The Fortunate Minister

[The simplified Chinese edition of Fortunate Minister will soon be available for preorder. Follow Xiaoyue Bookshop on Weibo for details.]

The young master of the Duke's estate, Xu Chun, was eighteen and had his heart set on finding himself a male lover.

A little older, and considerate.

Handsome, naturally.

And good in bed. Everything is hard the first time, so he needed to start off on the right foot.

That was the only way to enjoy a life of endless sensual pleasures!

After searching high and low, he settled on the emperor, his Ninth Brother, traveling incognito.

Xie Yi became emperor before he was a month old.

At twelve, he joined forces with the court's civil officials and his imperial uncle, forcing the Empress Dowager, who had been ruling from behind the scenes, to relinquish power. He took the reins of government without a hitch.

At fourteen, when a foreign tribe invaded, he allied with furious frontier generals and weakened the Regent, who had held power in his grasp and controlled everything.

By sixteen, he was the undisputed Son of Heaven of the Nine Provinces.

The Son of Heaven ruled with a light hand and stayed out of other people's business.

Now, nearing thirty, Xie Yi had begun to feel that life was terribly dull.

After being emperor for so long, there was nothing interesting about it. He didn't want to live anymore.

That was until he met Xu Chun, a notorious playboy and wastrel, by chance in the capital.

It began with attraction, grew through kindness and loyalty, and blossomed in their hearts. They hit it off at once.

Somehow, the two of them managed to make a rather delightful life together.

Until one day, Xu Chun discovered...

That the inscrutable emperor, enthroned in the highest reaches of the palace and wielding the might of Heaven,

was actually the Ninth Brother who read him storybooks every day and coaxed him into writing flower cards.

Reader's guide:

1. Xu Chun is the shou, Xie Yi is the gong. Xie Yi is older.

2. There is household drama (ridiculously stupid villains), palace drama (tacky and melodramatic), and court drama (clumsy and childish).

3. Neither lead is perfect. Both grow, and their flaws have reasons behind them. In particular, Xie Yi and Ji Bingyuan are both emperor gongs written by the same author, but they are distinctly different. Ji Bingyuan is older, tolerant, mature, and rational. Xie Yi was tightly controlled from childhood and hurt by his family, so he has an avoidant defense mechanism and rejects intimate relationships.

4. The views and values of all characters, whether major or minor, do not represent the author's own.

Theme: True love always inspires people to become better