Heavens' Laughter - Chapter 74: Steps

An advertising director is reborn in 1988 Hollywood as an eighteen-year-old blond-haired westerner named Eric Williams.

Xiao Shan is a famously profligate prince, the kind that makes his emperor father angry just by being seen. Xiao Shan’s greatest wish in life is to be a salted fish who lives without any worldly strife, until his father bestows upon him Xie Zhui, a ger who has been mixing with men, to be his bride. Xie Zhui took his brother’s place in the army at fourteen, achieved great merits by successfully defending against enemies outside the northern border city at sixteen, and was discovered to be a ger after being seriously injured at eighteen. After returning to the capital, the emperor pardoned Xie Zhui’s crime of deceiving the monarch and bestowed him to Xiao Shan as his rightful spouse. Everyone says that Xiao Shan has married a ger who came out of a pile of men, with a vast grassland above his head. They think about how much the emperor must dislike Xiao Shan to have given him such a troublesome marriage.

Chi Xiaoman and Qiao Ning have been childhood friends for over ten years. Then, under the influence of alcohol, they end...

For ten long years, Adam was a prisoner within his own body, paralyzed and helpless, silently observing a world he couldn't interact with. As his life finally ebbed away, connected to hospital machines, his last conscious thought wasn't one of peace, but a desperate, burning wish hurled into the void: If I get a second chance, let me be the strongest.The universe, in its mysterious ways, answered. Adam was reborn, not into light, but into an infinite, suffocating darkness. Yet, within this void, he discovered an astonishing truth: he possessed unimaginable power. Reality itself seemed to bend to his mere thought; he could conjure wonders or horrors with a whim. He was, by all measures, the most powerful entity imaginable. But this godlike power came with a cruel twist – he was utterly trapped, unable to escape the encompassing darkness.His prison, he soon grasped, wasn't empty space. It was the consciousness of another being. He was an unseen passenger, a silent god locked within the mind and soul of Eric, the unassuming Third Prince of a kingdom unknown to Adam. Eric, frail and seemingly ordinary, was completely unaware of the cosmic powerhouse dwelling within him.Adam's initial goal was simple: escape or seize control. But a chilling revelation halted his plans – his existence was inexplicably tethered to the prince's fragile life. If Eric died, Adam's own newfound power, perhaps even his very being, might shatter. A reluctant protector was born from a desperate prisoner.Now, Adam walks a razor's edge. He subtly guides and shields his unwitting vessel, Eric, from the dangers of court intrigue and hidden enemies, intervening with earth-shattering displays of power only when Eric faces certain death. These brief, terrifying moments where the “weak” prince unleashes godly might leave the world baffled and fearful, whispering legends of the prince's hidden potential.To navigate this precarious existence and perhaps forge a path to his own freedom or dominance, Adam devises a unique tool: a 'System' granted to Eric. Is it a gift to empower his host, a means to strengthen the vessel for eventual takeover, or a dangerous gamble with unforeseen consequences?As Adam fights unseen battles, protecting Eric while plotting his own endgame, questions linger. Can he ever break free? Will Eric discover the terrifying truth of his inner 'guest'? And what will happen when the world realizes that the power shaking kingdoms doesn't belong to the prince, but to the ancient, godlike entity trapped inside him? His journey is one of immense power bound by frustrating confinement, a hidden war fought within a single soul, where the fate of a prince and the ambition of a captive god hang in the balance.