My childhood sweetheart and my older brother defied the system for me. Instead of pursuing the fake heiress who was the designated protagonist, they showered all their love and devotion on me, the real heiress.

To break off his engagement and marry me, my childhood sweetheart endured 999 electric shocks.

My brother transferred all of our parents' inheritance to my name and nearly got electrocuted to death for it.

They both said, even if it cost their lives, they would give me all their love.

But during a trip abroad with me, they suddenly vanished.

I was kidnapped by a group of thugs and taken to Snake Island, where I was brutally tortured. My legs were broken and my tongue was split in two.

In the depths of despair, I overheard their conversation with the system:

[How can you let them torture the real heiress like this? She won’t survive it!]

My childhood sweetheart's voice was icy cold. “She enjoyed five years of love that rightfully belonged to Daisy. It's time she repays her.”

My brother echoed his words. “Exactly! Luna has the protagonist’s halo. No matter how much she’s tortured, she won’t die. But Daisy might. Once she finishes Daisy’s storyline, we’ll compensate her double.”

At that moment, all hope within me died.

I no longer resisted the man lunging toward me.

——

“Well, look at that! This woman suddenly had a change of heart!”

At his exclamation, the other thugs all crowded in.

The small room was littered with torture tools stained with my blood and flesh. My legs had been completely broken and my hands were tied to the bedpost.

Eight hours ago, when the first thug tried to violate me, I bit off one of his ears.

In retaliation, they split my tongue open. The pain nearly made me pass out.

The second thug had his groin crushed by my desperate kick.

In retaliation, they shattered both of my legs. Even so, I tried everything I could to protect myself.

Seeing how fiercely I resisted, the thugs feared I’d bite my tongue and kill myself. They stuffed a rag into my mouth and wrapped tape tightly around it.

My mouth was filled with the metallic taste of blood, but the fierceness and desperation I once had were gone.

I was numb, like a puppet at their mercy, longing only for death.

Just as one of them was about to violate me, the system cried out in panic. [Host! Can you really bear to let her suffer this much?]

My brother’s voice trembled, but his words were still merciless.

“In the original plot, Daisy was kidnapped and subjected to all kinds of torture. Luna has now taken her place up to this point. Nothing can be left out!”

The system grew anxious and turned to Gerald.

[You're her fiancé! Can you really just stand there and watch her be violated?]

Gerald roared, "No matter what, I’ll still marry her! Luna has the protagonist’s halo. She can handle it! But Daisy has been pampered since childhood, pure as a blank sheet of paper. Are we supposed to let these thugs destroy her innocence and drive her to death?"

Hearing their words, I felt as if a hole had been carved open in my chest, letting icy wind flood through.

No wonder they used the excuse of finding a diamond for the engagement ring to bring me to this remote and savage country.

I had been uneasy at first, but they reassured me and said that special forces bodyguards would be accompanying us, that there’d be no danger.

It turned out that it was all planned from the beginning

The five years of affection they had shown me was all just a setup to have me die in Daisy’s place.

The pain in my body was nothing compared to the agony in my heart.

Silent sobs wracked me as tears, mixed with blood, slid down my face.

Suddenly, a sharp, tearing pain erupted in my lower abdomen, like I was being ripped apart.

The man on top of me let out a startled cry and quickly got up, cursing under his breath.

“Damn it! What is this?”

The others crowded around. When they saw clearly, they all gasped in unison.

“My god, she’s pregnant!”

The room fell into immediate silence. The man scowled and backed away, pulling his pants back on.

Then, they began speaking in a dialect I couldn’t understand. But from the expressions on their faces, I could tell that they wouldn’t be doing that to me again.

When I realized I had lost the baby, the pain nearly killed me.

I remembered how Gerald once held me in front of his parents' graves, crying like a child. He said that his greatest wish in life was to marry me and have a sweet baby, so he would no longer be a homeless orphan.

I had collapsed from heatstroke and was taken to a local hospital, where they discovered I was pregnant.

Overjoyed, I was about to share the news with them, only to be captured by those thugs and brought to this desolate Snake Island.

[Host, that person doesn’t want to continue anymore. Luna…]

Before the system could finish, Gerald flew into a rage.

“Don’t tell us the details! You know we can’t handle it!”

“If he doesn’t want to, then find a way to make him want to! Luna may be strong-willed, but she’s still a woman. She won’t be able to resist for long!”

"Yes! She must experience every bit of the torment Daisy was meant to endure!" my brother snapped, his voice laced with threat. "You’re the one who made the mistake, binding the protagonist role to Luna by accident. Now we have no choice but to see it through!"

The system grew frantic. [But Luna’s will to survive is about to hit zero! She didn’t do anything wrong. Why should she suffer in Daisy’s place?]

“She’s not the only one suffering!” Gerald’s voice was filled with pain. “We’re being tormented too. Our hearts are breaking!”

My brother's voice trembled with barely-suppressed sobs. “If Daisy had to go through this, she wouldn’t make it. And if the target of the plot dies. We die too!”

[Is this fair to Luna?] the system protested. [She finally found her real family, only to be thrown into this hellish place to be tortured!]

[If you two would just agree, I could restart the world right now…]

The system didn’t get to finish its sentence, but my brother cut it off with a sharp, commanding voice.

“The world must not be restarted! Daisy can’t endure this kind of torture. She’ll definitely die!”

“Exactly!” Gerald roared. “Luna won’t die. She’s already suffered so much. It's better than starting over and putting Daisy through all of it, right? This way, both sisters can live. Isn’t that what matters most?”

A bitter cold spread through my chest. ‘Live? Is this what they call living well for me?’

The system fell silent.

The two of them urged it to proceed.

“Don’t worry,” they said, “As long as she survives the final torment, we’ll rescue her right away!”

Suddenly, the door burst open again.

The man from earlier herded a massive python toward me.

Feeling utterly numb, I closed my eyes.

I felt the cold flick of its tongue brush the bend of my knee. The thick stench of blood filled my nose and tears surged down my face.

‘My baby…’

‘I’m sorry… Mommy couldn’t protect you.’

‘Gerald, if you knew your own flesh and blood met such a fate because of you, would you feel even a shred of regret?’

Probably not.

After all, if he didn’t care about me, how could he possibly care about an embryo?

I completely lost the will to live, sinking into an abyss of darkness.

I allowed them to torment and abuse me however they pleased.

I no longer felt any pain like a lone boat floating on a black river, drifting toward an endless hell.

[Shit! She really has no will to survive anymore! You need to save her now!] The system screamed in panic.

But my brother and Gerald didn’t care. “She’s so strong and with the protagonist’s halo, how could she possibly die? You’re overthinking this.”

[Luna, as long as you want to live, you won’t die! Don’t give up!]

[Hang on! The final torment is almost over!]

The system’s fake encouragement made me want to laugh.

It was its fault, yet it was being forced by those two to sacrifice me.

Since that’s the case, I would make sure they all meet a bad end.

Perhaps it was the intense desire for revenge that stirred a flicker of survival instinct within me.

I struggled to open my eyes and saw the last man holding a syringe, about to inject it into me.

Just as everything seemed to be ending, the door was violently kicked open.

My brother’s roar filled my ears.

Gerald gently lifted me, tears streaming down his face as he carefully removed the cloth from my mouth.

"Luna, don’t be afraid, we’re here to save you! You have to hold on, don’t die... If you die, I don’t want to live either..."

Hearing this, I felt nothing but anger and absurdity. They were the ones who had hurt me, yet I couldn’t even hit or scold them.

My rage overwhelmed me and I coughed up a mouthful of blood.

Gerald panicked, shouting for someone to call an ambulance.

My brother ordered the bodyguards to tie up all the criminals.

"Luna, it’s my fault... I shouldn’t have left you alone in the hospital..." he said.

"It's all my fault! I shouldn't have dragged your brother to see the diamonds, causing you to be captured by those thugs. We won’t let anything happen to you, hang in there, Luna..." Gerald cried as he pressed on my pressure points.

Their acting was so convincing, as if they truly loved me. But as their tears fell on my face, all I could feel was deceit and disgust.

It was a hundred times more nauseating than that cold snake.

Anger and sorrow overwhelmed me and everything went black as I lost consciousness.

When I woke up again, I was in our private hospital.

By the bedside, the fake daughter, Daisy, was grinning with satisfaction, staring at me.

"Luna, I heard you almost got killed by those black men. What a shame, you were so close," she mocked.

"You dared to fight with me for Gerald and Nick, so heaven couldn't stand it anymore and punished you. It’s so satisfying!"

Seeing that I didn’t respond, Daisy pulled out her phone and shoved it in front of my eyes. "Shameless woman, you’re about to be ruined and yet you’re still pretending!"

A trending video was playing on my phone.

In the footage, I was on Snake Island, dressed provocatively, wearing a suggestive expression as I flirted with a black man and entered a room with him.

The comments on the screen were full of insults calling me shameless.

[Isn't this the real daughter of the Helmes Family? She's wild. She went abroad to cheat on her fiancé.]

[Disgusting as hell. If I were her fiancé, I’d break her legs!]

[You’re actually right! Word is she got so kinky that she ended up in her own family's hospital. Hilarious.]

At that moment, I felt like I was going insane.

"You can't handle it already? It's not over yet!" Daisy put her phone away, smiling maliciously.

The next second, she reached for the scalpel nearby and stabbed herself several times in the left shoulder, wailing.

At the same time, the hospital room door was violently pushed open and a crowd of reporters with cameras barged in.

Daisy shoved the scalpel into my hand and, clutching her bleeding shoulder, began to sob bitterly.

"Luna, I know you wish I were dead. But you're just too reckless! Running off to that place and getting beaten up like this. If Nick and Gerald had arrived any later, would I have lost my big sister forever?"

For a moment, the reporters were full of outrage. "Who would've thought this real daughter could be so arrogant? She even dared to hurt someone! Call the police, quick!"

I hurriedly threw the knife away and waved my hands to show that it wasn’t me.

“How kind of the fake daughter!” someone sneered. “I heard she was originally engaged to Gerald, but five years ago, after Luna was brought back by the Helmes Family, she stole him away…”