A Manual of Cooking Unusual Species

[Other works by Front-Row Orange] ● Today Brings Wedding Bells: Chinese cosmic horror, a charlatan bottom × a "over three meters tall" ghost-bride top Blurb: Lin Jing inherits an estate from a distant uncle he has never met. The estate consists mainly of a modest amount of cash, a two-bedroom apartment in an old residential complex, and the furniture that came with it, which is rotting at an astonishing rate. His uncle died in the apartment, and the cause of death is unknown, but Lin Jing doesn't mind. Because he is poor. He gives up his cramped rental and moves in. Even though the walls are covered in countless gray patches of mold, he thinks that's normal. The pipes upstairs leak all the time, after all. The old appliances, their exteriors oxidized and yellowed, make strange noises. He doesn't find that too surprising either. They've been in use for over ten years and are barely hanging on. As for the living green slime molds crawling over the wardrobe and table corners... Well, they're definitely weird, but he thinks he can live with them. Poor Lin Jing settles into the slightly strange apartment. Until one day, when he opens the old refrigerator and finds a lump of "butter" inside, looking as if it's about to melt and slowly changing shape. Lin Jing stares at the "butter" intently for ten seconds, swallows, and says, "I want to make butter-fried potatoes." "Can you eat this?" 1. An alternate setting, cosmic horror, and plenty of original worldbuilding. 2. The bottom is a gorgeous beauty and a total heartthrob. The author is a simple-minded fan of this trope. 3. The top is a very novel kind of top. -------------------- Ongoing -------------------- Nonhuman Construct Blurb: Su Lian, exiled to a garbage planet, finds himself a perfect partner. Though his partner is an abandoned companion robot he picked up from a junk heap. His partner comes without any large-scale weapons of destruction, only a perfectly proportioned body designed to meet human aesthetic standards, made with the latest bionic materials. His partner also has no dangerous content stored in its memory, only common books such as The Complete Guide to Positions in Bed, Repairing Erotic Toys, 108 Ways to Comfort Your Partner, and Delicious Home Cooking: Give Your Lover a Taste of Home. After a year and six months of living on nutritional supplements, Su Lian sees the cookbook and immediately decides to repair the robot. He pulls his own energy interface from his spine, connects it to the robot, and completes the pairing without hesitation. Life with a partner is happy and strange. Delicious food, comfortable massages, perfect experiences in bed... Except his partner seems to be everywhere. The little mechanical dog he just brought home, the spacecraft he repaired, even the smart home system all bear traces of his partner's presence. His partner watches him with a fervor that goes beyond its programming. Su Lian: "?" After seeing his partner violate the companion robot guidelines for the third time, Su Lian finally decides to give its program a complete overhaul. Operation log [Wife-Watching Diary] Connected to the network Synced with the interstellar calendar. Woke at 18:52 on December 12, 3028, Imperial Calendar. Scanning... Insufficient energy... Replenishing energy. A human detected. He's so beautiful. His energy interface is silver. He connected with me... [Heart] [Rose] This is our first time [Heart] [Rose] Su Lian, who hasn't been on the star network for over a year: "???" "Have companion robots really advanced this far?" 1. Probably an atypical nonhuman. 2. The bottom has had some of his limbs mechanically modified. 3. Does a mechanical puppy bark, too? -------------------- Upcoming -------------------- Today Brings Wedding Bells Blurb: After getting beaten down by society, Chu Huan decides to follow in his father's footsteps and return to his hometown to become a fortune-teller. Well... a half-baked, family-tradition fortune-teller. There is nothing wrong with moving graves, summoning souls, and reading feng shui for a living. It's just that the unknown deity his family has been worshipping for who knows how long starts undergoing strange changes after he comes home. The tall body covered in verdigris suddenly takes on patches of bright red. The roughly carved robe gains the texture of real fabric, and a veil seems to cover the deity's head, blurring its features. Chu Huan can't make sense of the changes, until one day he comes home and finds the statue has moved from its pedestal to his bed. At nearly four meters tall, it makes the wooden bed creak pitifully. Layer upon layer of scarlet wedding robes and a veil decorated with delicate tassels completely conceal "her" face. Only a pair of cool, pale hands rests obediently on her knees. Those hands are so big they look like they could wrap around his waist with just their fingers. Chu Huan suddenly understands. "Oh, so you're my wife." My golden finger (X) My wife (check) Big-hearted, half-baked charlatan bottom × "over three meters tall" ghost-bride top 1. Chinese cosmic horror. The Taoists, ghosts, spells, talismans, and other elements in the story draw on Taoist books and folk customs. Please don't overanalyze them. 2. The top is over three meters tall when standing, not three meters in the butt, so the bed can hold her, sob. Theme: Face difficulties and live bravely.