Those Years I Was Willing to Be a Laughingstock

[Slow burn, and the updates are slow too. I recommend waiting until it's complete before reading. Also, my profile has lots of completed novels waiting to be picked.]

1.

Jin Yu Jiao was famous for not knowing his place. Everyone thought he'd be a spoiled wastrel for life, but then he suddenly changed and started acting like a lovesick puppy. He kept it up for three whole years.

And the person he devoted himself to was none other than Li Mo Ran, whom his father was grooming to be his successor.

Li Mo Ran was upright and devoted to martial arts. His cold expression had broken the hearts of countless young men and women.

Meanwhile, Jin Yu Jiao lived a life of wine and women, spoiled and pampered. He'd done countless vile things, bullying men and women alike. He might not have been infamous across the land, but people certainly kept their distance.

His father, the Alliance Chief, and his mother, a wealthy merchant, were at their wits' end with their precious son, so they sent him to the mountains for three years of hard training. No one expected him to revert to his old ways as soon as he came back down, relentlessly pursuing Li Mo Ran and making the whole world aware of it.

For three years, no matter how often Li Mo Ran rejected him, Jin Yu Jiao greeted him with a smile. He even knelt in the ancestral hall for three days and nights, just to get his family to approve.

Everyone treated Jin Yu Jiao as a laughingstock. Only he was happy, cupping his face in his hands as he asked Li Mo Ran if he loved him a little more now.

2.

Jin Yu Jiao didn't care if other people laughed at him. He only feared that Li Mo Ran would never fall for him.

He believed that if he tried hard enough, he could earn even a little of Li Mo Ran's affection. He didn't mind giving a hundred for every one he got back, as long as Li Mo Ran loved him.

So whether Li Mo Ran was cold to him or scolded him, Jin Yu Jiao accepted it gladly.

He asked Li Mo Ran three times if he loved him. The first time, he was ignored. The second time, he was scolded. The third time, Li Mo Ran finally gave in.

Li Mo Ran pointed his sword at Jin Yu Jiao's heart. The blade was stained with the blood of everyone in the Jin family.

Li Mo Ran said, "After you helped me so much, how could I not love you?"

The moon that night was huge and round, its light making Jin Yu Jiao's jade-like face look deathly pale.

3.

Li Mo Ran was alone in the world when he entered the service of the Martial Arts Alliance Chief to study martial arts. His extraordinary natural talent made him a favorite.

Who didn't know the Jin family's only son was a hopeless mess, while Li Mo Ran looked poised to inherit the Alliance Chief's mantle?

But the smooth road everyone envied was one Li Mo Ran had walked while suppressing his pain and hatred.

Every moment he spent calling his enemy father, he dreamed of killing him with his own hands. Then someone he found irritating started clinging to him...

Jin Yu Jiao was the shamelessest, most brazenly self-indulgent pest he'd ever met, and the most hopeless fool in the world.

And yet this very person made Li Mo Ran's heart, long frozen and numb, feel alive again.

The last time he heard Jin Yu Jiao ask that stupid question, he tightened his grip on his sword and pointed it straight at Jin Yu Jiao's brow.

Jin Yu Jiao's eyes were dry. In a hoarse voice, he said, "You want to take my life with your own hands? Then I won't give you the chance."

The plum blossoms in the courtyard were in full bloom. On this day last year, Jin Yu Jiao had complained that the snow was too heavy and the weather too cold, saying they could look at the wintersweet when it was warmer next year.

It happened to be a mild winter. The scent of plum blossoms filled the air, and Jin Yu Jiao's blood stained their petals.

A little extra:

After the Jin family was wiped out, the martial arts world remained largely undisturbed.

Li Mo Ran became the new Alliance Chief and organized a grand martial arts tournament.

Masters gathered from far and wide, all looking to Li Mo Ran for leadership. Yet one person specifically challenged him to a duel.

(There should be a little more after this, but I can't write it just yet. I'll add it once it's done.)

The bottom will not change. Cover artist: Juan Si Ji-Er Gou

(The original idea dates to 2023.8.11, and the first version of the blurb was updated on 2025.1.8. Screenshots of both are saved on Weibo.)

Theme: Where snow and wind bury the bones, spring plum blossoms will eventually break through the cold