Hello everyone! My name is Su Ya, a thoroughly overworked corporate drone.
In my past life, I used to be an accountant at a small company on the verge of bankruptcy, living through the agonizing daily routine of a nine-to-five. All I ever dealt with was a hodgepodge of financial statements, all sorts of tangled expenses, and those bastard sales reps from the sales department who never had receipts when they filed their expense reports.
One day, just like any other, I was woken up early in the morning by a phone call from my boss, summoning me to the office for overtime.
Nobody bothered to tell me that an electrician was coming to fix the wiring today! And absolutely nobody told me the main breaker hadn't been shut off either...
Just like that, I stepped on a tangled mess of wires on the floor and kicked the bucket...
Turns out souls really do exist after all once people die!
I stood atop the clouds, looking down at my family, and at my 1.87-meter-tall, handsome, high-achieving civil servant boyfriend!
Watching my family weeping with snot and tears streaming down their faces, my handsome boyfriend, who usually carried himself like a seasoned senior cadre, collapsed over my corpse and wept bitterly.
I just wanted to scream at the top of my lungs: "Family! Remember to pull the weeds off my grave! Remember to burn paper offerings when you visit..."
"Why would you want people to pull weeds off your grave?"
Star Lord Siming, who had detained me, asked with a completely puzzled expression.
I tugged on the rope he had tied around me and said impatiently, "Since you're such a handsome Star Lord, why do you go around tying people up with ropes all the time?"
I leaned close to Star Lord Siming's ear, staring right into his handsome face, and said in a slightly teasing tone, "Could it be that you want to play bondage with me?"
"Young lady, what does 'bondage play' mean?"
Little Fate Master looked at me with a face full of curiosity. It seemed this handsome young man was quite the studious pupil! But to actually mispronounce "play" as "rogue", that was just infuriating!
I snapped irritably, "You're the rogue, your whole family are rogues! That's called 'play', it's a kind of hobby between a young married couple... a way to deepen the affection between husband and wife."
"Uh, uh, deepen the affection between husband and wife?" This Star Lord clearly had zero experience with romance; his fair little face turned as red as a monkey's backside.
"You, you... how can a young lady like you be so, so shameless?" Star Lord was so provoked by my words that even his speech became completely stuttering.
"What do you mean, 'you'? This young lady here had just crossed the threshold of thirty when you dragged me off, and you actually dare to scold me for being shameless?"
I glared at him with feigned anger. It was true, after all! I was already thirty years old, and I had finally managed to land a tall, rich, and handsome boyfriend who worked in the civil service and stood 1.89 meters tall—we were getting married at the end of the year!
I had spent thirty years as a single dog, hoping against hope, praying to the heavens, wearing out the floor tiles in front of my ancestral hall with my kowtows, just to pray for a boyfriend this drop-dead gorgeous, with a stable job and a good family background.
And yet, ugh! I can only blame myself for having such a short life...
Seeing that I was a bit upset, Star Lord lowered his voice and said, "Young lady, I'm sorry! This humble immortal wasn't scolding you just now... It's just that I've always been clumsy with words, please forgive me, young lady."
"Forget it, this young lady is magnanimous, I'll let you slide this time. But if there's a next time, humph... you'll just have to compensate me with yourself!"
Star Lord nodded repeatedly. "Yes, yes..."
Then he suddenly shook his head and waved his hands frantically. "Young lady, I'm an immortal, I can't possibly compensate you with myself!"
I was exasperated into a laugh by this stubborn Little Fate Master. Taking a deep breath, I said, "Fine, whatever you say goes." Anyway, I was already dead, and I would soon be starting my next round of reincarnation anyway.
I raised my bound hands and lifted my bound feet to signal him to untie me quickly.
Star Lord began waving his hands again, looking as though he were in great difficulty as he said, "Th-this won't do! Tying up newly arrived souls is the rule around here."
What? What kind of crappy rule is that? Do souls not even have human rights here?
I really wanted to curse out loud, but my nine years of compulsory education wouldn't allow me to be such an uncultured person.
"Young lady, what did that word 'what' you just said mean?"
The Little Fate Master asked with a studious attitude, brimming with curiosity. I patted his shoulder and explained to him with a straight face, "What? In the human world, it means 'I like you', understand?"
As soon as the Little Fate Master heard that, a face even whiter than snow instantly turned several shades redder than the sunset on the horizon.
He was clearly a pure little virgin... I felt the thrill of a successful scheme!
He hurriedly changed the subject and said, "Young lady, you mentioned earlier about having your family remember to pull the weeds on your grave. Is there some extraordinary symbolism behind that?"
I frowned and said, "Actually, there's no extraordinary symbolism at all! It's just that I was a very clean person in life, and I couldn't bear the sight of weeds growing on my grave!"
Though that was indeed the truth. I was a neat freak of an accountant; I wouldn't even let my colleagues sit in my chair.
The crucial part was that I cared a lot about my pride.
If my grave were overgrown with weeds, people would know nobody was visiting to sweep it, or worse, that nobody cared about me at all!
If other souls found out about that, wouldn't they laugh at me for being an unloved child?
A woman who cared about her dignity all her life...
"Oh! So that's how it is! This humble immortal once heard a soul I escorted back last time mention something about humans having a weed killer called paraquat. She said that stuff doesn't just kill people the moment they drink it; if you pour it over a patch of weeds, they turn completely withered and yellow in a split second."
He said thoughtfully, "Why don't you have your family pour some paraquat on your grave? Then you wouldn't have to worry about weeds growing at all, right?"
Talk about absurdity opening the door for absurdity—absurdity at its finest.
I glared at him furiously and said, "Pour paraquat? Are you afraid I didn't die thoroughly enough? Or are you worried I'll turn into a zombie?"
This pretty boy's face was flushed red by me once again, and he started apologizing nonstop: "Um, young lady, I'm truly sorry, this humble immortal said the wrong thing again, I'm sorry..."
I waved both my hands at him—since my hands were tied, I could only swing them together—and said, "Forget it! I'm already dead, why bother fussing over such trivial matters?"
"Tell me, Lord Siming, was your previous client someone who died from drinking paraquat?"
Siming nodded frantically, asking like an inquisitive child, "Yes, yes, yes, young lady, how did you know?"
"..."
I, I was really rendered speechless by this pretty boy, utterly speechless! Did he even need to guess?
His previous client had already told him that paraquat could poison weeds and poison people, so of course he must have died by drinking that pesticide!
Whatever, I couldn't be bothered to keep chatting nonsense with this little moron. Time to drink the Soup of Forgetfulness and get reincarnated early.
"Handsome, where is this young lady going to be reincarnated this time? You'd better find me a good family, it has to be a household like Wang Jiusi's, or at the very least, some kind of noble or aristocratic family!"
Little Fate Master pulled out the Book of Fate and frantically flipped through it. After flipping for a long time, he finally replied, "Young lady, this time it is definitely a good family, really, immensely wealthy and noble!"
"Ah, what kind of immensely wealthy and noble family? Let me take a look!"
I skipped and hopped over to his side. Written in the Book of Fate were the words: "Yún Zhāo, ruler of Longxia State, proficient in both pen and sword at age four, ascended the throne as emperor at thirteen, decisive in killing and cutting down enemies, conquering in all directions..."
Being a man in ancient times was probably a lot harder than being a man in modern times, right? Besides, I hadn't had enough of being a woman yet!