The snow had begun falling at dusk—silent and stealthy, yet it had already managed to accumulate into a thick, heavy layer. The usual hustle and bustle of the campus main road had been dampened, turning the world into a blurred, breathing expanse of white.
Early that morning, Wen Chu stood at the entrance of the teaching building, waiting. She had bundled herself into a massive, cream-white lamb-wool coat. She wore a fluffy hat and a matching off-white scarf wrapped so tightly it reached the tip of her nose, leaving only a pair of eyes peeking out—misty and damp from the biting cold.
The weather was freezing. The tip of her nose was flushed red, and her fingertips throbbed with a dull ache from the cold. Wen Chu tucked her chin deeper, trying to bury her entire face into the fluffy, plush edge of her scarf.
Since it was a weekend morning, most university students were still tucked away in their beds. There weren’t many people walking through the campus, but every student who did pass by couldn’t help but steal a glance at this “ball of fluff.”
Quite simply, it was because Wen Chu was breathtakingly beautiful.
Wen Chu—or rather, Wen Xia (as she was known in her past life)—clumsily pulled her phone from her pocket to check the screen. 7:30 AM. There was still half an hour until their appointed time. Her feet were growing stiff from the cold, so she slowly crouched down.
She let out a heavy sigh, her small face wrinkling in distress. Who could have imagined that a hardcore “shut-in” with severe social anxiety like herself would somehow catch the trend of “transmigrating into a book”? To make matters worse, she had transmigrated as the “cannon fodder” ex-girlfriend of the male lead.
In the original plot, Wen Chu and the male lead became a couple through a series of coincidences. Just how “coincidental” was it?
Well, imagine waking up a week ago, having just transmigrated, only to find yourself in a neon-lit, rowdy private KTV lounge surrounded by a crowd of people. For someone like Wen Chu, who hadn’t seen more than a handful of people in an entire year, being thrust into such a crowd made her face flush instantly and her palms break out in cold sweat.
She had tried to shrink herself into the darkest corner of the sofa, wishing she could simply dissolve into the patterns of the wallpaper.
At the center of the crowd was a boy surrounded like a king, radiating a calm, steady aura. He leaned back against the sofa, his fingertips idly tapping against the side of a glass, seemingly indifferent to the cacophony around him.
Suddenly, a roar of cheers erupted.
The boy had apparently lost a game. The people around him were jeering: “Brother Xi! Brother Xi! Truth or Dare? Pick one, quick!”
Xi Liye raised his eyes slightly, clearly finding the game tedious. “Dare,” he said. His voice wasn’t loud, yet it easily cut through the background noise.
The proposer’s eyes lit up. He scanned the room, pulled out a “Dare” card, and cast a mischievous glance over everyone present. “Brother Xi, if there’s a member of the opposite sex here whose phone battery percentage is exactly the same as yours, you two have to try dating!”
As soon as the words left his mouth, the room exploded with whistles and excited shouts. Almost instantly, every girl in the room—wearing smiles that ranged from shy to bold—hurriedly unlocked their phones. They held up their screens, eyes burning with anticipation as they looked toward Xi Liye in the center. The air was thick with hope.
Xi Liye curled his lip slightly and, with zero emotion, displayed his screen: 47%.
A wave of disappointed groans and sighs followed as the girls called out their numbers. No one matched.
Just as the commotion began to die down and the proposer was about to suggest a different game, Xi Liye casually pointed toward Wen Chu, who was curled up at the edge of the sofa. “Have we checked hers?”
When every eye in the room turned toward her, Wen Chu wished she could evaporate on the spot. Where… where on earth am I?
Unable to handle the weight of so many stares and wanting only to show them her phone so she could leave, she tremblingly fished her phone out of her pocket. Because she was so nervous under the scrutiny, it took her several tries just to unlock the screen.
47%
Wen Chu’s eyes widened. Huh? No way…
A sense of bewilderment and shock replaced her pure panic, causing her to instinctively look up at Xi Liye in the center of the crowd.
Xi Liye happened to be looking at her, too. Or rather, he had been watching her all along.
The moment she looked up, he quirked an eyebrow, a very faint trace of surprise flickering through his deep, dark eyes. He slowly held up his own screen—a matching 47%, like a silent yet resounding echo.
“WHOA—!!!”
“It’s exactly the same!”
“It’s destiny, Brother Xi!”
“Quick, quick! Relationship achievement unlocked!”
The deafening cheers drowned the room again, even more intense than before. Everyone was ignited by the sheer improbable coincidence. In the end, under the gaze of the entire room, Wen Chu’s brain went numb. Suffocated by the fear of facing so many people, she was forced to add Xi Liye’s contact information before making a hasty excuse to bolt.
Thinking back on that scene now, Wen Chu wanted to kill her past self. Why didn’t I just play on my phone a little longer? If I had, the battery wouldn’t have been exactly the same as the male lead’s!
It had been a week. A full week since she transmigrated into this trashy book.
Other people transmigrate as the female lead, but she ended up with the “cannon fodder ex-girlfriend” script—the kind of character who gets manipulated by the male lead until she’s abandoned by everyone and dies a mysterious, lonely death.
“Wen Chu, oh Wen Chu,” she whispered, huffing warm air into her palms. “What kind of sins did you commit in your past life?”
In the original plot, the male lead, Xi Liye, was a textbook “black-bellied” madman. To the public, he was a cold, top-tier genius; in private, he was a paranoid control freak. The character “Wen Chu” was merely a stepping stone for his romance with the female lead, a contrast to their “beautiful love.”
According to the plot, she had to be as high-maintenance and annoying as possible until Xi Liye couldn’t stand her anymore and initiated a breakup. But here was the problem: after the breakup, this madman would eventually turn back and take revenge on his ex-girlfriend.
When Wen Chu had read the novel, she had squealed about how “intense” and “sexy” a dark, obsessive male lead was. Now that it was her own head on the chopping block, she just wanted to buy a one-way ticket out of town.
“Break up… I have to break up…” she muttered to herself. “But how do I do it without him holding a grudge?”
After adding his contact info, she had hoped he might just forget about her—a girlfriend who just existed as a name in his contact list. But even if they were to break up, she couldn’t just “ghost” him. If the male lead started dating the real female lead later and suddenly remembered he had an “un-fired” ex-girlfriend, she would be doomed.
A few nights ago, suffering from insomnia, she had typed into a search bar: How to make a boyfriend initiate a breakup?
The results were varied, but one title caught her eye: “Reverse Psychology: Try ‘Thermal Violence’?”
The poster claimed that some guys absolutely loathe clingy girlfriends. Message bombing, constant check-ins, forced physical intimacy—especially for guys who are germaphobes or have a strong sense of personal boundaries. If you use this combo, he’ll run away faster than anyone.
Wen Chu’s eyes had lit up. Wasn’t Xi Liye exactly the type to be a germaphobe with high boundaries around girls (except for the female lead)? If she followed this method, it might actually work wonders!
Excited, Wen Chu reached out and poked the snow on the ground. A gust of cold wind hit her, making her shiver violently. To implement the “Thermal Violence” plan, she had intentionally arrived early. They had agreed on 8:00 AM, but she had come much sooner.
Because the post said: Self-sacrificing, “touching” devotion makes the other person feel that dating you is a high-pressure chore, thereby increasing the probability of a breakup.
But it had snowed last night, and the morning air was truly freezing. Wen Chu sniffled, feeling a pang of regret. She could only pray in her heart that this move would contribute to her future breakup success.
As she was fantasizing about the successful breakup, a shadow suddenly fell over her. Someone was standing in front of her.
Wen Chu snapped her head up, flashing a practiced, overly-sweet “drama queen” smile: “You’re finally here!”
The words had barely left her mouth when she realized something was wrong.
The boy in front of her… wasn’t Xi Liye.
He was wearing a grey down jacket and black-framed glasses, his face slightly flushed. “Um… excuse me, classmate, could I… could I add your WeChat?”
The boy was a medical student. Rare for a Sunday, he had woken up early for breakfast. He hadn’t expected to see such a girl standing at the teaching building entrance so early, seemingly waiting for someone. Bundled in her fluffy white coat, she looked like a small animal lost in a snowy field. Her profile in the morning light was breathtakingly beautiful.
As a single guy, his heart had skipped a beat. After hesitating for several minutes, he had finally gathered the courage to walk up to her.