Bad Apple

Original title: The Real and Fake Young Masters' Crematorium 2. Blurb below.

1.

Ye Zhou thought his life would just keep rotting away.

He was a useless scumbag from the bottom of society, a bug everyone hated.

But one day, a group of people found him smoking on the street and told him he was a child of the Gu family of S City.

The wound on Ye Zhou's face was dark with dried blood. Baring his teeth, he told them to get lost.

The Gu family was one of the most prominent families in Hong Kong. It was a height Ye Zhou couldn't reach even on tiptoe.

If they wanted to scam someone, they should find a rich person. He had nothing but his worthless life. What was there to scam him for?

But when Gu Shuhe appeared, he suddenly fell silent.

2.

What did Gu Shuhe represent to Ye Zhou?

Perfection, excellence, boundless ability, and something beyond his reach.

But it didn't matter. Ye Zhou liked seeing Gu Shuhe angry, and liked the way he looked at him as if he were garbage.

Whenever the refined Gu Shuhe showed his hypocritical true colors in front of him, Ye Zhou felt a strange thrill.

The Gu family's golden boy, held in such high regard by everyone, wasn't even a legitimate heir. And at heart, he was rotten to the core, just like me.

Dragging Gu Shuhe down with him was one of the few joys in Ye Zhou's trash heap of a life.

Like a hedgehog, Ye Zhou exposed his soft belly and gambled on whether Gu Shuhe would caress him or stab him.

It was a shame he lost completely, gutted and left in pieces.

3.

The Gu family's Fourth Madam was the luckiest of them all. Although she married into the family late, she had two sons:

Her eldest, Gu Shuhe, had first followed Third Madam when she remarried, then later joined Fourth Madam. He was the Gu family's most illegitimate and ill-fated son, yet he had made a place for himself through his own efforts.

Her second son, Gu Tianci, was the Gu family's cherished youngest child, who got everything he wanted. Sadly, he had fallen gravely ill and urgently needed a blood transfusion.

The other branches were all craning their necks, hoping he would die soon. But Fourth Madam was indeed lucky: Gu Shuhe found the cure that would let Gu Tianci live.

Ye Zhou was also a child of the Gu family, but no one cared about him. His only flaw was his untamable nature.

And Gu Shuhe had taken care of that one flaw, too.

Later, it turned out that blood wasn't the only thing Gu Tianci needed...

*

Ye Zhou had a secret, and it was about someone.

A long time ago, on a rainy night, he had somehow brought a fool home.

Back then, the fool had squeezed into Ye Zhou's tiny, shabby bed and told him, "I don't remember anything, but I'll always be good to you."

Later, the fool had returned to his polished, professional image. With disgust hidden beneath his cool exterior, he told Ye Zhou, "I don't remember anything, but you and I are from different worlds."

This secret should have stayed buried, but the fool still found out, after Ye Zhou underwent heart transplant surgery.

-Character Profiles-

Ye Zhou: Self-destructive but stubbornly resilient. A hedgehog on the outside, soft and naive within. The real young master.

Gu Shuhe: A cold and arrogant child of destiny. A gentleman on the surface, dark and volatile underneath. The fake young master.

[Reading Guide]

1. A melodramatic crematorium romance with all kinds of tropes thrown into the pot. The main story includes flashbacks, but not many.

2. My own take on the medicine. It serves the plot, so don't take it too seriously.

3. Gu Shuhe had already severed his family ties with the Gu family before Ye Zhou was brought back, so there is no morally taboo relationship between him and Ye Zhou.

-

Blurb for the upcoming novel Old Sparrow

An Yan became Li Yunjian's kept lover at eighteen, and has always been known as his canary. But unlike the songbirds Li Yunjian can summon with a snap of his fingers, An Yan is thirty now.

A beta who isn't young anymore has drifted long enough. He decides to step aside and give his place to a beautiful omega in the throes of menopause.

Li Yunjian agrees to let him go, but says An Yan has to take care of "a few things" first.

-

Li Yunjian's precious son, Li Chen, needs someone to look after him.

An Yan agrees.

Li Yunjian's longtime business partner, Bai Ran, needs An Yan to handle some arrangements.

An Yan says yes.

Zhou Zheng, the rising star Li Yunjian is currently promoting, needs a temporary assistant.

An Yan nods.

Meng Lanchuan, the young lover Li Yunjian keeps sneaking out to meet, has fallen ill and needs someone to care for him.

An Yan thinks for a moment, then says, "That shouldn't be a problem either... Give me two days off. I'll go back to my hometown and get married, then I'll come right back."

Only then does Li Yunjian understand that An Yan is truly determined to leave.

2024.4.26

Reading Guide

1. The blurb isn't finished yet, so this will have to do for now. I'll revise it later.

2. ABO setting. Everything serves the melodrama.

Theme: There is no hierarchy in human nature. Kindness is a treasure, worthy of every care the world can offer.