Chapter 8 – Which side was actually the one acting cheap?

After the Rebirth of the Film Emperor
kirie
45 Chapters

Chapter 1 - The 22 year old Ji Zhinong Chapter 2 Chapter 3 - The 32 year old Wen Che Chapter 4 - Choosing Roles (Wife) Chapter 5 - Both short and fat like an AA battery Chapter 6 - You really aren’t picky!  Chapter 7 - You ate all the makeup Chapter 8 - Which side was actually the one acting cheap? Chapter 9 - “(╯-_-)╯” Chapter 10 - The little substitute has his own plans Chapter 11 - “You can’t get dirty.” Chapter 12 - Embarrassing, really embarrassing Chapter 13 - Shameful fetish Chapter 14 - Little good-for-nothing Chapter 15 - Public ridicule Chapter 16 - @JiZhiZhiDidYouGetPopularToday Chapter 17 - GossipConsumer Chapter 18 - “In love.” Chapter 19 - Don’t let anyone bully him Chapter 20 - You’re going to finish the entire field of strawberries! Chapter 21 - The first person to bravely sink a ship Chapter 22 - The sugar daddy using cheats at the scene Chapter 23 - A meticulous and cute little girl Chapter 24 - Even you are mine! Chapter 25 - Envy Chapter 26 - The scene of death from embarrassment Chapter 27 - I might just be a wicked criminal beyond redemption Chapter 28 - “I’m willing to prove his innocence.” Chapter 29 - Perhaps he was a god Chapter 30 - Defy world opinion Chapter 31 - Detergent Li Shaoyao Chapter 32 - “Just got family punishment” Chapter 33 - I’m the matsutake mushroom on the chopping block. Chapter 34 - “I don’t eat fellow mushrooms.” Chapter 35 - An old score (End of Part One) Chapter 36 - How shabby (pt. 1) Chapter 37 - How shabby (pt. 2) Chapter 38 - How shabby (pt. 3) Chapter 39 - How shabby (pt.4 ) Chapter 40 - How shabby (pt. 5) Chapter 41 - How shabby (pt. 6) Chapter 42 - How shabby (pt. 7) Chapter 43 - Past relationship (pt. 1) Chapter 44 - Past relationship (pt. 2) Chapter 45 - Past relationship (pt. 3)
Content Warning: This chapter may contain depictions of violence, sex, offensive language and has been marked NSFW

Translator: kirie

Proofreader: celare

Editor: alexie

Midnight.

When Ji Zhinong pushed open the house door and walked into the living room, Lin Lan was hugging her pet samoyed, using a dryer to sort the dog’s snow-white fur.

“How come you went out and got dirt all over yourself today? Be obedient. Mom will blow you clean.”

The dog wasn’t very obedient, struggling the entire time. Lin Lan wasn’t annoyed in the slightest, very patient. Her motherly smile didn’t slip even once.

The samoyed saw Ji Zhinong come back and barked at him twice, like guarding against a stranger.

Thinking of Li Shaoyao’s words, Wen Che felt shivers appear all throughout his body.

In this house, the original owner of the body was indeed even lesser than a pretty looking pet dog.

No one cared about his late return. He returned to his room upstairs and took a hot shower. While he was dressing, he touched the red streaks near his collarbone, disappointment welling up in his heart.

Others got cheats after reincarnation, so why did he have to—have to fall to the level of “selling his body” to find a way out?

Wen Che thought back to his short life in detail. When he was in school, he’d never bullied his classmates. After he’d started working, he didn’t use his authority for embezzlement. After he got famous, he also did a lot of philanthropy. No matter how he saw it, he was clearly a proper and well-brought-up youth of society!! So how did he end up dying in his prime?

Even though he was reborn into a younger body, the mess left by the original owner didn’t make it seem like God was compensating him.

Why was he so miserable? He asked both Ji Zhinong and himself.

It was midnight. He collapsed onto the bed in a daze, but just as he was about to fall into sleep’s embrace, a Wechat message appeared on his phone.

Li Shaoyao: Remember to come to the hospital at 8 tomorrow.

Ji Zhinong resisted the strong urge to roll his eyes and threw his phone away.

Bang bang bang——!

The sudden knocking sounds in the dead of the night almost shattered his eardrums.

“Ji Zhinong! Open the door!!”

Ji Rugui’s noisy voice sounded repeatedly. “Open the door!!!”

“If you don’t open the door, I’m kicking it open!”

What was up with all these lunatics in the family?!

Ji Zhinong reluctantly opened the bedroom door. Before he got a clear look on the situation outside, a gust of wind rushed towards him, and the next thing he knew, Ji Rugui had already pressed him against the wall with his arm muscles bulging and his grip almost enough to rip his clothes into tatters.

The memories of the original owner of the body reminded Wen Che that his second brother was in the boxing club when he was in university.

“What do you want?” He was pretty calm, thinking that, at the very least, the children of the Ji family wouldn’t lack the most basic upbringing and hit his biological brother.

Ji Rugui: “Did you go target Yunan today?”

“???” Ji Zhinong felt baffled. “What are you talking about?”

“He said it was you who stole the role of Lu Yun. Do you know that he prepared for a year for this drama?!”

So it was over this matter.

Ji Zhinong countered, “Auditions are based on your ability. How is he not having the ability and getting rejected my fault?”

“And you’re still making up excuses. Who are you to compete with him?!”

He pushed Ji Zhinong away. There happened to be a decorative flower vase nearby.

Graphic/violent scenes; skip if it makes you uncomfortableWith the shatter of the flower vase, the broken pieces flew upwards. Ji Zhinong felt a coldness at his neck, and he lifted his hand to touch it, his palm covered in red.

Ji Rugui grabbed him up from the floor and slammed him against the wall, the back of his head knocking against it, his ears ringing, and a high degree of the overlapping images of Ji Rugui’s ferocious face appearing before his eyes.

That seemed to be a dark night. On some balcony, two dark shadows were intertwined. The original owner of the body noticed something and suddenly started running but was very quickly dragged by his hair into a corner, punches landing one after another. In the end, he was picked up and thrown down from a dozen or so stairs from the living room, screams sounding in all directions.

Summary of graphic scenes for those who skipped themJi Rugui beat up Ji Zhinong, and Wen Che realizes it’s not the first time this happened.

“Zhinong? Zhinong!”

There was a woman calling him.

Ji Zhinong opened his eyes. It was Ji Ruzhang. She was pressing against his neck. Seeing him awaken, she visibly breathed a sigh of relief.

Ji Rugui was being held back by Ji Yunan to the side.

“Thankfully it didn’t hurt an artery. I’ll bandage it for you.”

Ji Ruzhang used a tissue to wipe away the blood on her hands. She had to go to the living room to get medicine, but before leaving the bedroom, she told Ji Rugui, “If you hit him again, dad and mom are going to wake up. You know the consequences if this gets to grandpa.”

His elder sister’s words extinguished the flames in Ji Rugui’s violently heaving chest.

After Ji Ruzhang went downstairs, Ji Zhinong looked at his second brother, who was standing next to Ji Yunan, asking strangely, “This isn’t your first time hitting me, is it?”

Ji Rugui’s expression didn’t change much, but Ji Yunan visibly started panicking.

Wen Che saw it clearly.

Ji Ruzhang quickly returned to the bedroom with the medicine kit. It was only when she was bandaging Ji Zhinong’s wounds that Ji Yunan said in guilt, “Sorry, I drank some alcohol today and said some nonsense. I didn’t think second brother would take it seriously.”

Ji Rugui: “What are you apologizing for, Yunan? Why are you apologizing to him?”

Ji Ruzhang reprimanded, “You two get back to your rooms!”

Ji Rugui slammed the door loudly.

Ji Ruzhang stopped Ji Yunan at this moment, saying straightforwardly, “When will you change your problem of talking behind people’s back?”

“Sis…I…”

After his eldest sister stared at him for two seconds, he lowered his eyes in guilt, unable to say anything in response, and fled with his face red.

Ji Ruzhang turned and said to Ji Zhinong, “Before your wounds are healed, don’t go see grandpa to keep him from worrying.”

Keeping him from worrying was secondary. It was probably fear that it would be hard to explain if the gramps asked about it.

Ji Zhinong agreed reluctantly in consideration of her bandaging his wounds just now.

“Sis, can I ask you a question?”

Ji Ruzhang: “What?”

“Did second brother constantly hit me before?”

“…Do you remember something?”

Ji Ruzhang saw the CT scan of Zhinong’s brain in the hospital, so she knew that he did indeed lose his memory. Although the reason for it wasn’t clear, he definitely wasn’t faking it.

“…No.” Wen Che already knew the answer in his mind. He smiled and said, “When second brother was hitting me, it seemed to come very easily. He probably has a lot of experience.”

“…” Ji Ruzhang: “He’s bad tempered. Don’t bother with the likes of him and don’t argue with him…I heard Yunan say that your audition was very successful?”

Ji Zhinong: “…” The discussion topic was very forced.

Probably before he’d returned, the entire Ji family had already heard Ji Yunan talk about the day’s matter in his embellished way.

“He’s got a loose tongue,” he smiled, asking, “What else did he say? That I stole his role? Sis, from start to end, wasn’t it all Zhang Yunan stealing what was mine?”

“…Dad and mom raised him for more than twenty years. He’s their biological son even if he isn’t. Besides, wouldn’t it kill Yunan to send him back to the Zhang family with the type of situation they’re in?” Ji Ruzhang said. “It’s only when you prove yourself that they’ll really acknowledge you. ”

What situation was the Zhang family in? When Father Zhang was young, he opened unorthodox casinos and lost an arm to debtors after misoperation of the casinos. Afterwards he got a drug addiction, a body full of problems. Mother Zhang was gluttonous and lazy, grumbling that her son couldn’t be raised for nothing, and forced Ji Zhinong to drop out of high school to mix in quick money making circles.

Wen Che could clearly see a small, 12 year old boy keeping watch at the door outside the casino with a yellow light, opening the door for those idlers in front of a long muddy street through the memories of the original owner. A few times the police came, so Father Zhang just threw out the minor, leaving the police helpless, and then made his escape.

Wen Che really wanted to ask this rational sister, even you know that the Zhang house isn’t a liveable place? Then why didn’t any of you feel guilty and compensate Ji Zhinong for staying there more than twenty years?

Their biological son was crippled from others’ upbringing, so they gave up on him early and would rather pamper the son of another’s family?

He really didn’t know which side was the one acting cheap.

Since it was deep into the night, Ji Ruzhang didn’t say much else.

The second day. The sun rose as usual, with everything normal at the Ji family as if yesterday’s fight had never happened.

Ji Zhinong left the house early, going to the hospital at the agreed time.

Li Shaoyao had arranged everything, so Zhinong only had to lie on the operating table. The cold instrument pressed at the corner of his eye. There was a slight burning, painful feeling. The entire process was very quick, and the doctor nodded in satisfaction, telling him to avoid spicy food for a week, everything else was okay.

This was indeed a small, harmless surgery, but when he looked in the mirror, Zhinong’s face gained an eye catching characteristic that he originally didn’t have. When he walked out of the operating room, Li Shaoyao was already waiting outside. He was also very satisfied, since he used the smallest cost to create a perfect substitute.

Ji Zhinong had already accepted his fate and spread his hands. “It’s good as long as you’re satisfied, boss. Can we discuss the matter of the contract now? You said you would discuss it with the people at De Yu in my place before. I don’t want something to happen midway.”

“The lawyer already went to…Hm? What happened to your neck?”

Li Shaoyao saw a circle of white under the scarf and raised his hand to pull at it. He saw that it was bloodied gauze and frowned. “I don’t remember letting you get hurt yesterday night.”

Wen Che didn’t want to use this chance to act pitiful, but his anger flooded in when Li Shaoyao raised the matter from last night. He thought, since you got pleasure from my body, then you should naturally vent my anger for me.

So he purposefully acted pitiful. “Yesterday night Zhang Yunan went home and told on me, so my second brother hit me.”

Li Shaoyao’s eyes darkened. “He hit you?”

Ji Zhinong: “He trained in boxing before. Although he isn’t professional, it’s more than enough to bully me.” His words carried a strange tone.

Li Shaoyao’s good mood was ruined. His expression wasn’t very good. He first brought Ji Zhinong to the surgical dressing department.

After the doctor examined the wound, he said that it was a scrape from ceramic shards. It was a good thing his arteries were unharmed or his life would be in danger.

Assistant Chen told Li Shaoyao quietly, “It doesn’t seem to be the first time Ji Rugui hit his biological brother. A year ago, Ji Zhinong was hospitalized. Because he was sent to the emergency room before dawn, someone took a video, and it got on the news. The Ji family said he accidentally fell down the stairs, but there was also an anonymous doctor who reported that at the time Mr. Ji was covered in bruises, clearly from deliberate hitting.”

Li Shaoyao looked at that wound, just millimeters away from the neck artery, and felt indescribably scared.

It had been six years. He’d finally found a perfect shadow after great difficulty; he definitely couldn’t let someone else destroy it.

Translator’s Note:

Poor Zhinong T_T

How do you think Li Shaoyao’s going to avenge Ji Zhinong?

kirie

Hi there! I'm Kirie. I enjoy reading, listening to kpop, and translating. uwu

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4 thoughts on “Chapter 8 – Which side was actually the one acting cheap?”

  1. I dont like Li Shaoyao… but the whole family is worse.

    I get it, you raised him as your own but why must your biological son continue to suffer? No one but grandpa is willing to care for him at all.

    and how creepy that as soon as the biological son returns, the other two brothers start making out *bleh* (at least I think it was the two brothers, otherwise why beat him?)

    thanks for the chapter! <3

    Reply
    • Omg, I didn’t even see that. I now realiz the “two intertwined bodies” could have been the brothers (Rugui and Human) and Zhinong was running cuz the “thing he saw” was scandalous! I thought intertwined was Rugui trying to beat up poor Zhining. Wowowowow

      Reply
  2. Every time I came back to this story, this crazy shit family is always getting on my nerves…
    Thank you for the update ❤️
    Can’t wait for the family be properly ruined to the ground.

    Reply

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