Chapter 1 – A Sugar Daddy… What?!
Inside the Minghua Entertainment Building, the long-silent meeting room was suddenly broken by a sharp, cool male voice.
“One signature for twenty years?” Pei Ji held the artist contract between his fingers, a cold smirk tugging at his lips. “Heh, your company might as well call this a slavery contract.”
“Watch your tone, kid. Minghua is the biggest entertainment company in the industry. We’ve made countless top stars. For someone like you with no background and no connections. It’s already our generosity to even look at you. Don’t be ungrateful.”
Manager Xu, a middle-aged, balding man, jabbed a short, fat finger toward Pei Ji’s face as he mocked him.
To be fair, Xu wasn’t wrong. In showbiz, background and backing mattered most. Though Pei Ji’s looks and talent were top-tier, he was just a fresh high-school graduate with no capital behind him.
But Pei Ji couldn’t care less about those unspoken rules of the industry. He had always done things his own way.
He brushed Manager Xu’s hand aside, his cold eyes unwavering. “This is an exploitative contract. I’m not signing it. You can give up now.”
Maybe Manager Xu thought that because Pei Ji was young, he’d be easy to bully. His greedy eyes slid over the boy’s figure before narrowing with a lewd grin. “Well, if you’re open to a… different kind of deal, I might reconsider.”
Xu stood, taking a step toward him, hand outstretched to touch that flawless face.
But the moment his hand rose, Pei Ji seized his wrist and twisted it hard.
“Ah-! Ow! Sh**! It hurts! Let go! Let go, damn it!” Xu’s face contorted in pain, the flesh of his cheeks bunching up grotesquely.
Right before the joint was about to pop, Pei Ji released him, his expression filled with disgust. “Trying to take advantage of me? Have you looked in a mirror? Someone like you makes me sick just by existing.”
“You-! You…! Ah! Ow!” Xu clutched his arm, gasping, unable to get another word out.
Minghua Entertainment might be the most famous agency in the business, but right now, Pei Ji felt like even the air inside was filthy. He just wanted out.
Without hesitation, he flung the thick contract straight into Xu’s ugly face and delivered a sharp slap for good measure.
Then he turned on his heel and strode out, leaving only four light words behind: “I’m not signing.”
His back straight, his tone dripping with disdain.
Screw the unspoken rules. Screw their “top company.” He didn’t need that garbage.
Downstairs, his friend Kong Chuan was waiting. The moment he saw Pei Ji, he ran up. “Well? Did you sign the contract?”
Pei Ji’s face was calm. “No.”
“What? Why not?” Kong Chuan was stunned. “Did something go wrong? You’ve got the looks of a national treasure, no one else even compares!”
“How could they not want you?”
From the first time he’d met him, Kong Chuan had known Pei Ji was the best-looking guy he’d ever seen.
Sharp features, deep-set eyes, and striking bone structure. He was born photogenic. His soft peach-blossom eyes, the kind that made even a dog feel loved, softened his otherwise cool face. Tall, broad-shouldered, and long-legged. He was a full-package dreamboat. No wonder he was always topping the campus confession wall.
With looks like that, it made no sense that an agency would turn him down. Usually, they’d be fighting to sign him.
“It’s not that they didn’t want me,” Pei Ji said coolly. “I didn’t want them.”
His voice was icy, his gaze razor-sharp.
Kong Chuan blinked, trying to process that, but before he could speak, a blaring car horn roared from down the street.
A blinding pair of headlights came hurtling toward them from the right.
The black car sped forward like it was out of control.
It was too fast. Pei Ji couldn’t dodge. His lone figure was swallowed by white light, a searing pain tearing through him before everything went black.
“Pei Ji!”
“Pei Ji?”
When consciousness returned, his head was spinning, his mind hazy. He could faintly hear someone calling his name.
A doctor changing shifts glanced at the file in his hand, then at the pale young man on the bed. “Well, I’ll be damned. It really is you.”
The voice grew clearer, and Pei Ji forced his eyes open.
The face in front of him was familiar, only the features had sharpened, matured.
When the man came closer, Pei Ji finally recognized him.
It was Kong Chuan, wearing a white coat, pen clipped to the pocket.
“You…” Pei Ji blinked, thinking he must still be dreaming.
Kong Chuan looked down at him, tone faintly teasing. “Two years without seeing me and you already don’t recognize me?”
Two years? That couldn’t be right, they’d just been talking outside the agency.
Pei Ji’s mind went blank and his eyes filled with confusion.
“What, did the crash make you stupid?” Kong Chuan leaned in, concerned.
But as he did, Pei Ji frowned, studying him up and down before asking, completely serious, “Didn’t you say you’d rather die than study medicine?”
Kong Chuan froze, his hand halfway raised.
“That was years ago,” he said dryly. “How do you still remember that?”
Pei Ji looked even more lost. “Years ago? It just happened recently, didn’t it?”
“Recently?”
“Yeah, like right after graduation.”
Kong Chuan frowned. They hadn’t spoken in two years so how could Pei Ji think they’d just met?
He studied Pei Ji carefully and noticed something strange.
Those eyes, clear and bright, that bold, youthful energy… it wasn’t the Pei Ji who’d been through the grind of adult life. It was the Pei Ji from high school.
Kong Chuan’s brows furrowed deeper. “You’ve been in two car accidents. Which one are you talking about?”
Pei Ji looked bewildered. “Two? There’s only this one, right?”
What kind of cursed luck would it take to get hit twice?
But wait, he glanced down at himself. His limbs worked fine. He was intact.
And Kong Chuan looked nothing like a student now. Stubble on his chin, weary eyes, the air of someone beaten down by the working world.
Something wasn’t adding up.
Pei Ji’s heart skipped. “How old am I right now?”
“Twenty-five,” Kong Chuan replied.
That hit like thunder.
Twenty-five?! He’d jumped seven years into the future?!
His youth hadn’t even started, and it was already over?!
Pei Ji pointed at himself, wide-eyed. “I’m… twenty-five?”
Kong Chuan gave him a flat look. “What, you thought you’d stay eighteen forever?”
“I was eighteen before I woke up.”
“…Oh, for f***’s sake,” Kong Chuan muttered.
The once-brilliant campus heartthrob was reduced to this?
“Don’t tell me you think you time-traveled or lost your memory.”
“I think I really time traveled.”
Both spoke at once then froze, realizing what the other said.
Kong Chuan leaned in close, turning Pei Ji’s head side to side. “Weird. No missing parts.”
Pei Ji barely noticed; his mind was a mess.
So he’d really jumped seven years ahead. He was twenty-five now. How was his future self doing?
Curiosity prickled. He glanced around the room.
The ward was huge. Luxurious décor, full furnishings, more like a presidential suite than a hospital room. Several nurses were attending only to him.
This was definitely a private hospital, one of the most expensive ones in the city.
Which meant… maybe future him was doing pretty well?
“Did I… make it big?” Pei Ji asked, half-hopeful.
Kong Chuan’s expression shifted instantly. He remembered the man who’d come a few days earlier to pay Pei Ji’s medical fees, a stunning man with sharp brown eyes, even hidden under a cap and mask. His gaze was cold, proud, untouchable.
Only later had the nurses whispered who he was Chu Tinghan, the famously aloof “The God of Songs.”
Chu Tinghan had been a sensation since debut: a naturally gifted singer with both ethereal beauty and a haunting voice that could make people forget to breathe. Cold, distant, rarely appearing in public except for concerts or album promos, he was the kind of artist even the richest investors had to wait in line for.
So when that man had appeared in the hospital, everyone had lost their minds except Kong Chuan, who’d stood there thunderstruck, remembering exactly what the man had said:
“He’s been living with me for two years. You can treat me as his family.”
Even now, the shock lingered.
So when Pei Ji asked if he’d “made it big,” Kong Chuan could only stare at him, speechless.
Not exactly big.
“Not famous,” he said finally.
“Then what?” Pei Ji pressed.
Kong Chuan smirked. “You landed yourself a sugar daddy.”
“A- A sugar daddy?!” Pei Ji’s mind went blank.
He’d just rejected a pervert trying to “sleep his way up,” and now he was being told he’d become some kept boy? Impossible!
“You don’t believe me?” Kong Chuan raised an eyebrow, handing him a hospital card. “Proof’s right there. Your sugar daddy prepaid three hundred thousand for your treatment. You can check if you want.”
Pei Ji froze mid-reach. Three hundred thousand?! His fingers trembled before taking it, the card burning hot in his palm.
Kong Chuan shoved it at him anyway.
Swallowing nervously, Pei Ji asked, “So… who’s my sugar daddy?”
A powerful businesswoman? A sleazy rich guy? A young heir with too much money?
He mentally went through every possibility and wanted to crawl into a hole.
He couldn’t accept any of them.
Kong Chuan thought for a moment, then walked to the window, pulling the curtain open. “You’ll see.”
He pointed toward a row of tall office buildings across the street.
On five massive LED screens, the same ad was playing:
“The God of Songs: Chu Tinghan's Global Tour. World Arena Concert.”
The man on screen looked only a few years older than Pei Ji but already held the entire world in his palm.
Pei Ji blinked. “What does that have to do with my… sugar daddy?”
Kong Chuan’s lips curved in amusement. “Everything. Because you two are together.”
Pei Ji’s pupils contracted. He must be dreaming.
But Kong Chuan’s voice was steady, each word striking him like a hammer:
“The top singer in the world, Chu Tinghan.”
“He’s your sugar daddy.”
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