Xiao Lin and I Are the Best of Friends

[Preorders: My Senior Sister Next Door Is Reading Her Save Files Again and After Losing My Memory, My Disciples Can All Hear My Inner Thoughts are waiting eagerly in my author page. Blurbs below.]

After death, Gu Shengsheng wandered the world as a lonely spirit, witnessing the changes of rivers, mountains, and humankind. But just as she watched the "Calamity" destroy the world, she was caught in a bolt of heavenly lightning and sent back three hundred years.

When she opened her eyes again, the "Calamity" in his youth was looking at her with a complicated expression. She suddenly remembered that after she died, he had been the one who kindly gave her a proper burial.

Great. It seemed she wasn't quite as dead as she'd thought, and she was even clutching the Heavenly Dao's complimentary scripture, The Primordial Elixir Heart.

As she thought this, Gu Shengsheng spat out another mouthful of blood. Outside the window, the young "Calamity" spat out a mouthful of blood, too.

Gu Shengsheng: Huh?

*

Everyone said that the demon child Lin Ying was the Heavenly Dao's castoff, a destined fiend who would one day destroy the world.

So in her previous life, Lin Ying destroyed the world. See? He was very cooperative.

Unfortunately, after he destroyed the world, the Heavenly Dao slapped him back three hundred years to start all over again.

Lin Ying, wearing a world-weary expression: Damn Heavenly Dao! You ungrateful brat!

He looked up and saw the little girl in the nearby window. In his previous life, she should have been a corpse by now, and he had even gone out of his way to bury her. Now she was choking on a blade of Spirit-Bearing Grass, rolling her eyes, looking like she was on death's door but still somehow alive.

Lin Ying: Huh?

*

The alchemical legacy of the Cangmi Realm had been lost for thousands of years. Yellow-rank pills cost a fortune, while mystic-rank pills were so rare that everyone fought over them. Ordinary cultivators could only chew spirit herbs raw or swallow pills they had kneaded by hand. Alchemy was no easy task, and alchemists were all but extinct.

Then one day, the alchemical legacy reappeared in the Cangmi Realm. Longevity Valley rose from nowhere, its gates thronged with visitors, and a single pill became impossible to find.

At last, the ignorant masses believed that heavenly-rank pills really existed in this world. And the person capable of refining them was a frail little girl with no cultivation whatsoever, so delicate that a gust of wind might blow her away, and who coughed up blood from time to time.

Who'd believe that?

Well, they all did.

Anyone who didn't believe got beaten senseless. They didn't dare disbelieve. Really.

Who could have guessed that behind this pale, fragile-looking girl, who seemed so easy to bully, lurked a vicious dog that bit everyone it saw?

Lin "Vicious Dog" Ying: Is that any way to treat people?

*

One day, Gu Shengsheng asked Lin Ying:

"What made you decide to come with me back then?"

"Hmm, probably because you smelled familiar."

"Oh? What did I smell like?"

"Like someone who'd been slapped by the Heavenly Dao."

"..."

What he didn't say was that, when he saw the light in Gu Shengsheng's eyes, something somehow pried open a crack in his heart. One glance, a love that lasted a thousand years.

[Preorder No. 1 in my author page]: My Senior Sister Next Door Is Reading Her Save Files Again

Shen Mi transmigrated into a doomed supporting female character in a cultivation novel.

She opened her eyes to a living nightmare. After failing to frame the heroine, she was trapped in a monster's lair and about to be reduced to bones.

Shen Mi: Oh, come on!

Then she got a golden finger: she could reload and rewind time.

Shen Mi was delighted. She knew this sort of thing inside out!

After reloading three hundred times, the monster was reduced to bones!

Time to get grinding!

Her pills kept blowing up the furnace? Reload thirty times!

Her sword intent kept getting stuck? Reload five hundred times!

Someone stole her opportunity in the secret realm trial? Then she'd reload a thousand times and keep at it until she got a perfect clear!

She ground away until one sword split the heavens, and a thousand streams became auspicious clouds. One voice alone rang out between heaven and earth: Senior Sister is mighty!

-

Huo Gui was a once-in-a-century genius of the Qingyang Sect. But one day, after climbing the freezing pool three hundred times, he fell into a bizarre loop.

He reached for a roast spirit rabbit thirty times, but never managed to get it in his mouth. He was so furious he nearly passed out.

He practiced comprehending a sword intent five hundred times, and just as he began to get the hang of it, he had to start over.

He was trapped in the secret realm a thousand times, and every time he was about to clear it, he got sent back to the entrance.

Huo Gui was losing his mind. When would Senior Sister ever spare a thought for whether he lived or died?

Then he watched helplessly as Shen Mi plunged off a cliff to save him, reloading more than ten times. Huo Gui's poor heart couldn't take any more. Before she could reload again, he grabbed her wrist and cornered her beneath a peach tree. "Even if the sky falls today, Senior Sister, you're going to hear me out!"

[Huo Gui loves Shen Mi! No matter how many times time resets, he'll never forget how he feels!]

[Extra Scene]

Beneath the Sword-Wiping Terrace, the Milky Way hung upside down, the whole scene shimmering with light. Huo Gui's palm was damp with sweat as he clutched a sword soul he'd been nurturing for years. "Senior Sister, I..."

[System alert: Host's sword intent is not yet complete. Automatically reloading save file.]

Shen Mi vanished, and Huo Gui returned to the starting point. The sword soul clattered to the ground.

In front of the alchemy room, the furnace blazed and the air shimmered with heat. Huo Gui's ears flushed pink as he cautiously offered her a jade box filled with spirit plants. "I feel..."

[System alert: Host's alchemy attempt has failed. Automatically reloading save file.]

Shen Mi vanished, and Huo Gui landed at the foot of the mountain, almost dropping the jade box.

Huo Gui could take no more. Dark circles shadowed his eyes. "Senior Sister, do you know how many times I've practiced saying 'I love you'? More than two thousand!" And he still hadn't managed to say it aloud.

Shen Mi: Ah, well, now I know.

[The grindset senior sister who keeps reloading while idle X the genius junior brother driven mad by the time loop]

Shen Mi tried to escape dozens of times, only for Huo Gui to drag her back onto the bed. "Senior Sister, this is a good time to reload a few more times."

Theme: A healer's compassion