Tang Can rapidly searched through the memories in his head. Once he understood exactly where his hundred-thousand monthly allowance had gone, he quickly realized that this was not something he could recover simply by calling the police.
In truth, the original host had initially wanted nothing more than to rise in status through his child and enjoy wealth and comfort. He had never seriously considered entering the entertainment industry.
Unfortunately, the Huo family had controlled the prenuptial agreement extremely tightly, and the original host’s life as the lavish spouse of a wealthy man differed wildly from what he had imagined.
He had a huge villa to live in, but it was so remote that even if he wanted to go flatter people at the Huo family’s old residence, the round-trip commute alone would take four hours.
He had a car and a driver, but it was merely a base-model Maybach worth a little over a million. The original host could not have afforded it himself, but that did not stop him from feeling humiliated that, after scheming his way into a wealthy family, this cheap car was all he got to drive.
And neither of those fixed assets fully belonged to him. The moment he divorced, the Huo family would take them back.
The only thing he could actually hold onto was the fixed hundred thousand deposited into his card every month. Then, after repeated persuasion from the Tang family, he replaced the driver and maternity nanny with Cheap Uncle and Cheap Grandma respectively.
To the Tang family, the original host had a driver’s license himself, so replacing the driver with one of their own was equivalent to picking up twenty thousand for free every month.
As for the maternity nanny, the Huo family had initially hired two. After Grandma Tang squeezed one of them out, the old woman came over, did neither childcare nor housework, and even put on the airs of an old madam while ordering the remaining nanny around until that woman was exhausted into quitting as well.
They had originally planned to call over a distant female cousin so she could make money too, but when the Huo family found out, they directly cut off the household staffing budget.
In the end, the distant cousin never came, but from then on, the original host had to pay both Uncle and Grandma’s wages himself.
And although the two of them collected their pay without fail, Cheap Uncle called off work nine days out of ten, while Cheap Grandma simply became “too exhausted and sick” to come at all. In short, the people could be absent, but the money absolutely could not be.
Uncle and Grandma together swallowed forty thousand a month. Add the other cheap relatives who occasionally came by to freeload, and the original host was barely left with forty or fifty thousand each month. Meanwhile, after marrying into wealth, his spending habits had soared. That amount was nowhere near enough for his daily expenses, which was why the Tang family had been able to push him toward chasing a career in entertainment.
On the surface, the entire family stood united, supporting his debut so he could crush the fake young master who had stolen his place and heartlessly ignored his poor relatives. In reality, they simply wanted to create more job openings around him.
Sure enough, before he had even officially appeared on the show, he already had a cousin-manager earning thirty thousand a month and a distant cousin waiting to be hired.
It truly was stealing a shared bicycle to ride to a bar—stingy where he should spend, lavish where he should save. With a three-year-old, the original host practically wanted to split a single cent into eight pieces, but when it came to the Tang-family trash, he became the God of Wealth himself. He had truly managed to spend every cent on the blade’s handle instead of the edge.
And that was not all. The moment Cheap Cousin became his manager, he invented a pretext and got the original host to mortgage the villa for more than five million.
The excuse was that they needed money to grease the right palms so he could become an overnight sensation, after which he would never again have to depend on the Huo family or suffer their contempt.
In reality, Cousin Manager was a double-dealing parasite making money from both sides. He had tricked the original host into taking the child onto the parenting show specifically so father and son could serve as stepping stones for the fake young master.
In the novel’s plot, forget becoming famous through the parenting show—the original host became the miserable comparison-group failure, he and the little future villain getting crushed into the mud beside the protagonist’s child and the fake young master.
The original host’s persona as the pampered spouse of a wealthy family collapsed, and his deranged child abuse was exposed as well. Not only did his hundred-thousand monthly allowance disappear, he was sent directly to prison.
And today, they were supposed to take promotional photos and record the pre-interview. The manager had deliberately told him the wrong time and instructed him to arrive later, intending to manufacture a scandal from the very beginning.
Even if Tang Can rushed over with the child right now, the other three groups would already be finished. Every staff member would be working overtime waiting for him. That blame was guaranteed to land squarely on his head.
So after canceling all the scheduled transfers, Tang Can immediately called the police. “Hello. My Maybach S480 has been stolen…”
*
At the same time, #Shining Little Ones Trial Broadcast# and #Tang Yichen’s Older Brother Is Late# shot onto the trending topics one after another.
【Holy crap, the so-called trial broadcast was actually an early livestream! Are they testing it now so they can use the footage in the edited version later? [cheering][cheering][cheering]】
【Jiaojiao really is undefeated youth itself. She’s had a child and still looks this good bare-faced~】
【AHHHHHHH Chen-baby is here!!! President Gu, the grudge of stealing my wife is irreconcilable! Is it even legal for Brother Yichen to be this handsome?!!!】
【Tang Yichen holding little Shengsheng’s hand is absolutely overflowing with married-man energy. My phantom dick just exploded—who gets me?】
…
【Wait, aren’t we still missing one guest family?】
【That Tang Can, right? The other groups are almost done filming and he still hasn’t arrived. What kind of backing does he have to be this arrogant?】
【Playing diva and arriving late on the very first livestream? Wow. Just wow.】
【He probably didn’t know the production team would suddenly do a trial livestream, so his true colors came right out. I’m dying…】
Seeing Tang Can trend under the label “Tang Yichen’s older brother,” Tang Yichen’s fans were the first to explode.
【What the hell? Is everyone sick? What do you mean “Tang Yichen’s older brother”? Does Tang Can not have his own name? They’re not even related by blood and he still has to cling on?】
【Exactly exactly. Anyone who didn’t know better would think Chen-baby told him to act like a diva. Our Chen-baby was the very first guest to arrive. He’s nothing like that classless Tang Can.】
【A poor nobody suddenly getting rich, that’s all. And after being raised by a family of trashy paupers like that, what kind of decent person could Tang Can possibly be?】
Once the topic reached the trending list, plenty of casual spectators who had not been following this new parenting show clicked in. Seeing the comment section uniformly dragging Tang Yichen’s so-called “older brother,” they naturally became curious about Tang Can too.
Unlike Tang Yichen, who had debuted as a child star and had been a famous second-generation celebrity since childhood, Tang Can had only briefly appeared in the public eye four years ago, when the mistaken-at-birth incident came to light.
Even though many people had heard the news about the Tang family’s switched children, few remembered that the other person involved was named Tang Can.
Although both sides had the surname Tang, their family circumstances were worlds apart. When the story first broke, most people sympathized with Tang Can, the unlucky child who should have grown up with a golden spoon in his mouth but had accidentally fallen into poverty instead.
But Tang Yichen had accumulated enormous goodwill with the general public since childhood, so very few people accused him of occupying someone else’s nest. At most, they sighed over the tricks of fate.
That lasted until Tang Yichen’s antis dug up the fact that after the families recognized the switch, he never once returned to the poor Tang household. When the poor Tang family went to find him, Tang Yichen’s wealthy adoptive parents drove them away. Tang Yichen did not even appear at his biological father’s burial.
Later, more stories emerged saying that the poor Tang family was morally rotten, that his biological father was an alcoholic, violent gambling scumbag, and that Tang Can—the boy that man had personally raised—had only managed to squeeze into a wealthy family by drugging an older rich man and using the child to gain status.
Even so, Tang Yichen, now the glorious male spouse of a family worth tens of billions, still had this tiny flaw staining an otherwise perfect jade-like reputation.
And right now Tang Yichen desperately needed an utterly spotless, positive public image. Only then could he take over the Gu family’s charitable enterprises from his wealthy mother-in-law and truly secure his footing and position within the Gu family.
That was precisely why Tang Can had been selected as a stepping stone. The more disgusting and unbearable Tang Can and the poor Tang family looked, the more any stain splashed onto Tang Yichen would resemble an undeserved disaster.
Sure enough, one sudden trial broadcast made Tang Can’s already terrible reputation even worse.
Whether beneath the trending topic or across the livestream comments, people were cursing Tang Can for acting like a huge celebrity despite having no status, while pitying Tang Yichen for being dragged into it.
Inside the studio, the three groups of adult and child guests were all cooperative, so both the photo shoot and pre-interviews proceeded smoothly. Once the scheduled time arrived, the celebrity guests had other jobs. They could not possibly keep waiting solely because Tang Can’s group had failed to appear.
Only Tang Yichen stayed until the very end. Before leaving, he even took the initiative to apologize to the staff. “…If only I could reach him, everyone wouldn’t have had to work overtime because of this.”
“This isn’t your fault!” Wei Kai, the director of the parenting show, gripped the script rolled into a tube, his face black with anger. “I’ve never seen such an irresponsible guest!”
In reality, Wei Kai was already laughing his head off inside. Parenting shows were everywhere these days. Even though the guests they had chosen were all highly topical, there was still enormous pressure if they wanted to break through the competition and become a ratings champion.
He had deliberately arranged an early trial broadcast to catch everyone off guard and see whether they could capture something fresh enough to stir discussion. He had never expected Tang Can to deliver such a massive gift right at the start by simply vanishing.
Naturally, Wei Kai would not let such a perfect opportunity go. He was preparing to make a few sarcastic remarks in front of the livestream cameras, then use Tang Can’s status as the pampered spouse of a wealthy family to steer the conversation, whipping netizens into a frenzy of anger and abuse as advance publicity for the official premiere.
The intern responsible for coordinating with Tang Can suddenly ran over clutching her phone. “D-Director Wei, Tang Can is calling me on voice…”
Before Wei Kai could react, a clear and pleasant male voice was already playing through the speaker. “Director Wei, my car was stolen. I’m waiting for the police to come take my statement, so I really can’t get over there right now. I know this was outside my control, but I’m genuinely very sorry. Would you rather reschedule for tonight, or another time?”
Director Wei Kai’s face stiffened. “Your car… was stolen???”
Wei Kai was not the only one who did not believe him. No one on set or in the livestream did. They all assumed Tang Can had only invented an excuse after seeing how viciously the internet was criticizing him.
Xiao Zhang, who was handling audio nearby, had a quick mouth and muttered, “A car doesn’t just get stolen because you say it did. It’s not some shared bicycle parked by the roadside. He could at least come up with a better excuse.”
Tang Can was so hungry he was nearly fainting. The instant he heard the delivery doorbell, he shot out like an arrow while casually suggesting, “If you don’t believe me, you can come over and see. You can record the pre-interview while you’re here.”
That would save him a trip too. The place he lived was absurdly remote, and taking a taxi over would cost both time and money.
Once he heard the director was sending people over, Tang Can stopped wasting time. He ended the voice call, grabbed the McDonald’s, and rushed back inside.
Everything else could wait. His vision was already going dark and sparkling from hunger.
Ever since waking up, Tang Can had been battered by one plot revelation after another and had not had time to pay attention to himself.
It was only after calling the police and making a trip to the bathroom that he discovered he not only shared the book character’s exact name, but even had a similar face.
Still, truly stunning beauty was one in ten thousand, and sometimes the smallest difference created an enormous gap. His original self had merely been fair-skinned and delicate-looking. This face, however, was obviously the sort that could make an easy living on looks alone.
At first Tang Can had assumed the child looked so good despite being starved into a little dried twig purely because of mixed-race advantages. Now it seemed his own side’s genes were pretty impressive too.
His features were rich and exquisite like an oil painting. His complexion was excessively pale, but the underlying beauty of his skin and bone structure was impossible to hide. No wonder the original host had believed the Tang family’s flattery and encouragement, convincing himself he could debut as the center of a parenting show…
Perhaps because the two faces had already resembled each other somewhat, Tang Can did not feel much unfamiliarity at first glance. Not only did he quickly accept his new appearance, even the tiny red mole that now sat on his Adam’s apple seemed inexplicably familiar.
The one thing Tang Can truly could not get used to was how painfully thin this body was.
Both versions of him were members of the “one-eighty goalkeeper club”: this body, like his original one, measured a barefoot 179 centimeters, but weighed at least ten kilograms less than he had before—and Tang Can had already been the naturally thin type.
So now he was far beyond merely slim, more like a paper-thin praying mantis. No wonder when anger rushed to his head earlier, he had felt as though his whole body might float away. One look at this plastic little frame made it obvious he had probably developed low blood sugar from hunger.
Opening the warm brown paper bag, Tang Can sounded almost ecstatic. “Dengdeng! Our food is here!”
Huo Dengdeng had still been working hard to play the wooden doll, but the smell was far too obvious. His beautiful gray-blue eyes simply could not look away, and the flood of saliva in his mouth made him swallow again and again.
On the surface, he did not move. In reality, his soul had already thrown itself at the food.
While the little one was still locked in an internal battle, Tang Can quickly took three kids’ meals out of the paper bag. Each had a corn cup, mini fries, a Filet-O-Fish, a carton of milk, and a little Ultraman toy. Even all three together did not amount to much.
Tang Can had deliberately avoided ordering too much. For one thing, the child had been deprived for too long, and it would not be healthy to suddenly let him gorge himself without restraint.
For another, Tang Can had originally only planned to use McDonald’s to take the edge off their hunger before bringing the child out to taste one of those famously expensive Michelin restaurants.
He had not expected those old bastards from the Tang family to have been enjoying peace and comfort on his money first. Until he recovered the funds, father and son would probably have to keep their standard of living around McDonald’s level…
Tang Can cursed inwardly, but when faced with the pitiful child, he quickly brought out his professional skills. Smiling, he lifted the little one into the dining chair. “Baby, time to eat-eat~”
He knew the child had been terrified by the original host and needed time to adjust. So after pushing the child’s kids’ meal in front of him, Tang Can grabbed a Filet-O-Fish in each hand and began devouring them enthusiastically.
Delicious! Seriously delicious!!!
As expected of the famous old Western-medicine doctor. Come to think of it, his tastes had always been very close to those of the children in his class. When he worked overtime, he often ordered from Doctor McDonald and Doctor KFC, and he was also very fond of the pediatric traditional-medicine miracle worker, Doctor Taco Bell. Paired with the happy water of fat shut-ins—cola—it was perfection!
Tang Can was eating with abandon. When he turned his head, he found the toddler beside him still motionless, those beautiful huge eyes solemnly studying the hamburger as though telling its fortune.
“Is the table too high? Are you uncomfortable?” Tang Can asked gently while once again cursing the original host from head to toe in his heart.
Given how stingy the original host had been with the child, expecting him to buy a proper child-sized chair would have been impossible. The tiny two-heads-tall toddler sat in an adult chair with only a fluffy crown of soft hair barely visible above the table. Still, since they were eating hamburgers, making do for the moment was fine. It was better than holding him in his arms and having the child alternate between petrifying and trembling.
Huo Dengdeng pursed his little mouth and shook his head. Before Tang Can could lean closer and ask more, he volunteered an explanation. “…Dengdeng… Dengdeng not hungry.” Then he sucked in a mouthful of saliva with an audible gulp.
Tang Can could not help bursting into laughter. When the child instantly shrank back in fright, he swallowed the words he had wanted to say: Baby, your gray-blue eyes are practically glowing green, and you still say you’re not hungry?
“It’s mealtime, so we should eat-eat. Does Dengdeng not like fragrant hamburgers?” Tang Can’s mind spun, and he began making things up on the spot. “That won’t do~ Han people should speak Han language, wear Han clothes, and eat hamburgers~” As he spoke, he reached over and unwrapped the child’s burger.
The little one blanked: What kind of nonsense banana is that?
Tang Can picked up the hamburger and waved it dramatically in front of the child while switching his professional coaxing voice to its optimal setting. “Here comes the little flying burger~~~”
Huo Dengdeng had never seen anything like this. At first, when Bad Daddy raised his hand, he thought he was going to be hit. Trapped in the chair and unable to run, he could only open his mouth and begin crying as he begged for mercy—only to have it stuffed full of fragrant Filet-O-Fish.
The child went completely still in shock. The tears he had urgently summoned happened to spill out at the same time, making little Huo Dengdeng look as though the delicious smell had moved him to tears.
Tang Can found it both funny and heartbreaking. He had guessed no toddler could resist the “little flying spoon” feeding trick, but he had not expected the poor thing to immediately cry while eating.
Tang Can understood perfectly well that three years of harm could not be repaired overnight. Right now, the child feared and hated him both physically and emotionally.
According to the novel’s plot, the future villain’s tiny seed of darkness began sprouting around this time. Otherwise, without the child’s cooperation on the parenting show, the original host’s road to prison would never have gone quite so smoothly…
Naturally, Tang Can knew the safest approach would be to simply refuse to join the parenting show at all. Unfortunately, the original host’s cousin-manager had been terrified that this cooked duck might fly away and had proactively pushed the contractual penalty to the maximum.
But looking on the bright side, recording one episode paid more than a hundred thousand after tax and took at most four days including travel. More than a hundred thousand for four days—the cost-performance ratio was something Tang Can could never even have dreamed of while working himself like a beast of burden.
No thunderous entrance from heaven was needed. This old servant came with his own sound system!
What was one little almost-blackened toddler? Tang Can was not going to follow the original scumbag’s path, and he did not believe a three-year-old could possibly become all that dark anyway.
And looking at the tiny child in front of him, moved to tears by nothing more than a hamburger, too afraid to make a sound even while wolfing it down and secretly checking after every few bites to see whether Tang Can was angry…
At first he had only cared because of the money, but now he could not help adding just a tiny billionth of genuine feeling. He was absolutely going to become the number-one dad on this parenting show!
Considering that the child before him was already on the verge of turning dark, he was bound to be unusually sensitive and suspicious. With a toddler like this, the best approach was to be completely direct: say what he meant, then make sure his actions matched his words. Given enough time, trust would gradually return on its own.
So Tang Can finished the hamburger in his left hand first, then raised his index and middle fingers to swear an oath. “Dengdeng! Daddy will definitely treat you well from now on! As long as Dad has a mouthful of meat to eat, you’ll definitely have a mouthful of soup to drink!”
Huo Dengdeng froze in place like a skipping disc. He looked stunned by Tang Can’s oath, but in reality he had so many complaints that he did not even know where to begin.
He knew very well that Bad Daddy’s changes today were all because he wanted to take him onto the show. When Daddy had bought him new clothes a few days ago, he had repeatedly warned him that he had to behave even better than usual once they were on the program, or Daddy would beat him to death after they came home.
Huo Dengdeng understood everything. He simply had not expected Bad Daddy’s acting to begin before they even went on the show.
But… what did he mean, if Dad had meat, then he could have soup? So even Daddy’s very best treatment only meant giving him soup? He really was awful!
The thoughts in the little one’s tiny brain flashed by at lightning speed. He was about to summon a few tears so he could play along when something caught his eye—Bad Daddy had only raised two fingers. Even this promise about giving him soup was fake!
Did he think a toddler did not know that you had to raise three fingers when swearing an oath? No. He knew everything!
Huo Dengdeng’s eyes reddened. After hesitating for a moment, he murmured, “Daddy… why only two fingers?”
Once the words left his mouth, his large, dull, vacant eyes stared straight at Daddy.
Tang Can looked utterly innocent. “What? Huh?” He had not realized at all that his oath had found a loophole.
Seeing that Daddy showed no sign of getting angry, Huo Dengdeng tested the waters again. “Swearing isn’t two…”
Tang Can knitted his brows and thought deeply for a moment. Very soon, a gleam of wisdom blossomed across his picturesque face. He understood. If the kid said two was wrong, then two was wrong. Why argue over something like this?
Tang Can obediently folded one finger down, solemnly repeated his soup oath, then waggled his brows at the child. “How about now~?”
Huo Dengdeng stared numbly at the middle finger Tang Can was holding up and nodded.
Inside his head, his baby voice roared: Big bad guy!
