Commerce Emperor - Chapter Eighteen: Interlude: The Alchemist

With a father as strong as the highest heavens themselves, Gravis wasn't required to step into the cold and ruthless world of cultivation. But when Heaven used him in a scheme to get back at his father, Gravis realized that he needed strength to gain true freedom.

As long as he remained his weak self, he would always remain beneath Heaven’s oppression. Only true power brings true freedom. To gain strength, Gravis ventured into the lower worlds to start his cultivation under true life and death tempering.

Only a strong will, which had been forged in striving for every resource available, would allow him to reach the peak. Heaven’s strongest weapon was Lightning of Divine Punishment, and only if he made this weapon his, would he have a chance.

So, to overthrow Heaven,

Lightning Is the Only Way!

Yet, the path to power is painful.

Not everyone reaches the peak.

But Gravis will!

No matter how much pain he feels along the way!

What? He’s transmigrated into an apocalyptic novel?

What? He transmigrated into a white lotus?

What? The white lotus killed the main character shou (bottom, uke) and even proudly became a mistress?

Oh, luckily the white lotus in the apocalypse has a thick thigh to hold on to (someone to rely on).

What? This was actually an apocalyptic rebirth revenge story?

What? The thick thigh was actually a really big cannon fodder?

Therefore, this is the dramatic story of a man who transformed into a white lotus struggling to survive in an apocalyptic rebirth revenge novel, trying to avoid the reborn pig’s foot (the original main character), and trying his best to get away from the cannon fodder gong (top, seme).

- Description from Novelupdates

This is the story of the youth Wen Leyang, born into the family with an expertise in the cultivation of the Art of Poison.

After being torn from the only life she knew, 16-year-old Margo is forced into a new home with strangers who call themselves her parents. Haunted by memories of her past and consumed by feelings of isolation, she struggles to adapt to her unfamiliar surroundings. School offers little relief—until she meets Lucien, a mysterious boy who appears just when she needs a friend the most.Gabriel is everything Margo needs: kind, attentive, and always ready to whisk her away from her troubles. Each night, he invites her to secret places—an abandoned playground, a fog-choked garden, a crumbling train station at the edge of town—each more unsettling than the last. Yet with every chilling rendezvous, Margo feels more alive... more seen.But something isn’t right. Gabriel never comes to school during the day. Her adoptive parents never see him. And when they catch her talking to thin air, their concern deepens into fear. They say Gabriel isn't real—that he’s a figment of her imagination. Margo wants to believe them, but Gabriel feels real. More real than anything else in her life.As the nights grow colder and more twisted, Gabriel’s true nature begins to surface. Shadows move where they shouldn’t. Time warps in his presence. And the places they visit seem to echo with whispers from another world. Margo is forced to ask herself: Who—or what—is Gabriel? Why does he only want her? And what will happen on the final night he asks her to come with him?As the line between reality and delusion begins to crumble, Margo must make an impossible choice: stay in a world where she feels loved, or return to one that barely feels real.But one thing is certain—some friendships never let go.