Picking Hibiscus

[Possessive, coercive, melodramatic romance] The whole story will be completed within 200,000 words, so it goes VIP at 60,000 words!

Lu Xuetang has always believed that Gu Fu can never escape his grasp. She's gentle by nature, and her mother is in his hands. He hired the finest doctors in the land for one reason only: to keep her mother alive a little longer.

Gu Fu is devoted to her mother. She could never abandon her.

When they report that Gu Fu has stabbed the old madam to death with her own hands, Lu Xuetang first thinks it can't be true, then feels a great wave of panic surge inside him.

He rushes over. Gu Fu is waiting for him atop the high city wall, her eyes bright and carefree.

Lu Xuetang sees her skirt billowing in the wind, and his heart sinks. "Gu Fu, come down!"

Gu Fu looks at him and smiles brightly. "Are you going to threaten me again? What are you going to use against me this time?"

Lu Xuetang presses his lips together and says nothing. He has no leverage left. Her skirt flutters wildly, and his heart pounds with panic. Even his voice trembles. "Fu'er, come down first..."

Gu Fu stands up, her gaze drifting far away. Lu Xuetang sees it and, like a dying man grasping at a lifeline, thinks there's still hope. But the next moment, Gu Fu smiles again.

She suddenly says, "When I was sixteen, six pairs of twin lotus blossoms bloomed in Qingling Pond. Everyone said it was a good omen, and so many people went there to make wishes. I secretly wished, too, that I could break off my engagement to him."

Lu Xuetang goes rigid.

So she'd lived this extra quarter of an hour just to wound him to the heart.

"But Lu Xuetang, you don't deserve me." Her body falls backward like a butterfly.

Lu Xuetang runs toward her like a madman and leaps off the wall, trying to catch that butterfly.

But at last, the butterfly flies away, right before his eyes.

--Coming-soon separator--

Spoiling My Little Treasure

Liang Baiyu gets into a fight and scratches someone's face. Fu Zhihan puts on a stern expression, just about to scold her, when Liang Baiyu bursts into tears.

Fu Zhihan laughs in exasperation. "You beat them up like that, and you still have the nerve to cry?"

Liang Baiyu sobs, "Husband, my hand hurts."

Fu Zhihan's anger vanishes at once. He anxiously takes her hand and sees a tiny scratch on her delicate arm, already about to heal.

"..."

Liang Baiyu: "Waaah!"

Fu Zhihan sighs in resignation, applies medicine to her, and can't help lecturing her. "Don't do that again."

The very next day, she sets her dog on someone and gets them bitten.

"You're a little menace," Fu Zhihan grits out.

Liang Baiyu protests, "No, I'm your little wife."

Fu Zhihan sneers. "Aren't you my younger sister?"

Liang Baiyu answers matter-of-factly, "Of course I'm your younger sister in public. You're twelve years older than me. It wouldn't look good if people found out."

-

Liang Baiyu has always thought he was old, and Fu Zhihan agrees. They're far apart in age and life experience, and this marriage was arranged in a muddle. He's thinking of finding the girl a suitable match, which would be the least he could do for his old comrade. To everyone else, she's just his younger sister anyway.

He's hesitating over how to bring it up when a servant reports that Miss has beaten up the Crown Prince.

Fu Zhihan: "..."

Forget it. With her knack for causing trouble, who else could protect her but him? So what if he's older? He's strong and healthy, far better than those young men by who knows how much.

Theme: Stay grounded and build a better future together.