juice, and casually opened her terminal to reply to a friend’s message.
A minute later, the system couldn’t hold back any longer: [Hey, hey, hey, you heard me, right? Lady Protagonist, Lady Protagonist! I know you can hear me! Don’t ignore me!]
Jiang Qingli finally responded, her voice clear and flat, without any inflection: [I’m cannon fodder. You’ve bound the wrong person. The female lead is trending on the hot search.]
After she said this, a speck of light appeared in front of her.
The speck of light stretched into a question mark the size of her palm.
The mechanical voice emanated from it: [Oh, right. I haven’t explained the current situation.]
[Let’s put it this way. Actually, Host, you are...]
Jiang Qingli: [I am Jiang Qingli, right?]
System: [???]
System: [!!!]
The system was utterly shocked: [You-you-you, how did you know—]
After screaming for two seconds, it answered its own question: [It’s normal for the female lead to be smart. I overreacted. I’m sorry, please forgive me.]
The question mark stretched out, transforming into a stick figure that knelt on the coffee table and started kowtowing to Jiang Qingli. BANG! BANG! BANG! It prostrated itself with such force that the tabletop trembled.
Jiang Qingli: [...]
’This system seems a bit unreliable.’
’But it’s best to figure out what’s going on right now.’
Jiang Qingli pinched the bridge of her nose. [So, what exactly is the situation? You say I’m the female lead, but at first, you clearly said I was cannon fodder.]
[That wasn’t me!] the system said, flustered.
thought for a moment, then began to explain from the beginning:
[Jiang Qingli, you are the female protagonist of a highly popular novel.]
[In the early plot, you were a talented genius girl who never gave up, and the romantic chemistry between you and your five fiancés was amazing for fans to follow. But then the author suddenly stopped updating.]
[The novel was so popular that the website found someone else to continue writing it. They swapped out the female lead, killed off the main characters, gave everyone a Bad End, and the whole thing became a complete trainwreck.]
[The readers’ resentment grew exponentially, so the main ’HE’ System dispatched us to the novel’s plane to help the female lead rewrite the bad ending and reclaim a happy life.]
[But when I arrived in this world, I discovered that you weren’t in your body. Your soul had been thrown into a world called Blue Star. That place is my old home turf, and it’s super strictly managed with tons of paperwork. It took me ages to bring you back!]
[Who knew that just after I managed to stuff you back into your body, we lost contact the very next second...]
A crying expression appeared on the stick figure’s face. freēwēbηovel.c૦m
[I investigated later and found out that the readers’ twisted resentment gave rise to a system that specializes in plundering the female lead’s luck.]
[They extract souls from other planes and insert them into the bodies of the novel’s supporting characters. They trick them with fabricated plotlines and use various item-based missions to win the male leads’ favor, steal the female lead’s luck, and attempt to replace her, siphoning the luck from the entire world.]
[And to turn female leads like you into stumbling blocks for their fabricated plot, that system extracts unknowing souls and forces them to act as vicious cannon fodder, making them despised by everyone. If they fail, they get electrocuted.]
Jiang Qingli thought about the stories she’d heard about the "original owner’s" deeds since arriving, and the torment the "original owner" had suffered at the hands of her five ex-fiancés. Her brow furrowed.
’No wonder. In my fragmented memories, the previous soul was nearly killed in the sea by Yu Chenglan, yet even after hearing that Ling Qing and Yu Chenglan were plotting to murder her, she was still eagerly simping for them a few days later...’
Jiang Qingli asked, [The souls that were in my body before... are they still alive?]
’Even though they did a lot of embarrassing things using my body, they were forced into it. It would be too tragic for them to be tormented in all sorts of ways by scumbag men only to die in the end.’
said, [The main system is working on a fix. Their souls should be restored by next year.]
Jiang Qingli let out a breath of relief.
hesitated, then spoke in a tiny voice: [Host, there’s something...]
Her terminal vibrated a few times.
Jiang Qingli glanced at it. It was a message from Ye Linyuan.
He had sent a picture of a long, stretching highway under a gloomy gray sky.
Ye Linyuan: [On my way back.]
Jiang Qingli typed: [Okay, welcome home~ [Little snake throwing confetti]]
Ye Linyuan: [Yeah.]
A few seconds later, as if feeling that one word was too cold, he sent a sticker of a little snake nodding.
[Wow, wow!] 030 leaned in, a look of adoration materializing on its face as it clasped its hands to its chest. [You’re amazing, Host! You’ve already tamed this snake to this extent! Our future is looking incredibly bright!]
Jiang Qingli remembered she still hadn’t asked what this guy’s purpose for being here was.
Suddenly, there was a knock on the door.
Startled, Jiang Qingli grabbed the system and tried to hide it behind her back. Then she remembered that, according to standard novel tropes, ordinary people couldn’t see systems, so she tossed the stick figure aside.
The stick figure tumbled through the air a few times before executing a slide tackle, landing smoothly on its knees on the coffee table.
Yi Nuo’s voice came from outside the door. "Miss."
The two of them had been master and servant for a long time. Jiang Qingli could tell he had something to say—something that was likely a bit difficult to bring up, which was why he couldn’t say it directly.
Jiang Qingli went to open the door and let Yi Nuo in.
She asked, "What is it?"
Yi Nuo glanced around the room, then lowered his eyes. "Miss, Mr. Ling wanted to request a meeting with you. Mr. Gu had the bodyguards give him a beating, and now he’s shouting..." A gloomy look flashed in the gray wolf youth’s eyes. "...that you need to take responsibility for it."
Before his words had even faded, 030 shrieked beside her: [Aaaah! Not allowed! You’re not allowed to take responsibility for this tainted male lead!]
The shouting gave Jiang Qingli a headache, but she sharply caught the two words "male lead."
She suppressed her emotions and said calmly to Yi Nuo, "Get rid of him. From now on, beat him up every time he shows his face. I’ll dock the pay of anyone who goes easy on him, and I’ll give a raise to whoever does a good job."
Yi Nuo nodded.
He never questioned Jiang Qingli’s orders.
After Yi Nuo left, Jiang Qingli looked at the stick figure, which was still dutifully kneeling in self-punishment:
[What did you mean when you called them male leads?]
hadn’t intended to hide it from her anyway: [Actually, the plot went off the rails the moment you bound a male lead. We don’t need to refer to the original book’s plot, so just treat this as background information.]
It sent an electronic document for Jiang Qingli to read.
At the same time, it explained the previous settings:
[Chi Yun is a tsundere, hot-tempered red fox warrior who would have changed his bad temper for you and become a clingy, obedient little fox.]
[Ling Qing is an aloof, untouchable white snake and a film emperor. Under the influence of love, he would have awakened a dual Superpower and made a public confession that would be the envy of the entire interstellar community.]
[Yu Chenglan is an aloof, untouchable, and beautiful merman. He’s sharp-tongued and picky with others, but he would have spoiled you without limits, using all his flirtatious, worldly tricks.]
[Then there’s Helian Ying and Jin Li, whom you haven’t met yet. One is an eagle-type, a domineering master marksman who would have doted on you and taken care of your daily life. The other is a mutant white tiger, a powerful Marshal who doesn’t understand love, but would have learned to cook for you and become a doting, fatherly husband...]
Compared to them, Jiang Qingli was more concerned about something else: [What about my current Beast Husbands?]
030: [Er... their endings aren’t very good.]
[For example, that villain Ye Linyuan you were just chatting with, Host... he’s the one who dies the earliest...]
