Reborn With A System: Your Bragging Lies; My Fortune

CHAPTER 5 - WHAT SU WAN KNOWS

LIN FENG'S POV

The phone slipped clean out of my hand and cracked against the kitchen tile, the screen splitting into a spiderweb of fractures right as her message finally loaded.

I dropped to my knees, ignoring the sharp bite of broken tile against my skin, and snatched the phone back up with fingers that would not cooperate. The screen still worked, thank God. The crack ran diagonally across the glass, but the text underneath was still readable.

“Vivian isn't just planning to embarrass you tomorrow. She's planning something bigger. I heard her on the phone with Ryan two days ago. They're bringing someone Ryan owes money to, and I think they mean to use you to pay part of it off.”

I stayed frozen on the floor, my knees pressed against the shattered tile, staring at those words until they blurred together.

Ryan was in debt?

That was the first thought that hit me. The second was worse, they wanted to use me to pay for it.

I read the message again, slower this time, searching for some detail that would make it sound less serious. Maybe Su Wan had misunderstood. Maybe Vivian and Ryan were planning another cruel joke, something designed to humiliate me in front of everyone at the reunion.

But the more I read it, the harder it became to convince myself that was all it was.

In my old life, I had never known Ryan was in debt. He had always carried himself like money was the least of his problems, flashing a new watch every few months and bragging about investments that never seemed to go anywhere concrete.

I had believed every word of it, of course I had, that was the kind of fool I had been.Ryan had known exactly how to make me believe him. He had been my best friend for years. Whenever he talked about money, connections, or his family's business, I had never thought to question him.

Why would I? I had trusted him more than I trusted myself. 

My thumb moved quickly across the cracked screen. “How do you know this? Why are you telling me?”

The reply came slower this time, like she was choosing her words with more care. “I used to like him a long time ago, before I understood what he actually was. I still hear things because his cousin works with my sister. I'm telling you because what he's planning isn't just cruel, it's dangerous, and nobody in that room is going to stop it if it happens.”

I sat back against the kitchen cabinet, my heart pounding as my mind spun through every version of tomorrow night I had imagined since waking up in this second chance.

I had pictured cruelty and humiliation. The same tired insults about my empty bank account and my dead father. I had pictured Ryan laughing while everyone else joined in, just like they had before.

But I had not pictured real danger. I had not expected money owed to people I didn't know to become part of the reunion and I certainly hadn't expected my name to be involved.

“What do they want from me?” I typed.

The answer came almost immediately. “I don't know. Just be careful. Whatever you're planning, because I can tell from that message you sent in the group chat that you're planning something, don't underestimate how far Ryan will go when he's desperate. He's not the boy you remember.”

I stared at the last sentence. He's not the boy you remember neither was I, the thought came quietly, almost without permission.

The Ryan I remembered was the boy who had sat beside me during school lunches, borrowed money from me when he was short, and promised that we'd both make it someday. But that version of Ryan had disappeared long before I died, maybe I had simply been too blind to notice.

I set the phone down beside me and pressed both hands against my face, breathing hard as I tried to fit these new pieces into a picture that had already been complicated enough.

Someone had whispered in Ryan's ear the night he killed me. Now I was learning that Ryan had hidden debts and Vivian was involved. Somehow, they were planning to bring someone into the reunion who could turn those debts into my problem.

None of it made sense on its own. Together, it painted a picture far uglier than the simple story I had carried for ten years, the story of a jealous friend who snapped and shoved me into traffic out of spite.

But was that really all it had been?

I thought about the stranger's message from earlier. I had dismissed it as impossible because accepting it meant questioning everything I thought I knew about my own death.

Now, for the first time, I wasn't sure what to believe, maybe there had been more behind Ryan's actions. Maybe there hadn't. Either way, I wasn't going to walk into tomorrow night assuming everyone around me was harmless.

I picked the phone back up. My hands were steadier now, the fear settling into something colder. “Thank you for telling me this.”

The reply appeared after a short pause. “Just don't go tomorrow, Lin Feng. Please.”

Staring at the four small letters of my own name carried more concern than almost anyone outside Cheng Ye had shown me in years. For a moment, something inside me softened.

Su Wan and I had never been particularly close in my old life. We had been classmates, nothing more. I remembered her as someone who watched more than she spoke, someone who never seemed impressed by the people who spent their lives showing off.

But I already knew my answer before I typed it. “I have to go. There are things I need to settle. But I promise to be careful.”

The three dots appeared and disappeared several times before her final message came through, it was shorter than the rest.

 “Then I'll be there too. Someone should be watching your back, since it doesn't sound like anyone else will.”