[A tsundere, possessive emperor top who overthinks his way into love X a book-transmigrated, lie-flat junior preceptor bottom who ends up working himself to the bone]
Ye Weizhou, a young man who wanted nothing more than to lie flat, transmigrated into a novel. He was ordered to reform Dugu Xiu, the infamous ruler destined to lose his kingdom, and turn him into a wise monarch celebrated for generations to come.
After transmigrating twice, both times he was mercilessly beheaded by the tyrant. On his last attempt
System: Congratulations! You've transmigrated as Dugu Xiu's junior preceptor. You'll be able to spend all your time with him, so your chances of success are even greater!
Junior preceptor?
Wasn't that the crown prince's spy planted at Dugu Xiu's side? And wasn't his death especially gruesome: dismembered piece by piece while still alive?
What mission? All he wanted now was to die quickly!
Ye Weizhou tossed his head aside and gave up on the job. "Let someone else do it! I'll die first, thanks!"
He grabbed a kitchen knife, drank poison, burned coal, jumped off a cliff...
He went to extreme lengths, and all he managed to do was save Dugu Xiu's life.
Well, fine. He'd saved a life, so surely Dugu Xiu would be grateful and spare him, right?
But that very night, while they were sharing a cave, a chill suddenly crept along Ye Weizhou's neck. Dugu Xiu had drawn a dagger and was trying to kill him!
He really shouldn't have hoped for mercy from a villain!
One clean blow was better than being carved up piece by piece. Wearing the System's OOC punishment shackles, Ye Weizhou kept testing the limits of his own demise, hoping to die sooner and be reborn sooner. But after waiting and waiting, Dugu Xiu still hadn't killed him. Instead, a note arrived from the crown prince, telling him to get rid of Dugu Xiu as soon as possible.
The moment he accepted the note, Dugu Xiu sent over two plates of pastries, one large and one small, and asked him to choose
Even an idiot could tell what they were meant to symbolize!
Ye Weizhou clutched the note. A million curses raced through his mind, but they all boiled down to one question: Could you not carve me up? Could you just kill me with one stroke?
When Dugu Xiu moved out of the palace to establish his own household, Ye Weizhou decided to lie flat and leave all the work to others. Then he could use his poor work ethic as an excuse to escape this tiger's den and enjoy a few years of carefree retirement in the countryside.
But Dugu Xiu only said admiringly, "Sir truly knows how to put the right people to work. I should learn from you."
Ye Weizhou froze. Before he knew it, Dugu Xiu was dragging him into daily discussions about how to govern the people.
Not only did Dugu Xiu make him work, he insisted that they share all three meals and that Ye Weizhou read with him through the night. He kept him by his side, monitoring him around the clock!
Ye Weizhou worked himself to the bone until Dugu Xiu finally ascended the throne.
According to the plot, on the day of his coronation, Dugu Xiu would settle accounts with the crown prince's faction in the great hall. Ye Weizhou just had to fake his own death before the purge began, and he could avoid being dismembered.
Dugu Xiu sat on the dragon throne and glanced at him with phoenix eyes, a smile playing on his lips. "I hereby appoint Lord Ye as Minister of State, in charge of all the officials."
Just freed from the System's punishment and about to down the fake-death poison he'd hidden in his robes, Ye Weizhou: "?"
So how was he supposed to perform his planned death-to-prove-his-innocence scene now?!
This lazy fish not only had to keep exhausting himself as Minister of State, but Dugu Xiu, who in his previous life had been debauched, kept three thousand beauties in his harem, and spent every night with a different consort, was now too bashful to even choose his concubines. He dumped the whole responsibility of choosing an empress on Ye Weizhou, saying, "I only want one beloved, to be together for all eternity."
And there was also Dugu Xiu murmuring as if by chance into his ear: "With your looks, why be a concubine to the Turkic Khagan? Why not become the empress of Great Yin instead?"
Ye Weizhou froze. "This is bad..."
★ He thought he was following a script where he was destined to be killed, but it turns out he's on the love-story route? The emperor who once beheaded him without batting an eye now risks his life to save him?
★ Help! The debauched emperor wants to be with him "for all eternity"? And he's using all the tricks he once used to please his favorite consorts on him?
Reading Guide
1. Younger top, turns a straight man gay, 1v1, happy ending
2. They scheme against each other like crazy at first; later, it's very sweet and affectionate
3. Inspired by Sui and Tang history, but with extensive fictional liberties. The setting is fictional, so please don't nitpick the history
4. The full novel is already written. Once it starts, it will definitely be completed.
Theme: A capable minister is someone worth having
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Night Among the Flowers
I Just Want a Wife
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