Steel and Sorrow: Rise of the Mercenary king - Chapter 45: Small council(2)

“She's back, let's get a divorce.”After three years of secret marriage, he suggested divorce when she faced a family's crisis and was pregnant. He also turned a blind eye to her plea for help. Disappointed, she concealed her pregnancy and signed for divorce.She thought they would be strangers after the divorce, but her pregnancy was suddenly exposed.When he proposed remarriage, she angrily said, “I only want to keep the child with me, and if you want to see them, kneel down!”She thought he would give up when faced with difficulties, but she really underestimated his abilities.Soon, a video of him kneeling and begging for reconciliation was displayed throughout the day on the outdoor big screen in the most prosperous area of the city.

Yan Xi was the eldest young lady of Beiqiao City’s top four families, the Yan family. Despite her talents, she was sickly and destined to die young. She was an unattainable dream girl for many.

One day, she had a dream, and the setting was in a novel. In the novel, for the sake of alleviating his pain of losing his wife, and soon his daughter as well, her father adopted a girl named Chen Xiangxiang who looked just like her. The girl was docile as a deer and very therapeutic, which made her all the more lovable. This girl became her substitute, and after a series of heart-wrenching incidents, everyone, from her father, brother, fiance, to her friends, they all doted on this girl. Meanwhile, she, the real rich daughter, was schemed against. After being disfigured, she jumped from a building and fell to her death.

Now, she returned to the moment when she was just discharged and before the tragedies happened. She lowered her head and looked at the person before her. She smirked. This time, she would control every development, and those who intended to harm her could forget about escaping.

Shen Yansheng always thought that she didn’t like Lu Jingce until one day she heard that a certain group boss intended to marry his daughter to Lu Jingce. She was so angry that she couldn’t eat anything that night and locked herself in the room after returning home. When Lu Jingce came back in the evening, he took the key from the study, opened the door and entered her bedroom. He sat beside the bed, leaned over and kissed her to wake her from her sleep. She looked at him angrily, but he smiled happily and asked, “Jealous?”

Shen Yansheng and Lu Jingce have been falling in love all the time, mainly because she hadn’t figured out how to explain their relationship to her parents, which caused her parents to always think she was single, so they took the initiative to trick her into going on a blind date. But someone happened to have a dinner in that restaurant that day, and saw her and her blind date sitting at a table for dinner from a distance. She felt a gaze looking at her from behind, and when she turned her head, she met someone’s handsome face that was half-smiling. That night, as soon as Shen Yansheng came home, she threw herself on someone, raised her hand and swore, “I can explain it!” Someone still had that half-smile and pinched her cheek, “The explanation is invalid.”

- Description from Novelupdates

Adeline Smith's life took a sudden and dangerous turn when her grandmother’s will named her as the sole heir to her massive fortune, leaving her uncle with nothing. But the rules that came with the inheritance only made her a target, as her uncles would stop at nothing to claim what they believed should have been theirs.When one of her uncle’s murderous schemes left her gravely wounded and on the edge of death, she was found by Enzo Laureati, an annoying, yet breathtakingly handsome man. What she did not know was that Enzo was no ordinary man—he was a vampire prince who had abandoned his world and royal duties to live among humans just for fun.The moment he saw Adeline, he knew she was his mate, as his heart that had remained dormant for hundreds of years suddenly began beating. But despite knowing what she meant to him, he felt no love or attachment toward her.Out of curiosity, Enzo saved Adeline’s life and proposed an unusual deal: he would become her fake fiancé, help her expose her uncles for trying to murder her, and secure her inheritance. But he didn't propose this deal because he wanted to help her, but because he was simply bored. Adeline agreed, unaware of the chaos that was about to come her way.At first, their partnership was nothing more than a random deal. Living with Enzo wasn’t easy, as he was infuriatingly confident, annoyingly flirty, and had a knack for driving her crazy with his nonchalant attitude.When Adeline finally discovers who Enzo truly is, will she see him as a monster or the man who had always protected her from her uncles? And will Enzo be able to embrace their mate bond, or will secrets tear them apart?(PS: I'm not sure if one would consider this novel slow burn, but the REAL romance between my MC and ML begins at chapter 74.) Thank you so much for supporting my book!