Back when I was 15, I gave my extraordinary luck to Whitney Johnson. Six months later, her wealthy parents showed up at the orphanage and took her home.

At 18, I stopped her from dating the school heartthrob, who later died in a car accident.

Whitney blamed me for his death. She tore up my admission ticket for college entrance exam, made me miss the test, and completely ruined my life. I ended up homeless, yet it wasn't enough for her. She pushed me into the river and drowned me.

Now, as I open my eyes, I realize I've been reborn and returned to when I was 18. This time, I'll never give her my extraordinary luck again.

"Gosh, I'm starving…" I mumbled, my eyes dull and lifeless.

Crowds came and went on the street, yet everyone who saw me quickly stepped aside with a look of disgust. I ignored their stares and spotted a trash can up ahead.

Stumbling over, I bent down and dug through it, my whole upper body practically inside it. This time, I got a bit lucky. I found some spoiled leftover burger, covered in a shiny green liquid.

Without a single care, I shoved it straight into my mouth.

It had been three days since I last ate. The sour, rotten patty was impossible to swallow. After just a few seconds, I gagged and threw it all up.

My stomach growled loudly, and my eyes stung. I clutched the trash can with both hands, choking on my breath. Not a single tear came out, though—all that I could manage was a hoarse, broken whimper.

I longed for just a bite of fresh bread, yet right now, that seemed almost too much to wish for.

"You must be famished." Whitney Johnson, my adopted sister, sounded cold and mocking as she stood behind me.

I sniffed, not looking at her. I didn't even have the strength to lift my head. I leaned against the trash can as flies buzzed angrily against my face, annoyed that I'd disturbed their meal.

"What do you want this time?" I asked weakly.

Ever since Simon Campbell, the school heartthrob, passed away, Whitney had set me up repeatedly, tarnishing my name and turning everyone against me. The entire city had blacklisted me—no one would hire me, not even for washing dishes.

She took her time tormenting me. Every time I was on the verge of starvation, she would show up and say she wanted to "play a game". She treated me like a puppet—if I amused her enough, I would get a cracker or even a burger.

She once livestreamed me cleaning every public restroom in the city. My reward? A packet of crackers.

Another time, she put a metal collar around my neck and walked me through the streets like a spectacle for people to gawk at.

At that moment, a cold laugh escaped Whitney before she ordered the bodyguard behind her, "Grab him."

The bodyguard grabbed me and carelessly dragged me toward the van. My feet scraped against the ground, a sharp, burning pain shooting through them. I bit my lip so hard that I drew blood.

She simply stared at me, her gaze icy. Even as I left a trail of blood along the street, she acted like she didn't see a thing.

People around us pointed and whispered, but no one dared to step in. After all, who would risk angering the unpredictable daughter of the Johnson family?

Not to mention, the last person who'd tried to help me was still in the hospital, with both arms broken and their fingers mangled.

Since then, I'd stopped hoping someone would save me. I didn't want anyone else to get hurt because of me.

I stared blankly at Whitney. She was no longer the reliable elder sister who used to look at me with so much warmth.

Gone was the girl who would sneak into the kitchen through the window late at night to steal meat pies for me, simply because the orphanage director was too stingy to feed us properly.

I could still remember how I used to crouch in a corner, my eyes red as I devoured those pies like I hadn't eaten in days.

"Are you a piggy? You're really pigging out," Whitney had said gently back then.

At that moment, I hadn't cried because I was hungry.

I'd cried because Whitney had suffered multiple blows from a cane after the director found out she'd stolen the pies. She'd clutched them to her chest, protecting them with everything she had.

By the time she handed them to me, her entire body was covered in bruises. Bloody scratches marked her thin face, but her eyes were bright as she smiled and urged me to eat.

"I don't know what to do with you. You'd better make a ton of money and pay me back one day, you little brat," she'd joked carelessly.

I lowered my head even more, but my tears wouldn't stop streaming down my face. It was the first time anyone had ever been so good to me, and I was moved.

So, I lent her all my extraordinary luck. After that, she was never caught stealing again. Everything started going smoothly for her, so much so that even the orphanage director began treating her well.

I didn't have to go hungry anymore. Whenever Whitney got something, she would always think of me first.

A sharp pain twisted in my stomach, yanking me back to reality. Someone threw me into the back of the van, and Whitney's figure disappeared from my sight.

When I came to, I found myself by a cold, windy river on the outskirts of town. My hands and feet were tightly bound with rope.

A sudden thought struck me, and my whole body trembled. A numb, electric jolt shot down my back as though someone had jammed a live wire straight into me.

"Let me go… Please…" I begged weakly as the cold, damp air from the river hit me, fear squeezing my chest tight. I was terrified of water, and Whitney knew that.

"Throw him in!" she said coldly, not a hint of hesitation in her voice.

The icy water rushed into my mouth and nose, and despair swallowed me whole. I kept trying to scream for help as darkness engulfed me.

Somewhere above the river's surface, I faintly heard Whitney's voice. "You deserve this, Gabriel Johnson. If it weren't for you, Simon wouldn't have died."

I couldn't hear anything after that. My consciousness was slipping away. Still, I knew one thing clearly—I was the one who'd tried to save Simon, while she'd caused his death. So why was I the one being tortured?

…

"Hey, dummy, I'm talking to you. You deaf or what?" A sharp, cocky female voice rang out.

My mind exploded with a loud boom, the terror of drowning still clinging to me. When I opened my eyes, I saw Whitney's face.

For a moment, I thought I was dead. A surge of pure hatred rushed through me, and I shoved her away before I even realized what I was doing.

At the side, Simon reacted quickly and caught Whitney in time. She stared at me in shock, struggling to process what had just happened.

The next second, Simon stormed over and pushed me to the ground.

He snapped, "What is wrong with you? Why did you push her?"

He wrapped an arm around her as she put on a pitiful, teary-eyed look. "Whitney, I told you your little brother's sick in the head, but you never believe me…"

Perhaps he still wasn't satisfied, for he glared at me with pure anger and raised his foot to kick me. I dodged, and he roared, "How dare you dodge?"

Simon's incessant screams rang out a few seconds later. Like a madman, I'd lunged at him and started swinging punches. Both of us ended up with bruises all over our faces, swollen and beaten black and blue.

"It's you!" I screamed in my head. "You're the one who made my life a living hell!"

By the time Whitney finally snapped out of it and reacted, I'd already knocked Simon to the ground. She furiously shoved me away and carefully helped him up. I noticed her hands were trembling.

I frowned, only then feeling the sharp, stinging pain on my face. That was when it finally hit me—I'd been reborn and gone back to the time when Simon and Whitney were secretly flirting behind everyone's backs.

Looking at the two of them, I couldn't help but smile. My nails dug so hard into my palms that the skin split and blood smeared across my hands, but I didn't feel a thing.

Simon was the pampered son of a wealthy family, while I was just the Johnson family's adopted son. And yet I'd just beaten him up in front of a crowd.

The school didn't dare to sweep this under the rug, so both our families were called in.

"Mom, it's him! He pushed Whitney and hit me. Someone with such terrible behaviour shouldn't be allowed to stay in this school."

Simon held an ice pack to his face, glaring at me with hatred.

I recalled that Simon's mother, Ashley Campbell, a sharply dressed career woman, was efficient, strict, and also one of the school's shareholders. She looked at the bruises covering Simon, then glanced at me. Her expression was terrifyingly calm.

That was when Whitney stepped forward and apologized sincerely. "Our apologies, Mrs. Campbell. My brother shouldn't have laid a finger on your son."

Then, she came over and grabbed me by the neck, trying to force me to apologize to Simon. I resisted, refusing to give her what she wanted.

In my past life, when I first caught Whitney and Simon sneaking around under a tree, I'd only spoken to them harshly, but he'd beaten me up so badly that I'd ended up in the hospital.

The school had sent a fruit basket and some flowers as consolation, but that was the end of it. I was brushed aside like nothing.

Despite knowing I was furious, Whitney had held me down and warned me, "Stop provoking Simon, okay? He's rich and not someone we can afford to mess with. The less trouble there is, the better it is for us. Got it?"

I'd always trusted her, so I swallowed my anger back then simply because she told me to.

Later, when I accidentally saw them meeting in secret again, I overheard Simon ask her, "Doesn't it break your heart that your little brother is all bruised up because of me?"

Whitney, who'd been panting heavily just a moment before, suddenly went cold. "Why are you bringing him up? He's just a pet we happened to adopt and raise."

That night, I cried nonstop.

Since then, Simon's revenge had only worsened. After I lent Whitney my luck, I'd grown weaker and had terrible luck myself.

Every time I turned a corner, I somehow ran into Simon again. He tormented me so badly that I would still be shaking when I walked home.

Whitney would look at me with disgust and say, "I've told you a million times not to provoke him. You deserve it, looking like that."

After she met Simon, she'd changed completely. She was no longer the protective sister who stole meat pies for me.

Now, seeing that I refused to apologize, Whitney angrily tightened her grip around my neck. "I said, apologize."

Mom, who'd been quiet the whole time, didn't have the heart to step in.

I shrugged off Whitney's hand from my neck and, with a look of disgust, wiped the spot she'd just touched with a tissue.

Her face darkened, and I let out a cold laugh. "I might be in the wrong, but he's as guilty as I am. Why should I be the only one apologizing?

"Besides, I only stepped in because I saw Whitney being pinned against a tree by a guy. I thought he was bullying her, but…"

I paused, and everyone at the scene paled.

Simon tried to stop me from saying anything more. "What nonsense are you spouting, Gabriel?"

I went ahead and said it anyway. "But I didn't know they were kissing… I just thought she was being bullied and went to help her. Who knew I'd ruin their private moment?

"Then Simon came over and beat me up. He shoved me to the ground and insulted me horribly as well. If you don't believe me, feel free to check the surveillance footage."

The moment I stopped talking, I saw the color drain from Simon's face. His lips quivered as he turned to his mother.

Whitney, on the other hand, pursed her lips in embarrassment. Her eyes turned red as she glared at me, but I didn't care at all.

Mrs. Campbell was grooming Simon to be their family's heir, so there was no way she would let him date around this early. He only dared to put on a bold front in public, that was all.

As expected, Simon, who'd originally wanted to make things difficult for me, was now desperately trying to think of ways to get past his mother.

"I'll deal with you when we get home," Mrs. Campbell said to Simon, her expression darkening as she dragged him out of the principal's office.

Back at home, both Whitney and I were punished by being made to kneel in the back garden. I was punished for fighting, while she was punished for lying to our parents.