High-IQ Novels About Scheming and Conquering the World, with No Forcefully Idiotic Side Characters #高智商,谋略天下的小说,不要强行智障的配角
Translated by GPT-6 Luna
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451
A Game of Two Faces 双面奕局
Seven years ago, Yan Chi, commander of the northern frontier, was betrayed by a close friend, branded a traitor, and saw his family wiped out. He barely escaped with his life. Seven years later, he returns to the imperial capital under the alias “Chen Yu,” a mysterious merchant. On the surface, he is a wealthy imperial merchant offering an auspicious treasure. In truth, he intends to make one grand move on the chessboard of power and bring down the dynasty in a game of revenge.
7Reads—Score—Shelves
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452
The Twin Phoenix Tribulation 双凤劫
[Two Strong Leads + Palace Intrigue + Revenge + Substitute Marriage + Love After Marriage + Woman Disguised as a Man + The Regretful Husband's Pursuit] On the eve of her twin sister's marriage into the imperial palace, she was murdered, violated, and left to die. Returning drenched in blood, Feng Jiuyan shed her armor and took her sister's place, becoming the empress of the nation. Then she went on a killing spree! The emperor had a beloved woman, so everyone assumed Feng Jiuyan would receive no
83kReads9.3Score7.9kShelves
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453
The Black Heiress 黑千金
Zhou Zhizhi was born a wealthy heiress, but she was abandoned in a remote county and taken in by a man who had just been released from prison after serving time for a serious crime. At just five years old, she was already able to save her father. Later, she also brought home an old scholar and former examination candidate, and the three of them began building a life together. The hardened criminal turned into a coal magnate, while the abandoned girl became a true heiress of the underworld. How w
48kReads9.3Score6.6kShelves
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454
Reborn as the Beloved of Everyone: The Movie Emperor's Wife Is Poor and Fierce Again 重生团宠:影帝夫人又穷又凶
[Print edition signed for publication] [Insanely outrageous wish-fulfillment + a few secret identities + savage online roasts + devoted romance with both leads’ first love + dazzling the world] In her previous life, she died with regrets. Now she has been reborn in the middle of a massive online hate campaign! If they’re going to hate on her anyway, she might as well stop pretending! Her scumbag fiancé gets shoved into a cold pool, then coughs and blames her? Sheng Wenyin: “What, caught a cold?
144.8kReads9.6Score16.8kShelves
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455
System: The Savage Lands Crown Princess Just Wants to Herd Sheep 系统:蛮荒太子妃只想放羊
Also known as The Ambition Isn't Great: Just You and the World A Qi is clever and innocent. Her eldest brother is honest and just wants enough to eat; her second brother is sharp and wants to see the world. Their aunt is always fierce when chopping wood, their father is a wonderful cook, and their grandfather can recognize twenty characters, though he gets thirteen of them wrong. Their ambitions weren't great, but somehow they ended up winning the world. Content warnings: ...
36kReads9.6Score4.4kShelves
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456
The Whole Sect Is Full of Crazy Villains, Only the Junior Sister Is a Goofball 满门反派疯批,唯有师妹逗比
After transmigrating into a book, Ye Linglong becomes the vicious cannon-fodder villainess in a cultivation novel. With terrible aptitude, she even coerces the heroine into taking her into the top sect during the Cultivation Tournament. After joining, she opposes the heroine at every turn and eventually dies a miserable death. To enjoy a long, happy life, Ye Linglong immediately gives up on coercing the heroine and turns around to join the worst sect in the cultivation world. She’s done being th
301.2kReads9.6Score32kShelves
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457
The Black Phoenix Queen 黑凰后
She is a goddess sent from heaven, the eldest princess of the Shen Kingdom. But someone stole her divine fortune, and she was abandoned in the Sacred River. They say she won't live to see her fifteenth birthday. She says, “My fate is mine to decide, not Heaven's. Give me back the fortune you stole, and repay the life you owe me.” She has been a bandit and an empress, and in the end, she ascends to the throne. He says, “In my heart, you matter more than Buddha. All the gods and Buddhas in heaven
4.8kReads8.7Score723Shelves
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458
The Age of Honor and Trust 信义时代
Ren Zhixin was once a powerful figure who made waves in the business world. Now, debt had turned him into a deadbeat, and the words “judgment defaulter” had been forcibly tattooed in red on his body. The day he walked out of prison, he smiled and waved at the cameras. “From today on, my life is performance art.” Everyone expected him to hit rock bottom, but he used his tattoo as a branding hook to launch a livestream, expose the industry’s dirty secrets, and make an unlikely comeback by building
1Reads—Score—Shelves
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459
A Mirror of Mountains and Rivers: The Qingchuan Chronicles 山河鉴之青川纪
Newly appointed county magistrate Ren Pingsheng carries a family heirloom pendant, which is actually a fragment of the ancient divine artifact the Shanhe Mirror. After uncovering the sinister plot of evil cultivators lurking in Qingchuan County, he resolutely embarks on a path of protection. Starting from a single county, he cuts through the murk of officialdom, fights opponents who cultivate sinister arts, and gradually gathers the fragments of the Shanhe Mirror, unlocking its powers, including
—Reads—Score—Shelves
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460
I'm a Coder, I'm the Universe 我是码农,我是宇宙
This is a high-concept novel that combines realism, business, science fiction, and the intellectual thrill of a power fantasy. It’s a new kind of web fiction, unlike traditional stories that rely on emotional wish fulfillment! Zhang Wei uses SAP as his System to cultivate immortality and attain the Dao! Yes, you read that right! The same SAP as the German ERP system! Zhang Wei’s System! This sly guy actually built a cultivation path around SAP, from Foundation Establishment to Core Formation, Na
117Reads9.1Score—Shelves
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461
Tears of the Gu 噬蛊泪
After transmigrating, a brain surgeon saves a sickly, sweet-on-the-outside, dark-on-the-inside patient, only to get herself caught up in the mess too. The male lead is ill from the start, but he’s no pushover. The female lead soon cures him, and then he takes on the whole world. The Ci’en Clinic has been practicing medicine for generations. To inherit the family business and investigate the deaths of her father and brother, Lin Yun has long disguised herself as a man while treating patients. O
21Reads—Score—Shelves
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462
Three Kingdoms: Zhao Guang, Zhao Yun’s Son, Revives the Han Three Times 三国:赵云之子赵广,三兴大汉
[Three Kingdoms] [Master of Empty Promises] [Farming] [Strategy] [Iron and Blood] After transmigrating as Zhao Yun’s second son, Zhao Guang, he knows that even by the fall of Shu Han, when Jinzhu dies defending the kingdom, he’ll only have made it to a lowly Gate Guard General! If he wants to survive this life, he’ll have to claim some land and take up farming! A rebellion in Nanzhong? Wonderful, free labor! Bind them all and put them to work in the fields! The Han women of Nanzhong have lost th
26Reads6.8Score—Shelves
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463
A Dream of Flowers on the Wasteland 荒原百花梦
The space-time universe, the Ark of Heaven, the Interstellar Alliance, the illusory realm: what kind of existence is the world we live in? From the ancient age of gods and demons, through the classical age of wandering heroes, to the modern age of technology, and finally the future age of artificial intelligence, the history of intelligent civilization seems to be a cycle... Will artificial life ever develop independent consciousness, gain a soul and intelligence, and ultimately replace intellig
10Reads—Score—Shelves
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464
Those Memories Haven't Faded Like Smoke 那些往事并不如烟
Based on true historical events, this book recounts how Chinese public security and political security agents in the 1960s used extraordinary methods to endure humiliation and infiltrate enemy intelligence organizations in Taiwan. They remained undercover for more than twenty years, making major contributions to national security. The story paints a sweeping historical panorama. Its twists and turns are vivid and compelling, and its main events are adapted from historical fact. Rich in the spiri
507Reads8.7Score—Shelves
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465
Seeking Life Amid Lingering Regrets 残念觅生
[Infinite-flow, rules-based horror, extreme escape, eerie games, no harem, no formula, no invincible protagonist, no System, no mindless plot, not a feel-good power fantasy] I’m a ballet doll, grinning as I watch them kill themselves. I throw people into “my” mindscape and lay out an inescapable path to their doom. But that lunatic Li Yu finds a loophole in every stage. I crank up the difficulty of surviving, but he uses game theory to beat me. I forbid him from speaking, but he has the whole t
156Reads—Score—Shelves
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466
Great Qin 2025: My Asura Path of the Strange 大秦2025:吾的修罗诡道
On television, a glamorous female host held a microphone and said, “Good evening, viewers. Welcome to this edition of Great Qin News. Today’s featured figure is the Chancellor, who has governed our Great Qin for over a thousand years.” The camera cut to an elderly man, frail with age. Even through the television screen, his sharp gaze was like a knife, making it hard to look him in the eye. “Your Excellency, why did you go to the local police station to turn yourself in?” “Oh, I wanted somewhere
3Reads6.2Score—Shelves
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467
What Makes You Think I'll Keep Liking You? 你凭什么认为我会一直喜欢你呢
[Everyday romance] [One female lead] [Mutual healing] Because of a promise made in childhood, Chen Lu spent seven whole years pursuing the girl he’d grown up with. In the end, all he got was a cold rejection. Chen Lu smiled in acceptance, but his heart had turned to ash… until he met the sweet, clumsy girl who’d come to thank him. The girl was lovely and innocent, standing alone in the rain right where the two of them had agreed to meet. “Why haven’t you left…?” The girl slowly lifted her head.
129kReads9.7Score15.7kShelves
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468
The Darling in the Palm 掌上娇娇
[Print edition preorder opens July 17] [Film and TV rights sold] [Reader's guide: sweet romance, devoted couple, feel-good wish fulfillment, with clever schemes and political intrigue, many clues and details, and a large cast of well-developed characters. The heroine never gets the short end of the stick; anything that doesn't make sense will be explained later] Prince Xuan, He Junting. In the novel Devoted to the Imperial Consort, the author wrote of how he slaughtered the entire Northern Di co
132.2kReads9.5Score16.7kShelves
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469
The Reborn Legitimate Daughter Returns 重生嫡女归来
Banxia, the legitimate daughter of the Marquis of Medicine, was murdered by her sister and the Crown Prince she loved. When she awakens, she has been reborn a few days before returning to the capital. With the memories of her past life, she tears away her sister’s beautiful facade and exposes her stepmother’s false piety. The capital says she’s a country bumpkin, but she’s more fashionable than anyone. They call her a village girl, but she’s more graceful than them all. They say she’s illiterate
7.2kReads9.0Score1.8kShelves
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470
Unrivaled Splendor: The Scheming Legitimate Daughter Rules the World 独步惊华,腹黑嫡女御天下
Unrivaled beneath the heavens, she rises with every step. A master of a thousand faces, she commands the realm through strategy. She learned to read at one, wrote poetry at three, devoured every book under heaven by ten, and at fifteen placed first in the imperial examinations, becoming a revered imperial tutor! Brilliant and politically astute, she held the fate of the realm in her hands. But after trusting a treacherous wolf, she met her end in the cold palace. Fate gives her another chance at
644Reads8.6Score103Shelves
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471
The Female Emperor of Great Zhao 大昭女帝
She transmigrates from another world and becomes a figure who stirs up the entire realm. “They can sit on the throne as ruler of all under heaven. Why can't I?” “I want you to become my sword.”
1.4kReads9.1Score138Shelves
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472
The Alluring Empress Opens Her Eyes, and Every King in the Realm Kneels 倾城女帝一睁眼,天下诸王皆跪了
She was the Empress of Canglan, unmatched in both martial and scholarly arts, unrivaled in strategy, and a master of both medicine and poison. After being set up, she was reborn in the body of Yan Li, daughter of the Grand Tutor of the Mu Kingdom. The moment she wakes, her uncle and aunt beat her? Just watch her make them beg for mercy on their knees. The crown prince smears her name to break off their engagement? The emperor strips him of his position as heir to protect her! The empress of a ne
6.3kReads9.1Score836Shelves
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473
The Refugee Saintess: The Cold Tyrant Can't Stop Plotting Against Her 逃荒圣女,冰冷暴君总想图谋不轨
Also known as The Doomsday Powerhouse Slays Her Way Through a Chaotic World [Strong heroine + satisfying read + sweet romance + mutual devotion] Ability-wielding saintess vs. cold tyrant Luo Shengge, an S-rank agent from the apocalypse, transmigrates into a chaotic age and becomes the saintess of the Xiyue tribe, gifted with the power of divination. Her people are hunted by various nations, while this chaotic world is rife with monsters, treacherous hearts, famine, and bandits. Luo Shengge reali
2.7kReads9.1Score343Shelves