Elena had always thought she was lucky.
She was born into a powerful military family.
Her father was a Regiment Commander and her grandfather a retired Division Commander.
She grew up surrounded by people who loved her.
She had a comfortable home, excellent education, and a future that had already been arranged for her.
The only thing that made her life unpleasant was Ethan Cole.
Unfortunately, he had been there for all eighteen years of it.
Their families had been rivals for generations.
So naturally, their children became rivals too.
From childhood to adolescence, Elena and Ethan competed over everything.
If she came first, he came second.
If he came first, she made sure he regretted it.
They could turn buying snacks into a competition.
They could turn playing chess into a battlefield.
And when the college entrance examination results were released, Elena would finally win.
By two marks.
She treasured those two marks.
She simply never will have the chance to tell him. Nor did she want to.
After all, their rivalry was real.
They had competed throughout and now she knew she won.
It was the best chance to one-up him but she chose not to.
The results weren’t out yet.
By the time they come, she would be in the countryside farming for the rest of her life.
After the examination, Elena discovered that the life she thought belonged to her never had.
A chance encounter awakened memories from a life she shouldn’t remember.
The truth was simple.
She was not the biological daughter of the Shaw family.
She and Lily were switched at birth.
And now that the truth had been discovered, Lily would return to the Shaw family while Elena would return to the family she was born into, the Bennet family.
A farming family in the countryside.
The life she had spent eighteen years believing was hers disappeared almost overnight.
Her college education was gone.
Her comfortable home was gone.
Her carefully planned future was gone.
Even the people she once called family began to look different.
Elena knows what she was supposed to do.
Cry.
Resist.
Fight for her identity.
Beg to stay.
Or perhaps become bitter and resentful.
After all, that was what the original story expected from her.
But Elena now had one advantage nobody else possessed.
She knew this world was a novel.
And she knew exactly how the story would end.
So she made a decision.
If the Shaw family didn’t belong to her, she didn’t want it.
If college was no longer possible, she would find another path.
If she had to live in the countryside, then she would make the countryside work for her.
She could start with the only thing she knew.
Future.
But for now, she could only go home with the oranges she was carrying and have dinner.
Father Shaw hadn’t returned yet and given that food was ready, it was obvious he wouldn’t be returning anytime soon.
After returning home, Elena didn’t act differently, kept the oranges down on the kitchen counter and helped carry the bowls and chopsticks to eat.
There wasn’t much entertainment in these times.
She lived in Hanging Moon City in 1988.
Mother Shaw called for her, "Elena, go call your grandpa for dinner."
Elena nodded and rushed to the second floor shouting "Grandpa, dinner’s ready!"
"Coming."
The voice was loud and full of energy, not of a failing old man. It seemed he was still as healthy as ever.
Dinner followed the rule of no talking while eating so it passed uneventfully.
After dinner, Elena didn’t go to sleep but started scribbling in a notebook.
She knew she couldn’t write down the future events.
That would be worse if someone read it.
No matter if she wrote it in English, someone would read it and she didn’t know any other language.
So she scribbled away, mumbling the plot.
"Tomorrow I’ll be exposed as not my parent’s daughter due to the medical blood tests supposed to be done for University admissions."
"Then my parents will trace it back to the hospital and look for children born the same day as me."
"Then they’ll discover Lily and would visit the Bennet family..."
She continued mumbling in a low voice but she knew it would take days before being revealed to her.
After all, her parents didn’t want her to know she was a fake but didn’t want to lose their only child as well.
So they planned to keep both.
However, in which novel have the fake and real heiress lived together in harmony?
That’s just impossible.
Besides, on the other side Lily was alone in the bathroom in a daze.
She had just been reborn, remembering how a week from now she’d be taken back by the Shaw family as she’s their daughter.
The only reason it took a week to trace her was because she was working part time in the city while the Bennet family didn’t know where.
The Shaw couple visited the Bennet family but couldn’t find her and thus the misery began.
In her memories, she’d never outmatched Elena and now she hated Elena with fervor.
She didn’t know why or how she was reborn but everything that Elena possessed belonged to her and she would take it back.
For now, however, she needed to go back and wait for the Shaw couple to visit.
Then she’d find some way to expel Elena out of the Shaw family.
She didn’t want to live another life under the shadow of another.
Just as the thought crossed her mind, her clenched hands finally unclenched dripping blood.
She hadn’t realized her nails had dug deep into her palm in a daze.
She wiped away her tears of humiliation and went out confidently.
"Manager, I Quit," she said resolutely to the older woman who was scolding her relentlessly just a while earlier.
Before the older woman could understand and come out of her daze at the change in the newcomer’s attitude, Lily had already walked away.
"This time, I’ll show everyone I’m not less!" She said through gritted teeth, walking back home ignoring the cursing manager.