Chapter 5: Borrowing A Private Room

With the confusion of coming to a made-up world, along with the indescribable rejection of the "inheritance" from original owner, Su Ran wasn't able to fall asleep till late into the night.

The next morning, before the sun was even out, Su Ran was woken up by all the gossiping outside of her door.

"Aiyo, look at these. Such a mess, how are we supposed to walk through the hallway?"

"Exactly. This looks like a pig sty. This is so aggravating."

"What pigsty? It's a chicken nest, if you ask me."

(T/N: "chicken" is used to refer to a woman of that "profession".)

"Hehe, I guess you are right about that."

Su Ran didn't even need to exercise her imagination to know that all the wives and unmarried women outside were talking about her.

The original owner might not have a lot of money the last few years, but that didn't stop her from buying a lot of cheap items. Any shoes that wouldn't fit inside her house were piled up in the hallway.

Most families have some random items that were placed outside their front door.

Normally, nobody would comment on them.

Except that they were startled by the loan shark's ruckus and Su Ran's reaction last night, and they hadn't had a chance to blow off their steam.

With all the disgruntlement that was cooped up, they were finally able to find something to complain about.

"The hallway was already narrow enough. How are we supposed to get pass? And so dirty too. As I have said, aggravating."

"If you ask me, she looked exactly like the kind of person who'd do something like this!"

"Have that woman come and pick them all up! If she doesn't, we'd throw all this trash away!"

"That's right! Throw them all away! She shouldn't have piled them in the communal area to begin with!"

"Okay, then throw them away."

The women were all riled up in their gripe fest, so nobody expected the subject of their discussion would appear in front of them all of a sudden.

They all paused for a second and looked a little embarrassed.

"Cough, we wouldn't just throw away someone else's possessions like that. We would just like it if you can clean this up a bit."

The most these women would do was gripe and say all sorts of things while Su Ran was asleep. They would never have the courage to really throw her stuff away. They didn't want things to escalate too much and what if Su Ran called the cops?

"I meant it." Before the crowd could figure out what her deal was, Su Ran went back inside the house only to return with two big bags of stuff.

"And these too. If you are going to throw things away, then throw them away as well," said Su Ran.

Those were the bags she had packed up last night.

She couldn't stand the original owner's stuff. Even without the help of these women, she had planned on getting rid of this stuff today anyways.

Naturally, these women had no idea that Su Ran wasn't the original Su Ran anymore. They looked at each other and just thought that this woman had gone insane.

"You really want to get rid of them all?" One of them walked up and asked Su Ran as she looked at her dubiously.

"That's right, I don't want them anymore."

"Okay, you said it yourself. If you don't want them anymore, I am going to take them away."

"I don't want them anymore. You can have them all."

"Don't ask for them back once I've taken them away." As she was talking, the woman had already swiftly taken the two large bags from Su Ran along with all the shoe boxes outside the door.

The crowd, "..."

After a while, the crowd finally dispersed outside of Su Ran's apartment and they started gossiping about her in a low voice all over again.

"What was wrong with that woman? She just threw away so much of her stuff."

"I don't know. Maybe she has lost her mind."

"Maybe she's getting ready to pull a disappearing act. Didn't you see those loan shark guys last night? They all looked so vicious!"

"Exactly. I say, Da Bao's Grandma, why do you want that woman's used stuff?"

"She might have a lot of stuff, but none of them are good stuff. You've seen her normal cheap style. Why did you take her old clothes? You can't even cut them up and make shoes out of them."

"Exactly, my Qianwen said her Louis Vuitton purses are all knock offs. And not even the high end ones at that. They're all the lowest types of knockoffs."

"Aye, I am not keeping them for myself. My sister is back in the village. I am going to give these to her daughter to sell. Even if they bring in $10 or $20, it's still money, right?

"Plus, they might look like trash to us, but they might still be in style somewhere else."

"Oh, so you can do that huh…?" Listening to what the women were saying as they walked away, Su Ran felt that she had just lost out on a ton of money.

As she thought about that regretfully, she went back inside the apartment and started to clean up her appearance.

Ten minutes later, Su Ran walked past Da Bao's grandma without any makeup on. Da Bao's grandma almost didn't recognize the neighbor that has been living on the same floor as her for the last few years.

"You? Oh? Su, Su Ran? You are on your way out?" After all, she had just taken a bunch of her stuff just a few minutes ago. Now that she realized this was Su Ran, it'd be quite awkward for her to not at least greet Su Ran.

"Yes, on my way out."

***

"Someone who works night went out so early in the day time? The sun will be rising from the West. With her new style of clothes on, it looked like she had completely changed into a different set of skin," grumbled Da Bao's grandma after Su Ran had walked out of ear shot.

Su Ran tied her hair back into a ponytail today. She had no makeup on and also didn't try to hide the scar on her forehead like the original owner normally would. She had on the same outfit from yesterday and also a pair of white sneakers.

Almost all of the original owner's shoes were over 10 centimeters "work style" stilettos, with an occasional pair over 15 centimeters. This pair of sneakers that had been washed so many times that it was starting to turn white obviously didn't belong to "Su Ran".

If they didn't belong to Su Ran, then they must belong to Su Han.

When Su Han left home, he only brought with him his book bag and the clothes that he had on him and nothing else. Su Ran figured this pair of shoes were left behind from then.

Having lived with "Su Ran" for over ten years, Su Han still possessed very little. Whatever he had left behind, would not have been noticed amidst the original owner's massive amount of stuff.

For a 12-year-old, his shoe size was already at 37, same as the original owner. That worked out perfectly.

At least, as far as Su Ran was concerned right now, her instant son's sneakers were much better than the original owner's heels that could also be classified as weapons.

In her new style, not only her neighbors, even those who had been working with her just the day before had a hard time figuring out that she was the same person as the one from yesterday.

Sure enough, right when she arrived at the club that the original owner had worked at, she was stopped.

"Stay right there. Who are you?"

"Hah? I have something to take care of, so I…."

"Something to take care of? Do you know what kind of a place this is? You just kept on walking. This is not a milk tea shop, we are not open during the day time."

"Aye, Uncle Wang, it's me, Su Ran." Noticing that he didn't recognize her, Su Ran identified herself.

When she transmigrated over, she had adopted the original owner's memories, so she was relatively familiar with the original owner's workplace.

"Su Ran? You are Su Ran?

"Oh boy. You didn't have makeup on. I didn't recognize you at all." After he had recollected himself, Uncle Wang chuckled embarrassingly.

"So, why are you here so early?"

"I need to take care of something."

"Ah… you want to have a career change," speculated Uncle Wang.

Throughout the years, many had left this place for a different phase in life – some went back to their old home; some got a serious job, some got married and had children. Of course, some were picked up by rich men as well.

Judging from the way Su Ran looked, she probably belonged to the group who was going to get a real job and live her life.

"Something like that," smiled Su Ran as she nodded.

"Then good luck to you."

Uncle Wang only became a security guard here because he didn't have much education. He wasn't a bad person. It did sadden him to see so many young girls join this profession.

Now that someone had it all figured out and wanted to go for a real job, Uncle Wang was genuinely happy for her.

"Is Hong-jie in yet?"

Hong-jie was the woman who led the team with her to the Gu's yesterday. All the "princesses" at the club reported to her so Su Ran must talk to her in order to quit the job.

"Hmm, I haven't noticed whether Hong-jie has arrived yet. Why don't you go inside and look for her yourself?"

"Alright."

Su Ran walked around the dimly lit club. Before she was able to locate Xiao Hongmei, she was stopped by another woman.

"Xiao Ran, you are so early today."

"Xia-jie."

Xiao Xia was a distant relative that Hong-jie brought with her from her hometown. She was usually fairly nice to the original owner.

"Is Hong-jie not in yet?"

"My cousin? You don't say." As though she had recalled something else, Xiao Xia added, "She came back in the middle of the night last night. When she got back, her face was entirely blackened. She shouted at Xiao Ling and the others so much that they almost started to cry.

"By the way, I heard that you got out of the car midway?"

Before Su Ran had a chance to respond to her, Xiao Xia nodded and said, "Let me tell you, you lucked out for not going last night."

Even though she didn't know exactly what had happened at the venue, she could tell it was bad just from the way the girls looked when they returned. From what she could gleamed out of what her cousin had said, the bosses there weren't happy with the quality of the girls that she had brought with her and got upset right away. A few of the girls came back injured.

Hearing that, Su Ran tightened her lips and didn't ask any more questions.

"Where's Hong-jie right now then?"

"She's not here, she left early today with the two new girls who joined this month." Probably went back to apologize to the big boss.

After all, they couldn't afford to offend any of the big bosses doing what they do.

"What do you want to talk to my cousin about so early in the day?"

"I want to quit. I just want to give Hong-jie a heads up." When the original owner first came here, she was forced to sign a 5-year contract. Back then, she couldn't leave even if she wanted to. Now, even Su Han was already in junior high school, so the contract had expired a long time ago. Except that toward the end, Su Ran could no longer get away from her source of income.

"You? You are going to quit?!" Xiao Xia was very surprised.

Many girls joined this profession for all sorts of reasons or purposes, but there was one type of person that Xiao Xia felt that they'd root themselves there and never go anywhere else, and she had pegged Su Ran as one of them.

She wasn't young anymore, had no family, and had nothing else other than her looks. She has no skills. On top of that, she was shallow and had the knack to spend every penny that she earned. What else could she do other than staying in this industry?

"Are you going to one of our competitors?"

She supposed that was that possibility. Su Ran was considered old by the standard of this industry. She seemed to have some bad reputations in the field a while back, but nobody could deny that she was a very pretty woman.

"Of course not."

"Then you've found yourself a wealthy man?"

Xiao Xia immediately struck out that idea.

That wasn't possible. Su Ran might have some rich regulars a few years back, but none of them expressed that they'd like a long time "financial relationship" with Su Ran.

"You…"

Borrowing Uncle Wang's words, Su Ran said, "I am going to have a career change."

"You are kidding me, right?" Xiao Xia stared at Su Ran and suddenly had the feeling that the-girl-whom-she-had-been-keeping-an-eye-out-on-and-had-plans-to-promote-to-become-manager-had-suddenly-decided-to-quit.

"Never mind, never mind. It's your call." Xiao Xia waved her hand and didn't want to continue with the subject. "But my cousin is out right now and I have no idea what time she'd be back. I don't suggest you wait for her today."

"Alright, I'll wait and talk to Hong-jie when she is in. Oh, there's just one more thing."

"What one more thing? I don't deal with personnel matters. It won't help you to talk to me about it."

"No, it has nothing to do with me quitting this job. I just want to borrow the private room for a little bit. Oh, and the piano as well."