Mind reading saves the whole family; I'm firmly in the role of a charlatan.

Chapter 297: Fanfiction is Out of Character!

Du Yihan deliberately emphasized the word "good," and Xiao Jinhang felt a chill run down his spine, making him shiver involuntarily.

He felt that the person in front of him was looking at him with too sharp eyes, as if they could see through his dark thoughts at a glance, making all his schemes impossible to hide!

Ji Yinde, however, seemed oblivious to the subtle tension between the two, and continued to comfort Xiao Jinhang with a smile: "It's normal that you don't understand many things since you've just arrived at our research institute. But don't be too nervous. Everyone in our institute is very kind. If you have any questions, feel free to ask us. We will definitely do our best to help you."

Xiao Jinhang was far less patient with Ji Yinde than he was with Du Yihan, but he was good at using the opportunity to climb up the ladder, looking at Du Yihan with eager eyes.

"Really? That would be great."

Du Anrao observed his every move, raising an eyebrow slightly.

[Xiao Jinhang must have just been reborn not long ago. Knowing that Third Brother is very likely the only person in this world who can save him, he rushed to curry favor with Third Brother the moment they met, but...]

Du Yihan and Xi Jingyue's hearts were in their throats again. They belatedly realized that Du Anrao had mentioned at the beginning that there were two books related to the person in front of them.

The first book is written from the perspective of a time-traveling female protagonist, which is the one she just mentioned. As for the second book…

【Huh? So that's how it is. No wonder I always felt something was off?】

Du Yihan and Xi Jingyue were slightly taken aback, and their ears perked up.

What happened? Tell me what went wrong!

It turns out that the two books that recorded Xiao Jinhang's life were not, as Du Anrao had previously thought, two familiar authors who had agreed in advance to borrow a story background and jointly write a book.

Rather, it was a fanfiction created by a reader who couldn't accept the ending given by the original author, without the original author's consent, under the guise of a sequel.

Fan fiction?! Xi Jingyue and Du Yihan were stunned for a moment, then filled with question marks, wondering what this was all about.
Du Anrao was unaware of the two's inner thoughts. He glanced at Xiao Jinhang, who had clearly entered "version 2.0," and was filled with grief and indignation.

[It's one thing to use a sequel as a cover for fanfiction, but can you please not ruin the lives of important characters? Everyone knows that out-of-character (OOC) writing in fanfiction is a major taboo!]

The whole thing started with the ending where Xiao Jinhang was mercilessly killed off by the author. On the very day the original novel was marked as finished, a reader went to the book review section and made a fuss, claiming that they couldn't accept the ending and hoped that the author could rewrite this part to give the male and female protagonists a better ending.

Du Anrao was speechless at this.

[This ending is indeed unkind to the male lead, but perfect for the female lead. Or perhaps, for these people, the ideal ending for her is to marry a chauvinistic murderer, live the life of a wealthy wife constantly subjected to jealousy and violence, financial humiliation, and the ever-present fear for her life?]

Some people are fine as fictional characters, but in real life, they're so awful you'd want to call the police and have them arrested!

The original author clearly shared this view, and their replies to these comments exuded a sense of resignation and madness. The gist was: while she wrote the story and created the characters, at a certain point, the characters developed self-awareness and acted according to their identities, personalities, and circumstances, no longer under her control as the author.

This ending is the result of their own actions following the plot, and it is also the best ending for them.

At the same time, she also reflected on herself. Originally, she wanted to write a melodramatic story about a wife-chasing-after-the-crescent-after-the-becoming-the-wife novel with a substitute as the protagonist. However, as she wrote, she felt that the male lead was a scoundrel. She accidentally went too far with the wife-chasing-after-the-becoming-after-the-wife-crematorium story and pushed the male lead into the incinerator, where he died instantly.

She will remember this lesson and never touch such unsuitable topics again, lest she go astray.

These words sound sincere, but in reality, they all boil down to one point: the ending is great, the male lead deserves to die, watch it if you want, or don't!
Xi Jingyue: "..." This author has quite a personality.

Du Yihan: "..." Although you killed me off, I can't deny that I'm quite satisfied with this bastard's ending.

Unfortunately, their satisfaction does not mean that some readers who identify with Xiao Jinhang are satisfied, which is why Du Anrao mentioned this fan fiction.

The fanfiction begins with Xiao Jinhang dying of liver cancer, filled with regret and grief, only to be reborn before his beloved returned to China. At that time, he hadn't severed ties with Wen Xia Nuan, kicked her and her grandmother out of the house, and Dr. Du was still alive and well.

Xiao Jinhang was overjoyed and quickly devised a series of plans to make the female lead devoted to him. At the same time, he found his uncle, the dean, and asked him to arrange for him to enter the research institute to get close to Dr. Du and build a good relationship with him in advance so that he could humbly beg for medicine later.

However, as we all know, rebirth only gives the other person the advantage of being able to foresee the future; it does not change a person's temperament, much less increase their intelligence.

It's true that Xiao Jinhang got in touch with Dr. Du through connections, but with his limited abilities, he would only be a hindrance in the lab. Dr. Du hates nothing more than these useless connections who can't help and always slow down the research.

Therefore, even though Xiao Jinhang tried to please him, their relationship inevitably deteriorated into mutual dislike.

Seeing that the soft approach wasn't working, Xiao Jinhang started plotting crooked methods again, and the plot here is connected to the book "Infinite Flow" that Du Anrao mentioned before.

However, as the background of the dungeon world, the book only briefly touched on these things, hiding many details.

However, from Xiao Jinhang's perspective, he unexpectedly added a lot of content that Du Anrao had not seen before.

Having been rebuffed by Dr. Du himself, Xiao Jinhang decided to take a different approach, using the female lead, whose attitude towards him had softened, to help confirm the progress of Dr. Du's experiment.

After confirming with the female lead multiple times that Dr. Du had indeed completed the production of the cancer-specific drug, Xiao Jinhang encountered Liu Tianyuan and his group.

With their help, Xiao Jinhang successfully smeared Dr. Du, falsely accusing him of plagiarizing other people's papers in an attempt to seize Dr. Du's experimental results.

At first, everyone in the laboratory and even the school who knew about Dr. Du's abilities did not believe the accusation. However, faced with the various pieces of evidence fabricated by Xiao Jinhang and the main characters, as well as the accusations made by some people in the laboratory, they had no choice but to believe it.

Here we must mention a few old acquaintances who played a crucial role in this conspiracy and ruthlessly betrayed her third brother, the most important of whom is Ji Yinde, who is standing in front of them at this moment.