CHAPTER 299: CHAPTER 299: SWITCHING LIVES IN REALITY

A Weibo post titled "#Explosive! Sang Ning and Chu Xi’s real-life swapped princess drama#" triggered an enormous wave of discussion.

The gist of the post was that Sang Ning’s parents deliberately swapped Sang Ning and Chu Xi to ensure their biological daughter could stay with the Chu Family and live a wealthy life. As a result, Sang Ning stole twenty years of Chu Xi’s life.

Sang Ning enjoyed twenty years of a princess-like life in the Chu Family, while Sang Youming and Hu Zhi took Chu Xi back home and maliciously abused her, even stripping her of the right to attend school—leaving her without a high school diploma.

If not for an accident, Chu Tian and Li Sulan would never have uncovered Sang Ning’s true identity. Until now, the Chu Family had remained clueless about the actions of the Sang Family.

What’s worse is that even after Chu Tian and Li Sulan discovered everything and planned to bring Chu Xi back, Sang Youming and Hu Zhi greedily demanded one million yuan from the couple, threatening to spread the scandal everywhere and ruin them socially if they refused.

These kinds of high-society scandals always make for prime gossip among netizens, particularly when the characters involved are currently the most talked-about individuals.

[Oh my god, I’ve never seen anything like this! This is basically the real-life version of "Parasite." How do Sang Youming and Hu Zhi even have the audacity? Let their own daughter live like royalty while treating Chu Xi like dirt.]

[I really owe Chu Xi an apology. I used to mock her for being uneducated, but who knew she had lived such a harsh life for twenty years—couldn’t even complete high school. How could her academic level be anything but low?]

[And not finishing high school is bad enough, but wasn’t Chu Xi really young when she debuted in the entertainment industry? Thinking about it more carefully... it’s horrifying. There’s a real possibility that Sang Youming and Hu Zhi forced her to quit school to start working.]

[Now that I think about it, Sang Ning’s genius-student persona totally makes sense. She grew up in the Chu Family, receiving elite education. Of course her academic skills are impressive—but this is all what Chu Xi should’ve had.]

[People are so twisted. I really didn’t think Sang Youming and Hu Zhi were capable of this kind of behavior.]

[I have a question—if this is all true, why didn’t the Chu Family choose to call the police? This is basically a crime.]

[Maybe they’re trying to save face? They probably didn’t want to completely tear things apart. No matter how terrible, Sang Youming and Hu Zhi did raise Chu Xi, at least keeping her alive. For the Chu Family, that might be enough.]

[Sigh. It’s the kids who suffer for the adults’ mistakes. Just think about Sang Ning: living in luxury with the Chu Family for over twenty years, suddenly going back to the Sang Family—how could she possibly adapt to that?]

[Don’t feel sorry for Sang Ning just yet. This whole situation becomes scarier the deeper you think about it. Remember how Sang Ning kept snapping at Li Sulan on that TV show while defending Hu Zhi and Sang Youming? Logically, she shouldn’t have formed such close bonds with her biological parents, considering they barely interacted. But her behavior says otherwise.]

[Oh my god, if what the commenter said is true, does this mean Sang Ning has known for a long time that she isn’t a child of the Chu Family? She might’ve secretly been in contact with her biological parents behind their backs.]

[If that’s the case, then a lot of things start making sense. Sang Ning constantly targeting Chu Xi and Li Sulan on TV might’ve been out of spiteful revenge after being sent back to the Sang Family.]

[But how dare Sang Ning act vengeful? She stole Chu Xi’s parents for twenty years. She should be kowtowing to Chu Xi begging for forgiveness!]

The Weibo post only covered the general outline of the situation, without delving into detailed specifics. Still, netizens found plenty of material to piece together their own versions of events and logic that they deemed plausible.

No detailed explanation was needed; sometimes allowing netizens to form their own interpretations creates an unexpected public opinion effect, which was Chu Tian’s intention.

Sang Ning hadn’t expected Chu Tian and Li Sulan, people who cared so much about their reputation, to choose to make the scandal public—especially in such a humiliating and rumor-filled way.

But now that they had seized the upper hand, any attempt by Sang Ning to clarify things would only be viewed as an intentional PR move to whitewash her image.

The negative consequences of this false story escalated quickly, and her family was the first to bear the brunt of it. She noticed Sang Chuan’s strange behavior right away.

Sang Chuan, normally a chatterbox, could go on endlessly whenever he wasn’t studying.

But at noon—precisely the time when he should’ve been relaxing after finishing his schoolwork—he was slumped into the corner of the sofa like a pile of lifeless mud, staring at Sang Youming’s phone and sighing repeatedly.

Although his movements were small, Sang Ning was keen enough to pick up on his sighs.

She got up from the dining table and walked to him. "Sang Chuan, if you have time to play on your phone, you might as well go rest and recharge your energy."

Sang Chuan was so engrossed in his phone that he didn’t even notice Sang Ning standing before him until she spoke. Panicked, he hurriedly swiped his screen to exit the app and stuffed the phone behind his back.

"Sis, okay, I’m going now," Sang Chuan said.

His gaze nervously flitted elsewhere for a moment, naively believing he had hidden his emotions well. He smiled at Sang Ning and began heading to his bedroom.

Right as Sang Chuan attempted to walk past her with the phone behind his back, someone moved swiftly and snatched it from his hand.

"Sang Ning, what are you doing?" Sang Chuan exclaimed in shock, reaching out to take back his phone.

But Sang Ning didn’t give him the chance. She held the phone up high, skillfully dodging every one of his attempts to grab it.

"Normally, when I tell you to stop playing on your phone and go rest, you’d argue with me about the importance of balancing work and leisure. But now, you’re acting too obedient. It’s making me uncomfortable." Sang Ning said while evading Sang Chuan, already unlocking the phone.

Sang Chuan had only exited the app but hadn’t cleared it from the background. As soon as Sang Ning opened the recent apps, she immediately saw the app Sang Chuan had been using.

The app was a chat app, and the screen was paused on Sang Chuan’s class group chat.

Red notification dots kept popping up non-stop, with chat messages flooding in like a storm, one banner after another.

[The Sang Family’s genes are truly garbage. No wonder Sang Chuan loves being a campus bully so much—it’s clearly inherited from his trash parents.]

[Be careful with your words. He’s been going down the genius-student route lately and is deeply loved by the teachers. Campus bully days are ancient history.]

[Stop pretending! No matter how much of a genius he is, it doesn’t change the fact that his parents are thieves. I don’t want a thief for a classmate.]

[You guys switch sides awfully fast. Weren’t you just envying him for having a celebrity sister and wanting to be friends with him? Why act different now?]

[Give me a break! Sang Ning’s just a washed-up D-list nobody. Not a real celebrity. The whole Sang Family is trash.]