"Eliana Quinn, why are you in my bed?"

The sweet scent lingering in the hotel suite hit her first, then came the man’s low, gravelly voice right by her ear—sharp, annoyed, and about as subtle as the eight-pack on his stomach.

Eliana blinked hard, dazed.

Just a few seconds ago, her past-life memories had crashed back all at once.

She used to be an overworked office grunt, and right before she finally got promoted, she suddenly dropped dead. Then she opened her eyes and boom—she’d been reborn into a novel she’d once read.

Good news: she was the real daughter of a top-tier wealthy family.

Bad news: the novel’s title was *“The Fake Heiress Loved by All the Rich Tycoons.”*

"…"

In the novel, the fake heiress’s mother, desperate to give her own child a luxurious life, secretly swapped the babies.

The fake one got to be the pampered princess of a rich family.

Meanwhile, Eliana was taken to the countryside, where she learned to shovel manure and feed pigs before she even learned long division.

Every time her adoptive mother lost money at mahjong, she’d take it out on her—making her sleep in the pigsty in the dead of winter, yelling that girls were more trouble than they were worth.

If this were the Eliana from her past life, she would’ve snapped back, “You’re so obsessed with having a boy—why don’t you go hang yourself and grow one? Or kneel and kowtow a few times; maybe you’ll pop out three kids in two years. Either way, you’re prickly as a cactus no matter which side we look at!”

But the truth didn’t surface until Eliana turned twelve.

When the Quinns saw their daughter curled up inside a filthy pigpen, their hearts shattered on the spot.

The tiny, bony girl had folded herself into a ball. Fiona Quinn tried to scoop her up, but Eliana shrank back, whispering that she was dirty and she’d have to pay if she stained anyone’s clothes.

Fiona broke down crying, swearing she would drag that heartless woman straight to jail.

But the adoptive mother played the victim immediately.

“I can’t go to jail! If I’m locked up, who’s gonna look after my daughter? Leave her with you rich folks? No way! What if you poison her to get rid of her?”

The Quinns would never drag innocent people down with them, but they truly had no reason to keep raising the fake daughter anymore. Looking at the so‑called mother and daughter, with their faces practically copy‑pasted from each other, it was obvious that any future interaction would be awkward at best.

Out of the twelve years they’d spent together, the Quinn family could at most agree to cover the fake daughter’s tuition and living expenses on a regular basis. And thanks to the forced‑drama plotline, the Quinns even backed down and accepted the adoptive mother’s tearful plea to turn herself in on the fake daughter’s eighteenth birthday.

But in the novel, the adoptive mother faced zero legal consequences.

Because right before the fake daughter became an adult, the woman somehow saved Haicheng’s richest man and then married straight into a wealthy family. With the tycoon’s overwhelming power behind her, he hired top‑tier lawyers to defend her, and she not only walked free but even smeared the Quinns afterward.

The fake daughter became everyone’s precious darling in high society. Not only did her so‑called brothers and uncles shower her with affection, but a swarm of male side characters practically lined up to worship her.

A notorious playboy cleaned up his act for her.

A top actor willingly stood at her side.

Even Eliana Quinn’s own fiancé fell for the fake daughter at first sight, offering her connections and resources without hesitation.

But the fake daughter felt no gratitude toward the Quinns whatsoever. If anything, she hated them to the bone.

She dragged the whole family onto a rich‑family reality show and constantly stepped on them to boost herself. By the end of the season, the Quinns had basically become public enemies, the kind people couldn’t wait to throw rotten tomatoes at.

Meanwhile, the fake daughter’s family lived in perfect harmony, and her career sparkled like a constellation.

Eliana Quinn had dropped the novel halfway for a reason.

"What kind of toxic story is this? A rich family crushing the law, a scheming protagonist winning at life?! And that so‑called ‘kind heroine’ kept cheating on me, setting me up, and dumping every mess on my head!"

The author had to be some kind of demon.

Eliana wailed internally.

Mom, you really had it rough!

"All these years you kept wiring money to Vivian Atkins on time. You paid her tuition, her living expenses—everything. And how did she repay you? By dragging our whole family into bankruptcy!"

Right now, on the first floor of the hotel, inside the banquet hall, Fiona Quinn was desperately worrying about borrowing money.

The bank had clearly agreed to the loan just yesterday, yet overnight they suddenly changed their stance. Even their long‑time business partners treated her like she was carrying some kind of plague—dodging her, avoiding eye contact. Borrowing money? Not a chance.

Just as Fiona was drowning in frustration, a sharp crackling sound blasted by her ear.

Her shoulders trembled.

Did… did someone just call her Mom?

She thought it was her imagination, but the voice rang out again.

"Dad, you got screwed too!"

"You’ve been doing honest research all your life, and they still smeared you for plagiarism! They even call you a freeloader! A man who married into the family!"

Fiona froze in shock.

She turned around and looked at her husband, Ethan Quinn, who was standing in the corner scribbling out a math equation like always, avoiding socializing.

Their eyes met mid‑air—Ethan was staring back at her with the exact same stunned expression.

The two instantly understood.

This wasn’t an illusion.

They were hearing their daughter’s inner voice.

—

Meanwhile, Eliana Quinn had zero clue that her thoughts were leaking all over the place.

She was rubbing her nose while trying to recall the plot.

"So tragic… my whole family’s a walking disaster!"

"They even went after our Lucky… and cooked him!"

The moment the image popped up—Lucky wagging his tail like a goofy little idiot right before getting betrayed—Eliana Quinn’s eyes instantly welled up.

Right then, a tiny childish voice chimed in, "Host, please don’t cry!"

Eliana burst into louder sobs.

Great.

She was officially devastated enough to start hearing things.

"It’s not a hallucination!" the little voice insisted.

"I’m the Supporting-Character Survival System! Since the main cast has gotten more and more twisted and the side characters pitiful enough to make readers cry, boom—I was created!"

"You, host, can tweak the original plot with homophone tricks and save yourself and your whole family!"

Eliana blinked through her tears, stunned for a second.

Homophones?

In her last life, she had been a stand‑up comedian—surviving in that chaotic, blink-and-you’re-gone comedy scene—and the audience had crowned her the Queen of Punny Wordplay.

Nothing about her past was impressive.

Orphan.

Barely clawed her way into a mid‑tier university thanks to mountains of practice exams.

Got stuck in a farm‑animal nursing major of all things.

Honestly, nothing to brag about.

Except puns.

Puns were absolutely her home turf.

Eliana’s eyes lit up. "That’s awesome!"

"What's awesome?"

A cold male voice cut through the air.

Eliana jerked her head around, only now realizing there was a half‑naked man sitting right beside her.

Her fiancé—Mitchell Blake.

She stared in confusion. "Why are you here?"

"This is actually my line to ask you."

Mitchell Blake shot her a sideways glance, his eyes turning even icier. "I really underestimated you. To force a marriage, you actually drugged me. No matter what you pull, the person I like is Vivian Atkins."

Eliana Quinn’s expression twisted into something complicated.

So before, under the plot’s control, she had genuinely loved Mitchell.

Could it be… the reason her whole family ended up miserably in the original story was because she fought the heroine over a guy?

"Mitchell Blake, let's break off the engagement. Right now."

Mitchell froze for a second, clearly not expecting those words to come out of her mouth first.

"Eliana Quinn, what trick are you playing now?"

Eliana sighed. "Honestly? I prefer guys who are, you know… vertically a bit more economical. And besides, even if you're standing in a pile of trash, you still don’t stand out."

Mitchell: "?"

Eliana looked at him sincerely. "Every time I look up at you, your two nostrils are aimed right at my face. It stresses me out. And stress doesn’t turn into motivation—it turns into a medical record. So let’s just call off the engagement, pig bro."

Mitchell: "???"

He’d been scouted on the streets more than once, and he’d been the school heartthrob since he was a kid.

So why the hell was he suddenly being compared to a pig?

Just then, footsteps echoed in the hotel hallway.

"Shh! It’s this room!"

"Mitchell Blake and his fiancée are inside. If we get a picture and prove Vivian Atkins is the third wheel, it’ll definitely blow up online!"

Hearing that, Eliana blinked.

Vivian Atkins—the fake daughter.

She couldn’t help mentally complaining:

I remember now. The ones outside are paparazzi.

[In the novel, once the paparazzi exposed my engagement to Mitchell Blake, Vivian Atkins instantly became the “other woman” and got roasted all the way to the trending list.]

[Her billionaire dad freaked out, dragged his whole family onto a reality show just to back her up, and even threatened to destroy the Quinns.]

[A bankrupt mom, a jailed dad, a broken brother, and me ending up miserable!]

[You only get one life, and apparently a whole load of ways to lose it! System, help me out here!]

Whether the system heard it or not was unclear, but Ethan Quinn and Fiona Quinn definitely caught every word.

Their whole family’s fate sounded way too tragic!

The two of them rushed out of the banquet hall, hurrying upstairs to find their daughter.

But… they were still a step too late.

"…"

Somehow, the paparazzi had gotten their hands on a master key card.

With a crisp beep, the door was about to swing open.

Right at that critical second, the system chimed in again.

[I’ll send you the original text now!]

[Original: When the paparazzi burst in, Eliana Quinn and Mitchell Blake couldn’t move at all, forced to sit and wait for death.]

[Your current level is low, so you can only change one single homophone.]

Hearing this, Ethan and Fiona were so anxious they practically spun in circles.

What homophone?

How were they supposed to change anything like this?

Just when the couple were racking their brains, their daughter’s voice rang out.

[A tiny plot twist for you—let me show you the true power of homophones! Change the “death” in “wait for death” to the “coin” in “wait for coins!”]

The Quinns: "!!!"

Wait for coins?

Honestly… that sounded kind of awesome!