Mr. Octopus and His Missus

This book has applied to become free to read, so please don't subscribe if you're just joining us. The announcement was posted in the chapter right before it became free. Mr. Octopus had an astonishing intellect. One day, while he was asleep, the tide accidentally swept him ashore. When he opened his eyes, an unfamiliar human girl was standing barefoot in front of him, gripping a long knife and looking ready to chop off one of his tentacles. Mr. Octopus was horrified and tried to bury himself in the sand. Unfortunately, despite his enormous size and all his effort, he managed to bury only two of his tentacles. The girl crouched down and curiously examined the strange creature, then held out a hand. "Shake hands. Or I'll eat you." Mr. Octopus twisted one tentacle and laid it meekly in her soft palm, thinking: Once I become a spirit, I'll definitely eat her. * After the girl took him in, Mr. Octopus got a huge aquarium, plenty of food, and a comfortable environment. Most importantly, his owner put on cheesy evening dramas for him and left the remote by the aquarium whenever she went out, so he could change the channel. He was so content that he forgot his original plan to return to the ocean. Until one day, after their daily handshake training, his young owner muttered, "Wouldn't an octopus this old make tough takoyaki?" Mr. Octopus became a spirit in sheer terror. * While gathering seafood along the shore, Yun Qing found an octopus nearly two meters long and took it home as a pet. As its owner, she diligently cared for it for a long time, putting up every night with the noise of this bizarre soft-bodied creature watching TV in the middle of the night. Later, for certain reasons, she had to leave it behind. Her life as a pet owner was about to end. The night before she planned to release it, she couldn't bear to part with it and was reluctant to let go, so she playfully threatened her pet while they shook hands. The next day, the octopus Yun Qing kept in her glass tank was gone. On moving day, an unfamiliar grown man stood at her door. Hesitantly, he held out his hand. "Hello. Would you like to shake hands?" [A brief heads-up: The heroine has an ex, and there will be a few fake-substitute tropes. Nothing melodramatic, they're only there to serve the plot.] [My upcoming novel: The Ghosts Beg Me to Burn Them Paper Money The Ghosts Beg Me to Burn Them Paper Money Chi Mian has yin-yang eyes and has been able to see ghosts since she was little. When she was twenty, the only foster father who had raised her passed away. That year's Qingming Festival, the daunting task of burning paper offerings for the ancestors fell to her. Chi Mian put on a tearful display in front of her ancestors' graves and used the drizzle of the Qingming Festival to burn through the small bag of paper money she'd brought. A few days later, a ghost dressed in gold and silver, dripping with wealth, came to visit her at night. Chi Mian squinted at him for a long while before recognizing that this rich ghost was the very ancestor she'd made offerings to a few days earlier. Chi Mian asked in shock, "Didn't Dad say the last three generations of our ancestors were all poor ghosts?" "What can I do for you?" She trembled, afraid that her ancestor would think she'd brought shame upon the family. Instead, the old ancestor grinned, showing off a mouthful of gold teeth. "I came to thank you for bringing glory to our family!" "..." * Chi Mian accidentally discovers that any paper offerings she burns become real offerings in the underworld. Burn paper money, and it becomes real currency in the underworld. Burn a wreath, and the recipient gets a real flower basket. Burn a paper-made pork knuckle, and it gets sent to an underworld auction, where it sells for an unprecedented price. After that, ghosts keep coming to her, asking her to burn all sorts of strange things. A month later, her business has grown so much that her visitors include not only ghosts from the underworld, but also people from the living world. "Young lady, could you burn me a television? The underworld's entertainment options are so boring!" "Sis, I'm a starving ghost. Could you burn me a chicken leg? After I eat it, I'll go get reincarnated." "Miss Chi, my boyfriend died young, and I've written him a love letter. Could you..." For twenty years, Chi Mian pretended she couldn't see ghosts. On the Qingming Festival of her twentieth year, her cover was blown.] Theme: Love the Earth and save the world