Chapter 1: Transmigrating Into a Book

Chen Yi was rushing toward the high-speed rail station. He had already picked up his phone countless times to check the time.

There were only twenty-one minutes left before the train bound for Fo City in Eastern Province departed.

At this hour, they were probably already checking tickets and entering the station.

Even though Chen Yi had called and told Du Yuan over and over that she absolutely had to wait for him, given their divorced relationship, the chances of Du Yuan listening to him were less than half.

Chen Yi had repeated himself a thousand times, telling her she had to wait until he arrived before doing anything. He could only hope that, for the children’s sake, Du Yuan would give him a chance.

Chen Yi looked at the faintly visible corner of the station in the distance and urged the driver again.

The taxi driver sounded helpless. “The traffic is what it is. It’s not like I can fly over there.”

“You’re right.”

Chen Yi did not get angry at the driver’s attitude. Reality was reality. He was the one asking too much.

Since he could not grow wings and fly there, Chen Yi could only lean back against the seat again and look at the unfamiliar scenery outside the window. Yet what filled his mind was how he could fight for even the slightest chance to survive in the upcoming doomsday plot.

He could foresee the future entirely because he was not from this world.

When he woke up that morning, he discovered that he had transmigrated into a book.

And it was a foul, long-winded, ten-million-word male-lead power fantasy he had finished listening to as a bedtime story.

Suppose one were to classify novel worlds by setting and genre.

From slice-of-life farming stories full of family trivialities, to infinite-flow worlds crawling with ghosts and monsters, and then to immortal cultivation worlds where great powers could overturn heaven and earth with a flip of the hand, if the difficulty of surviving in those worlds was divided into easy, normal, hard, nightmare, and so on...

Then what this world was about to face was a mode above everything else, close to the hell mode of Lovecraftian horror and immortal cultivation.

Spiritual energy would revive. A hundred ghosts would walk the night. Ancient, terrifying life-forms would be released from the folded universe. They would enslave humanity and feed on humans. Even bacteria from ancient times could easily kill vast swathes of people.

When the apocalypse descended, a throne would be born in a hell piled high with countless bones. Only the protagonist of the book’s world could ascend to the peak and become humanity’s hope, leading all mankind to accomplish a grand imperial undertaking.

A fine sword was forged through grinding.

Every hardship had been meticulously designed by the author in order to cultivate the protagonist.

As a reader, Chen Yi had naturally accepted this. His life as a 996 corporate slave was dull and tedious. There were no beauties hidden in books, but there was a Long Aotian protagonist.

When he had nothing to do in his free time, reading male-oriented web novels was basically his only hobby.

Provided, of course, that he was a bystander.

After confirming that he had transmigrated into the book and realizing what kind of desperate situation he was about to face, Chen Yi’s brain, which had not truly moved in years, began to operate at frantic speed. At once, he seized upon the key point.

He seemed, probably, perhaps... to be the father of that pair of villains who opposed the protagonist around the middle of the book.

One was one of the boy-girl twins brought into the family by the stepmother as extra baggage.

In the early stages, he coveted the protagonist’s status as heir. Later, at the first moment the ancient sects descended, he betrayed Blue Star, offered up all of Blue Star’s intelligence, and targeted the protagonist for revenge.

The older twin brother, Chen Yiqian.

And the other was the malicious female supporting character, Chen Yilin, the younger twin sister. In the early stages, she liked making sarcastic digs at the protagonist. After growing up, she targeted the female lead. Then she found some big shot and became his mistress, yet still refused to stop courting death and kept going against the protagonist’s group. A venomous beauty through and through.

These two villains, whose intelligence had been severely lowered in the book and who made Chen Yi want to fast-forward whenever they appeared, had now become Chen Yi’s biological son and daughter.

At this moment, the two three-year-old children, whose values had yet to take shape, were being taken by his ex-wife, the woman who would torment the protagonist in the book’s future, toward the predetermined opening scenario.

In male-oriented novels, the people around the protagonist were either lackeys clinging to his thigh or villains who had been sentenced to death early on.

The person Chen Yi had transmigrated into was not completely absent from the book either.

When the villainous son’s reputation was ruined and he had nowhere to go, he eventually hid back in his hometown, only to be slapped to death by the protagonist in front of his biological father’s grave.

That was right. Chen Yi died as soon as he appeared.

The fact that he still had a grave in those chaotic times meant he must have died very early.

The protagonist killed people and destroyed their hearts too. After killing the old father’s son in front of his grave, he even flicked his sleeve and said lightly, “Repent in hell.”

Chen Yi did not believe that simply avoiding people connected to the protagonist would let him remain untouched in the coming apocalypse.

First, that was the future, and it had not happened yet. It was something that could be corrected.

Second, those two future villains were blood relatives of this body. Chen Yi had been born under the red flag and raised in the spring breeze. At the very least, he had once been a Young Pioneer. He could not do something like cut off family ties and protect only himself.

Rather than that, he might as well educate his own children himself. As long as he shaped them with the correct values, they would have no motive to oppose the protagonist. Then would all the trouble from the protagonist not be solved at its root?

His thoughts came to a halt before the crowded plaza of the high-speed rail station.

Chen Yi paid the fare and sprinted toward the waiting hall. At the same time, he took out his phone and called again.

Before the call connected, he saw his ex-wife standing in front of the ticket gate, holding one child by each hand.

The original body and his ex-wife, Du Yuan, had been college classmates. One was a poor campus heartthrob whom his whole family had strained every resource to send to university. The other was a beautiful, dashing student council officer.

A talented man and a beautiful woman met in a free-spirited university and began a romantic journey of love. They knew each other for one year and were in love for three. Although marrying right after graduation did carry the suspicion of a shotgun wedding, the two of them had genuinely loved each other.

Unfortunately, society was another stage of life entirely. What was more, the two fresh graduates had to raise a son and daughter. In the end, because of all the petty disputes over daily necessities, they still became a resentful couple.

They had already said every hurtful thing there was to say, and they had already gone to the civil affairs bureau. The two could be considered peacefully divorced. At least in Chen Yi’s memories, there was no hatred.

They simply could not go on together.

“Du Yuan.”

Chen Yi had thought that when he truly saw her, he would freeze up and not know what to say.

After all, the two of them really were not familiar.

Only when he arrived in front of her did he realize that had only been because there had been no life-or-death crisis. In the face of death, even someone with social anxiety could turn into a social berserker.

“If it isn’t urgent, let’s talk.”

“It is urgent.”

Du Yuan had a sweet temperament. Her slightly plump figure instead gave her a face that looked destined to bring fortune to a husband. Otherwise, the protagonist’s father would not have married her as his second wife later on.

The book had not described in detail how Du Yuan and the protagonist’s father’s relationship began, nor did Chen Yi know why she would make things difficult for a child. But one thing was already showing signs at this moment.

“I know what you want to say.” Du Yuan smiled helplessly and rubbed her daughter’s head. “Chen Yi, this isn’t the life I want. You can’t give me what I want, so I’ll fight for it myself. If either of us had been able to compromise even the slightest bit, we wouldn’t have ended up where we are today.”

Four years after graduation, married life had changed Du Yuan a great deal. It was partly the original owner’s incompetence, and partly because the stubborn strength deep in Du Yuan’s bones had been awakened.

Or perhaps it was because this book required the existence of someone like her.

Without revealing that he knew the future, it was very difficult for Chen Yi to persuade her to stay.

In the end, Chen Yi’s gaze fell on the son and daughter who had looked delighted ever since he appeared and were now hugging his legs.

Three-year-old children still did not understand the meaning of divorce. In the past year, Chen Yi’s career had not gone smoothly, and he had spent the year at home as a stay-at-home dad, so the children were even closer to him.

When they saw him arrive, bright smiles of joy bloomed across their faces. They cheered and threw themselves at him, each grabbing one of his thighs.

“Daddy, Daddy!!”

“Is Daddy going to come play with us?”

“Daddy’s going on a trip with us!”

The children’s sincerely joyful voices drew Chen Yi’s attention. He lowered his head to look at them, then crouched down and hugged one child with each arm.

These two children were good-looking. They had inherited their parents’ best features. Their eyes were large and round, their skin fair and tender, and Du Yuan also loved dressing them up. In this waiting hall, they absolutely counted as eye-catching.

Chen Yi had not yet had time to develop deeper feelings for them, but he held them tight as though he were a drowning man clinging to a piece of driftwood, then said, “Let the children stay with me for now.”

Du Yuan’s brows instantly rose.

Chen Yi looked up at Du Yuan. “Linyin’s stomach hasn’t been good, and her belly has been hurting these past two days. Qianqian has serious internal heat too. You’re going to Fo City for work. What will you do with the children? Let me take care of them first. Once you’re settled, you can come pick them up. Is that okay?”

Du Yuan’s raised brows lowered, and a trace of emotion appeared in her eyes. “At least you still have a conscience.”

Chen Yi knew he could not directly ask for the children. Back when they signed the agreement, the children had been awarded to their mother.

Compared with Du Yuan’s future prospects, Chen Yi’s experience in society and the workplace had been simply terrible.

Otherwise, they would not have ended up divorcing over money.

But temporarily placing the children with their biological father was reasonable and fair. By the time Du Yuan settled down, the world would already be in chaos. She might not even have the mind to come pick up the children.

If she truly missed the children and came to get them, then by that time, Chen Yi, who would have pulled himself together and gained some spare energy, would definitely find a way to deal with it.

Du Yuan was also a decisive person. She immediately made a decision that most ordinary people could not have made.

She crouched down and hugged the children one by one, kissing each of them on the cheek. “Let Daddy take care of you for a few days first. Mommy is going on a business trip for a few days and will be back.”

Disappointment immediately appeared on the older brother’s face. He looked at Du Yuan pitifully. “Vacation. Not business trip.”

The younger sister had already started nodding, but after this reminder, she remembered too. “Vacation, vacation! The sea, the sea!”

Du Yuan truly was ruthless. Or perhaps she was also afraid of delaying the train’s departure. She gritted her teeth, stood, and ordered Chen Yi, “Hold them tight.”

With that, she pushed her luggage and left.

Both children froze, probably never having imagined that the mother who said she would take them on a trip would really abandon them just like that.

They immediately became unhappy.

The corners of the younger sister’s mouth drooped, and her tears were about to fall.

Chen Yi sighed inwardly. Du Yuan really was worthy of being a villain who had fought against the protagonist for five hundred chapters and still existed.

He was far, far inferior to that ruthless decisiveness.

The children’s aggrieved expressions stabbed at Chen Yi’s heart. It was probably the sensation of blood kinship. Though these were clearly children he had only seen for the first time, Chen Yi felt unbearably distressed for them.

He kissed one, then patted the other. Fortunately, children’s emotions came quickly and left quickly too.

To divert their attention, he took out the ultimate child-soothing tool, his phone, found a puppy cartoon, and placed it in front of them.

The children watched, still sniffling and crying.

The ticket gate closed.

Time jumped to its predetermined moment.

The high-speed train bound for Fo City slowly left the station.

Chen Yi stared at a corner of blue sky outside the window and sank into deep thought. By the time he came back to himself, the cartoon the children were watching had just ended.

Chen Yi no longer hesitated. He crouched in front of the seats, looked at his son and daughter with their red noses from crying, and revealed a smile meant to trick children. “Qianqian, Linlin, how about Daddy plays a superhero game with you?

“I’m the superhero teacher, and you’re superhero babies. Now you need to acknowledge me, the superhero teacher, as your master and learn from me.

“Are you willing to become the superhero teacher’s disciples?”

The three-year-old children only half understood, and the one saying this was also the father they loved and trusted the most, so naturally, they nodded.

Ding!

Recruited two disciples. Task completed: three.

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