Crowned by the Treacherous Big Shot - Chapter 12: Infuriating Lu Lingxiao

He’s her stepbrother, her sin and her biggest mistake waiting to happen.Catherine Brown thought moving in with her mother’s new husband couldn’t be harder until she met the cold, arrogant and sinfully attractive Julian Vaughn, her stepbrother.He hates her, teases her and gets under her skin everyday. He’s everything she should stay away from, off-limits and untouchable.But when his anger turns into something darker and hungrier, when he looks at her like he wants to ruin her innocence, Catherine realizes danger has a new name.And no matter how hard she tries, she can’t stop wanting the one man she’s not supposed to have.When hate turns to desire, who’s really in control?EXCERPT✨“You’ve never had sex before?” Julian asked, disbelief flickering in his eyes.Catherine hesitated, then nodded, staring at the floor instead of him.He bit his lower lip, trying to rein in the thoughts crowding his mind. Goodness, she was too innocent for her own good.“So all you did with your previous boyfriends were just kisses and smooches?”She immediately stood, her cheeks flushed. “There are no boyfriends,” she blurted. “I’ve never even been kissed. Please don’t laugh at me.”Laugh? Hell no. Julian wasn’t laughing. He was fighting the urge to pull her close. Knowing she’d never been touched only made his hunger worse.She didn’t realize he’d moved until his breath brushed her ear, his voice dropping low and dangerous.“Catherine, just say the word and I’ll show you what it means to be touched by a man.”Her heart stuttered in her chest and he could hear every beat.

Alexis an outcast, a “Hunted” yet able to hide under their noses, desiring to live at every cost. Even if it meant pretending to be a man.But she was also once one of the moon goddess’s three pillars. She was in charge of assigning mates, but her curiosity into what it would feel like to have a mate, to fall in love was considered a breach of rules.The goddess’s three pillars do not fall in love! It was forbidden.So she was sentenced, removed and reduced to the status of a mere werewolf. Her memories were wiped and she no longer knew what she once was, not even after her rebirth.In a world of werewolves where shifting was a must, what would happen to her? A girl who never shifted? Never manifested.What would she do now, suddenly having found herself struck with a heat cycle—something she had never once experienced. She was abnormal, never manifested, yet, there she stood in the middle of hundreds of guests drowning in her sudden heat that one way or the other drew his attention.Keelion Fane. The one who should have never known.He is the leader of the pack, but he is feared—said to be cold-hearted and cruel. He is an alpha who hasn’t found his mate for so long that he had no choice but to find a substitute.But Alexis was stuck. With nowhere to run, in his grasp.She…was doomed.

Leo had a problem. Don't be like Leo!It wasn't that he was poor. It wasn't that he was unlucky. It was that he had been cursed, or blessed by the Accidental Tycoon System.The rules were deceptively simple. Any money he lost on an investment would be returned to him, doubled. And any money he gained, aside from system reimbursement couldn't be used by him on himself.His life's new mission was crystal clear. He had to go bankrupt.In a high-tech world of S-Rank Heroes, magic, and newly-contacted alien civilizations, this should have been the easiest thing to achieve in the galaxy. He just had to become the biggest, most spectacular loser the universe had ever seen.So, he tried. Oh, how he tried...He threw billions at publishing a dungeon guide written by a 10-year-old. The maps were in crayon, and it listed the final boss as a Big Grumpy Badger.[Breaking: New S-Rank dungeon called 'The Whispering Labyrinth' appears! All high-tech mapping drones fail. A lost F-Rank porter used the crayon guide... and it's 100% accurate. The final boss is a 50-foot divine badger. The Galactic Union has declared the guide a 'holy text' for exploration!]He bought the galaxy's most useless moon, planning to build a 'Museum of Paint'.[Alert: Ancient magical ley-lines discovered under the moon's surface! It's the only place in the universe that can safely grow the 'Star-Lotus,' the key ingredient for immortality!]To the Intergalactic Hero's Guild, the Magic Academies, and the Alien Federations, Leo was the god of investment whose every move was like 5D chess that ordinary people couldn't understand.Heroes would soar with his sponsorship. Alien emperors offered him their daughters' hands in marriage for a single 'tip'.But Leo just stared at his bank account, which now displayed his wealth that he couldn't use on himself, with tears streaming down his face.“Please,” he cried, “I'm trying to fail! Why won't you just let me be poor?!”

Eternal life...A blessing or a curse?

But the man who possessed such a gift only saw it as a curse...a curse that haunted him throughout countless years.

He wished to die more than anything else...or at least forget himself so that he won’t feel the pain that haunted him anymore.

His wish was granted, and his memories disappeared as he went into slumber.

Many million years later, he woke up, reborn with no memories of his past.

But after living for a few hundred years in the new world, he got bored of his life and went into slumber again.

However, after waking up a second time after more than a thousand years, he was presented with a vastly different world...a modern world that seemed so different from the medieval era he had lived in once.

Seeing that there might be interesting things for him to do this time, he decided to not sleep anymore and live his life in the new world by doing things that others might consider boring and tasking.

He wanted to be a bodyguard, so he became one. A teacher? Why not? A delivery man? Of course! And so he kept on trying different jobs till he found ones where he could find a beauties to spend his company with.

But even if the man wanted to live a mundane life, his destiny had other things in store for him, guaranteed to make his life, not smooth sailing.

Without his knowledge, mysterious otherworldly forces were in play whose machinations seemed to revolve around this man.

Only fate can tell whether this immortal man would be able to continue living his life as he wished or if he would come upon unexpected paths and choices that could change his life for better or worse.

But most of all will he one day remember his true past? And will his past catch up to his present life? Read on to find out...

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Read my obligatory review. This novel contains R18 but not without a good plot. The novel also contains a bit of slice of life but not to the point of annoying fillers. Everything contributes to the story, and this novel starts off as an easy read. [No NTR or Rape included. Don't get into conclusions without knowing the whole story, just a warning ;) ]

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