Looking at the girl with wide-open eyes in the darkness, Ye Shuang fell silent for a few seconds before suddenly asking, "Yuyou, how do you feel about Chen Qin?"
"Chen Qin-jie is a good person," Bai Yuyou whispered. "Ye Shuang is also very important to Chen Qin-jie."
Ye Shuang asked, "What if one day, Chen Qin and I get married?"
Bai Yuyou grew quiet, as if seriously contemplating the question.
Ye Shuang didn’t seem surprised by her reaction. He reached out and gently stroked her head. "Go to sleep. You don’t understand yet."
Bai Yuyou murmured softly, "I don’t understand… Why can’t the people you like all stay together? I don’t want to be apart..."
Ye Shuang simply asked in return, "Then why do you feel resistant toward Ran Xinxin but not Chen Qin? Is it because Chen Qin usually takes care of you?"
"Mhm… I like Chen Qin-jie. I don’t want her to be unhappy."
"So, 'like' and 'like'… are still a little different," Ye Shuang said with a faint smile. "But you’re already doing great. You grasp things quickly—you just need a little more time."
"Mhm."
"Alright, sleep now. Tomorrow, we’ll go fishing."
"It’s a little hot… Ye Shuang, can I take off my clothes?"
"No."
"Already did."
"..."
"I’ll turn on the AC for you..."
……
……
The next day.
"Cock-a-doodle-doo—"
Ye Shuang was woken up by the sound of a rooster crowing. Honestly, he didn’t mind it—it was far more pleasant than an alarm, especially the default ringtone on iPhones.
Beep.
After turning off the AC, he glanced at Bai Yuyou, still fast asleep, then got up to wash up.
Tang Keke seemed to have woken up early as well, sitting in the living room downstairs watching TV. On the dining table nearby, breakfast was laid out—a simple plate of rice noodles, some sausages and bread, and a thermal container that likely held congee with preserved egg and lean pork.
"There aren’t many breakfast options in the countryside. Grandma bought these from outside," Tang Keke said with a grin.
"Your grandmother should rest more," Ye Shuang replied before asking where Tang Duoduo’s parents were. He learned that the couple had taken the elderly woman out early to visit relatives.
"So early?" Ye Shuang checked the time—it was barely past eight.
He’d go out for a walk later.
"Jie—"
"Jie—"
Just then, Tang Duoduo came running inside, wailing. Stumbling as if heartbroken, she cried out,
"Big Yellow is gone!"
"Big Yellow is gone?" Tang Keke and Ye Shuang exchanged glances.
"Stolen… Wuwu… This morning, I went to feed Big Yellow, but he wasn’t there… I checked everywhere, then looked at the security footage." Tang Duoduo sniffled and pulled out her phone, showing a clip of their front yard.
At the crack of dawn, the big yellow dog had been sleeping by the gate when a van passed by. After a few distressed yelps, the dog was snatched away with a looped rope—the whole thing took less than ten seconds.
The thieves were terrifyingly efficient.
"Wuu—"
"Dog thieves are the worst! How much could they even sell him for?!" Tang Keke fumed, though she knew reporting it to the police would likely lead nowhere.
Footsteps sounded from the stairs—Bai Yuyou had come down, drawn by the commotion. She didn’t fully grasp what had happened but caught the mention of "Big Yellow."
"I don’t want to raise dogs anymore," Tang Duoduo sobbed, her eyes brimming with tears.
Big Yellow had been her longest-lived pet. Previous dogs had either been stolen or accidentally poisoned by rat bait. Big Yellow had been smart and affectionate—yet even he hadn’t escaped the thieves.
Bai Yuyou finally understood—the big yellow dog that had playfully carried an ice cream around with her yesterday had been stolen.
"Ye Shuang…" Her chest tightened inexplicably. Clutching her shirt, she looked at him with sorrow.
"Let’s check the nearby dog meat markets. There might still be a chance," Ye Shuang suggested, trying to console the girls. Judging by the footage, only a few hours had passed—there was still hope if they acted fast.
But despite searching several large markets nearby, they found no trace of Big Yellow.
The difficulty of tracking stolen dogs was precisely why thieves operated so brazenly.
Keke didn’t know what else to say, only patting her sister’s shoulder. "Duoduo, don’t be too sad..."
To Ye Shuang and the others, Big Yellow might not have been deeply cherished, but for a child like Duoduo—who had few playmates in the countryside—a loyal dog was as precious as family.
Humans stood at the top of the food chain, so many saw no issue in slaughtering dogs they no longer wanted. But humans were also emotional creatures. Countless children had returned home from school, eager to play with their dogs, only to learn they’d been butchered or sold—leaving scars that lasted a lifetime.
Ye Shuang: "..."
His gaze settled on Tang Duoduo—
[Character: Tang Duoduo
Grade 2 student at Lai Su Elementary. Has a best friend named Big Yellow.]
In the upper right corner, a small clock icon appeared.
Ye Shuang checked his remaining chances—they had refreshed.
Might as well try...
……
Rain began to fall.
Drip by drip, it soon turned into a steady drizzle.
Ten kilometers away, outside a dog meat restaurant, a rusted cage held a curled-up yellow dog. Its body was covered in wounds, fur matted with blood—evidence of a desperate struggle.
Raindrops pattered against the cage.
Inside the restaurant, customers chatted and laughed, a stark contrast to the drenched, lifeless dog outside.
Perhaps resigned to its fate, the dog barely stirred.
"We’re running low on meat. String up the yellow one first."
"Got it."
A chef stepped outside, one hand opening the cage, the other gripping a leather noose. Even as the dog shivered, his expression remained indifferent—routine work.
Strangle, skin, chop.
You got used to it.
"Arf!" The dog was yanked out, its feeble resistance meaningless against its injuries.
"Woof!"
"Tch!"
The chef tightened the noose around the dog’s neck and hoisted it up.
Unlike humans, dogs didn’t die quickly. The struggle was slow, agonizing. The dog’s legs twitched weakly, its strength fading.
"Alright, skin it later." The chef turned—only to see headlights blazing toward him. An Audi screeched across the road, slamming into the shopfront with a deafening crash!
"What the—?!"
pression Bureau] Transported to a fantasy world overrun by demons and monsters, Gu Qingfeng becomes a jailer in the Demon Suppression Prison of the Great Yan Dynasty's Demon Suppression Bureau. From this point on, bizarre cases frequently occur in the Demon Suppression Prison, once known as hell on earth and infamous for its gloomy, terrifying atmosphere! Why do the demons and monsters in the prison wail miserably every night? Why has the corpse demon, capable of transforming into various beauties, donned black stockings and switched careers to become a foot massage therapist? Why has the eye demon, expert in soul-snatching and illusions, turned into a VR headset? Why is the fox spirit performing otaku dances? Are all these occurrences a twisted expression of demonic nature, or a descent into moral depravity? After peeling away layer upon layer of mystery, all clues ultimately point to a jailer named Gu Qingfeng. Gu Qingfeng: "Hehehe... My dear demons and monsters, whose card shall we flip today?"
transmigrates into the world as the sect master of the Heavenly Yan Sect, which is on the verge of being wiped out. He binds a system that grants him cultivation power based on the number of disciples he has: for each disciple, he automatically gains a year's worth of cultivation every single day! Take one disciple: every day he gains 1 year of cultivation power. While others struggle through a year of bitter training, he gets the same just by sleeping through a single night. Take ten disciples: every day he gains 10 years of cultivation power. Foundation Establishment, Core Formation, Nascent Soul—he breezes through all bottlenecks without lifting a finger. Take one hundred disciples: every day he gains 100 years of cultivation power. Even a Soul Transformation Venerable before him can’t survive a single blow. Take ten thousand disciples: every day he gains 10,000 years of cultivation power! With a wave of his hand, he topples empires. With a single step, he crushes the sacred grounds of the universe. ... While others fight tooth and nail for secret techniques, Lin Yan casually hands out Nascent Soul-level cultivation manuals as beginner textbooks. While others strain to find talented recruits, Lin Yan opens his doors to anyone—so long as they’re human. In just three short years, the Heavenly Yan Sect went from a backwater sect made up of three crumbling huts to a sacred land that every cultivator under heaven would kill to enter. ... One day, otherworldly demon gods invade, with a million demon soldiers pressing down upon the realm. Lin Yan, yawning, rises from his lounge chair and glances at the system panel: [Current Disciples: 1.28 million] [Daily Cultivation Increase: 1.28 million years] He waves his hand casually, and the countless demon soldiers are reduced to ashes in an instant. “So noisy… interrupting my fishing.”
e bizarre and supernatural had descended. The previous emperor was a thoroughgoing tyrant; no longer satisfied with human women, he had set his sights on a stunningly beautiful supernatural entity. He met his end in his bedchamber, drained of all his vital essence. As the legitimate eldest son and crown prince, Wang Hao was thus hastily enthroned, becoming the young emperor of the Great Zhou Dynasty. No sooner had he awakened the "Imperial Sign-In Intelligence System" than he was assassinated by a Son of Destiny—a classic villain's opening. The Great Zhou, ravaged by the former emperor's excesses, was in national decline. The great families within its borders harbored their own treacherous schemes, martial sects began to defy the imperial court's decrees, and border armies, their pay and provisions in arrears, grumbled incessantly against the central government. Fortunately, the central capital was still held secure by the half-million Imperial Guards and fifty thousand Imperial Forest Army who obeyed the court's orders, along with the royal family's hidden reserves of power, barely managing to suppress the realm. As the Great Zhou's finances worsened and supernatural activities grew ever more frequent, the court sat atop a volcano. Ambitious plotters everywhere dreamed of overthrowing the dynasty, and even some reclusive ancient powers emerged, attempting to sway the tides of the world. At the first grand court assembly, the civil and military officials nearly came to blows, fighting tooth and nail over the allocation of fifty million taels of silver from the summer tax revenues. The spectacle opened Wang Hao's eyes—the Great Zhou's bureaucracy was not only corrupt but also martially proficient, a cabinet of all-rounders. Some officials even had the audacity to suggest the emperor release funds from the imperial privy purse to address the emergency. Wang Hao suddenly felt weary. Let it all burn.
world slacker. But a genius female disciple just had to get clingy, insisting that he take her as a disciple. Not only that, she was always making advances on him, thoroughly disrupting his peaceful slacker life...
