Ancient China

[Connecting Past and Present + Troubled Times Famine + Classic of Mountains and Seas]

On her first day back in her hometown, Qin Ying discovered an ancient Miniature Kingdom inside a box.

Within the Miniature Kingdom, there was a famine in a world of chaos, tyranny, ferocious Monstrous Beasts, and hundreds of millions of commoners struggling to survive in the cracks of society.

Qin Ying looked down upon the World in the Box, and from then on, that world of suffering gained a Savior Deity.

With a casual pour of rice, she fed an entire city.

With a sprinkle of water, she ended the drought across the Thirteen Provinces.

With a wave of her hand, Qin Ying supported a handsome and upright New Emperor to ascend the throne, exterminating the anomalies and stabilizing the chaotic world.

Later, the Land of Gods was built within the World in the Box, and her Divine Name was praised across the Four Seas.

However, Qin Ying found herself in a dilemma as she looked at the Rare Beasts offered as sacrifices by the Miniature Kingdom.

Should she first kiss the Mini Panda in her left palm until its fur was ruffled? Or should she first tease the Tsundere Little Tiger in her right palm until it cried?

The New Emperor pressed his face against her knee, rubbing against her to vie for her favor: “Please, look at me.”

Qin Ying used her toe to tilt up his chin: “Have you no ambition?”

The New Emperor lowered his eyes and kissed the arch of her foot: “Your gaze is my only destination.”

Criminal investigations, soul-ferrying powers, a formidable partnership, and a slow-burn romance.

Everyone knew that Ren Fengjue, the Young Marquis of Renxuan Marquis Manor, was an exceptionally capable man. At a young age, he was already a high-ranking court official and one of the Emperor’s most trusted favorites.

With an illustrious background, striking looks, and both brains and brawn, he seemed to move through life without ever meeting an obstacle he could not overcome.

That changed the day a woman claiming to be his fiancée appeared at his door and opened with a sentence that left him stunned.

Xia Ximo: “Write me a letter of annulment.”

Ren Fengjue: “???”

At first, Lord Ren was buried in official duties and had no interest in romance. If she wanted out of the engagement, so be it. He had never intended to marry in the first place.

Later, after one twist after another, the way he looked at his fiancée changed completely.

Ren Fengjue: “I have already petitioned the Emperor for a marriage decree. If we annul the engagement now, it would count as defying an imperial edict, a crime punishable by the execution of nine generations.”

Xia Ximo: “???”

[BL + Narcissus + Power Couple + Infinite Flow + Ensemble Cast + 1v1 + Live Stream]

Ning Shuo was pulled into a horror Murder Mystery Game System.

A Clown wearing a mask of garish greasepaint grinned. [Please choose a codename for yourself.]

Ning Shuo thought for a moment. “Ning Banxian.”

The audience wondered what kind of ridiculous name that was. Did he really think he could swindle those Ghosts and Monsters in a horror game?

That was until they saw Ning Shuo in the Live Stream Room, acting like a mystical charlatan as he told a Ghost, “Tonight at the Hour of the Rat – within half an hour at most – you will surely meet a bloody end.”

The audience waited to see him make a fool of himself. However, at the stroke of midnight, just as the second hand hit zero, a sword pierced the Ghost’s throat.

A man dressed in ancient robes, looking almost identical to Ning Shuo, pointed his sword at him. He raised an eyebrow and asked, “Are you a monster too?”

Ning Shuo smiled. “Perhaps I am another you.”

…

From the first moment he saw Ning Wang, Ning Shuo knew he shared the closest bond in the world with this man – so close that they had once shared the same name:

Xie Ning.

–Warnings–

1. The MC (shou) enjoys acting like a chuunibyou and has poor health. If you don’t like this, please skip.
2. There are no plots where someone’s life is taken just because the MC felt slightly wronged; everything serves the plot. If you don’t like this, please skip.
3. Dual male leads with side pairings. No “crybaby” types here, as the author prefers a power couple dynamic. If you don’t like this, please skip.
4. Includes live stream Danmu. The content of the Danmu does not represent the author’s views, nor do the characters’ thoughts. If you don’t like this, please skip.

Ten years after my death, the young crown prince had grown up. Clutching my memorial tablet, he announced that he wanted to marry me.

His father beat him to tears with a court memorial.

The august emperor roared, “Wake up! She’s dead!”

You’re the dead one. Your whole family is dead.

I drifted back and forth, then kicked over his most treasured seal.

It landed with a clack, stamping half an impression onto the memorial—right where my name appeared.

Ruiniang.

The crown prince held up the memorial. The tears on his cheeks had not even dried, yet he was laughing and crying all at once. “Ruiniang! Look, Father, it’s Ruiniang! She’s still alive. She’s still alive!”

The emperor was plainly startled, but did his best to look composed. “Nonsense! I simply lost my grip on the seal!”

I kicked it again. The seal that had just settled flat went rolling across the desk and stamped half a crimson impression onto his dragon robe.

Ruiniang.

The emperor panicked and bolted for the door. Halfway there, he remembered something, ran back, and grabbed the crown prince by the nape.

At least he had some paternal feeling. He knew enough to take his son when he fled.

“Guards! There’s a ghost!” he shouted.

The crown prince, meanwhile, was sobbing as he cried into the empty air, “Ruiniang, is that you? You’ve come back, haven’t you?”

Even in tears, he held my memorial tablet tight against his chest.

I looked at him fondly and reached out to wipe his tears, only for my fingers to pass through empty space.

My fingertips felt hollow. My heart ached a little.

Of course. I was a ghost. I could not touch the living; only the things of the dead would answer me.

Sold into a marquis’s estate at seven, Fugui survives by becoming a living screen, a beautiful servant trained to endure heat, cold, and pain without moving.

When another screen maid is condemned to serve as beauty paper merely for attracting the heir’s gaze, Fugui realizes she will be next.

To avenge the woman who raised her and escape a household that treats servants as objects, she turns the nobles’ forbidden desires, jealousies, and schemes against them.

The day I decided to divorce Pei Qingshu was an ordinary one.

Only the night before, he had promised that he would send Miss Liu away the next day, then celebrate my birthday properly with me.

It finally seemed as though our life was about to get better.

Delighted, I rose early, opened my dressing case, and carefully drew my brows while looking into a copper basin.

Then I dug an old pomegranate-red skirt out from the bottom of the camphorwood chest.

After seven years of marriage, I did not own a single decent piece of jewelry.

Seeing my bare ears, I pinched off a balsam blossom and tucked it behind my bun.

On my way out to buy vegetables, I ran into Chunxiang’s mother, who caught my arm with a teasing smile.

“I saw Master Pei buy two hairpins the other day—one gold, one jade. Let me see which one you’re wearing.”

Then she noticed the balsam flower in my hair and froze.

Imperial Father has six daughters.

I am the fifth.

Mother Consort was once a kitchen maid at the Hall of Mental Cultivation.

She received the Emperor’s favor only once in her life, and that one night gave her me. She treasured me above all else.

When I was seven, Noble Consort Lan framed her for infidelity, and she died.

A few months later, by every means at my disposal, I became Noble Consort Lan’s “adopted daughter.”

Before the Second Young Master of Duke’s Manor was executed, the Old Madam wanted to leave him an heir.

She summoned all the maids to the rear courtyard and asked which of us was willing to make a trip to death row.

The girls exchanged uneasy glances.

If they wanted to climb into a young master’s bed, there were plenty of young lords in the manor to choose from. Why throw away their future on a man who was about to die?

I was the only one who stepped out of the crowd.

The others called me a fool for ruining my prospects when I had already been chosen for the First Young Master.

But what they didn’t know was that I had been lusting after the Second Young Master for ages.

He was going to die anyway. Once the deed was done, I would run.

After he was gone, I would burn plenty of spirit money for him to make amends.

But just as I was gleefully packing my bundle, news arrived that Second Young Master Jiang had escaped from prison.

I fled in a panic with the simple-minded young lady and the elderly Old Madam in tow.

Until one day, Second Young Master Jiang tracked us down with a sword in hand and bared his gleaming white teeth at me.

“Jinque, you and I have a score to settle.”

Men with big butts are good at bearing children. That’s what my mom always taught me.

She said that no matter how disobedient a man was, once you got him pregnant, he’d do whatever you said.

As luck would have it, my boyfriend abducted me and took me deep into the mountains, demanding that I bear children for his bachelor buddies.

“You’re not allowed to stop until you’ve had eight sons!”

Eight? I passed out from sheer delight.

Well, in that case, don’t mind if I do…

The newly crowned top scholar accidentally swallowed the love gu I had meant for my absent husband.

To keep him alive, I had to share his bed every seven days until the antidote arrived.

What began as mutual resentment slowly turned dangerously tender—just as my husband, General Zhou Hanchuan, returned and recognized me as the woman he had never forgotten.

Now one man refuses to let me go, the other refuses to grant me a divorce, and I am trapped between two rivals who would sooner kill each other than give me up.