Just at that moment, Yezi also came downstairs, her slippers going tap-tap-tap on the steps. Perhaps noticing there were a lot of people in the house, she blinked, glanced down at the tank top she was wearing, and bent forward slightly like a little grown-up.
"My apologies, I'll go change."
A few minutes later, Yezi came back down in a pair of pink pajamas. The serious little look on her face just now had Ye Shuang and the others struggling not to laugh. Perhaps spotting someone her own age, Yezi's gaze lingered on Duoduo for a couple of seconds before she said, "Hello, my name is Yezi."
"Hi, I'm Tang Duoduo." Tang Duoduo immediately spoke up after Yezi introduced herself.
Seeing the two little munchkins greet each other, Ye Shuang smiled and introduced Tang Duoduo. When she heard that the girl was Tang Keke's cousin, Yezi's eyes unconsciously drifted toward the other's chest area. "Hmm?"
"What's the matter, Yezi?"
"Oh, nothing."
At that moment, Ye Shuang also said to Tang Duoduo, "Yezi here is my daughter."
"Daughter? Daughter?!" Tang Duoduo looked utterly stunned. Such a big daughter?
Was she born with Sister Bai Yuyou?
"Adopted daughter," Yezi added at that point. Even though she was biologically his child, under the current circumstances she had chosen to stay in the household under the identity of an adopted daughter.
"Oh, I see?" Tang Duoduo nodded in sudden understanding.
After all, Sister Bai Yuyou didn't really look like someone who would have a child that big.
For the rest of the time, Tang Duoduo and her grandmother sat around at Ye Shuang's place for a bit before heading back. After all, they were just neighbors living upstairs and downstairs from each other—this was basically just a quick hello.
"Brother, I should head back too. I'll come over and play tomorrow." Tang Keke also said at that point. Since her grandmother had come over, it would seem a little rude to keep staying at Ye Shuang's place—after all, her usual excuse was that she was home alone.
"No worries, spend some quality time with your grandmother." Ye Shuang gave a slight smile.
As they got on the elevator, they could faintly hear Duoduo's voice: "Sister Keke, you've got some nerve..."
Most likely her butt was about to get a good smacking.
"Dad, are they all gone?" Yezi walked over to behind Ye Shuang and asked.
"Yeah. Duoduo will be attending your school from now on. Think you two can become good friends?" Ye Shuang turned around and asked.
"If that's what Dad wishes, I can."
"It's not about that. If you think she's someone worth getting along with, then it's fine to develop a friendship." Ye Shuang smiled. "A few true friends are better than many casual ones. And friends you make when you're young, if you can grow up together, that's a rare and precious bond."
That was exactly how it had been between him and Chen Hai and the others—close friends since childhood, their ties and feelings beyond what ordinary acquaintances could compare to.
"Yeah, Dad, I understand."
...
That night, Ye Shuang got into bed early, but he wasn't asleep. He was leaning against the headboard, his fingers tapping away on the laptop in front of him—after all, he wrote novels for a living, so he still had to get his updates done.
"Already at 1.5 million words. A few hundred thousand more and I can wrap this up, right?" Ye Shuang glanced at his word count. Over the past year, he'd written that much without even realizing it. He didn't know how he'd managed to keep going.
It must be the readers' support along the way.
"Yeah..." After spending an hour finishing his update, Ye Shuang put the laptop on the side table. Perhaps because of his cold, his head was feeling heavy and foggy.
"Cough, I need to get some sleep."
After turning up the air conditioning a bit, he slowly lay down and pulled the covers over himself.
His body grew heavier, and his consciousness gradually began to drift—
Vaguely, he felt like he was having a dream. He dreamed he was sleeping inside a cramped jar, with pounding sounds coming from outside, as if someone was knocking. Ye Shuang tried with all his might to open his eyes, but he couldn't no matter what. His consciousness slowly sank into chaos.
His awareness gradually faded away.
...
...
Early morning, when Ye Shuang opened his eyes, he realized it was already nine o'clock. He rarely slept in this late—perhaps because he was sick and hadn't set an alarm, so he'd slept more deeply than usual.
"Hm." Ye Shuang stretched his arms and found that his cold had improved considerably. At least the heavy, dizzy feeling in his head was gone.
After washing up and getting ready, he came down to the first floor and found only Bai Yuyou there, wearing an apron and preparing breakfast.
"Where's Yezi?" Ye Shuang asked.
"Yezi went downstairs to walk the dog." As Bai Yuyou spoke, she walked over to Ye Shuang.
Her jet-black, jewel-like eyes lingered on his face for a few seconds before she stood on her tiptoes and pressed her forehead against his.
After confirming he didn't have a fever, Bai Yuyou even stole a kiss on his cheek before pulling away.
Having done all that, her expression remained completely blank, as if nothing at all had just happened.
"Getting that close, you might catch what I have." Ye Shuang reached out and pinched Bai Yuyou's cheek.
"It's fine. I have a strong body."
Bai Yuyou struck a little bodybuilder pose, though her fair, delicate arms didn't exactly sell it.
Ye Shuang sat down to eat breakfast. What Bai Yuyou had prepared was a simple egg toast with milk and cereal, but it tasted pretty great.
"Huh... I feel like something's missing around the house." Ye Shuang said while chewing on his toast, a vague sense of something off making him lift his head slightly.
Sitting beside him, Bai Yuyou tilted her head. She had five slices of toast stacked on her plate, piled up like a little cake.
"It's nothing." Ye Shuang smiled, but quickly figured out what it was.
Keke wasn't there. They were short the little livewire who livened up the atmosphere.
Whenever he and Bai Yuyou lived together, the house was always peaceful and quiet—cozy in its own way. It was only after Keke joined them that things got more lively. Even the cat around the house was a lazy little lump.
"Keke didn't come over today?" Ye Shuang asked.
"Mmm, no..." Bai Yuyou said with her cheeks puffed out, mid-bite. "She's taking Duoduo to the park for a walk."
"I see." Ye Shuang nodded. Maybe from now on, Keke would be staying at her own place, since she'd be living with her grandmother.
After breakfast was over, Ye Shuang received a phone call from Chen Hai.
"Hello?"
"I got kicked out." One sentence from Chen Hai left Ye Shuang stunned for a few seconds.
"Kicked out by who?"
"My dad, that's who." Chen Hai sounded gloomy on the other end of the line. "Because of the divorce, I've got no money, no place to stay. The money is with Feng Shan, and the apartment we had is being occupied by Feng Shan. I don't have keys to any of the other properties."
"What a mess."
iemie, male, Race: Moon. Hobby: Collecting anomalies. At first, he thought he possessed two systems: the Crimson Rainbow Moon and the Clear Cold Frost Moon. One day, he discovered that he himself could also become a system for others, holding the chessboard of fate. The Eighth Epoch, also known as the Eternal Moon Epoch. Humans, witches, elves, bloodline descendants, specters, demons, and spirits together compose a new history. Walking the path on behalf of the moon, before he knew it, Chen Miemie's footsteps were followed by all manner of strange and wondrous anomalies. As time passed, many titles circulated about him—The King in Yellow, Lord of Anomalies, Heart of the Eternal Moon, and more. "Me? I'm just a traveler who enjoys collecting interesting creatures," Chen Miemie said.
] This is a dark fantasy-themed dating simulation game. The main gameplay involves containing various monster girls and investigating the truth of a world shrouded in mist alongside your companions. However, due to his love for the dark and bizarre atmosphere, Luo Wei ended up turning a dating game into a detective mystery game. Women? Women only slow down his quickdraw! To Luo Wei, the female leads in the game are more like tools to perfectly clear levels and squeeze out rewards. For Luo Wei, flirting with every girl he meets and then discarding them is standard procedure. Worried about characters losing affection points? No need. With his maxed-out charm stat, Luo Wei is practically a "human incubus." A little psychological manipulation and those points come right back. It's a bit scummy, but the paper cutout heroines in the game won't actually come at him with real cleavers. However... Luo Wei has transmigrated. He's accidentally entered the second playthrough of this game. His past actions have caused all the girls to transform into terrifying yanderes. Due to the game's setting, most of the heroines he once contained are "troubled girls." Obsessive, twisted, mentally unstable, all aggressive yanderes... The type who will kill you if they can't have you... Luo Wei wants to cry but has no tears left. "I really just want to survive..." In short, this is a story of battling wits and engaging in a love-hate relationship with yanderes.
ut it can buy an entire year of absolutely perfect training results! Su Yu stared at his empty wallet and decisively opened up various online loan platforms. “Borrow a thousand bucks! Recharge my vitality!” Boom! His vitality broke a hundred points, shattering the limits of the human body! “Borrow ten thousand bucks! Recharge my combat skills!” Boom! A basic punching technique so common it was everywhere instantly maxed out, revealing the ultimate assassination technique of Five Elements Unity—Inner Force! When a rich kid hired assassins for a midnight ambush, aiming to break both of his legs, they instead ran headfirst into a monster—a human-shaped tyrannosaur, brimming with dragon-like vitality. With just two fingers, Su Yu snapped a steel staff reinforced with alloy. Staring at the killer’s stash of stolen cash—a staggering quarter-million dollars—he showed a corporate-sincere smile: “Thanks for the pre-exam gift pack, Mr. Zhao! I’m gonna go re-invest this!” Three days later, at the National Martial Arts College Entrance Exam, while everyone else struggled just to reach the passing line, Su Yu threw a single punch—and more than a thousand vitality points literally detonated the entire arena!
ing gift was a patch of barren land, and disciples were all picked up along the way. He spent fifty years diligently building three "ramshackle little sects," thinking he could finally live a carefree life relying on his disciples. But right at the fifty-year mark, he was suddenly swept away by a spatial rift and exiled to the Chaos Desolation, the Disorderly Ruins. There was no spiritual energy there, only slaughter. Relying on the cultivation feedback from his disciples, Gu Changyuan hacked his way through a sea of blood for eleven hundred years. When the system finally fished him back out, he discovered the ramshackle little sects he'd built back then had developed a rather... unusual style. Hold on... I vanished for a thousand years, so how did my ramshackle little sects become holy lands?!
