"Sorry, I dozed off." Ye Shuang didn't notice Bai Yuyou's earlier action. Just as he was about to apologize for oversleeping, Bai Yuyou suddenly reached out and hugged him.
Warmth and softness enveloped him. Ye Shuang froze for a moment, looking down at the girl clinging tightly to him.
Was she… back to normal?
Just this morning, she had been avoiding him.
Ye Shuang glanced at Tang Keke, who was making a strange face, as if she wanted to say something but didn’t dare.
Still, it was better that Yuyou had returned to her usual self rather than keeping her distance.
"Oh, right—the cat." Ye Shuang looked around before gently telling Bai Yuyou, "Yuyou, let go for a second. The cat’s missing."
Only then did Bai Yuyou lift her head and release him. Ye Shuang stood up and began searching the entire house.
Eventually, all three of them joined the hunt, finally hearing noises from the kitchen trash bin.
"You're really something—no, cat something." Ye Shuang pinched the scruff of the kitten’s neck and lifted it up. A piece of fruit peel was stuck to its head, making it look utterly ridiculous.
Bai Yuyou noticed the kitten too—it must have been discharged from the vet.
"Wow, it’s kinda cute," Tang Keke said, her eyes sparkling with curiosity.
"Do you want to adopt it?" Though he already knew the answer, Ye Shuang still asked Bai Yuyou for her opinion. When she nodded, he smiled and said,
"Alright then, let’s give this little guy a name."
Bai Yuyou fell into thought.
"Ten Thousand isn’t a bad name."
"Brother, why Ten Thousand?"
"Because this little troublemaker cost ten grand in vet bills in just a week."
"That’s kinda wild."
At that moment, Bai Yuyou suddenly spoke up. "Ye Shuang."
Ye Shuang: "?"
Something felt off.
"Yuyou, why name it Ye Shuang?" Tang Keke asked curiously.
Bai Yuyou replied, "Ye Shuang… sounds nice."
"I get it! Because Yuyou likes Brother, she likes his name too!" Tang Keke declared, playing the role of royal interpreter with a smug grin.
Ye Shuang just chuckled, brushing it off.
In the end, the name was settled. From that day on, the long-haired orange kitten had its official name—
Ten Thousand.
A tribute to the ever-shrinking wallet.
---
Though Ye Shuang had insisted on going grocery shopping alone, Bai Yuyou and Tang Keke still tagged along. The three of them arrived at the market.
It was still early—plenty of time to prepare dinner.
"Want some soup?"
"Yes!" Tang Keke raised her hand enthusiastically.
"Yuyou?"
"Yes!" Tang Keke raised Bai Yuyou’s hand for her.
Ye Shuang couldn’t help but laugh. Bai Yuyou also murmured a soft "yes."
The market was crowded, and Bai Yuyou, uncomfortable in large gatherings, instinctively moved closer to Ye Shuang. Noticing this, he reached out and gently took her hand.
Feeling the warmth of his palm, Bai Yuyou visibly relaxed.
At the meat stall, Ye Shuang was about to pick out some ribs when he realized the butcher looked familiar.
Ye Shuang: "…"
"Old man, if you’re not buying, don’t block the way. Move it." An Shiyu said, gripping a cleaver.
"An Shiyu?!" Tang Keke recognized her, eyes widening in surprise.
"You know her?" Ye Shuang asked.
"She’s from Class B—always top three in grades, but skips class so much even the teachers can’t do anything about it," Tang Keke explained.
"Oh, Big-Chest Girl, you’re from Class A," An Shiyu remarked.
"B-Big-Chest Girl?!"
"Why are you selling pork again?" Ye Shuang asked, baffled.
He then noticed the actual butcher nearby and asked, "Is she your daughter?"
"Nah, she said she’s a student doing a social practice assignment. Paid me a few grand to let her run the stall for a bit," the butcher said cheerfully.
Money in hand and free labor? The butcher was more than happy. Besides ribs, most cuts didn’t even require much skill.
Pay up, play butcher for a while…
"You’re loaded?" Ye Shuang gave An Shiyu a skeptical look. They’d just shared pig trotter rice for lunch that morning.
And now she’s paying to be a sucker?
Ye Shuang was starting to understand why this girl kept popping up in random jobs.
"Money’s just numbers. Can’t take it with you when you die," An Shiyu said lazily. "Saw the pig trotter guy chopping meat at lunch and thought it looked fun."
"Wanna buy a trotter for me to hack at?"
Before Ye Shuang could respond, he noticed Bai Yuyou staring at him—along with Tang Keke’s shocked expression.
They had lunch together?
"It’s a long story. Just give me some ribs—I won’t interrupt your fun," Ye Shuang said.
"Sure." Without asking which cut, An Shiyu grabbed a slab, swung the cleaver a few times, and neatly chopped it up—no hesitation.
This girl… Would she find hacking up a person fun someday?
An Shiyu tossed the bagged ribs at him. "Here."
"How much?"
"Free. Consider it payback for the pig trotter rice."
Ye Shuang glanced at the butcher, who was still grinning.
The power of money.
After dropping a few grand, An Shiyu could hand out ribs all day without the butcher batting an eye.
"Thanks." Ye Shuang was starting to get a read on An Shiyu. He didn’t insist on paying, simply took the ribs and led Bai Yuyou and Tang Keke to the next stall.
An Shiyu watched them leave, tilting her head slightly as if lost in thought.
"Boss, give me some pork belly," a customer called out.
"Sorry, stall’s closed for today."
Customer: Huh?
Butcher: Huh?! ↗
---
On the way back, Tang Keke couldn’t hold back her curiosity. "Brother, how do you know An Shiyu? I heard she’s super hard to get along with."
"Long story. Let’s just say we keep running into each other, so we ended up acquainted." Ye Shuang didn’t elaborate. Maybe they’d known each other in a past life—why else would they cross paths everywhere?
He turned to Bai Yuyou with a smile. "Remember? We saw her last time when we bought squid."
Bai Yuyou nodded—she remembered An Shiyu.
By the time they left the market, the sunset had painted the sky orange. Watching the two girls beside him, Ye Shuang recalled the years he’d spent grocery shopping alone.
"Just go by yourself. Do you really need me for something this small? Or can’t you even carry groceries as a grown man?"
"Forget it. I’ll order takeout. Handle it yourself."
The sharp, painful echoes of the past were fading, replaced by the cheerful voices beside him.
"Brother, let us carry some. Is it too heavy?"
"Give it to me…"
Ye Shuang looked at the two girls extending their hands toward him and couldn't help but shake his head with a faint smile. Instead, he felt a weight lift off his shoulders, as if a burden had been released from his heart.
"Let's go. I'll cook a big meal tonight."
"Yay!"
Bathed in the fading sunlight, the three of them walked home together.
shall grant"] ["Inscribing the glory of our race upon tombstones"] ["All that is threatened, I shall protect"] How his younger sister sees her brother: A brother who only makes eye contact once a day, mostly fading into the background as he tinkers with who-knows-what in his room all day. Their life paths should have remained largely separate. Until one day. Su Qi created an equipment card for his never-met "online girlfriend." His sister fell into silent contemplation upon receiving the "white stockings." [Card can be upgraded] [Upgrade by fulfilling any of the following conditions] [Condition ①: Consume one hundred higher-tier cards] [Condition ②: Complete one 'Heart-Pounding Adventure'] What constitutes a Heart-Pounding Adventure? [Heart-Pounding Adventure (Beginner Level): Equip the card and invite 'Su Qi' to admire it.] [Heart-Pounding Adventure (Easy Level): Equip the card, invite 'Su Qi' to touch it, and analyze the equipment's texture.] [Heart-Pounding Adventure (Entry Level): Equip the card and invite 'Su Qi' to...] [Heart-Pounding Adventure (Challenge Level): Freely combine the words 'Brother' 'Out' 'Brother' 'Me' 'Please' into a complete sentence...] "Please help me analyze both teams' mistakes in this match, brother..." His sister exhaled in relief—surely... surely there couldn't be anything more difficult? [Heart-Pounding Adventure (Suicide Mission Level): Sneak a peek at the names of the galgames in 'Su Qi's' hidden E-drive folder]
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.”
ive and Ruthless] Before his transmigration, Ye Xuan was playing a game called "Severing Emotions to Attain the Dao." The game's core wasn't about leveling up by fighting monsters, but about conquering various "bad women" with wicked personalities and cold, fickle natures. There was only one method to conquer them: stay unwaveringly by their side, then die at a critical moment, driving them to madness after losing the protagonist. The higher their level of regret, the higher the player's score. To dominate the server, Ye Xuan conquered all the bad women. In the early stages, he showered them with boundless tenderness, only to choose to sacrifice himself for them later, making them weep bitterly and drown in regret. Among them were: Xia Lengyue, the unfaithful immortal wife who chased after powerful men and discarded her husband like trash. Ye Qingcheng, the Demonic Venerable of the Joyous Union Sect, who appeared pure and innocent but was, in reality, promiscuous. Wu Lingxiao, the Empress of the Great Xia Dynasty, who lusted after men and loved maintaining a harem. Bai Qiangu of the Endless Demonic Sect: a bloodthirsty mass murderer. However, when the protagonist transmigrated into the game world, he made a horrifying discovery. Eight hundred years had already passed. The bad women he had conquered had now each become deities and revered ancestors. Faced with the endless stream of toxic women coming for him, Ye Xuan could only rely on his god-tier acting skills to carve a path of survival through this world of treacherous women.
