"Okay, okay, three minutes!"
Li Ming turned and dashed into the bathroom, quickly washing up.
They say tall, fair, and handsome people look good even without clothes! Li Ming gave his face a quick rinse, and once again, his looks dominated.
Lin Xi was stunned—how could someone go into the bathroom for two minutes and come out looking like a completely different person? The disheveled mess from before was gone, replaced by a striking man.
Not dwelling on her surprise, Lin Xi led Li Ming toward the counseling room.
On the way, Li Ming asked curiously, "Why does this inmate want to see me? What's going on?"
Lin Xi glanced back at him with an exasperated look but answered anyway.
"She says you look like her dead husband. She’s been hysterical, demanding to see you—threatening to kill herself if she doesn’t. Earlier, she smashed her head against the wall in her cell. The guards couldn’t handle her, so they reported it to me. You need to calm her down. Don’t let her get too worked up. She’s got three years left on her sentence, and she’s been a model inmate. We can’t let her do something stupid now."
"Huh? I look like her dead husband? That’s ridiculous!" Li Ming rubbed his forehead, his expression twisted in disbelief.
"Ridiculous or not, if an inmate commits suicide in prison, you, as the warden, will be held responsible! Be smart about this—don’t make things worse!"
With that, Lin Xi pushed open the door to the counseling room.
Li Ming followed closely behind. Inside, a female inmate sat waiting.
To his surprise, the woman wasn’t old at all—far from the elderly figure he’d imagined.
Years without sunlight had left her skin pale but still firm. The thin prison uniform couldn’t hide her curvaceous figure. Her posture was straight, her face delicate, and for a moment, Li Ming almost forgot where he was.
She didn’t look like a prisoner. She looked like a lady of refinement.
The moment Li Ming entered, the woman’s eyes locked onto him.
He saw a flicker of joy in her gaze, but Lin Xi paid no mind, stepping forward to unlock the woman’s handcuffs so she could move freely.
Then the inmate spoke.
"Deputy Warden Lin, could you step outside for a moment? I’d like to speak with him alone."
Lin Xi didn’t seem surprised. She nodded, then leaned closer to Li Ming and whispered, "There’s no surveillance in here. I’ll be right outside. If anything happens, shout."
Li Ming waved her off without a word.
What could possibly happen to him, a grown man?
Once Lin Xi left, Li Ming sat across from the woman.
"I heard you asked for me because I look like your late husband? Do I really?" he asked, curious.
The woman slowly shook her head and lowered her voice.
"Warden, I lied to them. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have let me see you."
"Wait, what? Then why did you want to see me?" Li Ming was even more confused now. He couldn’t think of any connection between them.
"I… I need your help, Warden. I won’t ask for free—I’ll repay you. Anything you want. If you’re willing… you can even have me." Her voice trembled as she reached across the table and grabbed his hand.
"Hey, calm down. Tell me what you need first." Li Ming was taken aback. Her bold words left him scrambling for composure.
"Warden… I’m 35 now. When I was 14, my late husband kidnapped me. He forced me to bear his child. He was a drug dealer. When I was arrested, he was shot dead on the spot. I was involved too—not by choice—but I still got 15 years. Now, I have less than three years left. I just wanted to serve my time quietly and start over when I got out. But…"
"But last month, my older sister came to visit. She told me my daughter is running around with shady men. She’s even set a date to marry some lowlife! My daughter hates me. She’s never visited in all these years. The only news I get is from my sister. I’m terrified for her! But I’m stuck here! I have no choice but to beg you, Warden!"
"Please… could you go see her? Find out how she’s really doing. See if the man she’s marrying is good to her. I don’t want her ruined, walking the same path I did! Please, Warden! I’ll get on my knees! I’ll do anything you ask!"
Her grip on his hand tightened, and suddenly, she dropped to the floor with a thud, kneeling before him.
Li Ming lunged forward, pulling her up in alarm. "Stop this! Get up!" He forced her back into the chair, afraid she might hurt herself in her desperation.
"Warden! The only person I care about in this world is my daughter! Even though she never visits me, not a single day goes by that I don’t think of her. It’s all my fault for failing to protect her. I don’t blame her for hating me—I just want her to be happy, even if she never acknowledges me as her mother for the rest of her life. Please, Warden! You’re a good man, please help me!" Tears streamed down the woman’s face, enhancing her delicate features.
"It’s just checking on how she’s doing, right? Fine, no problem, I’ll help you! Stop crying, though. You’ll have to tell me where she lives, how old she is, and what her name is." Li Ming couldn’t stand seeing women cry. Watching her weep so pitifully twisted his heart.
Her circumstances were already tragic enough, earning his sympathy, and now with her like this, Li Ming couldn’t bring himself to refuse.
Besides, his system reward—his intuition—hadn’t given him any warning, meaning this prisoner wasn’t lying. Everything she said was true, so he had even less reason to turn her down.
"Thank you, Warden! Thank you so much! You’re truly a good person! There are no cameras here—let me help you! Don’t worry, I’m clean! The prison does regular checkups, I’m disease-free!" Overjoyed that Li Ming had agreed, the female prisoner beamed. With nothing else to offer in gratitude, she lowered herself…
"Hey! No, no! That’s not necessary! Stop! I said I’d help you, so I will—what are you doing?!" Li Ming shot a nervous glance toward the door.
The counseling room indeed had no surveillance. Prison psychological sessions had to account for inmates’ emotions—if cameras were present, they’d never lower their guards enough to open up.
But just because there were no cameras didn’t mean the room was soundproof! Lin Xi was right outside the door, and she’d even said to call if anything happened. For all he knew, she might be pressing her ear against the door right now!
He wouldn’t dare do something like this in broad daylight even if he had twice the courage!
"Relax, Warden! I’ve been in this prison for over a decade. Unless someone’s shouting, no sound gets out of this counseling room. I have nothing else to repay you with except myself. Please don’t look down on me, Warden. Aside from my late husband, I’ve never been with another man."
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?!
. As long as he maintains the villain image and follows the plot to the grand finale, he can obtain generous rewards and return to the real world. So Gu Chen'an entered the role and began to act as a scumbag villain, but who would have expected that the female leads could hear his inner thoughts. Miss Su from the Su family was shocked: "I originally thought Gu Chen'an was a scumbag, but I didn't expect he turned out to be a gentleman! What? You said I have to call off the engagement? I definitely won't, I'll piss you off!" Bai Yuan Tian was dumbfounded: "Young Master Gu is usually unreasonable and a complete brat, but he actually calls me little sweetie in his heart? What, Young Master Gu even said he likes me?" As the female leads' images collapsed more and more, the plot also collapsed with it. Gu Chen'an looked at all this chaos. "Ladies, don't aggro me, if you keep this up the male lead really will stab me, I still need to survive to the grand finale!"
] [Lone Wolf, No Male Gaze] [Protagonist is pursued early on; extreme protagonist-stans, stay away!] The "Carnival Paradise" descends and slowly devours the real world in the form of a game. By chance, Zhu Yan awakens the talent [Roleplay], becoming one of the first beta players. He thought he could develop safely, but after clearing the first instance, he is branded by humanity as the chief culprit behind the game's spread—a traitorous villain. A villain? Who would ever... become one! He'll be the villain! From then on, Zhu Yan is not only a player but also a lackey for the Carnival Paradise. Between the straight path and the crooked path, he chooses the con. With his left hand, he dons the villain's mantle, staging scenes within instances, infuriating players who decry him as a despicable traitor, all while the game happily promotes him. With his right hand, he joins the non-human organization "Fangcun Mountain," which opposes the Carnival Paradise, transforming into a mysterious player who slaughters game bosses, earning cheers of "Long live the expert!" from fellow players. Gradually, Zhu Yan rises to become an S-rank human player in Fangcun Mountain's archives, while also being the Carnival Paradise's certified top game Boss. But when the final war erupts and both major factions place their hopes in him— Players tag his various aliases: "Experts, this offensive depends on you." The Carnival Paradise's supreme Boss throws an arm around his neck: "Bro, you're the iron, I'm the steel; you can't let me down again!"
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!
