Artifact Reading Inspector - Chapter 8: New Work (2)

In all my life, I’ve only made two mistakes that I regret. The first was filling out my entrance exam application wrong, and the second was offending Zhong Yuan. If I had to use an idiom to describe the impact of my mistake, it would be simply, ‘Life is no better than death’. And if I had to use an idiom to describe Zhong Yuan’s offenses to me, it would be simply, ‘Too many crimes to record’. And yet, for as evil and wicked as he was, he attracted girls the way that flowers attracted bees and butterflies.

It happened that one day, for some reason, I taunted Zhong Yuan, “The King of Hell sent you to torture some more people, didn’t he?” Without a change in expression, he replied, “In order to torture fewer people, I decided to just choose one person to torture for the rest of my life.” I asked him, “What do you mean?” He smiled at me and answered, “If you don’t go to hell, who will?”

- Description from Novelupdates

Briar had always harbored a crush in her heart. However, with her status as the official nanny of the Meyer family, she knew her chances were close to zero. After all, there were many other eligible women out there and it was not in her place to cross this line.All it took was one crucial call from home and she found herself signing a contract she never dreamed was possible.The man she had pinned after for years, Logan Meyer, needed a trophy wife, an accessory to hang on his arm, and a mother to his three kids. And as the nanny his children were used to seeing, Briar happened to fit the bill.She needed the money to save a relative. But more than that, this was an opportunity for her to reach the forbidden fruit she could only see but not touch for years.However, when the secrets of her past, which she wished to have forgotten and had locked in Pandora’s Box over twelve years ago, threaten to come out. The kind that would shatter the image she had painstakingly forged, thwart everything that she had worked hard for all these years and send her to prison for the rest of her life, forcing her to part with the man she dearly loves.To stop her adversaries from destroying everything that she had dreamt of since she was a child, Briar would be forced to make choices. Choices that would change her life forever.Even if it means shedding all pretenses and revealing her true self.

Tong Yao never expected that getting a milk tea could result in getting struck by lightning on a sunny day, and then waking up in the 1980s. She became a mischievous, spoilt wife of a top-tier doctor from the future. Rather than leading an ordinary life, she was caught eloping and stealing money, and reacted with crying, making a fuss, and hitting walls.Under the hopeless circumstances, she discovered she could understand animal language. While other time-travelers were busy making money to support their families, she was just enjoying the show.“The deputy director's wife accepted five jins of pork from a patient's family. The old couple is squabbling behind closed doors right now.”“The Dean has had a flare-up of hemorrhoids these past few days and can't sit on a chair.”“Mr. Li's wife is a tough woman. That missing tooth on the left was knocked out by her.”“Tong Yao has improper conduct. She used to secretly meet people in the village.”Tong Yao didn't expect the day would come when she would be the talk of the town....One day, Tong Yao heard a stray cat at the door muttering, “Dr. Si is having a date with a nurse in the corridor.”Furious, Tong Yao went to catch them in the act, only to find the doctor was discussing a patient's condition with a nurse who was over fifty. Wanting to run away, Tong Yao found her escape route cut off by the doctor, who backed her against a wall, “So I heard you came to catch us, huh?”Tong Yao never expected the saying, 'Those who always walk by the river eventually get their shoes wet,' to come true.

I am Racist.…I mean, my name is Racis T.I was a stand-up comedian. The flop kind. The type who only got laughs when someone else was roasting him.One night, I was doing a gig at a shady, run-down bar—the kind where tattooed bikers drink motor oil for breakfast. I went in with my usual dark humor, but my jokes were getting the same reaction as my dating profile: complete silence.That didn’t sit right with my inner artist, who was already starving to death. So I did what any committed comedian would—I went darker.Turns out, one of my jokes (or all of them?) triggered a guy so hard that he pulled a trigger. Headshot. Instant death.But hey, look at this: A guy got triggered, so he pulled the trigger. That’s wordplay. But who cares? I’m dead anyway.All I wanted was a successful show, people laughing, and maybe a few girls swooning over my wit. I never cared about money. The millions I’d have made would have gone to charity—specifically, 0.001% of it. See? I’m generous like that.Anyway, death is death. My story should’ve ended there.But… if there is an afterlife, I had a simple wish: become a successful comedian, find a loving wife, and have just enough money to afford three meals a day… and maybe a humble little private yacht. Or a jet. But that’s it. Because, like I said, I don’t care about money.Unfortunately, wishes don’t work that way.Because, well—there was an afterlife.And it was absolutely not what I wished for.