Friendship

I was helping my mom sell grilled sausages by the roadside when a handsome guy in a cap scanned the QR code to pay. He gave his phone a little shake, signaling that the payment had gone through.

I smiled and nodded. Then my gaze suddenly sharpened, landing on the pale, prominent bone of his wrist.

There was a tiny black tattoo there.

I narrowed my eyes slightly and recognized it.

It was that bastard Chen Wen.

His friend came over, hooked an arm around his neck, and urged him on. “Come on, Chen Wen. Let’s go to the usual spot.”

But Chen Wen just had to do the opposite of what I wanted. He took two steps toward me, bent down, and met my eyes. A moment later, recognition dawned. He let out a laugh, his eyes curving like peach blossom petals.

“Is that… Boss Tang?”

“…”

“I’m going to be the Empress someday!”

Ten-year-old Song Weiwei stood on a dirt slope facing the imperial city in the distance, shouting those words with all the swagger she could muster.

As for me, I sat on a dirt mound with my chin propped in my hand, speechless.

“Song Weiwei, you still haven’t paid back the two copper coins you owe me.”

Song Weiwei turned around and rapped me on the forehead.

“What’s the rush? Have you ever seen an Empress who welshes on her debts?”

She hopped down from the slope and turned to coax me.

“Just think about it, Du Zeyi. If I become the Empress, you’d be my sister. You can have anything you want. Why worry about those two copper coins?”

As if becoming the Empress of a nation could be that easy.

I muttered under my breath, rubbed my forehead, and raised my voice. “My mother’s calling me home for dinner!”

Then I slipped away as fast as I could.

Leaving only Song Weiwei behind, stamping her feet in exasperation.

Lin Wanrou was twenty-four this year, an old maiden who still had not married.

Madam Lin’s standards for a son-in-law had fallen from imperial kin to any promising young talent with ambition.

She refused to believe that, with the Grand General’s influence, she could not raise up one dragon among men as her son-in-law.

Lin Wanrou did not want to marry. She would rather stay at home for the rest of her life.

The man I secretly loved was the legitimate princess’s fiancé.

I was the unfavored Seventh Princess, and the fiancé bestowed upon me was a drunken libertine who gambled, kept concubines, and maintained a mistress outside his estate.

But that was all right.

My best friend had the ultimate cheat code.

When I was fifteen, my royal father chose me from among his many daughters.

I was Xizhou’s brightest pearl, yet he sent me by carriage across the Gobi, the desert, and the grasslands.

I was to travel to the distant Central Plains and marry their Crown Prince.

The Crown Prince had his moonlight and his childhood sweetheart.

But the bright moon must sink, and green plums must ripen.

In the end, only the pearl’s light endures.

The first time criminal investigator Lou Xiao met Qiao Xia was at a wedding that had descended into total chaos. Years later, the two reunited on a blind date. From testing each other and misunderstanding each other to slowly drawing closer, one clumsy but sincere, the other clearheaded and independent, they learned, little by little, amid entanglements with people from the past, the pressure of work, and sudden danger, to put their love into words and to make room for each other in their future.

In the seventh year of having a crush on my childhood friend, encouraged by my best friend,

I carried flowers and a cake onto an overnight train to confess my feelings to him.

But on a basketball court roaring with noise and people,

I ran straight into the sight of the two of them kissing.

With his arm around my best friend, my childhood friend asked coldly, “What are you doing here? Can’t you see I’m busy?”

Disheveled and humiliated, I was just about to explain

when his roommate beside him let out a soft laugh. “My girlfriend came to bring me a cake. What’s it got to do with you?”

I tried to persuade my best friend to break up eight hundred times, but in the end, I attended her wedding and drank her wedding wine.

On the wedding day, I sat at the main table with the guy’s strategist, both of us checking our phones and comparing notes.

We realized that every time the couple threatened to break up, it was always the two of us who got dragged into it.

Our chat histories were eerily similar.

[We broke up. This time it’s for real.]

[But what about him/her? What should I do?]

Guy’s strategist: [Maybe you should change jobs. You’d make a great clown in a circus.]

Me: [Pay me some compensation.]

introduction:

[1v1 guaranteed sweetness + romance reality show + playfully going wild with memes + heartthrob + romantic battlefield + male lead]

Ning Xi lived for 21 years before realizing she was the universally disliked fake heiress in a novel where the rich family dotes on one child-a foil and stepping stone to the Real Heiress.

In the book, everyone who adored the Real Heiress got everything they wanted and became wildly successful, while anyone who went against her ended up miserable.

Ning Xi was silent. Ning Xi had an epiphany. Ning Xi got excited:

“I get it! I should chase after the Female Lead too! Be good to the Female Lead!”

So –

When the Real Heiress put on a brave face and spoke gently in front of Ning Xi’s fiancé, Ning Xi looked at her with genuine concern: “I know you want to be strong, but you don’t have to be strong anymore – I’ve got you!”

When the Real Heiress shed tears in front of Ning Xi’s Childhood Friend, Ning Xi yelled at him: “If you make her shed a single tear, I’ll make you bleed! If you break my sister’s wings, I’ll bring down your entire heaven!”

When the Real Heiress fainted in the arms of the Prince of Xiangcheng, Ning Xi swooped her up and warned him: “My girl – don’t touch, don’t steal, don’t even think about her. If you lay a finger on her, 110 takes me away, 120 takes you away!” (110 = police, 120 = ambulance)

When the Real Heiress was exposed for dating multiple guys and her reputation was ruined, Ning Xi fumed: “Even if we take ten thousand steps back, are those guys totally blameless?”

After going wild, Ning Xi’s whole mental state improved a lot.

But then, everyone else started acting weird.

The hot-tempered, sharp-tongued Childhood Friend started sending her abs workout videos; the cold fiancé’s eyes turned red and his voice shook as he begged her to get back together; the Villain Boss was willing to play the third for love.

Even the Real Heiress, who always put her down, was teary-eyed: “I thought I was just clever, but I didn’t expect you to truly love me.”

Ning Xi: ?

Everyone’s lost it…

My boyfriend’s manipulative junior had tried to steal him away from me one too many times. Finally, I reached my breaking point and gave him a piece of advice.

My boyfriend replied, “Got it.” The next day. The junior said, “Good morning, Senior! What a coincidence, seeing you here again.”

My boyfriend replied, “Good morning. I’m gay.” The junior: “?”