The Duke's Passion - Chapter 5 - Born Stupid (?)

Three Days of Happiness is a novel by Sugaru Miaki, also known as Fafoo. It’s a rewritten version of the story originally posted to 2ch.

The premise of the story revolves around a shop where one can sell away the remaining years of their life, and the consequences of doing so.

“I Say A Little Prayer” is a short related story which was posted along with the novel’s release. It spoils some things about the main story, but nothing major.

“Whose child is it?” Winston and Yu-jin were once passionately in love, but due to a misunderstanding, they separated. Even now, Winston believes Yu-jin was involved in an affair with his father. After being cruelly abandoned, Yu-jin struggled to survive alone while raising his daughter, never expecting to cross paths with Winston again. Then one day, a fire forces Yu-jin out of his apartment, leaving him and his daughter homeless. At his lowest point, he learns that Winston’s father, Harold Campbell, left him an inheritance in his will. Desperate for any help, he decides to visit the Campbell estate. When they meet again, Winston still despises him, while Yu-jin only wishes to collect his inheritance and leave. To his surprise, Harold has left him far more than expected—but with one condition: he must marry Winston and bear another child within a year. Yu-jin tries to refuse, but reality is harsh. Fueled by resentment over Winston’s continued cruelty, he agrees to the marriage out of spite. Winston, on the other hand, makes it clear that their union is nothing more than a formality to fulfill the will. Yet, despite their intentions, an undeniable pull keeps drawing them back to each other. Both insist it’s nothing but lust, desperately ignoring the emotions that refuse to fade…

Yuan Xi had been the secretary for Gu Hanchen for five years, working tirelessly without a single day off. Not only was she overworked like a horse, but she was also slandered by Gu Hanchen's fiancee and her friend, Miss Chu, who accused Secretary Yuan of delusionally hoping to turn from a sparrow into a phoenix and become the wife of President Gu. No longer able to tolerate the treatment, Yuan Xi handed in her resignation letter. After resigning, the once overburdened secretary surprisingly turned out to be the legitimate heiress of the wealthiest family in Jiangcheng, the Chu family! Back at the Chu household, Yuan Xi discovered that the family had taken in an adopted daughter, Chu Yan, who had been standing in for her. The false heiress was bright and unrestrained, rightfully considered the unrivaled young mistress of Jiangcheng. Even after the return of the true heiress, Chu Yan remained the celebrated young mistress while Yuan Xi was invariably seen as a mere shadow when compared to Chu Yan's splendid life. Yuan Xi's husband did not even own a house in the center of Jiangcheng. In contrast, the impostor Chu Yan was set to marry into one of Jiangcheng's top four wealthy families, the Bo family. Everyone in Jiangcheng ridiculed Yuan Xi for not having a life as fortunate as the false heiress, nor a discerning eye. That was until the day when Mi Chen was listed on the stock market, and Yuan Xi swiftly rose above her own father to become the new wealthiest person in Jiangcheng. On the day Yuan Xi's child was born, the established noble Huo family from A City announced with great fanfare the joy of welcoming a new grandson... Yuan Xi had always thought that her marriage to Huo Shiyen was merely a shotgun wedding, and that Huo Shiyen had someone else he considered his childhood sweetheart and sweetheart under the moonlight. Only later did she realize that she was, in fact, his cherished childhood love.

“Now you see?” she shouted in a mix of annoyance and disappointment. “You can't outsmart Scrients! They're the most intelligent beings across the two realms.”“You're right,” I muttered, averting my gaze with a heavy sigh. “I made a mistake. I was too arrogant to think that a mere human like me could fool them.”—BOOM!!“Heik! Wh-What was that?”“Hmm? I'm not sure. Maybe you should go and ask the most intelligent beings across the two realms. Oh wait, you can't. I killed them all.”______My name is Samael Kaizer Theosbane.On the last day of high school, I got into a fight with a kid I used to bully.It was a stupid, pointless scuffle, and in the middle of it, I tripped and hit my head on a rock.That’s when the memories came flooding in - the memories of another life, of a different world.Suddenly, everything made a twisted kind of sense. I realized two things.First, I was in a game I used to play in my past life.Second, I was a villain. A villain!Not the cool and mysterious kind, either.No, my destiny was to be manipulated and die a dog's death!I was the worst type of cliché: an ungrateful, privileged, insufferable young master. The sort you'd find in those poorly written fantasy stories.The kind everyone hates — a snobby brat from a powerful noble family who thinks he owns the world just because he was born with a silver spoon lodged in his mouth.You know the type. The one the hero beats to a pulp to prove his worth.Yeah, I was that guy.And the hero? The hero was the kid I’d been bullying all this time. The same one I got into a fight with.He was the supposed savior of this damned world.A world teetering on the edge of destruction, beset by wars, calamities, and a grim future that only I knew.And at the end of it all, the final antagonist of the game, the undefeatable boss… the Spirit King, was waiting.But could I even make it to the end?Could I conquer a game where defeat was the only certainty?A game that was now my reality!“Ah, fuck it.”I had no idea if I could, but I sure as hell was going to try.Extorting extras, manipulating main characters, twisting the story to my advantage, stealing the hero’s cheat items, killing villains before they could become threats - nothing was beneath me.Would the main characters be affected? Who cares!Would the story change? Even better!All I cared about was me—my survival, my life, my choices.“I will live this life with no regrets.”…But as I soon discovered, fate was not easily changed.And the price of altering one's destiny was steep.