In the blink of an eye, only half a month remained before Chen Qin was due to give birth. She had moved into a private hospital room quite early. Since due dates were generally fairly accurate, Chen's parents had arranged for her to stay at the hospital in case anything unexpected happened, so she could give birth at the first opportunity.
For Chen Qin, even staying in the hospital was more comfortable than being at home. After all, she had been forbidden from going out for eight or nine months, and even when she was allowed outside, the farthest she could go was the small garden on the estate. As Chen Qin herself put it, being cooped up for so long was driving her crazy.
“Mom, I know, I know.” Chen Qin was sitting on the bed eating fruit while Chen's mother chattered away on the other end of the video call. “There are three or four nurses looking after me, so don’t worry.”
“You need to be more careful.”
“I know.”
After finally hanging up, Chen Qin saw Ye Shuang walk into the room.
Calling it a hospital room was actually an understatement. It was more like a private hotel suite, complete with a sofa, television, dining table, and even a bathtub in the bathroom.
“Hubby, are you done talking to the doctor?” Chen Qin asked cheerfully when she saw Ye Shuang.
“Yeah. We discussed the delivery options. If you’re worried about the pain, you could have an extraperitoneal C-section,” Ye Shuang said. “I just asked about it. The doctors here are all highly experienced, and your test results show that you’re a suitable candidate.”
“Extraperitoneal? What’s the difference between that and a regular C-section?”
“With a regular C-section, they cut through the layers one by one. The peritoneum is the most painful part, so an extraperitoneal C-section avoids it and removes the baby from the bladder side,” Ye Shuang explained. “The advantage is that you can get out of bed on the first day, recover more quickly, and the incision is smaller, so it can heal sooner.”
“Oh, I see. Is a natural birth not better?” Chen Qin asked.
“A natural birth… might hurt a little,” Ye Shuang said. “Even with an epidural, it’s impossible to eliminate the pain completely.”
“It’s fine. I’ve got wide hips, hehe. I’ll go with a natural birth,” Chen Qin said. “That’s better for the baby, right?”
“It doesn’t really matter to the baby. I just don’t want you to suffer,” Ye Shuang replied with a smile. “I don’t think there’s any difference between children born by either method.”
“Wow, the baby would be sad to hear you say that.”
Just then, Ye Shuang’s phone vibrated. He glanced at it and saw a company contract that had been sent through QQ. He had no choice but to sit down beside the bed, pick up the laptop nearby, and start reviewing it.
Chen Qin sat beside him and looked over as well. She had not dealt with company matters for more than six months, so she was unfamiliar with some of the new projects.
“Hubby, do you need my help?”
“No. Just eat your fruit,” Ye Shuang replied as he read through the document. “Don’t get involved in work matters.”
“Oh~”
Chen Qin seemed to enjoy being looked after by Ye Shuang. She acted like a sweet, obedient little girl sitting beside him, occasionally feeding him pieces of fruit.
“By the way, hubby, what’s going on with Chen Hai?”
“You haven’t been in touch with him?”
“No. He was being so reckless, and it’s been several months since the divorce. There hasn’t been any news from Feng Shan either.” Chen Qin frowned. “I’m a little worried she might take the child and do something foolish.”
“She probably won’t. Feng Shan is an only child, and her family dotes on her,” Ye Shuang said, not particularly concerned. Besides, if anything really had happened, Chen's parents would probably have heard about it by now.
“The divorce must have hit Feng Shan hard, though,” Chen Qin said.
“Since she was the one who brought up the divorce, Feng Shan must have felt insecure.”
“Hubby, you won’t divorce me in the future, will you?” Chen Qin asked.
“Silly.” Seeing the worried look on her face, Ye Shuang couldn’t help smiling. He reached out and pinched her cheek before continuing, “No, I won’t.”
“Hehe.”
Speaking of Chen Hai, Ye Shuang realized that he himself had not been in contact with him for a month either. He had no idea what the man had been up to lately.
It wasn’t that Ye Shuang had deliberately avoided calling him. Life had simply been moving too quickly, and before he knew it, a month had passed without him even noticing.
“Want me to call and check on him?” Ye Shuang asked, holding up his phone.
“Then pretend I’m not here,” Chen Qin said.
“Sure.”
Ye Shuang dialed Chen Hai’s number directly. After a while, someone picked up.
“Hello?”
The voice on the other end belonged to a young woman, which made Ye Shuang freeze for a moment.
“Hmm.”
When he saw Chen Qin’s expression darken beside him, Ye Shuang quickly asked, “Who are you? Where’s Chen Hai?”
“Chen? Please wait a moment.”
“Hello—”
A moment later, Chen Hai’s voice came through the phone, accompanied by the sound of splashing water. It seemed he was taking a shower.
“Chen Hai, who’s that girl?” Ye Shuang asked.
“A girl? She’s just a young woman who came over to help me clean,” Chen Hai replied. “She was outside the door and said it was Ye Shuang calling, so I asked her to answer it for me. I’m still in the shower, bro.”
“A cleaning girl…” Ye Shuang obviously didn’t believe him, especially since Chen Qin beside him already looked ready to throttle him.
“Do you think I believe that?”
“Hey, I swear, why would I lie to you? I always say it straight—if it is, then it is; if it isn’t, then it isn’t,” Chen Hai protested. “You don’t think I’m fooling around, do you?”
“If you really wanted to do something, I couldn’t stop you. You’re single, after all,” Ye Shuang said.
“Exactly. Besides, this girl is really meticulous with the housework. She just refuses to wear a maid outfit. She’s not like your Fish-Head Secretary, who’s always playing dress-up in uniforms with you,” Chen Hai said. “Anyway, why did you call me?”
“Nothing special. I just wanted to check on you since it’s been a month. Have you opened the shop yet?”
“I’m thinking of starting with a street stall,” Chen Hai replied. “The economy’s not great right now. I’m worried that if I open a shop, I’ll throw several hundred thousand into it and get absolutely nothing back.”
“Alright, I’m hanging up.”
With that, the call ended.
“Heh. What a carefree life. He’s already started playing around with uniforms,” Chen Qin said with a cold laugh. “I think he’s enjoying himself a little too much.”
“That’s probably not the case. Chen Hai has always been pretty straightforward, so nothing should have happened,” Ye Shuang said. “But as for setting up a street stall…”
For a moment, Ye Shuang didn’t know what to say.
That was hard-earned money, after all. He had no idea what Chen Hai was really trying to accomplish.
“Hmph.”
Chen Qin understood that as well. Since she had not said anything during the call, Chen Hai probably had nothing going on with that particular girl. But who knew what he might have been doing with someone else?
“Heh, it does sound a little like that. Still, I don’t think he’s in the mood for that sort of thing anymore.”
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!
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.
Cheng's father told him he was getting remarried—to a wealthy woman. Cao Cheng realized his time had finally come: he was about to become a second-generation rich kid. Sure, it might be a watered-down version, but hey, at least he'd have status now, right? The wealthy woman also had four daughters!! Which meant, starting today, Cao Cheng gained four stunning older sisters?? But that wasn't even the whole story... "My name is Cao Cheng—'Cheng' as in 'honest, smooth-talking gentleman'!"
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?!
