Foolish humans, you will pay for your stupidity today!
Cough, wrong channel.
It should be the romance channel now.
Chi Xiaoxue had transmigrated into this robot body a few days ago. As for exactly how many days, she wasn’t quite sure.
Ever since transmigrating, she had been stuck at the robot testing center. That testing center had no sunlight; bright white fluorescent lights were on day and night. She couldn’t tell day from night at all. Initially, she could only gauge time by the engineers’ work shifts.
But they were a bunch of overtime maniacs. One day, Chi Xiaoxue heard someone say, “I have to go back and take a shower. I’ve been working nonstop for three days. If I don’t shower soon, I’ll stink.”
…
Chi Xiaoxue was utterly confused by these workaholic cattle and horses who didn’t care about their lives.
To be honest, she had been a bit muddled from the very start. During the transmigration, there seemed to be a system, and then she heard the system say something about an error, something about her having amnesia.
But after transmigrating, she never saw that system again, nor did she feel like she had lost any memories.
Chi Xiaoxue clearly remembered that before transmigrating, she was a vegetative patient. She had become vegetative due to a car accident when she was 7 years old. Her body couldn’t move, but she was conscious.
Her parents loved her dearly. They took care of her until she was 23 years old. The doctors said that Chi Xiaoxue living into adulthood was a medical miracle.
Now her soul had transmigrated; she didn’t know what had happened to her original body in that world—maybe it had already died.
If she died, her parents would probably be very sad.
Thinking of this, she felt a bit sorrowful. But then she thought that if she died, her parents wouldn’t have to pay expensive medical bills anymore, wouldn’t have to spend so much time taking care of her, and could even go traveling.
Maybe that’s… not so bad.
During those 16 years lying in bed, Chi Xiaoxue hadn’t been idle. Although she couldn’t open her eyes, ever since they found out she had hearing and consciousness, her parents would always talk to her and play songs for her.
She could guess who was visiting her each day by the songs played on the speakers.
Mom would play those lyrical oldies.
Dad would play passionate and stirring patriotic songs. Every time the intro started, Chi Xiaoxue had the urge to get up and march in formation.
After listening to songs for many years, her parents thought Chi Xiaoxue had grown up and should listen to songs young people liked. So they started playing rap and rock all day, making Chi Xiaoxue’s head hurt, but she couldn’t say anything.
Later, Chi Xiaoxue’s only good friend, Yi Yi, finally reached the age where she started reading romance novels. That’s when Chi Xiaoxue finally discovered the ultimate joy of her vegetative life.
At Yi Yi’s suggestion, her parents began playing various romance novels for her. They were pleasantly surprised to find that when listening to novels, Chi Xiaoxue had the strongest reactions. She would smile and cry along with the characters’ fates. Once, she even sighed during a misunderstanding plot between the male and female leads.
From then on, her parents stopped playing songs and played all kinds of audiobooks for her every day.
Initially, when there were kissing scenes or the like, her parents would cover her ears. After she turned 18, she was allowed to listen to a bit of romantic and slightly steamy content, but only above the neck.
So even though Chi Xiaoxue had stopped formal schooling after age 7, she always considered herself very learned, having “listened extensively” to a wide range of books.
Based on her vast knowledge reserve, she was now quite certain she had transmigrated into a sci-fi novel. But because she had listened to too many books indiscriminately or simply hadn’t paid attention, she wasn’t too clear about the plot direction of this particular book, and the characters still felt a bit unfamiliar.
However, based on the conversation between the father and daughter just now, Chi Xiaoxue confirmed this was the regular plot of a transmigration novel. She was the transmigrator, so she must be the female lead.
And the male lead seemed quite handsome and well-off, plus there was a beautiful three-year-old child.
All the elements were in place—the “stepmother in a wealthy family” trope. She was familiar with it.
It’s quite popular now—the female lead transmigrates, then lives a beautiful, laid-back life in a mansion, served by dozens of butlers and maids, and eventually both the husband and child fall in love with her.
Just thinking about it makes life seem to be getting better.
But there’s a variable here: she’s not a human now; she’s a robot.
Among all the novels she’s listened to before, she hasn’t come across one with a robot female lead. But Chi Xiaoxue optimistically thought it shouldn’t be a big problem. Actually, a human-robot romance could be quite romantic too.
She remained silent and optimistic in this way. The self-driving car came to a stop in front of a house.
The man turned his head and said to her, “Moji, we’re home.”
Chi Xiaoxue looked out through the automatically rising car door and saw a three-story small western-style house. It had a red roof and white walls, with dense green shrubs about waist-high planted around the yard gate.
It wasn’t the kind of private estate with a golf course from the novels, nor were there rows of servants and butlers lined up to welcome them.
But Chi Xiaoxue thought it wasn’t a big deal. After all, it was at least a three-story detached house, which would be considered a villa in her original world.
Carrying the small silver suitcase she brought from the tech company, she followed the male lead and his daughter into the small yard of the western-style house. Seeing the various fruits and vegetables planted in the yard, she paused again.
Isn’t this a wealthy family?
Did we directly switch to the agriculture channel?
“You’re back?” A woman wearing an apron appeared at the door of the western-style house. She had a good temperament and wore a proper Chinese-style long dress, but one could still tell she was older, around fifty or sixty.
While speaking, she was holding a handful of green beans and trimming them.
“Mm.” The male lead nodded, then turned to look at Chi Xiaoxue and said to the apron-wearing woman, “This is Moji.”
The apron-clad woman, still holding the beans, didn’t move. She just stared fixedly at Chi Xiaoxue’s face for a while, said nothing, then turned and walked into the house.
Chi Xiaoxue wasn’t sure if it was her imagination, but she felt the apron-clad woman seemed somewhat unhappy.
However, she confirmed one thing: the apron-clad woman definitely wasn’t a housekeeper or servant. In romance novels, housekeepers usually say things like, “This is the first time the young master has brought a woman home.”
They definitely wouldn’t be as indifferent as this apron-clad woman.
Chi Xiaoxue was a bit confused, wondering, Where exactly have I transmigrated to?
“Moji, I’ll take you to see your room,” the male lead said after entering the house.
From the moment she transmigrated until now, Chi Xiaoxue hadn’t spoken a single word. It wasn’t that she didn’t dare to speak, but after lying in bed for 16 years, her language system seemed to have deteriorated.
Just like earlier, she clearly wanted to respond with a “好 (Okay),” but when the sound surged to her throat, it felt as if it was blocked. She was so close to making a sound, yet just a tiny bit off—as if separated by a membrane—she just couldn’t get it out.
Maybe regular robots were also relatively quiet, so the male lead didn’t find it strange either. He directly pushed open a bedroom door and walked in.
It was a rectangular bedroom. Against the wall beside the window was a single bed—it looked like a single bed, yet not quite. There were no sheets, quilts, or bedding on the bed, just a pure white bed frame.
Chi Xiaoxue kept staring at the bed. The male lead then explained, “This is a charging bed. I haven’t set it up. If you need sheets or those things, you can decorate it according to your preference.”
“Ha… okay.” This time, she finally made a sound.
Under the window were a desk and chair. Opposite the foot of the bed was a small wardrobe, not very large. The wardrobe door was open, and inside was empty.
Other than that, there were no other pieces of furniture in the room. The walls were covered with simple light-yellow wallpaper with a subtle pattern. The curtains had a small yellow check pattern. It was a very simple, clean room.
But the view outside the window was quite nice. The half-open glass window faced a large tree with dancing shadows, bright light—it felt very comfortable.
“This is the bathroom.”
The male lead said, pushing open another door. Inside was a bathroom tiled with white ceramic, with a sink, toilet, and a small bathtub.
But there was another door on the other side of the bathroom. Chi Xiaoxue pointed at that door, wanting to ask what was behind it, but she couldn’t manage longer sentences. She just pointed at the door, wanting to speak but unable to, looking somewhat anxious.
The male lead immediately understood what she meant. “Are you asking what’s behind that door? That leads to Zhibai’s room. Your language system is still in the process of slowly activating. Don’t worry, take your time.”
Chi Xiaoxue felt this male lead spoke very gently, unhurried, and his voice was pleasant too, with a kind of soothing magic.
Hearing him say that, strangely, she wasn’t anxious anymore.
She was still staring at that door. The male lead then said, “We won’t visit Zhibai’s room for now. We’ll look another time after getting her permission.”
“Do you want to see my room?” A crisp little voice sounded from behind.
Chi Xiaoxue turned around and saw the pretty little curly-haired girl leaning against the doorframe, revealing a fluffy little head as she looked at her.
“Xi… xi…” Chi Xiaoxue tried twice but ultimately gave up on speaking, just nodding instead.
“Then take a look.” The little curly-haired girl walked into the bathroom on her short legs and directly pushed open that door.
“Go ahead and look. I’ll go help Ms. Zhang prepare lunch.”
The male lead didn’t follow them into the bedroom. From behind, he added, “Moji, once you’re done, take a bath first. There should be shower gel in the silver suitcase you brought. I’ll put the towels on the bed for you in a bit.”
The child’s room was the same size and layout as Chi Xiaoxue’s, but this side had much more stuff. The bed was made with blue and white striped bedding, cartoon stickers were on the wall, a brown teddy bear sat on the study chair… everywhere was full of life.
Chi Xiaoxue felt that living in this room would be very happy.
She wanted to say she’d decorate her own room nicely too, but she couldn’t manage such a long sentence, so she just silently thought about it in her heart.
After touring the child’s room, they went back through the bathroom connecting the two bedrooms to Chi Xiaoxue’s side. Sure enough, two neatly folded white towels were on the bed.
Chi Xiaoxue remembered the male lead’s instruction: take a bath.
She laid the small silver suitcase flat on the charging bed, unzipped it, revealing the contents inside. There were some small bottles and jars, with words written on them.
Chi Xiaoxue had just started first grade before becoming vegetative, so she knew some simple Chinese characters, but not many. During her over ten years as a vegetative patient, she forgot even those few simple characters.
So now she was illiterate.
She picked up a pink frosted glass bottle, unscrewed it, and sniffed it. She couldn’t smell anything. Maybe robots didn’t have a sense of smell.
The little curly-haired girl came closer, leaned down, sniffed it, and told her, “This is watermelon scent.”
“What… what?” Chi Xiaoxue shook the bottle in her hand. She actually wanted to ask the child what the stuff in the bottle was for, but clearly, the child misunderstood.
The child stretched out both arms and drew a circle in front of her. “Watermelon is like this, round, big, green skin, and red flesh inside when cut open.”
Chi Xiaoxue simply arranged all the bottles and jars together, rubbed her hands on her arms in a washing motion, and pointed at the bottles, asking, “Which… bubbles?”
“Oh, oh, you want shower gel, right?” The child was quite smart and could understand what Chi Xiaoxue meant even with her limited speech.
The little illiterate child, not yet in kindergarten, stood in front of the bed, picked up each bottle one by one for a careful inspection, then cautiously picked up a tube of gel. Completely unable to read the words [Special Adhesive for Bionic Skin] written on it, she confidently handed it to Chi Xiaoxue:
“This one.”
Chi Xiaoxue placed the [Special Adhesive for Bionic Skin] with the white towels, then put the remaining bottles and jars back into the silver suitcase.
Holding the towels and adhesive, as she walked toward the bathroom, she turned back and said to the child, “Xie… Xie, thank you.”