My husband, worried I might be lonely, gifted me a little female cat.

I turned around and found 50 feral toms to breed her with, making her birth litter after litter until she was utterly spent.

It was all because I had been reborn.

In my past life, I adored this little cat so much I could hardly put her down. I wanted to eat and sleep right beside her.

In just one short month, I aged rapidly into an 80-year-old woman, and the child in my womb withered and died along with me. No medicine could save me, and I simply died of old age.

After death, my soul lingered. I saw that the sickly, frail mistress in our household had somehow become radiant and glowing, and pregnant on top of it all.

I overheard her chatting in bed with my husband.

"Thank goodness I bound myself to the Life-Drain System. I separated my soul, possessed the little cat, and sucked away Leah's life force. That's the only reason I survived."

"She should count it as a blessing that you could drain her at all. It's better that she's dead. This way, the position of first wife is yours."

I was reborn into a new life, and I smiled.

Selling off a mistress would get me accused of treating human life carelessly. But she was merely a cat now, and surely it was perfectly reasonable to breed her for eight or ten litters and produce a hundred-some kittens.

"Go find me 50 feral toms in heat, and don't let anyone catch on!" I gripped the hand of my personal maid, Ember Smithe, and gave her my orders.

The cat had just been brought to my chambers. The other maids were fawning over it like it was the most precious thing they had ever seen, crowding around and cooing.

"Ms. Linton is truly so kindhearted. She's practically on her deathbed with her illness, and yet she still thinks of you, my lady. She even asked Mr. Hughes to find you a cat."

"Exactly! If Ms. Linton hadn't suggested it, would Mr. Hughes have even thought of you?"

The cat climbed right onto my pregnant belly, then deliberately pressed down hard with its paws a few times. A cold, vicious glint flashed in the corners of its eyes.

A chill ran through me instantly.

In my past life, Jocelyn Linton had bound herself to the Life-Drain System and possessed this very cat. She had clung to my side day and night, draining my lifespan dry and killing my unborn child.

Everyone around me gushed over how adorable the little cat was, but I flung it away from me as if I had been shocked.

In my previous life, this cat was sent into my chambers, and I poured my heart into caring for it. I ate and slept right beside it. Yet the very next morning, I woke up to find several strands of white hair on my head. By the third day, my skin began to sag. By the fourth, my eyes started to cloud over.

By the 20th day, my body had aged so severely that it could no longer sustain the child inside me. The baby in my womb became a corpse.

The miscarriage alone nearly killed me. Before the month was out, I had withered into an old woman and died in my sickbed.

At the time, I thought I had caught some strange disease. I searched the land for the finest physicians, but none of them could find an answer. It was only later that I learned the truth. It was Jocelyn's Life-Drain System all along.

"My lady, this is Ms. Linton's kind gesture. Why don't you give the little cat a name?"

The maids urged me on. A sly gleam flickered in their eyes. They still took me for the same naive fool from my past life, the clueless wife who did not know what jealousy was.

I simply curved my lips into a smile, leaned back against the chaise, and spoke lazily. "It's just a cat, a worthless little life. Since Jocelyn sent it, it will take her name. From now on, she'll be called Josy the Wretched Cat."

The moment those words left my mouth, the cat I had tossed to the floor puffed up its fur. A vicious hiss rose from its throat, claws out, lunging toward me with pure hatred in its eyes.

"Jocelyn is practically dying, and you give the cat a name like that to humiliate her? Leah Gilbert, you've gone too far!"

A tall figure strode into the room. Edmund Hughes furrowed his brow slightly and pulled Josy protectively behind him.

The maids put on a show of outrage as well.

"My lady, Ms. Linton thought of you even from her sickbed and went out of her way to find this cat to keep you company. And this is the thanks she gets."

"Ms. Linton is nothing but gentle and kind, yet some people are so jealous they can't even tolerate a cat. If I were my lady, I'd worry about the karma."

I looked up at all these people in this household, every one of them someone I had once treated with sincerity.

From the day I married into this family, I had served my husband dutifully and treated the maids well. Even when Jocelyn was brought in as a mistress, I never made things difficult for her, not even once.

Who was the one who never got the thanks she deserved?

Fine. If she wanted to disguise herself as a cat and play this little game with me, then I would play right along. One little beast was not enough. I would make her breed dozens—no, hundreds—of little beasts for my amusement.

I lowered my gaze and rested my fingers lightly on my belly. In this life, no one was going to touch my child.

Since that was how things stood, there was no need for me to butt heads with them directly. Hence, I smiled softly and spoke in a gentle tone.

"Why would I be upset? I love cats more than anything. I couldn't possibly be more delighted. It's just that people always say you should give a pet an ugly name, or it won't survive. They die young otherwise. I was only thinking of the cat's well-being."

Edmund's expression eased considerably at that, but then I continued without missing a beat.

"Jocelyn sent me a cat, so I really should thank her properly. I'll head over to her room right now."

Edmund immediately grabbed my arm. "Jocelyn is seriously ill. You shouldn't go. I'd hate for you to catch whatever she has."

In my past life, Edmund had used that exact same excuse. He never once let me visit Jocelyn from start to finish.

It was only after I died that I saw Jocelyn's soul drift out of the little cat and return to her own body, which had long gone stiff and cold. That pale, withered body flushed with life in an instant, until she looked like a beautiful girl no older than 15 or 16.

I sneered inwardly but kept up my gentle and gracious mask. "You're willing to tend to her at her sickbed yourself, and yet I, the lady of this house, shouldn't even pay her a visit? That hardly seems right."

I brushed Edmund's hand aside and moved to leave, but then he snapped at me. "Know your place! A wife obeys her husband. You dare defy me? You're forbidden from stepping one foot outside your room tonight!"

With that, Edmund turned on his heel and stormed off, leaving Josy and me to stare each other down.

Before long, the maids began their little performance of gossip.

"Mr. Hughes is normally such a mild-mannered man. For him to lose his temper over Ms. Linton like that, he must truly adore her."

"Exactly! I'll bet Mr. Hughes stopped my lady from going because he was afraid she'd give Ms. Linton trouble."

"Hush! Stop talking. My lady won't be happy."

I listened to their chatter in silence, then said quietly.

"I never realized before how many loose tongues I had among my maids. If I'd known, I would have sold the lot of you off and replaced you with ones who knew when to keep their mouths shut."

The maids began trembling at once and did not dare say another word.

At that moment, Josy seized her chance and tried to slink over to nuzzle against me. The second her fuzzy little head touched my calf, I jerked away and let out a tremendous sneeze.

"Oh dear, I nearly forgot. I'm allergic to cat fur. I can't be too close to her. You there, go find a cage and lock her up."

The maids had just gotten on my bad side and were terrified of being sold off, so they scrambled to find a cage immediately.

Josy froze for a moment, a flash of malice crossing her eyes, and then she lost all composure. She charged straight at me, impossibly fast, leaping at my legs with her claws aimed deliberately at my belly.

The thing was, no human could outrun a cat. I could not block her in time.

Cold sweat broke out across my body, and I twisted sideway to shield my stomach, which was all the opening Josy needed to land on my lap. She sat there staring up at me with a pair of smug, triumphant cat eyes.

In my past life, I had overheard Jocelyn explain that as long as the cat made physical contact, she could continuously drain a person's life force. The previous time, I held the cat while I slept for just one night, and my hair turned white.

At this point, the maids had found a cage and were walking back over. I furrowed my brows, clicked my tongue lightly, and said on purpose, "Oh my, this cat seems to be in heat. Shouldn't we find a tom to mate her with?"

One of the younger maids piped up eagerly, "I used to keep a female cat at home, my lady. I've heard that when a female cat is in heat, you can poke her backside with a stick to give her some temporary relief."

The moment Josy heard that, disgust and fear flashed through her eyes. She abandoned any plan of staying on my lap, terrified that I might actually have someone come at her with a stick.

She leaped obediently into the cage and nudged the door shut herself.

I laughed coldly on the inside. Scared already? Once those feral toms were all rounded up, there would be plenty more where that came from.

"Put her in the storage shed. I'm tired and want to sleep, and I can't have the meowing keeping me up."

With that, I yawned and returned to my bedroom. I shut the doors behind me, leaving only myself and Ember, the personal maid I had brought from my family home.

Ember looked worried. "My lady, finding 50 toms isn't impossible. But that cat was Ms. Linton's kind gesture after all. If you send her off to be bred, won't that..."

I smiled faintly.

"Breeding her and getting a few more litters of kittens only shows how much I value the cat. I just want more of them. Isn't that right? Besides, the poor thing is already in heat. Imagine how miserable she'd be if we didn't let her mate."

…

Early the next morning, Edmund came over. He was carrying Josy's cage and scolded me the moment he walked in, "This cat has a perfectly gentle temperament. Why did you lock her up? She spent the whole night in a freezing cage. How could you be so heartless?"

As he spoke, his eyes swept over me, studying me carefully. I immediately pushed back my hair, revealing a large patch of white hidden beneath the black, and put on my most pitiful expression.

"You think you're the only one who cares? I care so much it's turning my hair white. But I'm allergic to cat fur, so I can't sleep with her. Locking her up was the only option I had."

The sight of my white hair put Edmund at ease. He set the cage back down in my room and said, "I'll find the best doctor to prescribe you something for the allergy. And from now on, don't lock her up. You'll hurt Jocelyn's feelings."

Once no one else was around, Ember peeled away the patch of white false hair for me and asked curiously.

"My lady, first, you've been hiding iron plates under your clothes, and now, you're wearing fake white hair. What exactly are you planning?"

I smiled and tapped her on the nose. "Don't ask so many questions. But tell me, do you know how to do makeup? The older I look, the better."

I already knew that Jocelyn intended to kill me, and there was no way I was going to sit around and wait for it to happen.

After being reborn, I had someone custom-make thin iron plates that I could wear inside my clothing to stop the cat's claws from reaching my skin.

My face, neck, and hands were all coated in a special skin-toned layer that sat tight against the surface like a second skin. Even if the cat touched my hand, it would only be touching the coating, not me.

Before long, the doctor Edmund had called for me arrived, took my pulse, and left with a deep frown.

That night, Edmund actually came to sleep in my room. He let Josy out of her cage as well, and she immediately ran over to rub her head affectionately against my ankle.

Behind those eyes, though, was nothing but greed. She never stopped trying to drain my life force for even a second.

Edmund smiled at me warmly and said, "Relax, Leah. You're pregnant, after all. I won't ask you to serve me tonight. It's just that you don't actually have a cat allergy. You shouldn't lie to me like that.

"But I'll let it slide this time. Tonight, I'll stay right here and watch you sleep with the cat myself."

Josy's cat eyes were locked on me as well, her little mouth curling into what looked almost like a cold smirk.

When Edmund saw that I was not moving, he smiled pleasantly and said, "Leah, why haven't you taken off your outer robe to sleep? You can't be comfortable like that."