Xie Yunfan was awakened by a hurried ringtone.

Half-asleep, he pressed the answer button, and a woman’s choking voice sounded in his ear: “Yunfan, come to the City Central Hospital quickly. Your brother is in emergency resuscitation!”

Xie Yunfan blanked. “You have the wrong number, right?”

The other party asked in confusion: “Are you… Xie Yunfan?”

“Yes.” Xie Yunfan rubbed his eyes and sat up in bed. “But I don’t have a brother.”

Silence fell over the phone. Just as Xie Yunfan was about to hang up, the woman suddenly choked up and said, “I know you two just had a fight, but Xinghe is your closest relative in this world. He’s being resuscitated in the hospital right now, can you stop throwing a child’s temper tantrum?”

Scam calls these days are truly hard to guard against—there are too many fake doctors claiming your family is in trouble. But this call was weird; it said his brother was in the hospital, yet didn’t ask him to transfer money. Instead, it told him to visit the hospital?

Shouldn’t a normal scam call provide an account number and urge him to wire money to save a life?

Xie Yunfan looked down at his phone, only to unexpectedly realize—

This wasn’t his phone at all.

He had just switched to a white phone last week, but this one was a red, ultra-thin flip model, and the brand logo was completely unrecognizable.

Xie Yunfan stared at the unfamiliar phone in a daze.

Until the woman’s voice rang in his ear again: “City Central Hospital, Emergency Department Operating Room. Hurry over, I’ll have the driver take you.”

The other party hung up and immediately sent a navigation address.

Xie Yunfan picked up the unfamiliar flip phone. After studying it for a moment, he found that its operating system had many functions he had never seen before. The main screen displayed the date as October 30.

He opened the phone’s built-in browser and checked the current news in the gaming section.

[Cool new game “City Home” launching its open beta across the net on November 11!]

[The 3rd All-Member Mecha Tournament for “Mecha Apprentice” officially starts November 1!]

[Holographic masterpiece “Zombie Siege” releases its latest expansion pack “Crusader Legion”]

…

Xie Yunfan stared wide-eyed.

What was all this?!

As a senior game planner, he knew the new game releases of major domestic and international production companies like the back of his hand.

Yet at this moment, he hadn’t heard of a single game appearing in the trending news.

“Holographic games” were an even bigger blind spot for him; they were high-tech products that simply hadn’t been invented in his era.

Xie Yunfan quickly confirmed one thing—this was not his world.

Did he transmigrate?

Xie Yunfan carefully recalled his experiences over the past few days. The new game their team developed was about to launch, and as the lead planner, he had to track the progress of every department. Working continuous overtime for a week, 20 hours a day, eating and sleeping at the company, he was simply too exhausted. He couldn’t help but take a short nap at his desk, and when he woke up… he was here.

So, did a programmer die from overwork and have his soul transmigrate to another world?

Xie Yunfan smiled bitterly and knocked his forehead. The game he was producing happened to have a transmigration theme. He never expected that “transmigration” would actually happen to him.

“System, are you there?”

Xie Yunfan tried asking in his mind, but unfortunately, there was no response.

“No system to help me, huh?” Xie Yunfan climbed out of bed and looked around. “This doesn’t look like a game, there’s no player control panel… It seems I really have transmigrated to an alternate world.”

Regardless, he had to adapt to this environment as quickly as possible.

Xie Yunfan quickly pulled himself together, opened the door, and carefully observed his surroundings.

This was a villa, and its level of luxury exceeded his imagination. It seemed his identity in this life was likely a wealthy young master.

The caller ID from earlier showed “Cousin.” Her saying “your brother is in emergency resuscitation” was probably true. He needed to rush to the hospital immediately to avoid arousing the suspicion of relatives and friends.

Having made up his mind, Xie Yunfan immediately walked out the door.

Sure enough, a black sedan stopped in front of him. The driver proactively opened the door and said respectfully, “Young Master, Miss Mingzhi asked me to take you to the hospital.”

“Mm, got it,” Xie Yunfan said calmly as he got into the back seat.

The vehicle smoothly drove out of the courtyard.

Xie Yunfan lowered his head, unlocked the phone, and quickly looked up information about the Xie family.

The “Xingyun Group,” founded by the Xie parents over a decade ago, was a technology company primarily focused on mobile phones. They caught the era of the smartphone boom and made a fortune.

Unfortunately, the father’s thinking was too conservative. During a mobile OS generation upgrade a few years ago, Xingyun Group failed to keep up with competitors and was left far behind. “Xingyun Phones” were phased out by the market, and the Xie family gradually declined.

But a starved camel is still bigger than a horse. Even in decline, the Xie family was still considered one of the top wealthy families in the local area. That was until an accident two years ago, when the parents died in a car crash, and the 26-year-old eldest son, Xie Xinghe, took over as president of the Xingyun Group at a young age.

Unlike his “conservative” father, this older brother was a “radical.” He believed that since Xingyun Phones had lost a massive number of users and their reputation had severely tanked, it would be better to cut their losses, completely halt the mobile phone business, and pivot to developing the recently popular holographic gaming pods and large-scale holographic games.

Changing industries wasn’t an issue, but the steps he took were too big—he accidentally snapped his leg in the process.

According to the latest Q3 financial report, Xingyun Group had lost over a billion yuan. The ultimate reason was the complete failure of the “Xingyun Gaming Pod Project” led by Xie Xinghe.

The “Xingyun Gaming Pod,” which took two years and over a billion yuan to develop, was roasted on trending topics by netizens due to endless bugs upon release, setting a new record for return rates. Its bundled holographic game, “Master of Combat,” also offered a terrible player experience due to an imbalanced combat data system. Within three days, a massive number of players abandoned the game, complaint calls blew up the customer service center, and it became the biggest joke in the gaming industry.

Other game developers releasing titles at the same time said: It’s all thanks to our peers for making us look good.

Brother Xie suffered a massive blow and couldn’t recover.

Xingyun Group fell into a severe financial crisis and was recently filing for bankruptcy liquidation…

As the information unlocked, memories of this world gradually surfaced in Xie Yunfan’s mind.

—His current age was 20, a university student.

Growing up pampered by his parents and older brother, the Young Master of the Xie family lived in a carefree world, knowing nothing every day but drag racing, clubbing, and fooling around with a group of idle rich friends.

A few days ago, he had a fight with his brother. The cause was that he almost got into a car accident while racing on a mountain road with his friends. He was lectured by his brother, who confiscated his car keys. Unconvinced, Xie Yunfan talked back to Xie Xinghe’s face, even saying hurtful things like, “Mom and Dad didn’t control me when they were alive, what right do you have?”

Furious, Xie Xinghe pointed at his nose and scolded, “Get out, I don’t have a brother like you!”

After the brothers parted on bad terms, Xie Yunfan invited his friends to a bar to play all night. Dead drunk, he was sent home by his friends. When he woke up, he received the call from his cousin, Mingzhi.

Xie Yunfan thought carefully: it was highly likely that the Xie Yunfan of this world had died from alcohol poisoning.

By sheer coincidence, his soul had entered this body.

His soul was slowly merging with the body. He could remember some of the things Xie Yunfan had experienced recently, but he temporarily couldn’t recall anything from over a year ago.

…

In the blink of an eye, the car arrived at the hospital entrance. The driver said, “Young Master, I’ll wait for you in the parking lot.”

Xie Yunfan replied, “No need, go home first. I’m staying at the hospital tonight to keep watch.”

The driver paused, glanced at him through the rearview mirror, and said, “Alright.”

Xie Yunfan got out of the car and found the Emergency Department operating room. From a distance, he saw a woman pacing anxiously in front of the door.

The woman wore a blue long dress and high heels, with long, straight black hair. She looked elegant and gentle, but her face was somewhat haggard, and tear stains still hung at the corners of her eyes.

Sensing the footsteps in the hallway, she turned around and met Xie Yunfan’s clear eyes.

Mingzhi froze. The moment their eyes met, she suddenly had a very strange feeling. The person in front of her seemed a bit different… but what exactly had changed?

While she was in a daze, a familiar voice sounded in her ear: “Sis, how is my brother?”

Mingzhi snapped back to reality and said, “He’s having his stomach pumped in the operating room.”

“Stomach pumped? Food poisoning?”

“No, he took a whole bottle of sleeping pills,” Mingzhi said, her face pale.

“Sleeping pills?” Did his eldest brother want to swallow sleeping pills to commit suicide? Realizing the severity of the problem, Xie Yunfan immediately lowered his head and said softly, “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have fought with him.”

“You are already 20 years old, it’s time you act sensibly.” Mingzhi looked at Xie Yunfan with red eyes and spoke earnestly, “Uncle and Aunt passed away too suddenly, and your brother has been under immense pressure ever since he took over the company. He doesn’t expect you to help, he just hopes you study hard and make him worry less. He’s had enough headaches lately, and for you to talk back and say such hurtful things—it was truly a bastard move!”

“…Sis, I know I was wrong. When he wakes up, I will apologize to him face-to-face.” Xie Yunfan’s head dropped even lower.

“As long as you understand.” Mingzhi sighed softly and looked back toward the operating room.

Just then, the light in the operating room went out, and a doctor walked out.

Mingzhi immediately stepped forward and asked, “Doctor, how is my brother?”

The doctor replied, “We have pumped the patient’s stomach. Fortunately, he was brought in just in time, and the poisoning isn’t deep. He’ll need to remain hospitalized for observation, but he should wake up within 24 hours.”

Mingzhi breathed a sigh of relief: “Thank you, doctor!”

A nurse wheeled the hospital bed out of the operating room.

Xie Yunfan stepped forward to take a look. The man lying on the bed had a high nose bridge, handsome features, and a row of stubble on his chin, as if he hadn’t shaved in quite a while. His face was as pale as paper, and thick dark circles ringed his eyes. His condition was extremely poor.

It seemed that Brother Xie was truly mentally and physically exhausted recently.

His parents passed away, his company was on the verge of bankruptcy, and his ignorant younger brother argued and talked back to add to his misery… He was probably just too tired of living and had momentarily lost the will to go on, swallowing a bottle of sleeping pills to seek release.

Xie Xinghe’s mental state and sleep quality were obviously not good, otherwise, he wouldn’t have kept sleeping pills on hand. As a younger brother, the former Xie Yunfan hadn’t cared about him at all.

With everything going wrong, it was no wonder Xie Xinghe was disheartened and chose the path of “suicide.”

However, the terrible things were in the past, and bad luck couldn’t accompany the Xie family forever.

Although he had been dealt a terrible hand at the start of this alternate world, Xie Yunfan was best at making a comeback from a disadvantage in games. He would work hard to play this bad hand well.