"Pan Pan?" Su Yang called out while putting on his clothes and getting out of bed.
He walked to the bathroom door, turned on the light, and looked inside. Apart from the usual bathroom fixtures, there was nothing—no sign of Pan Ning.
"What the hell? Where is she?"
After scanning the bedroom and finding no trace of Pan Ning, Su Yang quickly stepped out of the room.
As he moved from the hallway into the pitch-black living room, his peripheral vision caught something flitting past the balcony.
A sudden unease gripped him, making him freeze mid-step before instinctively ducking behind the wall to peek.
His eyes narrowed, and in an instant, his hair stood on end. His pupils dilated, and he clamped a hand over his mouth.
Two figures stood on the balcony—both unmistakably female, judging by their silhouettes.
One was clearly Pan Ning. The other had a high ponytail, a curvaceous figure with an hourglass shape, and a height roughly matching Pan Ning’s, around 170 cm.
The balcony’s glass door was shut, and the glare from the lights of neighboring buildings made it hard for Su Yang to see the other woman’s face clearly. Still, he could tell she was drop-dead gorgeous.
The two stood face-to-face, engaged in what seemed like a heated argument. Their voices were muffled, but their body language suggested they were on the verge of a physical altercation.
‘What the actual hell is going on? Did I wake up in the wrong reality or something?’
Su Yang swallowed hard, his gaze locked on the balcony.
After what felt like an eternity of arguing, Pan Ning suddenly turned her back to the living room.
The other woman remained motionless.
Su Yang’s brain short-circuited. Abandoning stealth, he decided to march over and demand an explanation.
Who was this woman? Why was she on his balcony in the middle of the night? And what were she and Pan Ning arguing about?
But before he could take a single step, the bombshell of a woman abruptly grabbed Pan Ning and shoved her off the balcony.
"Holy—FUCK!!!"
Su Yang’s eyes nearly popped out of his skull as the expletive tore from his throat. His mind went blank.
BOOM!!
An indescribable, thunderous roar exploded inside his head.
His heart wrenched in agony as he lunged toward the balcony.
"I’LL KILL YOU!!"
……
With a strangled shout, he jolted upright, drenched in cold sweat.
Su Yang blinked at his surroundings, his face a mask of utter confusion.
"What the—?!"
Yep. He was sitting in bed. Pan Ning lay beside him, undisturbed.
Hearing his outburst, she stirred, rolling over with a groggy murmur. "Have you… lost your mind?"
"Was I… dreaming??"
"What are you talking about?" Pan Ning pushed herself up weakly, studying Su Yang’s bewildered expression.
After a two-second lag, Su Yang turned and helped her sit up.
"You… didn’t go out?"
"Go where?"
"Huh?! This doesn’t feel like a dream!"
"What’s wrong with you?" Pan Ning leaned against the headboard, frowning at him.
"Nothing… just a nightmare."
"You’re a grown man. Since when do nightmares scare you like this?"
Su Yang slapped his cheeks, then pinched his thigh—hard. The pain was real.
Whether the earlier scene had been a dream or not, this moment definitely wasn’t. As his pulse steadied, a dry thirst clawed at his throat.
He glanced at Pan Ning’s questioning face before swinging his legs off the bed. "Feeling any better?"
"A little."
"I’ll get water." Su Yang left the room and headed for the living room.
At the hallway entrance, he instinctively glanced toward the balcony.
Nothing.
Gulping, he poured himself a glass of ice water, chugged it, then filled another with warm water for Pan Ning before returning.
"Here, drink."
He sat beside her, carefully helping her sip.
Then he grabbed his phone from the nightstand. The screen read 2:46 AM.
His 3:00 AM alarm was still fourteen minutes away.
"Damn. It really was just a dream."
"What kind of nightmare was it? Ghosts chasing you?" Pan Ning asked weakly.
"Worse than ghosts."
"Tell me."
"Let’s talk tomorrow. Not in the mood now. Let me check your temperature." Su Yang picked up the digital thermometer and scanned her forehead.
Beep. 39.1°C.
"Phew—it’s dropped a bit. Stay under the covers; don’t catch another chill."
"I need the bathroom."
"Hold on, put this on first." Su Yang grabbed one of his jackets from the closet and draped it over her shoulders.
Two minutes later, Pan Ning emerged from the bathroom and obediently settled back into bed.
Su Yang touched her forehead again. Still feverish.
"Take another dose before sleeping."
"Mhm." Pan Ning nodded faintly.
He fetched a fever reducer and an antiviral pill, feeding them to her one by one.
"Alright, your fever should break below 39 in a few hours. Get some rest."
"Okay… You should sleep too."
"Yeah." Su Yang climbed in beside her.
Once the lights were off, Pan Ning drifted back to sleep almost instantly.
But Su Yang lay wide awake.
Staring at the ceiling, he thought, ‘Was that really just a dream? Something feels off.’
‘Dreams aren’t supposed to feel that real.’
He took a deep breath and mentally called out:
—System?
[Here.]
—Was I dreaming earlier?
[Yes.]
—But it didn’t feel like a dream. I’ve had dreams before. This was different.
[Scan confirms host was dreaming.]
—No way. Something’s not right.
The memory replayed in his mind—Pan Ning being shoved off the balcony—and his skin prickled with goosebumps.
Gulping, he quietly sat up and studied her sleeping form.
Assured she was undisturbed, he slipped out of bed and left the room.
At the hallway entrance, he slowed his steps and peered at the balcony again.
Still empty.
Su Yang flicked on every living room light before striding to the balcony and yanking open the glass door.
His half-finished pack of cigarettes lay on the side table next to the lounge chair where he’d last smoked.
He picked it up, counted the remaining sticks, then snorted at his own paranoia.
"Why am I checking my smokes? Even if that was real, it’s not like that woman would’ve helped herself to my cigarettes."
Shaking his head, he lit one and slumped into the chair.
In the quiet, his brain replayed the scene against his will.
Every time he pictured Pan Ning falling, his heart twisted like it was being ripped apart.
Leaning on his hand, Su Yang gazed into the distance. The early-morning air in Haicheng carried a biting chill.
A cold breeze swept over his bare torso, making him shiver. After two more drags, he stubbed out the half-smoked cigarette in the ashtray.
—System?
[Here.]
—One last time. That was a dream, right?
[Confirmed: dream.]
[The translated content will appear here once the original Chinese text is provided.]
grated, and just when he finally managed to get into an elite academy, he discovered that he actually had a system, and the way to earn rewards was extremely ridiculous. So for the sake of rewards, he had no choice but to start acting ridiculous as well. Su Cheng: "It's nothing but system quests after all." But later, what confused Su Cheng was that while he was already quite ridiculous, he never expected those serious characters to gradually become ridiculous too. And the way they looked at him became increasingly strange... (This synopsis doesn't do it justice, please read the full story)
ver to a world of cultivation and returned invincible. Modern medicine is child's play compared to elixirs; technological might crumbles before true cultivation. My name is Qin Ning, Earth's sole cultivator!
ress Kneels to Admit Wrong] [Dealing with Love-Struck Fools] [Forced to the Throne] Ren Tianye transmigrated into a female-oriented novel world, only to find everyone in it was utterly insane. He risked his life to save a young girl from barbarians, but was accused of arriving too late and branded the real murderer. He held a knife to a military officer's neck, demanding the troop tally, but the officer only cared about questioning his wife: "Do you not love me anymore? All these years of affection and time together, they were all a mistake, a mistake!" After seizing Yunji City, the original defending general, to save face with the Empress, knelt on the ground: "You must give Yunji City back to me, or I'll hang myself at the city gate and let everyone know you're a villain!" The young lord of the Duke's mansion, to please a woman, directly ordered a merchant: "The menstrual pads you buy for her must be studded with diamonds. Loving her means giving her the best." Having become a great general, he was about to marry a merchant's daughter, who set a pre-nuptial rule: "I can divorce you anytime. When that happens, you must give me half of your troops and soldiers!" Even the Empress was a severe love-struck fool, who ordered the execution of 70,000 elite troops simply because they stood in the way of her romance. Ren Tianye was speechless. He was done. Let it all burn! This deranged female-oriented novel world! ...
. As long as he maintains the villain image and follows the plot to the grand finale, he can obtain generous rewards and return to the real world. So Gu Chen'an entered the role and began to act as a scumbag villain, but who would have expected that the female leads could hear his inner thoughts. Miss Su from the Su family was shocked: "I originally thought Gu Chen'an was a scumbag, but I didn't expect he turned out to be a gentleman! What? You said I have to call off the engagement? I definitely won't, I'll piss you off!" Bai Yuan Tian was dumbfounded: "Young Master Gu is usually unreasonable and a complete brat, but he actually calls me little sweetie in his heart? What, Young Master Gu even said he likes me?" As the female leads' images collapsed more and more, the plot also collapsed with it. Gu Chen'an looked at all this chaos. "Ladies, don't aggro me, if you keep this up the male lead really will stab me, I still need to survive to the grand finale!"
