Game Over: Erased by the System

Right before the wedding, the male lead finally remembered I existed and came to the mansion to see me.

[Has Harper realized her mistake?]

The butler looked devastated: Miss Harper is already dead.

He didn't believe it.

He rushed into the bedroom, only to find my long-cold corpse.

Before my mission failed, I refused to give up. I sent Carter one last text message, asking:

"Do you really have to marry Chloe?"

A reply came quickly:

"If you keep throwing these tantrums, we can't even be brother and sister anymore."

I didn't even have to guess; I knew Carter was frowning as he typed that, annoyance written all over his face.

My heart turned to ash. I resigned myself to my fate, tossed the phone aside, and waited for death.

I watched helplessly at the countdown hovering above my head

From ten, all the way down to zero.

The system's mechanical voice echoed in my mind:

"Failure to capture the male lead's heart. The host will now be erased."

As soon as the words fell, I felt it with agonizing clarity

My soul was being peeled away from this body, inch by excruciating inch.

It was an unbearable sensation.

A hundred, a thousand times worse than when I was tortured and whipped in my past life.

I gritted my teeth as hard as I could, but a muffled groan of agony still slipped through my lips.

The experiences of this lifetime flashed before my eyes like a speeding movie.

I was supposed to be the vicious secondary character in a billionaire romance novel, but I was handed the script to win the male lead's heart.

To better nurture our feelings, I chose to enter this world as his childhood best friend.

For the first eighteen years of our lives, we were inseparable.

Whenever it was my time of the month, Carter would buy me pads and make me hot tea with a heating pad ready.

He would endure a twenty-four-hour flight, rushing all the way back from overseas just to say:

"I wanted to see you."

Almost everyone thought we were a sure thing, a match made in heaven. Including me.

That was until the female lead, Chloe, appeared.

Only then did I profoundly understand that a lifetime of friendship could never compete with love at first sight.

At my twentieth birthday party, I confessed my feelings to him.

Unsurprisingly, he rejected me.

He summarized over a decade of our bond into a single sentence:

"Harper, I only see you as a sister."

From that moment on, my "vicious secondary character" persona awakened, and I began to cling to him desperately.

And from the sidelines, I witnessed his on-again, off-again five-year saga with Chloe.

Leading up to today, where they finally got their happy ending.

If I didn't win Carter's heart, I would die. But at the same time, I genuinely loved him!

Back then, I was stubborn. I refused to believe that eighteen years of devotion couldn't rival a single fleeting glance.

Facts proved that I was wrong. Completely, absurdly wrong.

But Carter, it really hurts!

After the immense tearing sensation faded, my body became light, no longer confined to flesh and blood.

Strangely, I didn't disappear immediately.

Instead, guided by some bizarre force, I was pulled straight to Carter's corporate headquarters.

Dressed in a tailored black suit, he exuded the aura of an elite executive.

It was almost laughable.

That suit he was wearing? I tailored it for him myself.

I majored in fashion design in college. Back then, my eyes and heart were entirely filled with Carter. I naively told him:

"I'm going to gift you a custom-tailored suit for your birthday every year, so you can be the spokesperson for my brand."

He promised to invest in me, to take my brand global.

I kept my promise, but he broke his.

[Mr. CEO, Miss Chloe is calling to remind you about the wedding photoshoot.]

Carter's executive assistant, Hayes, walked in to inform him.

[I know.]

Carter replied, placing a photograph face-down on his desk before standing up in silence.

When he left, I was forced to follow.

I watched as he and Chloe laughed and smiled, shooting an entire gallery of wedding photos.

On the way back, Carter uncharacteristically did not drop Chloe off at her place.

The atmosphere in the car was inexplicably heavy, suffocatingly so.

Carters brows were locked in a tight frown, lost in thought, as if some unsolvable problem was bothering him.

After a long while, he spoke abruptly:

"Where is Harper?"

"What is she doing today?"

Usually, I was incredibly clingy.

Id call him countless times a day and send an endless stream of texts.

Even if he ignored me, I would always find a way to pry his itinerary out of Hayes.

This time, however, Hayes simply replied calmly:

"Miss Harper hasn't reached out to me at all today."

Hearing this, Carters frown deepened fiercely. He pulled out his phone.

Our chat history was still stuck on yesterday's screen.

Me: "Do you really have to marry Chloe?"

Carter: "If you keep throwing these tantrums, we can't even be brother and sister anymore."

He furrowed his brows and sent me a text, acting as if he was granting me a grand favor:

"Where are you?"

Normally, I would have jumped for joy and immediately started rambling to him, not wanting to make him wait a single second.

But this time, ten minutes passed without a single reply.

Carter finally sensed something was off and ordered Hayes:

"Go to Oakwood Manor."

Oakwood Manor.

This estate was Carter's coming-of-age gift to me.

I had lived here ever since and refused to move out.

Even the butler was handpicked by him.

When Carter arrived, the mansion was terrifyingly quiet.

Only the butler was in the living room, busying himself aimlessly.

Carter casually adjusted his cufflinks and ordered:

"Tell Harper to come down and see me."

Hearing my name, the butler's rigid expression cracked, revealing an incomprehensible layer of sorrow.

He cast a resentful glance at Carter and slowly spat out the words:

"Miss Harper is already dead."

Carter froze for a second, then his face returned to a mask of indifference. He scoffed:

"What kind of new trick is she playing now?"

I might have been willful and mischievous, but I would never joke about life and death.

Yet his trust in me was so incredibly thin that he wouldn't even bother to verify it.

Carter was absolutely certain I was just throwing a tantrum. Before leaving, he told the butler to pass on a message:

"Tell her not to come to my wedding. Chloe doesn't like her, and she's an eyesore to me."

The butler's eyes flickered, his gaze toward Carter tainted with pity and a hint of hatred.

Carter stayed in my mansion for barely ten minutes. He came in a rush and left in a hurry.

He climbed into his car, irritated. When Hayes saw no one following him out, he paused: "Sir, did Miss Harper not come down to see you?"

After all, the old me wouldn't have let him wait for even a second.

Setting the system's mission aside... it turned out I was just a shameless, desperate lapdog begging for his attention.

Harper, you didn't die unjustly.

Carter's brow twitched, his mood growing even more foul as he warned:

"Never mention that name in front of me again."

Hayes hesitated, glancing at the thoroughly impatient Carter, and finally swallowed all his words of persuasion.

I was sitting right there in the back seat, right beside Carter.

He seemed extremely agitated. He made the driver circle the entire city several times.

His thin lips were pressed into a tight, straight line.

He gripped his phone tightly, glancing down at it every so often. But the screen remained pitch black; it never lit up.

I didn't know what he was hoping for.

Was he still expecting me to call or text him?

Oh, I remembered.

Carter once said I was his anchor; he only felt truly at peace when I was around.

Once, after a bitter fight with Chloe, he got drunk and ran over to my place in the middle of the night, acting like a madman.

He held me so tightly, the scent of alcohol mixing with his warm breath against my neck. He nuzzled me, full of intimacy.

[Harper, what would I ever do without you?]

His tone was tender, as though I were the lover he had yearned for all his life.

That was the closest I ever got to completing the mission. If I had slept with him then, given Carter's rigid, traditional mindset, he would have taken responsibility for me.

But I didn't want to use such dirty tricks to chain him to my side. I wanted to stand before him with my head held high.

So, I always appeared whenever he was depressed and defeated.

I saw him at his absolute lowest countless times, but I was never allowed to share the glory when he was standing at the peak.

During the five years he was entangled with Chloe, they loved and tortured each other.

Every time he achieved a victory, he would childishly run to her side, lift his chin proudly, and provoke her:

"Chloe, you're my defeated opponent."

Chloe would get furious, her eyes turning red.

Then Carter would frantically apologize and coax her until she smiled.

And I just stood a short distance away, staring blankly at that eye-piercing scene.

Five whole years. I lost count of how many times I had to endure that.

I thought about giving up, but every time the thought crossed my mind, the system would blare a piercing warning of my impending erasure.

The morning light was faint. The distant, foggy blue sky gradually turned pale, and the morning sun struggled to break through.

Carter waited for me all night, but he never got my surrender. He closed his eyes and ordered coldly:

"To the office."

"Yes, sir."

Upon arriving at the office, Carter paced irritably around the executive suite.

His gaze shifted and suddenly landed on the photograph placed face-down on his desk.

Things had been too rushed yesterday; I never got a clear look at who was in the picture.

Was it Chloe?

They had been practically inseparable these past few days. Did he miss her so much that he needed to look at her photo?

Over the past five years, he and Chloe had a toxic, passionate romance, but the one who was always by his side was me.

Right before my twentieth birthday, Chloe came up to me and declared with absolute certainty:

"Harper, the one who will end up with Carter is me."

I froze, not taking her declaration of war seriously.

How could she?

Carter and I had a deep bond. He planned my entire birthday party himself, making it a grand, luxurious affair. So, we made a bet.

At the party, I confessed to Carter: "I like you."

The entire room erupted, people clapping and cheering: "Be together! Be together!"

I waited for his answer, full of anticipation and anxiety.

But Carter looked hesitantly into the crowd, and finally gave me a helpless reply:

"Harper, I only see you as my sister. If I did anything to make you misunderstand, I apologize."

In an instant, the mocking and shocked stares of the crowd shattered into thousands of sharp blades, stabbing ruthlessly into my heart.

An invisible execution.

I forced a smile, having no idea how to salvage the humiliating situation.

I thought it was a mutual romance naturally blossoming; I didn't realize it was just my own pathetic, one-sided delusion.

To make matters worse, Chloe walked up to the stage, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Carter.

She crossed her arms, gave me a disdainful look, and said: "Harper, I told you. Carter doesn't like you. You're just asking for misery."

Carter turned and started arguing with her, criticizing her for acting on her own, entirely forgetting that I was still standing there, drowning in embarrassment.

[Sir, Miss Chloe is here.]

Hayes' calm voice echoed in the spacious, quiet office, jolting both of us out of our shared trip down memory lane.

[Let her wait outside for now.]

Carter nodded expressionlessly and turned to walk into the private lounge.

The lounge had a massive walk-in closet filled with all kinds of clothes, every single one carefully paired and picked out by me.

It was so he'd always be prepared for any occasion.

Now, he was meticulously picking an outfit from the dazzling array of clothes I bought him, all to go on a date with another woman.

How laughable!

I did so much, yet failed to unlock his heart, only managing to pave the way perfectly for someone else.

It was truly pages of absurdity, a handful of bitter tears.

Chloe, who was supposed to wait outside, entered the office without permission and picked up the photo on the desk.

When Carter walked out and saw this, he flew into a rage, his voice sharp and severe: "Who told you to touch my things?"

This sudden burst of anger caught her off guard.

Chloe froze for a second before firing back accusingly:

"Wow, Carter. We're about to get married, and you're hiding a picture of another woman? What exactly is the meaning of this?!"

Another woman's picture?

It wasn't Chloe.

Hearing this, I burst out laughing, clutching my stomach and giggling. I didn't know Carter was such a player!

But it was for the best. Let Chloe taste the bitterness I once swallowed.

They got into a fierce argument and eventually parted on bad terms.

The massive office was left in a mess, leaving behind only... Carter's profound loneliness.

He bent down to pick up the photo from the floor. I leaned in curiously, wanting to know who this woman hidden in his heart was.

Even Chloe had lost to her.

But he deliberately covered the photo with his hand, guarding it so tightly that I couldn't see a thing.

I sighed in defeat.

But on second thought, I let it go.

What business did the dead have with the affairs of the living?

Besides, I was going to disappear soon anyway.

[Ring Ring]

The ringing of the landline shattered the momentary silence of the office.

Carter looked over, his eyes landing on the old-fashioned phone on his desk, the corners of his lips curving up slightly.

He purposely waited a while. Just as the call was about to drop, he leisurely picked up the receiver and said, "Hello."

The butler's calm, numb voice came through the line:

"Sir, how should we arrange the young lady's funeral?"

Not hearing the voice he expected, Carter frowned heavily, his annoyance flaring up:

"Is Harper addicted to playing dead?!"

"Tell her that these cheap tricks won't fool me, and I won't cancel the wedding because of them!"

The other end went completely silent. Just as Carter thought the call had been disconnected, the butler's voice echoed faintly.