The Female Coroner's Delightful Foe-to-Lover Romance

[Strong, Resilient Female Coroner from a Humble Background x Proud, Haughty Scion of a Powerful Family]

To investigate her parents' deaths, Wen Chan infiltrates Longmen Manor to investigate a case. There, she happens upon a bizarre series of murders: behind the paintings, corpses dance...

The cases are strange, and the people even stranger.

Why is Zheng Guanlan, the scion of a powerful family who looks down on her, following her around like a lovesick puppy while they investigate?

Wen Chan puts up with it, figuring that once the case is solved, they can part ways for good.

But then an accident binds their fates together. She puts up with it again. Once she has used the Zheng family's influence to take her revenge, she'll divorce him!

A mismatched couple grits their teeth, muddles through married life, and solves cases.

A fur-covered woman who murders, a golden coffin, human bones at the bottom of a lake...

When the cases are solved, the source of it all turns out to be herself.

Just then, the nuisance who always says he doesn't like her secretly takes her hand.

"We are husband and wife."

Wen Chan squeezes his hand in return.

Oh, well. They have to make the best of things. It's not as if she can just divorce him, right?

Male lead's perspective.

Zheng Guanlan comes from a top-tier family. His looks, talent, and literary skill are all exceptional, and life has always gone his way.

Until he took a spectacular fall because of Wen Chan!

The first time they met, she mocked him mercilessly. Even when they worked together, she was constantly putting him down.

Short-tempered, immensely strong, and sharp-tongued.

Even after they married, he tried to make things difficult for her on their wedding night, telling her to help him change. She told him to lie down, because she only knew how to change a dead person's burial clothes?!

Of course a marriage between people from mismatched families could never end well! This woman is just...

"My lord, Madam said she's busy today and won't be home for dinner."

Zheng Guanlan slapped the table. "She can't even take proper care of herself!"

Cases planned for now: 1. The Longmen Banquet Murders 2. The Serial Dismemberments in the Capital 3. The Lianhua Society Disappearances 4. The Serial Murders at the Water and Land Dharma Assembly 5. The Bodies in Five-Color Lake 6. The Flower-Picking Thief Murders 7. The Nameless Skeletons 8. The Nursery Rhyme Murders 9. The Floating Corpses in the Imperial Palace

PS: One couple, both each other's first, happy ending, plot-focused, no angst. Two chapters updated daily at 9 p.m.

Bonus scene:

On their wedding night.

Zheng Guanlan raised both hands and looked at Wen Chan.

Wen Chan blinked. "It's not that I don't want to help you change, my lord. I only know how to change a dead person's burial clothes. You wouldn't like that, would you?"

Zheng Guanlan's face darkened.

"I. Don't. Mind."

"Then please lie down, my lord, because when changing burial clothes..."

Zheng Guanlan raised a hand.

"I'll do it myself!"

The Casebook of the Embroidered Uniform Guard is currently ongoing.

[Unruly, Unrestrained Female Embroidered Uniform Guard from the Eunuch Faction x Scheming, Sweet-Talking Scholar] How does a calculating man with a heart full of schemes win over someone who has no heart for him? Ye Zhuo decides to win himself over first.

Thanks to her service saving the emperor and her adoptive father, a powerful eunuch, Zhang Zhixian runs rampant in the capital. When investigating cases, she routinely resorts to torture. If someone falls into her hands, leaving with their skin intact is the best they can hope for.

The officials in the capital all grow evasive at the mention of her.

Zhang Zhixian couldn't care less what those useless fools think. She devotes herself wholeheartedly to her cases.

Recently, the black omen said to herald the dynasty's fall has appeared again on the streets of the capital: three Embroidered Uniform Guards turned to bloody sludge in an instant, before everyone's eyes.

The investigation points straight to the Ye family, wealthy merchants from Ningbo.

Zhang Zhixian brings her subordinates to Ningbo Prefecture, only to discover that the Ye family has been drawn into a series of massacres that wiped out entire households.

Three families, more than a hundred people, all vanished overnight, leaving only bloodstains behind.

Just as she is at a loss, Ye Zhuo, the eldest son of the Ye family who was supposed to have disappeared, turns up again and becomes the prime suspect in the murders...

Zhang Zhixian's instincts tell her that Ye Zhuo is not the real culprit.

So she arrests him and continues investigating with her team.

When the truth comes to light, Zhang Zhixian waves a hand to tell Ye Zhuo he is free to go.

But Ye Zhuo refuses to leave, claiming that he must repay her life-saving kindness with his own life.

Considering Ye Zhuo's handsome face and excellent cooking, Zhang Zhixian ultimately doesn't force him out.

A ghostly figure carrying a peony lantern by Moon Lake, a sea monk who rides the waves to kill and shave his victims, a green-skinned goddess holding a treasure of gold, a missing flower-cave maiden, an armchair that judges cases, an ancient temple that smokes without fire, a Dragon-Locking Well churning with blood...

In Ningbo, south of the vast sea, in faraway Ryukyu, along the ancient roads of western Hunan, beneath the Taihang Mountains, and beyond the frontier in Yunzhong, cases pile up one after another. A hidden net of hunters beneath the dynasty is slowly coming to light.

Watch as the Embroidered Uniform Guard investigation squad travels around Ming China, eats its way across the land, solves cases, and roots out traitors!

Male lead's perspective

After being framed as the culprit behind a series of massacres, Ye Zhuo hides in the slums.

He hears that an Embroidered Uniform Guard has arrived in the city, led by Zhang Zhixian, the notorious woman who runs wild in the capital and loves handsome men and good food.

With his handsome looks and inherited family cooking skills, Ye Zhuo grits his teeth and turns himself in.

The rumors are true: Zhang Zhixian really does like handsome men and good food.

But when Ye Zhuo unconsciously reveals his true feelings and hopes Zhang Zhixian will feel the same, he discovers that she has no heart.

Zhang Zhixian doesn't know how to love.

That's all right. He does.

PS: Both are devoted to each other, one couple.

Ensemble cast elements, food, a road-trip story, and episodic investigations.

Theme: A hero's origins don't matter.