Given his lover's consistent paranoia about his safety, Chen Yu knew how severe the twins' reaction to his death would be. This awareness made him somewhat uncomfortable, particularly when the memory of Lu Guanting's madness overlapped with the relatively well-behaved brothers' faces.
But since he couldn't go back, he motioned for the system to start the next world immediately, intending to make it up to him this time.
Surprisingly, however, he was denied access.
The mechanical voice sounded a beat later. "The host's emotional state has temporarily been deemed unfit for carrying out the task. Please wait in this space until further notification."
There had never been such a situation before. Usually, the system was only too eager to rush him off. His interest triggered, Chen Yu probed, "What's the estimate on how long I'll be stuck here?"
Following a short pause, the system responded, "Due to the complexity of human behavior, there is not enough data to form a reliable estimate. Please be patient."
Before Chen Yu could ask more, a beeping sound signaled that the system had gone offline.
At this evasion, Chen Yu narrowed his eyes and rested his chin on his hand, humming thoughtfully.
While it was true that he wasn't unaffected, he was certain that it wasn't to the point of being incapable. His mental condition couldn't be the problem, so there was either an issue with the system's detection mechanism or an external factor preventing his transfer.
Of the two, Chen Yu judged the latter to be more likely, considering the fact that there hadn't been any extraordinary events that could explain a system malfunction.
In addition to its intrinsically supernatural functions, his system should have the backing of an extensive network based on its mentions of introductory mission phases and system models. Yet this indefinite wait indicated that whatever was causing the delay was clearly something the system in all its glory could only accommodate and not fix.
And the timing of this anomaly was rather intriguing. The trouble had occurred so soon after his lover's soul had split into two bodies…It was likely that the two things were related.
Chen Yu mused on these matters for some time, then lay down to rest. Anyway, the system wouldn't confirm or deny anything, so there was little point speculating. It would be better to just check for himself what impact this had had on his lover.
Thus, when an unknown amount of time passed and the system finally returned, he cooperatively entered the next plane right away.
---
The instant he woke up, a confusing mix of feverish heat and chills assaulted him, and an overwhelming sense of nausea swirled in the pit of his stomach.
About to automatically use his golden finger to shield off the discomfort, the numerous expensive medical machines he could barely distinguish through his blurred vision made Chen Yu pause.
To have gathered so many hospital-grade devices in a private bedroom suggested both that his condition was quite critical and that his status was very high. Yet there was no one around, not even a servant, to personally look after him.
It was as if the original owner was someone who could be neglected except for his physical health.
For the sake of satisfying his curiosity about this situation, Chen Yu put aside the pain and accepted the plot.
His identity in this world was Lei Xinxiu, a 16-year-old younger generation of the huge powerhouse that was Lei Jia. While he and his elder twin brother Lei Xinzhen had been orphaned very early, their lives as the main branch's sole children were indeed well-provided for.
Unfortunately, Lei Xinzhen and Lei Xinxiu both suffered from multiple organ failure syndrome due to injuries from the car accident that had killed their parents. Even with the Lei family's power, there was no way to cure the disease, they could only pay for the best care.
The silver lining was that the boys were rarely ill at the same time, reducing their caretakers' anxiety. Moreover, as they grew older, Lei Xinzhen's health gradually improved, so much so that by the time he was old enough to be a high school freshman, he was well enough to attend classes with other students for the first time.
Suppressing his reflexive twitch at the mention of twins, Chen Yu rubbed his eyes to glance at his surroundings.
The original owner's room was very big, but most of the space was occupied by monitors, IV machines, and examination instruments. There was even a glass wall, through which he could discern a sterile, fully-equipped operating area. The few personal items he could see were also high-quality, there was no hint of stinting.
In contrast, his comfort had been neglected in small yet significant ways.
Along with a bed too high for him to climb down from securely, he had been left with no water within reach and arms covered with scarred needle marks, there wasn't even a bell to call someone over. Presumably, it was enough for his keepers that any emergency would be noticed through his remotely tracked vital signs.
Faced with such obvious clues, it wasn't hard to understand why the brothers' health seemed inversely proportional to each other. The original owner was almost certainly being used as a human filter for Lei Xinzhen.
But why had Lei Xinxiu been so irrevocably abandoned? It couldn't be just because he was the younger son and not the heir—with their medical history, either of the twins could die at any time, so it only made sense to keep a spare, especially in an influential family.
Chen Yu curled his lips in interest and continued on to examine the rest of the storyline.
Despite his inexperience in dealing with his peers, Lei Xinzhen quickly adapted to life at Donghua Academy.
His superb academic performance stood out even in this elite escalator school thanks to Lei Jia's strict private education, and combined with his slightly sickly yet handsome looks, there was absolutely no hitch in his rise to becoming the campus's male god.
It was here that this slash world truly began.
Before Lei Xinzhen's transfer, the top figure had been Kan Yawei. Although he was a rare scholarship student, this youth was very popular, it was to the point that he was widely acknowledged to be the embodiment of everything good, from intelligence and responsibility to independence and beauty. Obviously, he was the destined shou.
As they say, like attracts like. After entangling each other for months, these two people above the common herd naturally became a couple.
Except for the trouble of keeping their love a secret due to society's prejudice against same-sex relationships, their road was smooth and sweet. Even the most concerning aspect of how Chun'yu Dao, the Lei twins' guardian, would react was easily resolved by the man's utter indifference.
In this harmonious atmosphere, Lei Xinxiu emerged to prevent the plot from becoming too dull.
Scanning through the original owner's actions, Chen Yu raised his brows, wondering if the system had accidentally assigned him a second male lead character. A second later, however, the body's ending convinced him that his role remained firmly in the cannon fodder category.
Essentially, Lei Xinxiu served to promote the shou's universal attractiveness, fix the gong's life-threatening disease, and exit conveniently.
Lei Xinxiu became involved in events after Kan Yawei visited Lei Jia. Having been blinded at the first glimpse by the shou's shining halo, Lei Xinxiu desperately stabilized his health and entered Donghua Academy in order to be closer to his crush.
But the same high school debut that had launched Lei Xinzhen into the skies pushed Lei Xinxiu into an abyss. In the end, the original owner died without even knowing that he had been designed from the start.
Having grasped most of the backstory, Chen Yu didn't open his golden finger right away and instead reflected for a moment.
There were several points which the plot left unexplained—for instance, how could the traditional Lei Jia not oppose its heir being gay, and how had an unconcerned guardian like Chun'yu Dao, who appeared to be a mere medical researcher, kept the twins safe from any ambitious branch families' schemes? It wasn't as if the brothers had had grandparents to protect them.
More significantly, there was a brief scene in Lei Xinxiu's early childhood memory that made no sense. All Chen Yu could distinguish from the confusing flashes were rows of armed men and a screaming woman, neither of which fit into the rest of the original owner's life.
But no matter how odd these points were, there was little point dwelling on them, so he shifted his attention to how far things had progressed. Luck was on his side for once; when he had crossed, the original owner had already been infatuated with Kan Yawei but was still too sick to attend school, leaving him free to search out his lover.
Even better, his character this time was fairly nondescript, because Lei Xinxiu hadn't encountered others often enough that they had formed any significant impression of him yet. Accordingly, the regulation against going OOC probably wouldn't apply in this plane.
Since that was the case, he didn't bother to converge on his personality. There were so many fun mysteries waiting for him, it wouldn't do to miss them because he was bed-bound.
Eager to get started, he therefore lazily stretched, unhesitatingly pulled out all his IV lines, and got to work.
---
In a lab not far away, rows of computers suddenly blared out urgent calls that a subject required immediate aid.
Startled by the abrupt loss of signal from every instrument at the same time, the research assistant on duty rushed to open the camera function, but she couldn't pick out anything through the shattered lens.
More startling was that not only had the machine's prominent camera been destroyed, the hidden monitors in the room had also been broken. This definitely hadn't been caused by the patient striking out during an episode.
Despite her surprise at how the usually quiet 004 was making a fuss, the woman followed protocol to call in doctors and nurses and, as an added measure, submitted a report to the team leader that the subject was displaying abnormal behavior. While it wasn't unusual for invalids to act out, she wouldn't endanger her job by doing anything to risk being accused of withholding information.
When his secretary relayed this update on case 004, Chun'yu Dao was just finishing a dissection, his narrowed eyes obscured by safety glasses.
That subject should be his nominal ward and, more importantly, his rarest specimen. For now, he hadn't managed to find any similar subject, so he restrained his annoyance at the trouble and nodded to indicate he would visit Lei Jia, tapping his bloody fingers on the cold metal operating table.