Ranking

I entered a horror game, and the final boss asked how I wanted to die.

“Thanks.

I’ll take old age, after a long life.”

The boss: “…”

There was a fool in my village who was always muttering: “Rock, scissors, cloth…”

The order had to be right.

If anyone got it wrong, he flew into a rage.

One day, a body turned up in the abandoned mud-brick house beside mine.

Even I became a suspect.

When the police carried the body out, it was still wrapped tightly in coarse cloth.

But when the fool saw it, his muttering changed to: “Cloth!

Cloth!

Cloth…”

I thought I understood why his rock, scissors, cloth had to come in that order.

A ridiculously handsome rich boy transferred to the university.

Not only could he drive a Rolls-Royce one-handed, he was funny, charming, romantic, and a shameless flirt.

There was just one problem: every girl who dated him got sick.

They couldn’t stand sunlight, craved blood, and even grew fangs.

“You smell wonderful.

You’re the sweetest-smelling girl I’ve ever met!”

The rich boy tied me to a pillar, looking utterly intoxicated.

“My little darling, is there anything you’d like to say to me?”

I tilted my face up and gave him a brilliant smile.

“Let evil and corruption scatter; let the Dao’s vital energy endure.

Obey this command with all haste!”

My childhood friend was the most popular boy in school.

He had dated nineteen girls, and every one of them was still in love with him.

Then Chen Qingsong transferred to our school.

The school beauty my childhood friend was pursuing abandoned her usual cold reserve and began showering Chen Qingsong with attention.

On our way home, he said lightly, “Xu Dusui, why don’t we give it a try?”

Almost at once, he dismissed his own suggestion.

“Then again, a clingy pest like you would be a better match for Chen Qingsong.”

I didn’t answer.

I was too busy texting: “Chen Qingsong, are we kissing again today?”

I took a concubine for my husband.

The concubine was tall and long-legged, with broad shoulders, a narrow waist, and extraordinary beauty.

My husband nearly lost his mind.

Because when the concubine pulled it out, it was bigger than his.

On the day I ascended the throne, I discovered that I could hear objects speak.

The Dragon Throne was a chatterbox, and a scalding bowl from the imperial kitchens screamed in my hands.

When I dropped it, only I could hear the shattered pieces lamenting their fate.

Prince Xiang’s heir was every noble young lady’s dream—and the emperor’s favorite candidate for the throne.

I slipped a little something into his soup to secure my future.

Unfortunately, my sister and three other ladies had the same idea.

One bowl later, he dropped dead at the imperial banquet, and all five of us became suspects.

I swore on my father’s life that I hadn’t killed him.

The trouble was, every suspect had a secret—and I wanted far more than a handsome husband.

I won my husband, Yang Dongye, with thirty wontons.

His family had fallen on hard times, and I was a notorious old maid: plain, fiery-tempered, and perfectly capable of keeping a household standing.

He wanted someone capable; I wanted someone young and handsome.

After several happy years, his family was exonerated—and his former fiancée came running from the capital.

I came second in the imperial examinations.

The first-place winner was the sort of swaggering hero who conquered everything in his path.

He spent his days drinking, writing poetry, and visiting brothels.

The third-place winner was the hero of an erotic novel.

He spent his days sleeping with princes and generals.

Once I became a censor, I worked overtime every day impeaching the two of them, until my face turned sallow and my eyes were ringed with blue.

Then I checked my pay at the end of the month: ten taels of silver.

Furious, I threw down my memorials, picked up my brush, and started a side business: Episode One: “The Third-Place Scholar Charms in Women’s Clothes; the First-Place Scholar Spends a Fortune for His Smile.”

I was the capital’s famous sickly beauty.

When I married into the marquis’s household, everyone was betting on how long I would live.

Everyone knew the young lord had a beloved concubine.

He married me because I would die soon and stay out of her way.

In the bridal chamber, he watched without a flicker of concern as his concubine kicked over my medicine bowl.

“She won’t live long anyway.

Don’t waste good things on her.”

What he didn’t know was this: that bowl had never held medicine to keep me alive.

It held the muscle-weakening powder my father had been dosing me with.

Without the medicine, I was perfectly well.

Shen Zhuo posted a video of me stepping out of the bathroom wrapped in a towel.

Every rich boy who had ever pursued me was in that group chat.

He had faked cancer to ruin my grades before the college entrance exam, and he was waiting for me to give up on him.

Instead, I produced another three hundred thousand yuan to save his life.

Then someone sent a message to the wrong group: Mianmian knew the truth, yet she had sold her apartment for him.

As the messages vanished one by one, Shen Zhuo turned deathly pale in his hospital bed.

On the day Pei Rongqi ascended the throne, a number of people were driven out of the palace.

Some were restless young maids; others were aging servants.

I looked at the eunuch and asked a rather presumptuous question.

“Eunuch Chen, must I leave too?”

We had known each other for years, and he looked a little troubled.

“His Majesty said it makes no difference whether the others go, Aunt Feng, but you must leave.”

I nodded in understanding and packed my things.

Looking back at the palace walls through the fine snow, I suddenly remembered Rongqi at nine, clutching my sleeve with all his strength.

“Sister, you must never, ever leave Rongqi.”

Ji Yan’s first love hit me with her car.

When she called him, he rushed to the hospital.

His expression faltered slightly when he saw me.

After he and his first love accompanied me through the examinations, he asked how much the medical bills were.

For three years, we had kept our marriage a secret.

Even when I miscarried, he had never come to see me in the hospital.

This was the first time he had ever accompanied me to a medical appointment.

When the nurse told me to have my husband look after me, I switched off my phone.

That would not really work.

We were in the process of getting divorced.

My mother was the finest embroiderer in the capital.

Even the emperor praised the wedding gown she made for the Princess Royal.

The princess rewarded her lavishly.

That very night, she severed Mother’s hands with golden scissors.

“One gown like this in the world, for me alone, is quite enough.”

Mother’s blood covered the floor.

The princess found it filthy, so she burned our entire residence to the ground, saying the blaze was festive enough to suit her.

On her wedding day, the princess became the most beautiful bride in the capital.

That same year, she became pregnant.

I entered her residence carrying the golden scissors that had killed my mother.

“Your servant has come to offer Your Highness the most beautiful garment of all.”

I was the heroine of an erotic novel.

Right in the middle of a passionate encounter, I suddenly landed in a chaste historical romance.

At that very moment, its male leads had lured me—the expendable supporting character—out to avenge their beloved.

They wanted to teach me a lesson.

Someone shoved me to the ground, and I couldn’t help letting out a little moan.

The man who’d been snarling at me a second earlier abruptly turned red at the tips of his ears.

“Ning Wan, what was that noise?!”

I was the queen, confined to the ancestral temple for a grave crime.

The king despised me, and for fifteen years he never came to see me.

The world said I had lost my mind.

Then the diviners foretold that my child would bring the four corners of the realm to submission and become sovereign of all under Heaven.

Taken from me on the day he was born and raised by the king’s favorite consort, he had never even seen his mother’s face.

Day and night I prayed, waiting for him.

At last, he came.

The boy was grown now, his brow bearing all the cold majesty of an heir to the throne.

Calmly, he laid a dagger before me.

“Your son asks only one thing.

Grant it to me.”

I’ve always been absurdly confident.

When the system told me to win over the male lead, I said it would be a piece of cake.

He rejected me, begged me to torment someone else, and claimed he wasn’t good enough for me.

Clearly, he needed a guiding partner he couldn’t chase away.

I succeeded—until the system returned and announced his affection score was zero.

Apparently, I’d fallen for an extra with the male lead’s exact same name.

Jiang Yue was the stand-in my family had chosen to bear my misfortunes.

She ate and slept beside me, raised as though she were the marquis’s second legitimate daughter.

She won Grandmother’s favor and Father’s affection, and she and my fiancé fell in love.

Only when she urged Pei Yu to push me into the fire did I learn that she was the cherished daughter of Father’s mistress.

I had been the one bearing her misfortunes all along.

She took my place, inherited my mother’s dowry, and married into the Duke of Yan’s household.

When I opened my eyes again, I had returned to the day she was first brought to our estate.

She took my hand and promised to protect me.

When Sovereign Cangxuan returned from his mortal trial, he brought a mortal woman with him.

They said she was Princess Yuyao of the mortal realm, a beauty without equal.

The Old Man of the Moon declared that she was the true reincarnation of the Azure Empress—the woman the sovereign loved.

And so the empress and the sovereign threw me, the impostor who had deceived him, straight into the Well of Gods and Demons.

My boyfriend was ruthless and vicious, with no end of evil deeds to his name.

And he had a childhood friend who was every bit as wicked.

Two of a kind, they joined forces and left the whole of Haicheng in turmoil.

I was his kindhearted girlfriend, destined to die young.

His wicked childhood friend had a first love too—a reserved, upright man with little time left to live.

After he and I died, the two villains would finally see the error of their ways, mourn us, comfort each other, and spend the rest of their lives fabulously wealthy.

When I became aware of the plot, I was gently trying to reason with my boyfriend.

“They helped you before.

Why do you have to destroy them completely?”

He lazily lifted his eyelids.

“Kindness is the most useless thing in the world.

And so are you, Ruoruo.”

I froze for a moment.

Then I lowered my eyes to the message I had just received.

[Want to set a time to look at burial plots together?]

Everyone calls Xie Qingwei the finest nobleman in Shengdu, and Jiang Zhiyu has perfected every virtue expected of a woman to win his family’s approval.

Then a vision shows her the miserable future awaiting her as his wife.

Determined to escape, she points to the impoverished Xue Shao and declares him the man she loves.

But securing a better marriage is only the beginning: in a world that gives women so few choices, Zhiyu may have to find a higher place of her own.

I’m obsessed with my big sister.

I’ve spent twenty years as her devoted servant, practically born into the job.

Nobody knows how to take care of her better than I do, and I’m immensely proud of that.

So when I learned she was going to marry Jiang Xubai, I promptly made a move on his little brother, Jiang Muye.

Dad exploded on the spot and threatened to break my legs.

I protested, “If my sister can marry into their family, why can’t I?”

Dad answered with a sweeping slap: “Because your sister is a girl, and you—are a boy!”

[Infinite scenarios + mild horror + lighthearted + special advantage + no fixed romantic pairing + scenarios + wish fulfillment]

Lin Yinxi has been killed by monsters ninety-nine times in a women’s dormitory.

The hundredth time she opens her eyes, her phone vibrates before she can even try to escape.

Someone with a rabbit profile picture adds her to a strange group chat.

[Women’s Dorm Building 1 Flayer Work Assignments]

Every member is a monster that has hunted her down in the dormitory before.

[Rabbit Keeper: The socially anxious Organizer is working on the fifth floor. Other staff, please do not disturb her.]

[Flayer 003: Szzzz… New colleague, remember to claim your starter pack…]

[Prop Maker: Time for some pics!]

Only then does Lin Yinxi realize that every move those human-hunting monsters make is visible in the group.

And she has been mistaken for a humanoid entity and brought into the group to work.

So Lin Yinxi joins more and more entity group chats. She lurks to steal intelligence and uses stickers to chat with the entities and maintain her disguise.

One tiny slip, and she’s dead.

As the conversations go on, Lin Yinxi discovers that the groups she enters are increasingly high-level. Little by little, she draws closer to the entities’ management.

Entity: We’ve been chatting for so long. Want to meet offline?

Lin Yinxi: Taking a break from the internet. Do not disturb. Thanks.

A second later.

Her phone vibrates again.

[Stop pretending.]

[I’m right behind you.]

P.S. The scenarios combine puzzle solving, battle royales, death games, rules-based horror, urban legends, role-playing, eerie cultivation, containment-center-style settings, and more. There are a lot of elements.

At twenty-five, I arranged for Bighead Xiao to take his first concubine.

Her dowry was an entire city.

At twenty-six, I arranged the second.

Her dowry was ten li of granaries.

At forty-two, he took his eighteenth.

There were so many women that I could no longer remember their names.

And I had gone from a farmer’s wife to the founding empress of Great Zhao.

After dying during an all-night gaming session, I woke in another world as the daughter of a destitute family.

I had dreamed of wealth, power, and a grand new life, but this world valued poor girls less than stray animals.

Sold into a merchant household, I learned that relying on a man could cost me my life.

To survive, I would have to find another path—and build a future with my own hands.

My husband claimed to despise one of his concubines, while treating me, his lawful wife, with perfect devotion.

I pitied her and protected her at every turn.

After I died in childbirth, he made her his wife and handed her my entire dowry.

Reborn on the second day of our marriage, I decided to stop shielding his so-called true love—and see what their devotion was really worth.

“Can I touch your tail?”

Twenty years ago, I used that same pitiful act to lure a snow fox into a cage and sell him to people from a zoo.

Twenty years later, I was on a blind date when a beautiful silver-haired youth sat down beside me, gently linked his arm through mine, and pouted.

“Honey, why are you going on blind dates behind my back?

Don’t you like me anymore?”

A cup of coffee hit me in the face.

The woman opposite knocked her chair aside and stormed out.

“Gay men who trick women into marrying them can go to hell!”

I wiped the coffee off my face and turned to him.

“Who are you?”

The silver-haired youth had already resumed his icy aloofness.

He sneered.

“The Fox King.

Here for revenge.”

There were no domineering male leads here—only sweet boys with softer tempers, bigger pecs, broader shoulders, and a height over 180 centimeters.

An old-fashioned girl like me had somehow become the decent woman everyone was fighting over.

They said any woman who could resist staring at a man’s pecs had to be a good woman.

The third time my parents came to order me to pay my brother’s gambling debts, I tossed a dagger onto the ground.

“Fine.

One finger for a thousand taels.”

As they had so many times before, they cursed and lunged to beat me.

A guard caught them by the backs of their necks and pinned them to the ground.

I raised an eyebrow.

The guard kindly taught them to kowtow.

“Repeat after me—We greet Her Highness, the noble consort.”

On my first day in the Duke of Liang’s household, my stepdaughter threw her ceremonial tea onto the floor, and my stepson threatened to have me cast out.

I drenched her with a teapot and took a ruler to his hand.

When their father asked what had happened, I told him I was merely teaching the children our household’s rules.

Everyone says a stepmother’s lot is hard.

But this household would recognize only one mistress: me.

I had studied immortal arts under my master since childhood.

A sharp pair of scissors and a sheet of white paper could bring anything in the world to life.

With that gift, I cut out ten thousand swallows and sparrows when locusts ravaged the fields.

In moments, they devoured the swarm and saved an entire town.

The townsfolk bowed to me as an immortal maiden.

The county magistrate offered to submit a memorial on my behalf.

I waved him off.

“I hear someone in this town once slew a snake demon.

I would marry that man and bring a thousand pieces of gold.”

Fang Liang emerged from the crowd in filthy rags, reeking of wine.

He grabbed my hand and grinned, baring a mouthful of yellow teeth.

“Little immortal, don’t you go back on your word.”

I looked at him and smiled, with a coldness beyond words.

My master had been a snake immortal.

Mortals had tortured him to death as a demon and used him to make a secret elixir of everlasting life.

Blind and arrogant creatures.

How could they know whether the woman they took home was an immortal—or a monster?

I worked on a pleasure boat, making my living at the bottom of society.

One day I found a woman’s body.

While searching her for valuables, I discovered a letter tucked out of sight.

Only then did I realize who this battered, broken girl had been.

I laid a hand over her staring eyes, her body crisscrossed with bruises.

“Don’t worry.

I won’t take your name for nothing.

I’ll avenge you.”

During the palace coup, I saved more than forty members of the Jiang household.

Afterward, the emperor asked what reward I wished for.

I knelt before him.

“This commoner wishes to enter the palace.”

The moment I spoke, the bright fire in the eyes of the Jiang family’s second son, standing beside His Majesty, died to ash.

Rule-based horror descended upon Blue Star, and each country had one Chosen One selected to enter the Horror World and fight for survival.

If a contestant died, their country’s national fortune declined and disaster struck.

If they successfully cleared the scenario, the country’s national fortune rose and the entire population received rewards.

Su Chen happened to be selected and entered the terrifying zoo horror scenario.

1. If the elephants you see look different from what you know elephants to be, do not panic. Open your eyes wide and tell yourself that seeing is believing.

2. This zoo has an Aquarium. If a staff member offers to sell you an Aquarium ticket, accept. There is a backup exit there.

3. There is absolutely nothing wrong with the zoo’s safety measures. No animal could possibly escape, and small herbivores in particular are kept in sealed enclosures where they cannot be touched. Therefore, if you see a rabbit running loose, pet it and carry it to a staff member. Rabbits can comfort you…

Just then, Su Chen awakened the Horror Rule Analysis System. As long as he deciphered the rules of the Horror World, he could earn rewards.

[Ding! Congratulations, Host. You have received the Death Rollback reward!]

From that moment on, the entire Horror World took a turn for the bizarre.

Su Chen: What do I do now that I’ve turned the zoo into a vacation resort? Urgent, waiting online!

The Mountain Trail, Mental Hospital, and School Horror Scenarios: Stay away from us!

Longguo: Su Chen is truly a blessing to Longguo!

Ugly Nation + Kimchi Nation + Sakura Nation: I’d like to report someone for cheating, but I have no proof!

I was the daughter of a male courtesan and a prostitute, born of their illicit affair.

For someone of my birth, life was supposed to mean servitude or prostitution.

My parents often urged me, “While you’re still young and beautiful, coax some wealthy, powerful patron into buying your freedom.

You can become his concubine.

That would be better than selling your looks in a brothel.”

But I was young and proud then.

I refused to become a powerful man’s plaything, to spend my whole life at someone else’s mercy.

So before the madam could make me take clients, I escaped from Rouge House.

Everyone in the industry knows that a certain A-list actress whose surname starts with J keeps a ghost child.

“Oh, very well.

I will marry him.”

My sisters’ eyes went round.

Everyone knew how hopelessly I adored Ninth Young Master Cui: his literary gifts, his youthful grace.

I had led his horse, ground his ink, and made an utter fool of myself over him.

Why would I now agree to help our aunt the empress build her faction by marrying Pei Yao, that Turkic bastard neither of his parents cared for?

“Quick, tell Father!

Sanniang has agreed!”

My eldest sister reacted at once.

Afraid I might change my mind, she loudly applauded my decision and sent a servant off with the news.

The others recovered, hastily put on smiles, and clasped my hands from either side.

Such a sensible girl, they told me.

I was bound to go far.

I knew none of them would accept this splendid opportunity if it were offered to her.

But for me, it was already the best future I could hope for.

After all, in that dream, I had fought against it.

I was a third-rank hairdressing maid at Chengxi Palace.

My greatest pleasure each day was making Her Ladyship look beautiful.

What?

His Majesty had visited a dancing girl from Jiangnan?

Time for a fresh summer look full of little joys…

What?

His Majesty had developed a taste for exotic beauty?

Time for a midriff-baring outfit inspired by the flying celestial figures of Dunhuang…

My skills earned me the position of chief steward of the inner palace.

Then, when I turned twenty-five, I needed to leave the palace for a while.

The Noble Consort, who usually ignored everyone, clenched her teeth.

“I forbid you to go!”

The dignified, courteous Empress smiled gently.

“The palace rules are outdated.

It is time we changed them.”

But—but I was only going home to visit my family!

A high fever left my sister intellectually disabled.

But she’d been beautiful since she was little.

After I got into university, I sold her first time to my rich roommate, and her second to the student council president.

Both came away looking thoroughly satisfied.

“She’s an idiot, but she’s something else.”

Thanks to those two, I sailed through university and found a way to stay in the big city after graduation.

As for my sister, she couldn’t even speak properly.

Sacrificing herself for me was only right.

Just as I was making a push for an even better position, my parents called.

“Good news.

Your sister’s recovered.”

When my elder sister tossed her embroidered ball to choose a husband, it split in two.

The heir to the Marquis of Yongning and young General Xie each caught half.

Neither would give way.

They even came to blows, setting the whole city talking.

In the end, my sister had no choice but to push me forward.

“My little sister is beautiful and gentle, and bears a strong resemblance to me.”

“General Xie, marry her and think of me when you look at her.

Please, don’t make this harder for me.”

In my last life, Xie Chenzhou had married me unwillingly.

He despised me and never so much as touched me.

I gave as good as I got, with cold, mocking words.

“My sister simply didn’t want you.

Stop flattering yourself.”

“She’s already showing, and you still haven’t let her go.”

And so we spent our whole lives bickering, loathing the sight of each other.

Now I had another life.

And I was back on the day my sister tossed her ball to choose a husband.