Cold.
That was the first thing he felt in the grand house.
The condescending whispers from his older siblings, and the cold stares of his father who considered him a disgrace to the family.
As the youngest child, considered useless, Luciel Edelweis’s presence was considered a stain on the family tree.
Every day was an exercise in survival amidst condescending stares and neglect.
Until one night, the sound of the whip cutting through the air ended, the pain of a small mistake that took away his consciousness, finally Luciel met his death after being abandoned in an old warehouse in a sick state.
“If there is a second life….
I just want to be loved,” he whispered weakly before his last breath was cut off.
But instead of darkness, warm light greeted him.
He awoke in a luxurious bed with silk sheets, not his gloomy room.
He was now in the body of Lucien, the snow-white-haired, frail teenager from the novel Little Rose.
As someone who had been neglected all his life, without Luciel realizing it, the presence of his soul that longed for affection radiated an aura that no one in that world could resist.
Without him asking, the Prince begins to stare at him with obsession, and the Antagonist suddenly abandons his evil plans just to protect him.
The world of ‘Little Rose’, which should have been a pure romance story, and should have focused on the female lead, has now slowly turned into a stage of obsession that all centers on one point: Lucien.
Emotional turmoil, possessive gazes, and a web of undeserved romance began to envelop Luciel, whose soul now resided within his fragile body.
Everyone wanted to possess and protect him.
Plak!
The sound of a book being closed loudly broke the silence of the dusty corner of the orphanage library.
A fiction book with a cover depicting an illustration of roses and stars now sits tightly closed on a wooden table whose surface is peeling.
Luciel Reed, a sixteen year old teenager, stared blankly at the cover of the thick book in front of him.
The glittering gold title read: You Are My Star.
“Our names are the same, but his fate is so troublesome,” he muttered dryly.
Luciel sighed.
He couldn’t understand why someone would crave attention so much that they would mess up the fate of a mortal world for the sake of a mortal emotion called love.
For him, being loved or ignored is equally unprofitable.
Being loved means having to live up to others’ expectations, which drains energy.
Being ignored means being left alone, which is actually much more practical.
For him, everyone ends up dying, so why bother creating fleeting emotional attachments?
Luciel got up from his creaking chair, he put the book back on the shelf.
As a skinny orphanage child with jet black hair that is cut haphazardly, Luciel is the definition of “transparent existence”.
He didn’t stand out, never caused trouble, and rarely spoke unless necessary.
His orphanage friends often considered him odd, but to Luciel, life was simply a long line to biological death.
Everything in this world will eventually be destroyed, decayed, and forgotten by time.
So why waste your energy on something so pointless?
The only thing that kept his soul from being completely empty was his intense curiosity.
He loves to read, enjoys logic puzzles, and often spends hours just observing how cause-and-effect chains work around him.
He read the novel You Are My Star (YAMS) to the very last page purely because he was curious about the main character’s name.
Now that his curiosity had been satisfied, he concluded that the story was too noisy.
“Luciel!
Are you in there?” A head poked out from behind the wooden library door.
It was Maya, one of the senior caregivers at the orphanage.
“Can you help me?
Our rice and oil supplies are running low.
We need to get to the grocery store now before it rains.” Luciel turned his head, his face as flat as a plywood board.
“Okay.” He didn’t refuse.
Refusing required an argument, and arguing required a greater vocabulary that would tire his mouth.
It was more efficient to comply and complete the task quickly so he could return to his thin foam mattress.
The afternoon journey proceeded as usual.
The city sky was gray, matching Luciel’s constant neutral mood.
They rode in the orphanage’s old boxcar to the wholesale shopping center on the outskirts of town.
Along the way, Maya was busy muttering about the rising prices of basic necessities, while Luciel just stared out the window, watching the electricity poles flash run past him.
Everything felt so fleeting.
Upon arrival, Luciel helped load several boxes of instant noodles and sacks of rice into the car’s trunk.
A thin layer of sweat beaded on the teenager’s forehead, making his black hair stick to his skin.
After all the items were in, Maya went back into the shop to take care of the receipt she left behind, leaving Luciel standing alone in the empty open parking area.
The afternoon air suddenly felt chilly.
A strong wind blew, carrying the strong scent of earth.
Creeeeeeeet!
Boom!
The sound of screeching tires rubbing harshly against the asphalt shattered the silence of the parking lot.
Luciel turned slowly.
At the end of the parking corridor, a black SUV was out of control.
The driver seemed to panic, instead of hitting the brakes, the car roared, hit the road divider and sped straight towards where Luciel was standing.
“Luciel!
Run!” Maya’s hysterical screams could be heard coming from the shop’s glass doors.
People nearby began to scream.
In those crucial seconds, Luciel’s brain was working at an abnormal speed.
He saw the car’s nose grow larger and larger in his view.
The escape route was to his left.
If he jumped now, he might survive with a few broken bones.
But what’s next?
The hospital.
Medical bills that would burden the home.
Exhausting physical therapy.
And after he recovers, he’ll have to return to this boring routine until he grows old and eventually dies.
His deeply ingrained nihilism suddenly took over every muscle in his body.
His legs felt heavy, not from fear, but from a reluctance to move.
Why should he expend so much energy just to delay the inevitable?
The car was less than three meters in front of him, its headlights dazzling Luciel’s dark eyes.
The teenager didn’t close his eyes.
He didn’t panic.
The corners of his lips didn’t even twitch.
He simply stared blankly at the large vehicle that was about to crush him.
‘Ah, this is the end of me,’ he thought calmly.
BUMMM!
A searing pain pierced every nerve in less than a millisecond, before Luciel’s consciousness was completely taken away by the silent, peaceful darkness.
True peace was finally within him.
A throbbing dizziness in the back of his head was the first thing Luciel felt as his consciousness slowly crept back.
‘Wait…
if I can still feel dizzy, does that mean I’m not dead yet?’ he thought, a little disappointed.
Luciel took a deep breath, preparing to smell the distinctive hospital carbolic acid or hear the shrill beep of the heart monitor.
However, his nose caught a very unfamiliar scent—the soothing scent of lavender combined with the scent of expensive sandalwood.
The bed beneath his back felt incredibly soft, far softer than any hospital bed, even a thousand times more comfortable than the bed at his orphanage.
Slowly, Luciel raised his right hand to massage his throbbing temple.
However, as soon as his hand passed before his sight, Luciel’s movements suddenly froze, feeling unfamiliar.
He blinked once.
Twice.
The raised hand wasn’t his.
The skin was so pale white, almost transparent, that the fine lines of his veins were visible.
His fingers were long, slender, with manicured nails, not a trace of calluses from lifting sacks of rice.
They were the hands of someone who had never experienced manual labor in his life.
Luciel immediately straightened up.
He ignored the dizziness in his head.
His eyes scanned the room.
He wasn’t in a hospital ward.
He was in a bedroom that was as large as the entire orphanage.
The ceilings are high with intricate gold carvings, maroon velvet curtains hang from the large windows, and the antique wooden furniture is neatly arranged in a display of unreasonable luxury.
His intense curiosity suddenly jolted.
The chain of cause and effect in his brain began to spin.
With slightly unsteady steps, Luciel slid his feet off the bed and walked over to a large, life-sized mirror standing in the corner of the room.
As soon as his reflection was caught by the clear glass surface, Luciel was stunned.
A teenage boy stared back at him.
He had fine, snow-white hair that fell beautifully past his forehead.
His skin was extremely pale, giving the impression of extreme fragility.
However, what was most striking were his eyes—blood-red, clear, yet emitting an incredibly blank and cold gaze.
His height seemed unchanged, still around 160 centimeters, but his body proportions appeared much more frail and thin.
As someone who had just finished the novel You Are My Star, it didn’t take Luciel long to realize the crazy situation he was in.
White hair, pale skin like a corpse, blood red eyes, and a weak body of 160 centimeters tall.
“Lucien…” Luciel murmured.
His voice sounded softer and clearer than his original voice, but his tone remained even and emotionless.
He couldn’t be more wrong.
This was the body of Lucien, the youngest son of the Duke family in the novel Little Rose, the body of a supporting character whose appearance resembled an albino, possessed by the soul of Lucien—the main character of You Are My Star—until the plot turned into a drama of obsessive attraction.
Luciel massaged the bridge of his aquiline nose.
“What a hassle.” He deliberately resigned himself to being hit by a car so he could retire from this mortal life in peace, but damn fate instead threw him into an overlapping triple world.
According to the memories of the remnants of the soul in this body, this luxurious room is located in the main residence of the Duke, the parents of the original body owner, Lucien.
Lucien’s siblings all have dominant physiques with brownish-black hair and green eyes, symbolizing the power of the Duke family, making Lucien always appear different and visually isolated.
Worse still, Luciel checked the silver desk calendar by his bed.
Today was exactly one week before Lucien—or rather, his current self—was to leave for the Royal Academy, a school exclusively for the empire’s high nobility.
The place where all the main characters gather.
The place where the Second Prince—the new Crown Prince, the black-haired, hazel-eyed Antagonist, and the Female Lead named Rose are in their third year.
The place where the YAMS plot should start to trigger BL romantic moments due to the aura of longing for affection that Luciel left behind.
Luciel walked back to the bed and flopped his frail body onto the soft mattress, lying on his back.
He stared up at the ceiling with the laziest expression ever.
He knew the plot of this novel.
He knew what dangers threatened this frail body.
Other transmigrated characters might panic, start making secret plans, or practice magic to survive and change their destiny.
But Luciel?
‘To hell with the plot,’ Luciel thought as he pulled the velvet blanket up to his chest.
‘Whether the plot is romantic, obsessive, or even if the world is destroyed, it’s none of my business.
It’s all fleeting.
This week I’ll just sleep on this soft mattress until it’s time to go to the academy.’ Luciel closed his beautiful red eyes, ready to let fate take its course in whatever direction it wanted, while he chose not to care.