Hard Enough - Chapter 8: Meeting the Mayor

What is martial arts?Martial Arts has nothing to do with musical instruments, chess, calligraphy, painting, treasures or secret manuals, nor is there so much talk about being the best in the world. Martial Arts is a technique, a method that gives the weak a chance to draw their blades against the strong.What is chivalry (xiá)?Chivalry is not about romantic affairs, traditional culture, or being gentle, respectful, frugal, and compliant. Chivalry is violence, it's the bayonet forged by those driven to Mount Liang to use against tyrants.Cao Mo pledged with a dagger, (Returning to) Lu to invade. Zhuan Zhu entered with grilled meat, (Pacifying) Wu to usurp the throne. Brother Zhang cried in the market, avenging his lord by defiling a lavatory. Suicide by cutting one's own throat to seek justice, acting while concealing his sleeve. The tyrant of Qin seized souls, the coward gained courage.This is a martial artist's story.In the 1930s, a group of like-minded young people came together, striving to change the world.Then, two hundred years later, in a garbage landfill, Xiang Shan, the Progenitor of Cyber Martial Arts who had once rebooted heaven and earth, woke up reciting the name of his enemy, having lost all his memories.“Perhaps it's because I lost back then that the world has become what it is...”“So this time, I won't be defeated again!”This is the story of a person changing the world once more!

He was summoned to save the world… but his greatest threat isn’t the Demon King — it’s the women who love him.Kai Veyron was just a delivery guy on Earth. But in the magical world of Aethria, he’s “The Chosen Hero” — gifted with ridiculous, godlike powers that he can’t control and didn’t ask for. He defeats monsters by sneezing, trips over relics that explode, and somehow charms every powerful woman he meets.Now surrounded by a beautiful, deadly harem — a tsundere princess, a cold-blooded assassin, a genius mage, a seductive demoness, and a broken childhood friend — Kai thinks he’s finally found purpose, friendship… maybe even love.But peace has a price.As whispers of prophecy grow louder, the women begin to ask the unthinkable:“What if the hero himself is the final calamity?”They laugh with him by day… and plot his death by night.And the worst part?Kai already knows.And he still protects them — even if it means his own downfall.

When Jasmine’s fated mate Elliot rejects her for the Lycan Chairman’s daughter, she is left broken, humiliated and alone. To make matters worse, her father gets arrested for embezzlement, and Jasmine needs to raise ten million to release him.Desperate to save her father from a wrongful conviction, Jasmine takes the only job she can find—tutoring the bratty daughter of a rich werewolf family.But she never expected her employer to be the Lycan chairman himself: Gareth Laken. He is ruthless, dominant… and her ex-mate’s future father-in-law.Gareth thinks she’s a threat. A bitter ex-girlfriend out for revenge, waiting to harm his own daughter. But the more he watches her, the more he sees a woman refusing to be shattered by the world that betrayed her. A woman he can’t stop wanting, despite the huge age difference.Now, Jasmine is caught between two powerful men—one who destroyed her, and one who might destroy everything she has left to protect.Excerpt“You’re playing a dangerous game,” Gareth said, voice low, his towering frame just inches from mine.“I didn’t come here to play,” I shot back, even as my heart pounded. “But you should be asking Elliot why he keeps showing up at my door. I’m not the one chasing ghosts.”His eyes darkened, his gaze dropping to my lips. “He’s not the only one haunted by you.”I froze.I should have walked away.Instead, I whispered, “Then why do you look at me like you want to hate me and kiss me at the same time?”He didn’t answer.But his silence spoke louder than any lie.

Recommended new novel: A heartwarming story set in the '90s, “Back to 1990, She Set the Surgical World on Fire”When Xie Wanying returned to 1996 and said she wanted to become a doctor, many laughed.“A phoenix begets a phoenix, a dog begets a dog. If a truck driver's daughter can become a doctor, then pigs can climb trees.”“Not only do I want to be a doctor, but I also want to be a female thoracic surgeon,” Xie Wanying declared. When medical relatives sarcastically told her, “There is not a single female leading thoracic surgeon in the country—who do you think you are!”After the college entrance exams, Xie Wanying entered the top surgical class in the country with the highest provincial science score, began as an intern in a top-tier capital hospital, and was fought over by the heads of surgery departments. She performed the world's first minimally invasive heart valve repair, marking the first surgery in the female surgical field!The Overseas Returnee Faction senior brother was a hot bachelor in the capital's circle and changed his QQ profile picture to one with his junior sister Xie.The young boss was a handsome man who came to the hospital every day to bring flowers and offer diamond rings.Not to mention the horde of well-wishers that had practically broken down the door of old Xie's house...——————“No woman loves a man who's not a little bit bad.”When a woman married him, everyone said, “This woman must be a bad woman who would stop at nothing to curry favor with him.”Everyone was curious about what kind of person Mrs. Xiao was when they heard that Mr. Xiao had gotten married.“My wife has overshadowed me. Everyone knows she is deaf, so they blatantly speak ill of her in front of her and openly discuss the bad things they plan to do to her,”Host: ............