Mistaken Fates.

Lin Yu had heard that when a person was in the grip of some extreme emotion, they could snap out of a drunken state in an instant.

He never knew what that feeling was like before.

He had never experienced it.

Now Lin Yu understood.

It was as if someone had injected a shot of ice-cold concentrated mint juice into his brain, that bone-chilling cold coursing straight down his spine, instantly reaching every limb and joint.

Lin Yu felt as though his entire body had gone cold in a single moment.

So cold that even his legs began to shake.

"Thud!"

With his legs losing all strength, Lin Yu plopped down onto the hard ceramic floor tiles.

He felt no pain at all.

Even after falling, his first instinct was to scramble backward on his hands and feet.

As if the woman standing at the bedroom door, with worry in her eyes, was not a graceful and enticing beauty, but a demon ready to devour him.

Lin Yu stared fixedly at Tang Yun, gasping for air.

In just a few breaths, a layer of sweat broke out all over his body, soaking his hair roots and shirt.

The Tang Yun storyline he had mulled over countless days and nights—always finding it bizarre—finally came together after obtaining this most critical piece of information.

He finally understood it all.

That segment of the Tang Yun plot he recalled back at the Shaxian Snacks shop,

well, it was a damn interlude.

Only then did Lin Yu escape the dead end called time, putting everything together.

Back in high school, when he was eating at Shaxian Snacks with Tang Yun, the erotic plot he remembered was so brief, strange, and riddled with a sense of crudeness—

it was because that erotic segment was a memory inserted within the main story.

That was why it felt so short and rushed.

Once he figured that out, coupled with the shock of Tang Yun’s familiar outfit in front of him, Lin Yu quickly recalled some scattered details about the Tang Yun side story.

Not a lot.

But enough for Lin Yu to piece together the entire chain of events.

The timeline of the Tang Yun side story was set after the disastrous ending of the first part.

Tang Manman was pregnant, staying at home to rest.

The one responsible for taking care of her was naturally her mother, Tang Yun.

On the first page of this side story,

the Original Host Blondie and Tang Yun met for the first time, both appearing oddly behaved.

The Original Host looked at Tang Yun with an aggressive gaze, the corner of his mouth lifting into a barely noticeable smirk.

Tang Yun, meanwhile, had a face full of flushed embarrassment, her eyes darting away as she tried hard to feign calm.

The reason their first meeting in the comic was so strange was simple:

they had already met before.

Back when the Original Host was in high school!

In the original work,

it was also Tang Yun who noticed Tang Manman’s declining grades and took the initiative to confront the Original Host Blondie.

Then, she was threatened by the Original Host using Tang Manman’s grades, and was easily taken advantage of.

But this segment was never shown in the first part of the comic.

Instead, in this side story about Tang Yun, it appeared as an interlude—only surfacing after the two had already met, even after certain things had already happened.

This was the reason why,

back in high school, the Tang Yun segment he recalled was so short, amounting only to a few pages.

Because it was just a memory!

Not his memory,

but the memory of a character in the comic.

A memory within a memory.

After that,

the Original Host Blondie, who had already set a precedent, naturally used Tang Manman’s health as leverage again, easily taking control of Tang Yun once more.

Then, the subsequent events unfolded.

Having figured all this out, Lin Yu was shocked and deeply frightened.

But he was sharp enough to seize the most crucial point of the moment.

The matter with Tang Yun, though terrifying, was already resolved.

As long as it was resolved, no matter how huge, it was no longer a problem.

And what about him?

Who was he, really?

Thinking of this, Lin Yu instinctively turned his head.

He saw the hallway outside the door was empty, leaving only a puddle of clear water on the tiles.

Damn!

Disappearing again?!

Lin Yu quickly scrambled to his feet, intending to chase after him.

This time, he couldn’t let him just slip away all confusedly.

Rushing out the door,

Lin Yu immediately checked the elevator.

One of the two elevators was stopped at their floor, the other on the tenth floor.

Neither showed signs of being in use.

Certain the elevator was empty, Lin Yu turned and dashed toward the stairwell in the building.

The moment he reached the stairwell, a wave of terror hit him like an explosion in his head.

The iron door to the stairwell was tightly closed, a chain as thick as a thumb wrapped firmly around the door handle, locked with a large padlock.

Lin Yu no longer had the energy to curse the idiotic property management for locking up a life-saving escape route like this.

Now, only one question filled his mind:

How did he get out this way?

Was it because Lin Yu had noticed too late?

Had he already taken the elevator and left?

Lin Yu tried hard to find a reasonable explanation for the Super Part-timer’s disappearance.

"Lin Yu?"

"Are you okay?"

Just as Lin Yu was racking his brain, Tang Yun, worried about her son-in-law, followed out. Seeing Lin Yu’s awful complexion, she asked with concern.

"Ah?!"

"I—I’m fine."

Seeing Tang Yun again, Lin Yu’s bone-deep fear of her hadn’t fully faded. He nearly stumbled flat on his face in front of her.

But Lin Yu managed to steady himself,

not making himself seem even more odd.

After sobering up, Lin Yu completely understood why Tang Yun was here.

Tang Manman had mentioned this before.

She was pregnant, and her mother often came to look after her, cooking her favorite dishes.

Sometimes Tang Yun stayed for a longer period, sometimes a shorter one; it was uncertain.

Whenever she stayed, Lin Yu had been careful to avoid her as much as possible.

But Lin Yu remembered that two days ago, Tang Manman said she was going back to her parents' home for a couple of days.

He had assumed the apartment would be empty.

Yet, for some reason,

Tang Manman had gone back,

while Tang Yun stayed behind...

After sorting through his memories, even though the crisis was over, Lin Yu still didn’t want to linger here any longer.

Hurriedly saying goodbye to Tang Manman’s mother, Lin Yu took the elevator downstairs.

This time, he truly didn’t dare to wander around anymore.

He found a random hotel and settled in, finally feeling at ease.