I Wasn't Born Lucky

The collector Xiao Li sat in the taxi with Tan Li. They drove through the greenery on the roadside on several occasions and returned home in this dangerous manner.

Taxis rarely visited the Xiao home, let alone one where the front of the car was damaged and looked like it had been in a serious car accident. Thus, when Xiao Li returned home, the housekeeper shouted as a greeting, "Second Master, you… how did you get back? Why didn't you ask the driver to pick you up?"

He spoke as he examined the car. Fortunately, Tan Li had already returned to Xiao Li's pocket and nothing was seen in the car. He just didn't know where Xiao Li got a taxi and drove it back. He quickly said, "This isn't safe. Second Master, how can you drive this type of car? Why is it like…"

"It's fine, please dispose of the car." The housekeeper was old and once he started nagging, there was no end to it. Xiao Li promptly prevented him from continuing and headed straight back to his room.

He didn't notice that when he got off the car, a woman on the balcony of the villa's second floor stood in a nightgown behind the curtain, frowning at him. How could he still come back? Mr Ye hadn't acted yet? There were no traces of fright or panic… she really wanted to record him panicking and yelling. Xu Mei's face was disappointed as she pulled out her phone and carefully pressed his fingers on them.

On the other side, Xiao Li returned to his room. Tan Li didn't need to speak and had already returned to the window to look down. The night lights outside the village were on and the soft lights shone on the seasonal flowers. The magnificent colours were something that couldn't be seen in an instance world.

The doll was actually lying on the window sill but in the blink of an eye, it sat among the flowers to feel the beauty at close range.

Xiao Li sat down and casually put the little yellow book in front of him. After his indifferent refusal of the little yellow book's request, it lost its information like a frosted eggplant. Fortunately, he didn't need to communicate with the other party. The teenager picked up the pen and wrote the word 'mall' to open the mall system.

This system was also simple. All convertible items were listed in this book and he simply had to tick the things he wanted to buy. It could be called very unintelligent and not practical.

Xiao Li had read countless novels and it was the first time seeing such a troublesome system. Other people got intelligent high-tech systems who could communicate or speak with the soul. In this ghost world, Xiao Li had to carry a little yellow book with him and also had to write in it to communicate. It wasn't spiritual at all.

He had asked Zheng Yi and the answer was that no other person's book had the function of dialogue, only the most basic choices.

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There weren't many things in the mall and Xiao Li roughly glanced over them. There were 'Expel Ghosts' charms (one time consumable, 200 survival coins), 'See Ghost Pill (one time consumables, allows you to see ghosts for 30 seconds after use, 100 survival coins), 'Cursed High Heels' (acquire two minutes of flying speed after taking it out but there is a chance of getting lost, 1000 survival coins), 'Team Symbol' (after writing the name, you will be assigned to the same world in the next instance, one time consumable, 3000 survival coins), etc.

There was nothing that Xiao Li needed in this mall but he glanced at his survival coins balance, generously exchanged it for the first two character papers and then closed the mall. After experiencing the orphanage instance, in addition to the 'mall' system, the 'forum' function also opened to increase the communication between reincarnators.

Xiao Li clicked into the forum and looked at it. The first post was a ranking of reincarnators:

[No.1 Anonymous]

[No. 2 Wang Huai]

[No. 3 Kudo Shinichi]

[No. 4 Huai Anzhi]

[No. 5 Mystery]

…

[1st comment: Fortunately, I queued up with the goddess Mystery for an instance. The goddess calmly reasons out the clues and laughs while making the ghosts vanish in a puff of smoke. She is worthy of being the goddess.]

[2nd comment: I am lined up with the self-proclaimed Kudo Shinichi. What is this unspeakable relationship with No. 3?]

[3rd comment: What are these rankings? Why haven't I seen any of them? Does it depend on the number of instances cleared?]

[4th comment: Is upstairs a newcomer? These are all big names. Those who can be ranked have both strength and intelligence. They were well-recognized.]

…

Xiao Li was deeply attracted to the third-ranked person. This was the first time he saw someone who used a pseudonym other than himself. His own naming skill was already bad and this was worse than him.

In addition to this ranking post, there were some discussions that exchanged clues on the instances or those looking for teammates around the world. Xiao Li scanned casually until his eyelids lowered and he closed the little yellow book.

It was already close to early morning. Zhou Ying had run out and hadn't returned yet. He was a ghost so Xiao Li wasn't worried. He just took a shower and went to bed. Due to his tiredness, he fell asleep quickly. However, his sleep quality wasn't good because he had a dream.

In the dream, Xiao Li was lying in bed. He was vaguely conscious but he couldn't move. The teenager tried to move his arm only to hear the clear sound of chains knocking against the bed. Xiao Li looked up and saw that his wrist was tied with a black chain that looked especially conspicuous against his white skin.

Then came the feeling of being tied up from his feet, like an invisible object had caught his ankle, binding him so tightly to the bed that he couldn't move. Xiao Li wanted to speak but he couldn't make a sound. His tongue was numb like it was caught by something ominous. The strength around his angle was growing stronger, like it was going to crush him. In fact, if Xiao Li could see it then he would find a palm mark on his skin.

Xiao Li was in pain but couldn't struggle without words. He could only frown a bit and endure it.

Then the force gradually diminished like it was distressed. It changed to a light touch like the licking from an animal. The palm print also faded and the pain slowly disappeared. There was no one by the bed and no colour. Only endless darkness that eroded at human reason.

Xiao Li sighed with relief. His mind wasn't clear and he became more and more sleepy until he fell into a deeper sleep under that touch. Before he lost consciousness, there was a voice that sighed very lightly. The tone was filled with trembling joy and contradiction. "…If only it could be like this."

Maymetho has drawn some lovely fanart of Tan Li.

The competition is fanart based, and submissions can be inspired by any of CG’s current, completed or teaser projects. If you’re daring, you can even combine characters from several stories and/or play with the plot as you wish! We’ll be selecting a winner through a voting system via the website after the submission deadline to make everything fair and reader-focused.

The deadline for submission is Sept 30, 2019 Submissions must be sent in via this form:

Voting will begin October 2, 2019 and end Oct 15, 2019. The winner will be announced on Oct 16 and their artwork will be showcased on the website. (We might even showcase the top three!)