Second-Rate Goods

To win over Chen Qi, the most popular heartthrob, Zhao Lingding was willing to earn herself the title of a heartless woman. She tried every trick in the book and finally got to pretend to be his girlfriend for a few months. Unfortunately, she still couldn't bring the lofty flower down to earth. After their breakup, she could only look for someone new to soothe her heart.

"Still don't like me?" On their last day as a couple, Zhao Lingding smiled as she ate a wasabi ice cream and gave him a kiss. Seeing him raise an eyebrow, she patted his shoulder with a look of concern.

"Next time, try kissing someone else. Maybe you'll feel something then."

**

Zhao Lingding thought of herself as an insignificant passerby who had fantasized about a god, only to return empty-handed. But the god who had been tempted seemed to have a different take on the matter.

1. The female lead is unfaithful, all looks and no heart. She's the worst of the worst, so I'll be the first to call her out.

2. Unfortunately, the male lead still falls into the female lead's trap.

[Modern romance works available for preorder in my author profile: a. Two Substitutes / b. A Green Tea Man. Pick whichever you like!]

a. After a Failed Kiss (A Powerful Man's Moved-On Love X A Nightingale's Moonlight)

After a long separation, the powerful man and his little nightingale each bring a date to a reunion, and both dates are far more accomplished than the other.

But true love is true love. No matter how beautiful, warm-hearted, or capable the two substitutes are, they can only serve as backdrops to the real thing.

As the powerful man and the nightingale act out version 2.0 of their possessive romance, he stands just beyond the door, turning an old flint lighter in his hand. He glances at the other backdrop, but says nothing.

In the pitch-black hallway, the faint glow of the flint illuminates his sharply defined features. A fleeting spark catches at the corner of his brow and eye, making him impossibly beautiful.

With a bright red lipstick, she brings a cigarette to her lips. As she leans in to light it, her lashes cast a flirtatious shadow. A wisp of mild smoke rises, and she raises an eyebrow with a smile. "Old classmate, your girlfriend ran off with someone else. Aren't you mad?"

"No. Someone a little older knows how to care for you."

He makes no effort to continue the conversation. Instead, he twirls a strand of her hair, his husky voice like a spill of hot vodka. "Want to?"

That tiny light looks just like the sparse starlight through the high school hallway windows all those years ago, or like the round red dots on a crumpled sheet of paper.

"Of all these people, you're the only one I haven't kissed."

"Then leave it that way."

Years later, she puts out her cigarette. In the pitch-black darkness, she rises onto her toes and kisses him squarely on the lips. With a mischievous smile, she says, "All right."

[It's my lifelong regret that I never made you my willing servant, but I certainly won't lose to you a second time.]

b. When a Bad Boyfriend Gets His Girlfriend Stolen (Set Abroad): A Cheated-On Woman X A Green Tea Man

At a class reunion many years later, the guys get drunk and grab Ling Jia by the collar. Unable to accept it, they ask, "How did you manage to keep our goddess Ji's heart when you were all the way in Canada?"

Ling Jia smooths out his wrinkled collar, his light brown eyes calm and unruffled. "I guess I just stuck with it."

Stuck with it by putting a green hat on her scumbag boyfriend, over and over. :)

They first meet at a gathering of people from their hometown in Canada.

Ling Jia enters with a skateboard in his arms, bringing with him a crisp, frosty scent. Ji Yuelong is being cruelly pressed by the others to reveal her feelings, while her boyfriend, the center of the conversation, watches with folded arms, completely indifferent.

Ling Jia's cool, distant presence leaves the whole room suddenly silent.

At the time, Ji Yuelong thinks it is just a brief encounter with a cool, handsome boy.

Until the night before Ji Yuelong returns home.

With alcohol on his breath, Ling Jia rests his head awkwardly on Ji Yuelong's shoulder. His warm breath brushes the tiny beauty mark at the corner of her lips. "Stop looking only at your boyfriend. Pay a little attention to me, too."

A faint blush from the sake spreads across Ling Jia's ivory-white face, but his eyes are clear. "He has so many people he's trying to seduce, but you're the only one I like."

Theme: I know who you really are beneath your false exterior, and I love you.