"Hello, Host. This is Book-Transmigration System No. 1328 at your service."
Silence.
"Welcome to our big family of book transmigrators. From this point onward, we will be mutually bound. In the world of the book, we will support each other and work together to complete the missions assigned by the Book Transmigration Bureau."
Silence.
"The novel we're entering this time is called… Host?"
Silence.
"Type 1 to confirm receipt."
Silence.
"Host? Host, did you fall asleep?"
Silence.
"I just checked your vital signs. Host, please stop playing dead. I know you're awake."
"…"
Only after hearing that did Chu Yu finally open his eyes at a glacial pace, about as fast as a sloth in a slow-motion movie scene.
"…"
One human and one System stared at each other, wide-eyed, for a full ten seconds before Chu Yu murmured dreamily, "Hello."
So sleepy. So tired. What even was this? Hadn't he been rammed to death by a van two minutes ago? Why could he still hear a human voice after dying? Terrifying.
"…" The System stared at the Host in front of it, hesitating over whether it should remind him that it could hear everything he was thinking.
Chu Yu silently and laboriously stared at the glowing ball in front of him for a while, waiting for it to speak and carry the conversation. Nothing came for a long time. Instead, he heard a burst of sizzling electrical short-circuit noises.
"…There seems to be a small BUG in the transmigration system, but it's nothing serious. I'll take you into the book's world first."
The instant the System finished speaking, Chu Yu's entire body went whoosh and twisted into a vortex. In the second before he lost consciousness, he heard the System say beside his ear:
"The book we're about to enter is a Boys’ Love novel about an entertainment-industry idol survival show. It's called Rise to Center Stage—The Domineering Crown Prince Falls in Love with Me."
"It's a… uh, melodramatic youth-pain novel full of dog-blood drama, crematorium regret, angst, and a painfully addictive romance."
–
Chu Yu spent quite a while failing to process this setup.
First, he had been hit and killed by a van.
Second, after dying, he had transmigrated into a book.
Third, he had become Cannon-Fodder Trainee A in this novel.
Cannon-Fodder A differed from both the protagonist top and protagonist bottom, and also from Cannon-Fodders B, C, and D. He occupied that sort of role that had a little page time but not much. He was called cannon fodder because every bit of his plot existed to create trouble for the protagonists and cue the next event. For example: the protagonist fell into trouble, and he cheered; the second male lead stabbed someone in the back, and he handed him the knife; the villain caused a disaster, and he pulled the switch. Always conscientious, always on the front line, always the brightest background prop at the scene of the crime.
Chu Yu swiftly flipped through the entire novel inside his mind and picked out every plot point involving his character, including but not limited to stabbing the protagonist in the back three times, fabricating six malicious rumors about the protagonist, making sarcastic digs at the protagonist to his face twelve times, and framing various supporting characters through similar methods an unspecified number of times. Every day, he was either causing trouble or on his way to cause trouble. In his limited page time, virtually every character avoided him like the plague.
Chu Yu: …
What a lunatic. Why do that much work when no one was even paying him a salary?
Wasn't there a character who was even more thoroughly cannon fodder? The kind who could start the story by pulling a little blanket over himself, lie there all day, and have no one notice?
"Cannon-Fodder D more or less matches your requirements, but Cannon-Fodder A has a greater influence on moving the plot forward. I believe your potential, Host, makes you more deserving of Role A."
Wait.
Chu Yu's thoughts stalled.
How does it know what I'm thinking?
"Host, we're in a binding relationship. Normally, I reside inside your mind, so I can hear whatever you think."
"…"
When Chu Yu remained silent for a long time, the System comforted him. "It's all right, Host. Just think of me as an accessory attached to your brain. You're free to think or say whatever you like."
Chu Yu did not answer. With his eyes half closed, he looked as though he might be sleeping or thinking. At last, as if accepting reality, he nodded and politely reminded it in his mind:
It might get a little noisy for you.
System: "?"
Before it could figure out what Chu Yu meant, they landed in the world of the book the next second, inside the very first setting in the novel—a trainee lounge just after auditions had ended.
According to the information in the book, the Cannon-Fodder A played by Chu Yu had some backing among the trainees. His entertainment company ranked fairly high in the industry, and he had already accumulated a group of fans before joining the survival show. That popularity had allowed the original owner of the body to bully others even more brazenly inside the camp. Most colleagues he tormented early on were furious but did not dare speak out. That continued until the protagonist bottom—a pure, delicate little white flower from a fallen family who was nevertheless stubborn and unyielding—bravely stepped forward to accuse him of his crimes. From then on, Cannon-Fodder A began a career of targeting the protagonist only to be slapped in the face in every conceivable way.
Chu Yu was not yet used to his new identity as an energetic, scheming, vicious man. It was far too different from his usual capybara-like state, where blinking took three seconds, drinking a glass of water took three minutes, and if the world ended he would rather just lie down and sleep.
He poked the System in his mind.
What's my transmigration mission?
Playing a villain and maneuvering around people every day was exhausting. The tangled relationship web was more complicated than his entire life. If all he had to do was cue plot developments, he could manage that. He could buy a timed loudspeaker to speak for him, prerecord the slander and sarcastic lines, and play them at the right times. He himself would not even have to show up. The thought would count.
But the System fell silent for a moment before answering.
"The mission from above hasn't been sent down yet. Actually, the Book Transmigration Bureau has a tradition: the Host personally draws their own mission. We usually call it…" the System said, "a Surprise Box."
Chu Yu: ?
"Host, are you usually lucky?"
If I were lucky, I wouldn't have been rammed to death by a van and ended up here, Chu Yu thought.
Besides, while alive, he had loved all kinds of gacha games. If there was a pity system, he always had to hit hard pity. If there was no pity, he sank without a trace. After more than ten years as a veteran black hole of bad luck, his heart toward blind boxes had long ago grown as cold as the knife of a supermarket fishmonger who had spent forty years gutting fish.
He had a bad feeling. The System was still reminding him inside his mind, "Host, there's still some time before the mission-card blind box arrives from above. Why don't we go out and investigate the situation first?"
They were currently at the very beginning of the novel's plot. Neither the protagonist pair nor the various cannon fodder characters had appeared yet. Working backward from the opening chapter's description of the protagonists' debut stage, they should still be before the official recording of Episode One.
But Chu Yu did not want to open the door.
The empty little room in front of him was like a beginner village, and Chu Yu was the slacker player stubbornly refusing to leave the village with an NPC and go fight monsters.
"Host, why aren't you going out?"
"I'm scared I'll run into humans."
"?"
Suddenly, a violent pounding on the door interrupted their conversation. Chu Yu's body stiffened. He instinctively shifted slightly backward and waited for the person outside to open the door themselves.
Meanwhile, his brain spun at high speed, trying desperately to suppress the urge to scream.
"Anyone in there? Is nobody inside?" A woman's voice came from outside, followed by the sound of the doorknob turning. "Chu Yu? Your name's Chu Yu, right?"
Fuck. An NPC came over on their own to cue the plot. Terrifying.
It's okay, it's okay. Only one person. My brain can handle that load.
Chu Yu did not even dare move his eyeballs.
The door finally opened. The staff member in uniform spotted him. "Oh, so you are here. Why didn't you answer?"
She strode over to him, grabbed his arm, and said, "Come with me. I'll take you to the main hall."
The main hall. The main hall? The main hall!!!
A place that, just from the name, obviously had lots of humans gathered together!!
Chu Yu's vision went dark. He instinctively entered standby mode and looked ready to keel over.
As the staff lady dragged him outside, the System was clattering away at something inside his mind while muttering to itself.
"Strange. The System keeps showing a BUG, but why can't I find it?"
Inside the survival-show hall.
The hellscape Chu Yu had imagined—hundreds of people packed noisily across the whole room—was nowhere to be seen. Only four or five trainees who had passed the audition had arrived so far. They sat together, exchanging information and whispering into one another's ears.
"One of the staff ladies told me they'll be adding another trainee to our group."
"I heard too. Apparently he's Tianxing Entertainment's main push. His name is Chu Yu."
"What? Chu Yu?! Our luck is awful!"
"What's wrong with him?"
"You don't know?" The trainee speaking cautiously looked around. "That guy is terrifying. He put nails inside the shoes of a trainee from his own company and injured his foot so badly he couldn't even come to the show."
"Holy shit? That scary?"
"He's got tons of dirt on him. Someone behind him just keeps suppressing it. He's gone after every trainee from his cohort who's better than him. He also leads people in ostracizing and bullying others. A trainee from his company even told me there used to be a staff member there who offended Chu Yu and ended up being forced to quit."
"Oh my God, I'm scared. How did we get grouped with someone like that…?"
"God bless us. Please don't let him come after the four of us…"
The instant those words fell, footsteps sounded from the corridor. The four trainees immediately lowered their gazes and fell silent, afraid of angering a troublemaker and bringing a pile of problems down on themselves.
The staff member soon stopped in front of them, pulling along a tall, slender young man. Someone in the middle could not resist lifting his eyes to observe the person standing behind her.
His appearance was exceptional. Delicate eyes and brows, a straight nose, deep-set features, and cool white skin made him look mixed-race. There was also a memorable beauty mark beneath his lower eyelid, softening his naturally cold, arrogant aura with a faintly seductive gentleness.
Both his skin-deep looks and bone structure were flawless, with the latter perhaps even better. He was the kind of face born for the camera, one in a hundred, with no weak angle no matter how he was filmed.
No wonder his company kept pushing him even with a personality this awful…
Thinking this, Jing Yan lowered his eyes and did not dare look again.
Then, in the very next second, a piercing explosion of sound tore through the oppressive air, stabbed through everyone's eardrums, and spiraled all the way up toward the ceiling.
[AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH HUMANS! SO MANY HUMANS! LEVEL-ONE ALERT! LEVEL-ONE ALERT!!!]
Everyone in the hall except Chu Yu looked bewildered.
The strikingly handsome troublemaker himself stood perfectly still with a cold expression. His faintly furrowed brows and half-lidded eyes made him look vaguely impatient.
Silence returned to the room. After that little incident, the atmosphere even became somewhat uncanny.
Several people arrived at the same thought at once.
