The Heir Is Cool but Clingy

*Complete. Weibo: Jinjiang Zhai Yi Duo Yingzi

Synopsis:

Lady Liu came from Jiangnan to seek refuge with relatives and set up a tofu pudding stall in an alley on West Street in the capital.

Every day, she sat at her stall, her dark hair loosely pinned up with a thorn hairpin. She rested her cheek in her palm and lazily fiddled with the abacus, her smoky-blue sleeves slipping to her elbows to reveal wrists as pale as snow.

From princes and nobles to peddlers and porters, people often came to her stall for tofu pudding.

The neighbors all said Lady Liu was wanton and shameless, with so many lovers that they could line up from West Street all the way to East Street.

Lady Liu never paid any attention to such nasty gossip. In fact, she was not above making it come true.

Song Yan, heir to the Duke of Dingguo's residence in Yong'an Lane, was just like his name: upright and refined as an inkstone, courteous and well-mannered. Before he had even reached twenty, he was already renowned throughout the capital, a figure as clean and clear as fresh snow on a plum branch.

The two should never have crossed paths.

Until one early morning, when a carriage stopped in the alley on West Street. Song Yan lifted the curtain and happened to see Lady Liu, speaking in the soft Wu dialect and greeting her customers with a graceful sway of her supple waist.

A young man's heart stirred, like spring rain that seeped into cracks in the wall and nourished vast patches of damp, shadowy moss.

Restless by day and night, he yearned for her.

From then on, a young man appeared at Lady Liu's tofu pudding stall, gripping his folding fan tightly and asking for a bowl of sweet tofu pudding with red ears.

Later, this young man, who could barely bring himself to look at her during the day, would bury himself against her neck, his damp lashes fluttering as he murmured pleadingly, "Just let me be your only lover, okay?"

*A coming-of-age story, in a fictional setting inspired by the Ming dynasty

Coming soon: Snake Is So Clingy. Please add it to your reading list!

Synopsis:

Second Miss Fang had a face like a hibiscus flower and a gentle, even-tempered nature. She was sensible and filial, but unfortunately, she was born to a concubine. Her mother died young, and Second Miss Fang grew up treading carefully in the shadows of the principal wife and her elder sister. Her greatest wish was to secure a good marriage for herself.

On a rainy day filled with the shrill cries of cicadas and frogs, she went out to pray at a temple and found a little silver snake with red, slit-pupil eyes.

The elders and servants in her household were all afraid of it, but Second Miss Fang thought it was beautiful and secretly kept it in her boudoir.

Second Miss Fang often went out to pray because she had set her heart on one of her father's students, Young Master Yao. His scholarly ability was ordinary, and his family was ordinary, but he was handsome and dependable. Whenever he saw her, he would blush, avert his eyes, and bow to her.

Second Miss Fang wanted to marry him.

Perhaps her earnest prayers had worked. The elders on both sides gave their approval, and Second Miss Fang waited with joy for Young Master Yao to come and propose.

But that day, thunder suddenly roared outside, and the gale showed no sign of letting up. Second Miss Fang never received word from the maid in the front courtyard. Instead, the window of her boudoir was suddenly smashed open.

Second Miss Fang turned back in shock. A red-eyed young man with soft white hair draped over his shoulders and a bare chest, his skin pale as snow, leaned in the window and lazily asked, "Who are you going to marry?"

Before she could answer, he burst through the wall. Second Miss Fang watched, wide-eyed, as he dragged an enormous silver-white serpent's tail behind him and slithered closer.

He coiled around her, pressed his icy cheek against hers, and, feeling her tremble, clung to her and whined, "Didn't you say I was the prettiest little snake? That you liked me best?"

Find more upcoming novels in the author's collection, along with the completed works Spring Breeze Through the Silk Curtains and The Young Marquis's Everyday Guide to Appeasing His Wife. Give them a try if you're interested!

Theme: Love life