I have such a dislike for this novel, especially when I finally finished reading it and got to the part that interested me. Because that part is not bad. But the rest of it... let me explain.
The story is about Lu Ran who was reborn. He is the youngest son of the Shen family who was lost when he was four. Later the Shen family actually adopted a kid from an orphanage and gave Lu Ran's original name Shen Xingran to the adopted son.
But later Lu Ran was found back, but no one in the family was accepting him, Lu Ran desperately tried to fit in but it never happened. Later he was implicated many times and even was in a car accident that left him immobile for a decade, only to rarely see his family coming over.
After being reborn Lu Ran decided that since his family is so vile, he will be even more mean and from there he sometimes had the crazy moments of doing whatever he wanted to make the Shen family unstable.
Why I almost hated this novel is the crude and vulgar "humor". The thing is several times Lu Ran used either shit or toilet water to threaten people around him. The first evening he came around he made his dog poop and threaten the family with it (holding the plastic bag with the shit). Later he "punished" people by shoving them into toilets...It happened so many times that I lost count. And I have no idea if it's author's way of joking or there is no worse scenario than being dipped in shit, but I just felt disgusted all the time.
At first the family acts strange, but there is not real foreshadowing at first, only later I continued reading because you have an idea that his disappearance, this family and other things are not simple. And this is the only part that I could praise.
Because each family member at different times remembered the day when Lu Ran disappeared and they all have different experience about it, but they all feel guilty, not knowing that others feel the same guilt and the consequent actions of each member depended on that very day.
And we have a full explanation why the older brother Shen Xingyu is so cold. Why the second brother Shen Xingzhou is almost crazy about protecting fake Xingran. Why Mrs. Shen always protects and dotes on the adopted son and why the father Shen Hongyuan acts so weirdly.
Truth should be told from the previous generation and Lu Ran's grandfather. He built his family business by himself, but he was not satisfied with the next generation and was holding onto power for many years. His son actually followed all the arrangements, but this started to make the Mr Shen dissatisfied again. Like how can you rule the business if you're so gullible. He cast his eyes on the next generation. He started with the eldest grandson, but that started to cry how he missed his family and was let go, the second grandson was out of question because he was naughty and the next was Lu Ran. He lived with old Mr Shen since he was two. Through glimpses of the past we see that Lu Ran is very caring and considerate, but there was no one to care.
We know that Mr Shen died because he had problems with sugar level. But only by the very end we find out that it was man-made. Because his own son drugged him.
And we also find out that Lu Ran disappeared not because of negligence, but pretty much man-made too, because he saw his own father with the syringe at night. His father was afraid of being told by a 4 year old.
Then the famous scene of a travel came around. Almost each member had their own car / RV. So not a single person noticed that a kid disappeared, but they all had a guilty consciousness, only Shen Hongyuan took it as opportunity.
Shen Xingzhou made a fuss that he wanted cake as the youngest, but then changed to ice-cream.
Shen Xingyu gave the youngest a cold shoulder when was asked to go together for ice-cream, because he was under too much pressure from young age under his father. He acted this way with Lu Ran all the time, although Lu Ran did nothing, but basically father lashed at Xingyuand Xingyu being immature did the same.
Mrs Shen just had an argument with her husband, so she also sent the young son away with irritation.
Shen Hongyuan actually saw his kid walking away, but at the last moment he stopped. He agreed to move as if nothing happened, when things were revealed he made appearances as if he went to search, while he didn't. Later he even prevented people from searching. All until he had to tell his father the truth. His father lashed out at him, but the next time they met he was calm. He knew that his own son said outside that he's going to die, that his son wanted power. But he broke that dream, he announced that he will leave everything to little Lu Ran. if he wants the family business, he might find the kid back.
But the kid is lost and Mr Shen is above him, in desperate move Hongyuan got Mr Shen the lethal dose. After his death he was actually blackmailed by his own brother and his mistress, since she was a caregiver and filmed the process. Later with Mr Shen gone he took a young boy outside and gave him the name Shen Xingran. Because the will said - youngest son Shen Xingran. And fake Xingran is youngest. This was just in case, because he forged the will and lived for years like that.
Mrs Shen found an outlet while everyone blamed her for being irresponsible (quite common for these novels). Shen Xingyu changed his ways because of this incident since he blamed himself and Shen family was above all, even if it was by wronging Lu Ran. Xingzhou forgot his brother but with the adopted son he found the outlet, even if he did not remember the events due to high fever.
So what Lu Ran knows as a novel and protagonist Shen Xingran has such a sinister flavor underneath it.
Even in his last life the car accident was most likely done by his own father. From the very beginning his father was nervous about him because he was afraid his son will remember those things and everything he had done will be out.
So this story behind everything and how each member thought it was thir fault, the explanation behind their actions I don't consider bad.
But all that toilet stuff and basically the dragged the fuck out novel (130 chapters) that has many repetitive moments is just not it.
The ML of this novel is Ji Min, he was unlucky that the novel was written in '23 when disabled bosses were still popular. No worries, like any other big boss he will be cured.
They met by chance when he saw Lu Ran saving his dog, it's an old dog named DaHuang who was thrown out by Shen family, because Shen Xingran fake cried he was bitted (DaHuang has no teeth to bite) and also another rich dude under instigation of Second young master Shen was going to hit DaHuang with a car. I mean what can be more vicious.
After that they crossed paths, but had misunderstanding, especially because Lu Ran never clarified rumors that he was not illegitimate child (spread by Shen Xingran) and Ji Min's situation is due to illegitimate brother.
Later they got closer and he acted like protective elder, but because I cared none (wanted just the family story) I skipped a lot of their parts and how they fell in love. I mainly didn't care because a lot of that disgusting humor was present between the two as well.
Honestly, so much toilet trash. I think there were several scenes of just feeding people toilet water with drinks and people would find out and shout - okay if you don't want to do business then don't, there is not need to do tehse messy things.
Damn even the justification of why eventually Shen Xingran betrayed his family was not that bad. After all he always knew he was adopted, he figured temperaments of everyone and he found out about the will and other things, he just wanted to flee the country but was caught in time.
But before that all those cheap green tea moment when he cated all innocent or wronged just ruined the damn picture so much.
Thus it became a mix of their own core idea that was not bad, mix of cliche and generic stuff and disgusting humor.
How am I supposed to rate it? But I definitely ranted as I wanted. Initially I didn't want to mention it at all. Not even write it down into my planner, which helps me keep track on things. But later I reached the point of finally finding things out (kept secret for entire novel) and I just couldn't stay silent.
RATE: 1/5. Fuck it.
PS: After posting decided to check if this novel is on NU, since it's at least few years old. And it is. I'm not going to delete my rant here though :)
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