From Villain to Virtual Sweetheart: The Fake Heir's Grand Scheme(BL)-Chapter 723: Relationship Status: Exposed (part three)

Micah slept like a dog that had finally found a warm place after wandering through a long winter.

His arm hung loosely over Clyde’s back. One leg was half outside the blanket and draped over Clyde’s legs. His hair was a mess, sticking up in several directions as if he had fought a battle in his sleep and lost.

The phone on the nightstand vibrated once. Then twice. Then it stopped... before starting again. The screen lit up every few seconds with new notifications. WeChat messages. Mentions. Tags. News alerts.

But Micah didn’t notice any of it. He snored softly and scooted closer into Clyde’s body.

Outside his window, the online world had already exploded. To be honest, Micah wouldn’t have cared even if he had seen it.

After almost dying once in this lifetime, after going through surgery that nearly turned him into a corpse on an operating table, his view of life had changed drastically.

In this lifetime, he had always tried to stay one step ahead. He had fought the system, fought the fake storyline, fought the host. He had struggled desperately just to take back the role that had always belonged to him, the protagonist of this world.

And he had won. The system was gone. The host was gone.

The world had returned to him.

Yet the moment he woke up after surgery, staring at the white ceiling of the hospital room, a strange thought had settled in his heart.

What if he had died that day? What if everything he had done, every plan, every scheme, every sacrifice, had been cut short? What would have been the point?

Life didn’t follow a perfect script. People died suddenly. Plans failed unexpectedly. The future could collapse overnight.

Micah had realised something very simple. Trying to control everything was exhausting. And honestly? He was tired.

Micah turned his face into the pillow and muttered in his sleep.

If someone had asked him now what his biggest dream was, he would have answered without hesitation. To be a salted fish. A lazy salted fish.

No struggles. No grand ambitions. No constant battles against the world’s will.

Just drifting through life comfortably. After everything he had gone through, hadn’t he done enough already? He had survived multiple life-threatening situations. He had untangled the original storyline. He had protected Darcy and Flora. He had fought against the system itself. What more did the world want from him?

It was time to enjoy life. Of course, Micah had also considered another possibility. Maybe this whole incident was simply the world’s final attempt to correct the storyline. In the original narrative, Micah Ramsy was supposed to be the naive protagonist shou. A pure-hearted young man surrounded by four powerful and devoted gongs. That was the script. That was the "correct direction."

But reality had gone completely off track. Micah had refused to play that role. Instead of being naive, he had become cunning. Instead of relying on those four men, he had pushed them away. Instead of following the story, he had rewritten it. Perhaps the world itself had tried to reset things. If Micah had truly died during that surgery, everything might have restarted.

The world would return to its "proper" path.

A new Micah. A naive protagonist. Four devoted male leads. A perfect shounen-ai romance.

Micah snorted softly in his sleep. He rolled onto his back and stretched.

No. He didn’t want that kind of life. Not anymore.

He was certain that the only reason he had survived that surgery was because he had resisted with everything he had. His love for Clyde had refused to let go. That emotion had anchored him to life. It had given him the strength to push back against whatever invisible force had tried to drag him away.

Still... Micah knew something unsettling. No one could say for certain whether the world would try again. What if one day the power of the original genre grew strong enough to force another reset? What if the story tried to correct itself again? What if next time he wasn’t lucky enough to survive?

There were no answers. No guarantees. And that uncertainty had led Micah to a very simple decision. Enjoy life. As much as possible. While he still could. He owed himself at least that much.

Meanwhile...

While Micah slept peacefully like a dead man, half the internet had stayed awake all night because of him. His WeChat post had spread across the internet like dandelion seeds caught in a storm.

Screenshots, reposts, discussion threads, memes, and fan edits dominated the internet. By midnight, the topic had already climbed to the trending list. By three in the morning, it had exploded into the top ten hot searches. By sunrise, it had become the number one topic across multiple platforms.

It wasn’t that homosexuality was considered shocking. Society had changed a lot in recent years. Same-sex relationships were widely accepted. Young people dating in university wasn’t unusual either. Normally, Micah’s post wouldn’t have caused such a huge reaction. But Micah was not an ordinary university student anymore. In a strangely short amount of time, he had become something close to a celebrity.

And the funny part? He had barely done anything. He hadn’t acted in ten dramas. He hadn’t released albums. He hadn’t even officially debuted in the entertainment industry.

Micah had only appeared in a single advertisement. Just one. Yet somehow that was enough. His face was unforgettable. The character he had portrayed in the ad was impossible to ignore.

And his bizarre family background had turned him into a walking headline. From the swapped heir scandal to the Ramsy family drama and the hospital incident. Every piece of news about him had attracted attention.

Before anyone realised it, Micah Ramsy had become an online sensation. And in the entertainment world, there was one rule everyone understood. Never reveal your dating status. Especially not casually. Fans often treated celebrities as fantasy partners. The moment a celebrity confirmed they were dating someone, a large portion of the fanbase would disappear overnight. For a rising figure like Micah, announcing a relationship could easily damage his future career.

But that wasn’t even the most shocking part. The bigger problem was that Micah hadn’t just revealed that he was dating.

He had revealed that he was dating a man. And not just any man. The identity of the person sitting beside him in that photo had turned the entire internet upside down. Because Clyde had deliberately allowed small media outlets to uncover his name.

Not through a grand announcement. Not through a press conference. Just a few subtle leaks. Enough to let curious journalists piece everything together.

Within hours, the mysterious boss of La Riviere Enterprise had been exposed. And the public had imagined something completely different. Most people expected a middle-aged tycoon. Someone with a round belly and a shiny bald head. Maybe a cigar. Maybe a gold watch.

Instead, what they discovered left everyone stunned. Clyde Du Pont was young. Tall. Cold. And absurdly handsome.

When the photo of Micah sitting next to Clyde leaked online, the reaction was immediate. Especially among the fujoshi community. People nearly dropped their phones. Screens were zoomed in. Fan chats exploded. The visual alone was enough to send people into a frenzy.

Micah looked bright, lively, almost mischievous. Clyde looked calm, distant, and intimidating. The contrast between them was intoxicating. Within minutes, thousands of edits appeared online.

Netizen 1: HELLO??? Who allowed them to look this good together??? I can’t even criticise them!

Netizen 2: This isn’t a relationship announcement, right? It’s just hype, right?

Netizen 3: One looks like a rebellious prince and the other looks like an ice emperor. I’m not surviving this.

Netizen4: Someone please tell me this is a drama promotion because my heart can’t take it.

Netizen 5: Why do they look like the main couple of a 200-episode BL novel?? What’s with this cuteness? Animal-shaped pattern pyjamas? For real? They wanted to kill us!

The trending topics kept multiplying.

#MicahRamsyRelationship

#LaRiviereCEO

#IceBossAndBrat

People began digging through Micah’s past. Old videos. Old rumors. Old posts about his temper and mischievous personality. At the same time, employees from La Riviere started anonymously sharing stories about Clyde.

How strict he was. How terrifying he could be during meetings. How the entire company froze when he walked into a room.

The more information people found, the more entertaining the contrast became.

Netizen 1: Wait... Micah has a terrible temper and Clyde is an ice-cold CEO??? This pairing writes itself.

Netizen 2: Golden retriever CEO x black cat boyfriend.

Netizen 3: No no no this is mischief cub x cunning fox.

Netizen 4: I swear this looks exactly like a novel plot.

And then someone discovered something incredible. A BL novel that was posted a few months ago. The story described a cold, untouchable ruler and a mischievous troublemaker who constantly challenged him. The personalities were eerily similar. The dynamic was almost identical.

The title? "The Ice Monarch and the Brat."

The author’s name had been an alias. But in truth, it was what Soha had written after meeting them for the first time at the Du Pont resort.

Within a few hours, the old story exploded in popularity. Thousands of readers flooded into the comment section of the book.

Netizen 1: ARE YOU A PROPHET???

Netizen 2: Did you secretly know them???

Netizen3: This is literally Micah and Clyde.

Netizen 4: Someone adapt this into a drama immediately.

Netizen 5: I refuse to believe this is a coincidence.

Fanfiction followed immediately. Dozens. Hundreds. Alternate universes. Office romances. Historical settings. Enemies-to-lovers plots. The internet was having the time of its life.

Of course, not everyone was happy. Some people were jealous of Micah. Some people were jealous of Clyde. Some simply enjoyed spreading negativity. Hate posts began appearing across forums and gossip sites. Articles questioning Micah’s character. Rumours about Clyde’s private life. Speculation that the relationship was fake publicity.

But compared to the overwhelming excitement of the fan community, those voices were relatively small. Most ordinary people simply ignored them. Meanwhile, dedicated fans fought back aggressively in comment sections.

Behind the scenes, two corporate PR teams were suffering greatly. La Riviere’s public relations department had stayed awake the entire night monitoring social media. At the same time, Ramsy Empire’s PR team was doing the same thing.

Deleting malicious rumours. Blocking troll accounts. Guiding discussions in a positive direction. Trying to make sure the situation didn’t spiral out of control. By morning, half of both teams looked like zombies.