"The painting is... quite good?"
Shang Wu blinked and patted Li Mo's shoulder.
She didn't know much about art, but at a glance, it did look impressive.
"Not bad."
Ying Bing nodded slightly, a hint of surprise in her eyes.
Even without facial features, she could recognize herself in the painting.
This meant the artist had mastered the essence and atmosphere so deeply that the work carried an almost lifelike spirit.
"Just a trivial skill, hardly worth mentioning."
Li Mo curled his lips.
He wasn’t being modest—he just knew his limits.
This level of skill had taken him sixty years of relentless dedication!
But.
Seeing Ying Bing’s gaze linger on the painting, her expression momentarily dazed,
Young Li suddenly felt the pain in his heart ease a little.
"Why didn’t you draw the face?"
Shang Wu pointed at the blank visage of the girl in the painting.
Li Mo sighed.
"It’s my first time painting a portrait. I wanted to capture a smiling expression."
"Besides, the composition is set in the brilliance of midsummer. If the subject isn’t smiling, it would ruin the entire mood."
"Isn’t smiling just..."
Shang Wu trailed off as she realized—
She couldn’t recall ever seeing Ying Bing smile.
Li Mo struggled to remember too.
In his memory, Ying Bing’s smiles were as rare as the sun rising in the west.
Not only had he never seen her laugh,
He couldn’t even imagine what the "ice block" would look like if she did.
"Little Bing, why don’t you... try smiling?"
Shang Wu coaxed.
Ying Bing’s delicate brows furrowed slightly. After a moment of hesitation, she relented.
After all, she owed Li Mo another favor.
Since she’d agreed to be his model until the painting was complete,
She had no choice but to...
Ying Bing parted her jade-like lips, slightly narrowing her eyes, forcing her usually frosty expression into something resembling a smile.
"Heh..."
Beautiful?
Yes.
But...
"Yikes—"
Li Mo and Shang Wu both recoiled, a chill shooting up their spines.
This was a smile, but it was undeniably a cold one!
Ethereal and merciless, like the moon gazing down on mortals, silently uttering two words:
"Insects."
If he painted that, the artwork would instantly be rated R.
Any minor who saw it would be traumatized for life.
"What to do..."
Li Mo pondered, then suddenly crossed his eyes (imagine the classic goofy face) and stuck out his tongue.
"Pfft— HAHAHA, are you stupid?!"
Shang Wu clutched her stomach, laughing uncontrollably.
"?"
Ying Bing’s frown deepened, utterly baffled by this bizarre behavior.
Li Mo reset his face to normal and said solemnly,
"Looks like it’s time for the Joke King to make his grand entrance!"
"Today, I will make you laugh!"
The Qiushui Pavilion Comedy Challenge begins!
First up: Contestant Shang Wu, the beautiful master!
Full of determination, she vowed to crack the ice block’s stoicism!
She began with a deadpan expression.
"A little butterfly was flying along when suddenly, she got so hungry she couldn’t fly anymore... HAHAHA... and then... and then—"
Before she could finish the joke,
She was already wheezing with laughter.
"And then... she fell into the mud and drowned in it, HAHAHA—"
Shang Wu doubled over, gasping for air.
"?"
Li Mo and Ying Bing exchanged glances.
Was this funny?
Where was the punchline?
"Master, what’s the joke supposed to be?" Li Mo asked.
"Hungry mud butterfly."
Shang Wu wiped her tears.
Li Mo: "..."
What a garbage pun.
Due to Contestant Shang Wu’s use of a cringe-worthy pun, Judges Li Mo and Ice Block unanimously disqualified her.
Well.
Mainly because the master’s sense of humor was so rotten that she’d laugh herself to death before finishing any joke longer than three words.
Next up: Contestant Li Mo!
He decided to deploy his ultimate secret weapon:
"A man’s farts were incredibly loud. Guess why?"
"Why?" Shang Wu shook her head.
Li Mo: "Because he was wearing bell-bottoms."
"HAHAHAHA—"
"?"
Ying Bing tilted her head, watching Shang Wu collapse in hysterics, utterly lost.
Was this... supposed to be amusing?
"Still not laughing?"
Li Mo’s competitive spirit ignited.
He refused to accept defeat!
......
Half an hour later.
Li Mo sat in stunned silence.
The beautiful master was clutching her abs, begging him to stop.
Meanwhile, Ice Block’s head was just collecting more and more question marks.
Li Mo, parched and defeated, slumped.
He was starting to suspect Ying Bing simply lacked a funny bone.
"I’m such a fool."
"Give up. Little Bing might just be born without the ability to laugh. Your jokes were great, dear disciple," Shang Wu consoled, finally catching her breath.
"How can we make her smile?"
Li Mo racked his brain, absentmindedly poking his cheek with a brush.
So absorbed was he that he didn’t notice—
He’d grabbed the brush backwards.
The inked tip left streaks of black across his handsome face.
"Pfft—"
"Master, stop laughing at me."
Li Mo wiped his mouth irritably, smearing the ink further until he resembled a certain cartoon cat.
"Huh?"
Shang Wu turned to him.
One glance at his new look, and her barely-contained laughter erupted again.
"Honk honk honk—"
Clearly, this laughter was different from before.
"Hm?"
Li Mo turned.
The last stubborn rays of sunset clung to the horizon,
Casting a warm glow on Ying Bing, her ice-mirror eyes shimmering between light and shadow.
The evening breeze tousled her hair, softening her features—
But the fledgling artist reflected in her eyes was crystal clear.
For a moment, Li Mo felt time freeze.
A masterpiece stood before him.
"Quit staring and paint," Shang Wu nudged him.
"Ah! Right!"
Li Mo snapped back to reality.
Focusing intently, he lifted his brush and finally filled in the blank face on the canvas—
With a smile both delicate and radiant.
Strangely,
As those strokes settled, a wave of exhaustion washed over him.
"Done? Let me see!" Shang Wu leaned in.
"Is this... me?"
Ying Bing stared at the painting, transfixed.
The girl in the artwork felt both foreign and familiar.
Even she couldn’t remember her own smile.
Yet,
With just a few strokes, Li Mo had captured it—
A perfect blend of cool elegance and vivid warmth.
That smile seemed eternal, so lifelike it was as if another version of her stood there, gazing back.
Under the moonlight, an indescribable emotion stirred in her chest.
Rustle—
The night wind whispered through the leaves.
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...
. 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!"
with Taming My Adopted Niece) (Multiple Heroines + Power Fantasy) Before transmigrating, Wang Jianqiang suffered greatly from novels with no female leads. Holding firm to the belief that "women only slow down my blade," he stubbornly maintained his virginity even after decades in the Sect of Dual Cultivation. In his twilight years, with his cultivation stagnant at the third level of Qi Refining, he finally succumbed and "rewarded" himself once—triggering the awakening of the Godly Cultivation System. From then on, he realized women might actually be his lucky stars on the path to immortality. Deciding to indulge freely and savor life, he found his ungrateful adopted niece knocking at his door...
le for a sister-in-law. But Xu Mu couldn’t bring himself to rejoice. The reason? He had transmigrated into the brainless villain of a novel—one who abused his wife, forced the Dragon King’s sister to live in a doghouse, and ended up having his ashes scattered upon the Dragon King’s return. Fortunately, Xu Mu awakened the "Justice System," and he was determined to rewrite his doomed fate. A wife should be cherished, and of course, his sister-in-law deserved to sleep in the villa’s cozy bed. When the Dragon King finally returned, he was greeted by a loving and harmonious family. Xu Mu soon realized that aside from the Dragon King, countless other protagonists began emerging—all targeting him—forcing him to fight back. You have a few breathtakingly beautiful senior sisters? Sorry, but they’re my senior sisters now. You’re a retired soldier king searching for your first love? Too bad—your "white moonlight" already sees me as hers. …
