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When my brother was found in the fields, nothing remained of him but a sheet of human skin.

Grandpa Eighteen, the village geomancer, said my brother had crossed a weasel spirit and paid with his life for giving the wrong answer.

That night, as I lit incense beside my brother’s coffin, I saw a weasel in a bright floral jacket leap onto the lid.

Its mouth stretched into a hideous grin, and a strange cry rasped from its throat: “Young master, do you think this Immortal looks human?”

Princess Chu Yuan has always taken whatever catches her eye, including the chaste young monk Yujingzi.

When his endless refusals finally wear her down, she casts him aside for a bold hostage prince—only to be haunted by dreams of a possessive snake-tailed god.

The truth is worse: Yujingzi is the divine serpent who has protected Great Sheng for years, and his coy resistance was never rejection at all.

Now the princess who loved and left him must survive his wounded devotion, win his forgiveness, and decide whether she can spend her life with the one creature she fears most.

Every day, Noble Lady Zhao Wan forgets one more memory of the emperor who once promised never to fail her.

When she remembers only the gentle husband of her youth, the white-haired ruler who betrayed her must watch her defend the man he used to be.

But as a palace purge restores the truth, love, ambition, and wounds too deep to forgive drive their reunion toward a final tragedy.

When I was twenty-five, I had a child with one of the most powerful heirs in Beijing’s elite circle.

There was no future for two people as unequal as us, so I took the money and opportunities the He family offered and broke up with him.

Then, five years later, during a break on set.

A little boy who looked strikingly like He Jinnan came looking for me.

He pursed his lips, aggrieved yet stubbornly proud.

“My dad is He Jinnan,” he said.

“And you’re my mom.”

I looked at him and gave a faint hum of acknowledgment.

He hurriedly pulled a thick wad of cash from his backpack.

His eyes were full of pleading.

“Can I hire you for one day to come to my parent-teacher meeting?”

Xie Chengze transmigrates into a novel about a powerful minister, becoming its vicious villain – the Second Prince, a man who murders his own brothers, treats human life as worthless, and ultimately dies when the powerful minister Shen Yuan drives a sword through his heart.

To escape that fate, Xie Chengze resolves to keep his head down and stay far away from the struggle for the throne. Whenever matters of state come up, he has only three answers: “Dunno. Ask the Crown Prince!” “Dunno. Ask Shen Yuan!” and “Dunno. Ask the Eldest Prince!”

Yet the looks Shen Yuan and the princes give him only grow more dangerous – and in every possible sense of the word.

–

After killing Xie Chengze with a single thrust of his sword, Shen Yuan opens his eyes to find himself ten years in the past.

In his previous life, the Second Prince flouted the law, brought ruin upon the country and misery upon its people, and threw the imperial court into chaos for nearly a decade. This time, Shen Yuan intends to uproot his faction as early as possible and restore peace and order to the realm.

Instead, he watches the once-vicious man devote himself to the common people, transform a wilderness into a land of abundance with his own hands, and usher in an age of peace and prosperity.

He has endless tenderness for the world – yet before Shen Yuan alone, he refuses to bow his head or bend his back.

While my brother discussed the most elegant way to sever an artery, I tended my vegetables.

While my sister sharpened her fangs for the coming feast, I tended my vegetables.

While the whole family prepared to revel beneath the blood moon, I was still tending my vegetables.

I cared so much about growing them well that I converted the cellar into a climate-controlled greenhouse and trained our familiar bats to serve as pollinators.

Mom and Dad took one look at the sea of green filling our grounds.

Exasperated but helpless to change me, they took the rest of the family on vacation so they would not have to see it.

For a long while after that, I enjoyed the idyllic peace of country life.

Then one day, as I was picking pests off my cucumbers, a luxury car screeched to a halt outside the gates.

A wealthy young lady in a lace dress pointed at my castle and shrieked coquettishly to her eight brothers, “Baby wants it turned into a Barbie dream castle!

This is where a princess belongs!”

Sold at sixteen to the Zhao family of Taoshui Village, Pan Xi’er expects a life of hardship among three unmarried brothers with terrible reputations.

Instead, she finds warmth, loyalty, and a family ready to work for a better tomorrow.

With tofu, new recipes, and stubborn kindness, Xi’er helps the Zhaos turn hardship into prosperity—until old wounds and new ambitions put their hard-won happiness to the test.

On his deathbed, the late emperor entrusted me with his heir—and had me bound and dragged back overnight to assist the new emperor.

Isolated and alone, the new emperor glared through bloodshot eyes, snapping at anyone who came near like a wolf cub.

“Better that I betray the world than let the world betray me!”

My eyes lit up.

The new emperor, later: “On second thought, the world hasn’t wronged me quite that badly.”

Yu Taozi has seen mysterious comments floating before her eyes since childhood, but only after learning to read does she discover the truth: her world is a romance novel, and she is the greedy country-bred villainess destined to be expelled for making the heroine cry.

When the rich male lead offers to keep her for one hundred thousand yuan a month, Taozi refuses to follow the script.

She rolls on the floor, demands justice, and turns every dramatic confrontation into a lesson in rural common sense.

Soon the heroine calls her an idol, the genius second lead begs to learn her farm skills, and the arrogant male lead is digging fields and getting rammed by pigs.

Taozi wants none of their romance.

She only wants to study hard, make her grandmother proud, and get into a good university.

But by derailing the plot, this simple country girl may give all of them a happier story.

[Tales of mountain spirits and sea monsters no longer circulate in the mortal realm. As the gods who protect humanity begin to awaken, they seek offerings of incense.]

[Do not underestimate this fair night. Many pairs of eyes lurk in the darkness, watching.]

[Wake up, humans! A terrible, all-destroying day of doom draws near!]

…

One day, Xie Qingling wakes to a murmuring whisper in her ear.

Amid one mortifyingly theatrical proclamation after another, the revival of the ancient gods begins to unfold before her.

…

The Special Incident Response Department in Future City has a new member: Xie Qingling.

At first, Xie Qingling thinks she is just an utterly ordinary rookie in the Special Incident Response Department.

Her senior colleagues think so too.

To whip the newcomer into shape as quickly as possible, they decide to spar with her and put her in her place. Time to teach her a little about the real world.

Then they see her out on a mission, taking on a vicious ghost alone and furiously wrenching its head off. A Four-Way Crossroads Ghost is forced into child labor, a Rakshasa has its blade stolen, and a Painted-Skin Ghost has its skin torn off…

Her seniors: “…” Their confidence is in pieces!

Afterward, Xie Qingling still thinks she is just an utterly ordinary rookie in the department.

As a newcomer fresh out of school, she decides to take the initiative and ask her seniors for guidance. A little sparring should help her improve and learn what the real world is like.

Her seniors recoil, terror on their faces:

“She can twist a vicious ghost’s head off, and you call that a rookie?”

“She can stop ghost children crying, and you call that a rookie?”

“Please spare us, rookie!!!”

Xie Qingling’s work diary: A person mustn’t get too arrogant. Especially a rookie as young as me.

Her seniors and the ghosts: She seems to have no idea how terrifyingly powerful she is. Does she even know what arrogance means?

What she’s doing is called being humble. 🙂

Are all the rookies this terrifying now?

She starts by ripping vicious ghosts apart, and you’re telling me this is a fucking rookie?

What’s the real world like? The rookie IS the real world.

Hey, rookie! Veteran here. Carry me, please!

Within Huaxia, no god gets to sit idle. The righteous gods return to their places; demons and monsters are put to the sword.