The Melancholy Young Lady's Domineering Butler

[Inline comments are open. Next novel: After Stealing My Stepsister’s Girlfriend]

In the fifth year of the apocalypse, Xiang Changge died in a natural disaster.

When she woke up again, she found herself transmigrated into a book, an old-fashioned novel she had read not long ago. There was also something in her mind claiming to be a System, making a racket with a string of bizarre cries.

Looking at the bright, sunny weather and breathing in the delicious scent of food, Xiang Changge punched the air and wolfed down five airplane meals before agreeing to the System’s so-called mission to save the supporting female character.

In this old-fashioned novel, the male lead has a fiancée who dies young. Her family is fabulously wealthy, and money is the most useless thing in the world to her. But she has never known happiness, and melancholy is her natural gift.

After learning that the male lead is only good to her out of guilt and a sense of duty to the engagement arranged by their elders, she chooses to step aside, allowing the domineering CEO and the passionate, innocent heroine to enjoy their perfect romance.

But with nothing left in the world worth staying for, she chooses to leave it all behind on her twenty-fourth birthday.

Xiang Changge’s mission is to help the supporting female character regain her faith in life and live happily.

Just after the System threatened to “cremate” her if she failed the mission, Xiang Changge smacked her lips, still faintly tasting dried earthworms, and said, “That’s it?”

The System: “...”

A Host who’s full of confidence? Interesting.

Mission One: Make sure the supporting female character eats three meals a day on time.

At seven thirty in the morning, Xiang Changge, the butler, carried Yu Qing to a dining table laden with forty-nine dishes. Yu Qing had stayed up all night, leaning against the bay window and gazing at the sunrise at a forty-five-degree angle. Xiang Changge entered her room as if it were unguarded, set a bowl of rice porridge in front of her, then polished off the entire feast herself.

Holding the bowl, Yu Qing watched the other woman eat with gusto. Almost without thinking, she took a spoonful of porridge, then suddenly realized something. “Hadn’t I locked the door? How did you get in?”

Xiang Changge: “Oh, they taught us how to pick locks at butler school.”

Yu Qing: “...”

Mission Two: Help the supporting female character discover the joys of life.

Xiang Changge thought it over, then handed Yu Qing a contract the next day.

Yu Qing thought it was a resignation letter. But when she took a look, she saw the title: “Wilderness Survival, Season Two: Filming Details.” Contestants: Yu Qing and Xiang Changge.

Yu Qing: “?!!!”

After a butler inexplicably appeared in Yu Qing’s life, things went like this:

Sitting alone in her studio, she looked at the melancholy painting she had just finished and said with a self-mocking smile, “Melancholy really is my natural gift...”

Suddenly, someone yelled from outside the door, “Melancholy Girl, dinner’s ready!”

Yu Qing jumped, her hand jerking and leaving a glaring streak of gold across the painting.

Yu Qing was playing piano in the music room until dusk. Watching the last rays of the setting sun vanish beyond the horizon, she murmured, “I’m surrounded by darkness. I can’t see a glimmer of light...”

Click. The huge European-style chandelier above her, made up of ninety-nine little flower-shaped lamps, lit up. The dazzling brightness made Yu Qing shut her eyes. A familiar voice came from the doorway: “Darkness Girl, dinner!”

“...”

*Dinner Girl x Melancholy Girl (crossed out)

*A transmigrator with maxed-out combat skills who’s happy as long as she has even the most basic food x a melancholy, frail supporting female character who has plenty of money but wants lots of love and dies young (check)

Written on 20250206

After Stealing My Stepsister’s Girlfriend can be found in my author profile. Blurb:

When the Pei family brought home an illegitimate daughter from outside the family, everyone in Yuan'gang waited to see Pei Miaoshu, the Pei family’s haughty and domineering young lady, make a fool of herself.

They weren’t disappointed. The two Pei heiresses fought fiercely over everything, from the top position at Pei Group to jewelry, luxury cars, designer dresses, and even limited-edition lingerie. Whenever one showed the slightest interest in something, the other would swoop in and snatch it away.

No matter what anyone else thought, Pei Miaoshu hated her stepsister to the extreme. When she learned that her stepsister had been getting close to a bar owner, she didn’t hesitate. She grabbed her black card and went straight to the bar, spending lavishly to summon the alluring, sophisticated owner for a drink.

The moment she learned the bar owner’s name, Pei Miaoshu brazenly declared, “Jiang Shangyue? Why not be the moon in my arms instead?”

Pei Miaoshu patiently played the game of courtship with Jiang Shangyue for three months. Then, one night, Jiang Shangyue accidentally drank something that had been spiked. She pressed against Pei Miaoshu, wrapped her arms around her waist, and asked in a captivating voice for Pei Miaoshu to help her.

Pei Miaoshu didn’t hesitate.

After their night together, Pei Miaoshu woke the next morning, still savoring the previous night. Looking at the woman asleep beside her, she suddenly realized she rather liked her stepsister’s girlfriend.

Thinking about how Pei Shutong, the white lotus who had stolen her family’s fortune, would have to watch her and the woman she liked getting intimate every day, and could only grit her teeth and call her “Sister,” Pei Miaoshu excitedly cupped the woman’s chin and declared, “Don’t be afraid. I’ll take responsibility for you.”

Jiang Shangyue traced Pei Miaoshu’s brow with a tender fingertip, her eyes full of trust. “All right. How are you going to take responsibility?”

Later, Pei Miaoshu learned two things:

First, Jiang Shangyue had spiked her own drink.

Second, Pei Shutong was in love with her.

Theme: Your hope should rest with you. Be your own light.