Name: Snowfall in the Capital
Author: Dan Wanggui Xi

Synopsis

He’s dark and twisted, but he just has to

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Blurb:

The summer after exams, a typhoon struck Hong Kong. Before the storm came a strikingly handsome man leaning against the doorway.

“Mo Mo, let’s get along. I’ll marry you.”

“Mo Mo, be honest. You don’t want… me?”

The secret whispers of adolescence were hard to put into words. But when Jin Mo saw him surrounded by beautiful women, she had already sentenced herself to a hopeless fate. A secret crush was a grand romance destined to end before it began.

She would break off their engagement.

But the boy who had dazzled her when they were young and the man who had grown into a deeply brooding adult were now worlds apart.

1,

That day, after class, his assistant came up to her.

“Miss, the boss is waiting for you in the courtyard. I’ll take you there.”

The modest courtyard he had bought for her was quiet all around. The sky was overcast, and autumn in the capital was dry and cold. He sat in a chair, his face obscured by the deepening night. Slowly drawing on a cigarette, he asked, “Who is he?” His voice was deep and resonant, unlike usual. Jin Mo felt as though a thousand-pound weight had come crashing down on her.

“He’s one of Grandpa’s students, just a friend,” she explained.

“Do friends wipe your mouth for you?” he asked.

At a food stall outside campus, the man had used a wet wipe to clean the smear at the corner of her mouth.

Jin Mo watched him tap away the ash. His silent, handsome face seemed different from before, too.

As Jin Mo remembered it, he had been a dazzling prodigy as a boy, then gone abroad. When he came back, he seemed like an entirely different person. The capital’s powerful families treated him as an honored guest. Even her usually composed older cousin had warned her not to offend him.

2,

After entering the workforce, the two of them had a fight. Even so, Jin Mo got herself ready and went to seek investors for her series.

At the gathering, the investor kept giving her the runaround and even hinted that she could have the actors under her sign a private deal. Another executive casually remarked, “Isn’t she Third Young Master Li’s fiancée?”

At once, the executives present began extending offers to her.

Jin Mo accepted them all. If she could make use of his status, why not?

Later, Jin Mo was stubborn to the core and insisted on ending the engagement. He finally agreed, but the very next day, her production crew was harassed.

“Li Junzhe, what do you mean by this?” Jin Mo was furious on the phone.

Li Junzhe sat in a chair. Outside the floor-to-ceiling windows, the weather was beautiful. His voice was languid. “Is something the matter, Miss Xue?”

Jin Mo drew a deep breath. “I’ll come home tonight. Tell them to stop causing trouble.”

The man pretended not to understand. “Oh? What are you talking about, Miss Xue?”

Jin Mo thought he was getting more and more despicable.

After that, the production crew was left in peace.

That night, when she returned to their home, the man was sitting on the sofa with one leg crossed. An easel stood in front of him, and he had clearly already put a few strokes on the canvas. Jin Mo walked over, glanced at the painting, and immediately blushed.

He drawled lazily, “Come here, Mo Mo. Let’s finish this painting.”

Jin Mo was pulled onto his lap. He asked her, “Do you like it this way, Mo Mo?”

3,

Later.

That deep winter in Belarus.

When Jin Mo won Best Director at the Minsk International Film Festival, she walked out of the banquet hall. Snow drifted down from the sky. The world was blanketed in white, and amid all that white stood a figure in deep black, silent and still, just as he had waited for her all these years.

The handsome man smiled, his voice low and husky. “Director Xue, congratulations.”

Jin Mo stood still for a moment, then ran to him happily and called him, “Darling.”

4, I know you don’t want love, only freedom. And I happen to be able to give it to you. When I learned to let go, you came running to me instead. Mo Mo, do you know how lucky I am?, Li.

5, Includes xxx. Proceed with caution if this bothers you.

6, No love rivals. 1v1. SC.

Content warnings:

1. Includes xx. Read only if you’re comfortable with it. Proceed with caution.

2. The heroine and hero become physically involved before she turns 20. Proceed with caution if this bothers you. (She has a crush on him before turning 18, breaks off the engagement after turning 18, and the hero is a jerk at first. He pursues her from the beginning.)

3. Under Hong Kong law, people aged 16 to 21 can marry with the consent of a parent or guardian. After turning 21, they can decide for themselves.

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Coming soon: The Night of Decadence

Lu Wangjing vs. Xu Zhiyuan

“Ah Yuan, Ah Yuan, ” On that miserable rainy night, in a dilapidated little room in a teetering alleyway, Xu Zhiyuan clutched her swollen belly, her back pressed against the doorframe, tears streaming down her face as pain pulled at her abdomen.

She had only gone to the convenience store at the end of the alley to buy a few necessities. Across the street, beneath the dazzling neon lights, the sight of the man getting out of a car nearly froze her in place.

She had avoided him for seven months, but seeing him again still struck her to the core.

Xu Zhiyuan had been beautiful since childhood, but like a young child carrying a precious treasure through the night, she had no idea how much danger she was in. Flowers grown in a hovel are often broken before their time. Fortunately, she learned about the world early and grew up trembling but determined. After getting into film academy, she was at a loss when a young master pursued and courted her, and could only say yes.

That young master was called Lu Qichi, and Xu Zhiyuan became his girlfriend.

Later, she became pregnant with his older brother Lu Wangjing’s child.

On those decadent nights, the man was forceful, and her cries were broken and sweet. He would always gently wipe away her tears, crouch down in the rain to clean the dirt off her shoes, then tenderly lift her into his arms so she wouldn’t get dirty.

He cherished her in every way, yet she still ran away.

Content warnings: 1. A laid-back, mildly world-weary tycoon hero; a guiding, daddy-like lover.

2. The heroine is very weak. She is not the strong heroine type. Proceed with caution if you don’t like weak heroines.

3. They are each other’s first. The hero doesn’t steal his younger brother’s girlfriend. In fact, the brothers are very close. (The hero really doesn’t want to inherit the family business and even wants his younger brother to take over.)

Theme: When snow falls in the capital, it is the sound of my love for you.