Chapter 204-The Manga Pariah's Guide to Self-Salvation
[I genuinely feel bad... will anyone remember this boy's birthday?]
[Group assassination of Old Uncle (1/100)]
[Old Uncle, is this really our Crown Prince? You said he was royalty, so why'd you make him look like a commoner?]
[Told you the only real royalty in Your Gui is ( )]
[The episode that makes me support Sykes's villain arc the most. So this guy is actually the one nobody in this world cares about...]
On the phone screen, Sykes's gloomy expression dominated the final page of the manga. A dense stream of comments floated across.
"What rotten luck!"
Tang Mingxi held her phone at arm's length and shouted out her biggest reaction after finishing the latest chapter.
The first half of the new chapter was all about Percy and his two companions heading to Sierra's base to rescue Lucy. In the second half, Sykes appeared, heading to the lower district and visiting his mother's tomb along the way. Just when the dejected Zheng fans thought they wouldn't get to see Ye Zheng in this chapter either, she unexpectedly appeared before Sykes, bathed in morning light.
Seeing the most arrogant male character in the entire series forced to address her as "Your Holiness," Tang Mingxi felt a secret thrill. She was petty like that—she hadn't forgotten how arrogant Sykes had been when he first received Ye Zheng, going so far as to grab her by the throat. At that level, even if Sykes kowtowed to Ye Zheng every single day, she would never forgive him!
In the manga, Ye Zheng's appearance clearly caught Sykes off guard too. The two exchanged a few barbed pleasantries before Sykes turned to leave in anger. But in the instant they brushed past each other, he received a note she had slipped to him.
[Coming-of-age ceremony. Imperial Palace. I'll help you restore all your memories.]
Tang Mingxi sat up straight with excitement. She knew her one's own fave all too well—there was no way this was purely out of goodwill to help someone restore their memories. It was obviously the start of something big, most likely targeting Sykes.
Perfect. Let Ye Zheng teach Sykes and all the unconvinced Zheng haters what it truly means to be "Your Gui's number one villain"!
This excitement vanished upon seeing the final scene of the manga chapter. Tang Mingxi's eyebrows shot up in disbelief—Sykes's real birthday was actually the same day as Ye Zheng's?
On the previous page, attendants bustled about in a lavish palace preparing Ye Zheng's ceremony. On the next page, Sykes learned the date of Ye Zheng's coming-of-age ceremony in a somewhat shabby shelter.
Many readers felt sorry for Sykes because of this contrast, but Zheng fans like Tang Mingxi only felt it was bad luck. She'd never seen such a clingy rival fandom!
Tang Mingxi and the birthday celebration team had already prepared everything for Ye Zheng's birthday—a mall billboard, an offline gathering, a 24-hour birthday art relay. She had also prepared plenty of free merchandise. Just thinking about celebrating and chatting with fellow Zhengzheng's mom fans next week had kept Tang Mingxi in high spirits all week.
Ye Zheng's coming-of-age ceremony was clearly a key plot point too. Given the manga's pacing, the coming-of-age ceremony storyline might even update next week in sync. Celebrating both inside and outside the manga—Tang Mingxi couldn't imagine how happy that would be.
But the thought that Sykes also shared the same birthday instantly gave her a pang of frustration.
Originally, her most hated King of the Demonic Domain character was the male lead Percy, but now Sykes had been promoted to the number one spot. He'd been getting a lot of screen time in the anime recently, and his handsome face had even attracted some new fans. His stans were getting bolder, and Tang Mingxi couldn't block them fast enough.
What was even more infuriating was that SyZheng was actually Ye Zheng's most popular ship! Was that even reasonable?
Although the smaller ship could still overpower SyZheng for now, just seeing her girl's name tied to that toxic masculinity male character disgusted her. In her view, the two had absolutely zero chemistry. If this were the entertainment industry, Tang Mingxi would suspect it was bundled marketing hype for some nobody male idol.
She clicked into the forum. Unsurprisingly, everyone was discussing Ye Zheng and Sykes's birthday.
[#1: It's actually the same day... Old Uncle, do you have a heart?]
[#2: I'm actually kind of devastated. Sykes's real birthday isn't even the date listed on the official website. Did Old Uncle deliberately want everyone to miss Sykes's birthday?]
[#3: This guy bears the stigma of being a brutal tyrant, but in reality he can't even celebrate his real birthday. His own home is being used to throw someone else's birthday party, and he's locked up in a shelter. Who's going to look after this underage boy's mental health?]
[#4: Just thinking about how Ye Zheng gets to celebrate her birthday in grand style at the Imperial Palace, while the Crown Prince Sykes, who shares the same birthday, needs Ye Zheng's invitation just to enter the palace... I can't take it...]
[#5: I feel like there's a bug here. Sykes's real birthday should be the day the late Empress died. Why is it the same day as Ye Zheng's? Is Old Uncle deliberately pushing the ship?]
[#6: Oh my god, now that you put it that way, Sykes is even more pitiful—just a tool for pushing ships.]
[#7: The SyZheng shippers next door are eating their angst candy again. "Fated redemption"... is angst candy built on the guy's suffering really that tasty?]
[#8: Don't Zhengzheng's mom fans love hyping Ye Zheng as an independent female lead? Then why do they keep tying her to our Crown Prince?]
[#9: Well, who told this guy to be Your Gui's number one cash cow...]
[#10: To be fair, Zhengzheng's mom fans bash Sykes the hardest. They're not the same group as SyZheng shippers.]
[#11: I've said it before—most female character stans are just yumejo in disguise. Don't forget that the ones who bash PerSy the most are also Zheng fans. They claim to hate male characters, but really they just hate that male characters aren't revolving around them.]
[#12: At this point, let us all say PerSy forever.]
...
Tang Mingxi read on in fury. Only male character stans would think their precious boy was some universally beloved treasure, right?
Zheng fans were still too well-mannered. She was going to start a #DailyGelding# hashtag right now. Anyone who dared slander them would have their precious boy subjected to cyber-castration! Let's see who really can't bear to part with it!
Tang Mingxi had been about to charge in for a fight, only to discover that the SyZheng shippers had already gotten into a brawl with the Sykes stans—or more precisely, the SyZheng shippers and the rival ship's shippers were at war.
[#173: May the world accept heterosexuality.]
[#174: The double-villain ship is just so good. Support the Saintess taming the dog!]
[#175: A broken engagement, a promise of redemption, born on the same day... you people who don't ship them are the ones with trash taste.]
Tang Mingxi's vision went dark. She decided this thread was no longer readable. How did these two factions manage to be enemies with each other while simultaneously assaulting Zhengzheng's mom fans' eyes?
Setting aside the fact that Sykes had tried to kill Ye Zheng multiple times, the so-called engagement theory was built on Ye Zheng being treated as a "Holy Vessel" for the Hope Project by the Royal Family. And people actually regretted that the engagement didn't go through—wasn't that shipping Ye Zheng's suffering?
And as for "taming the dog"—had anyone actually seen Sykes kneel down and bark for Ye Zheng? Not only did the original work have nothing of the sort, but even the fanfics flying the "dog-taming" banner never actually had Sykes serve as Ye Zheng's dog. Instead, they were obsessed with writing various AU scenarios where Ye Zheng lost her power and Sykes came to her rescue.
This wasn't shipping—no matter how you looked at it, it was cursing Ye Zheng!
Tang Mingxi scrolled a bit more. Completely unsurprising—when het ships and BL ships clashed, the one who got attacked and blamed was always the female character. Who could look at this and not say Ye Zheng was suffering an undeserved disaster? She didn't even want to engage with these people and quickly backed out.
[We still don't know how exactly fate has mistreated the precious boys...] [hot]
[#1: We still don't know how exactly fate has mistreated the precious boys...]
[#2: Those who know, know. Mood as above.]
[#3: I've developed a condition where I can't help but laugh whenever I see precious boys playing the victim.]
[#4: I know which precious boy the OP is referring to, but there are so many precious boys who fit the bill. Who's going to take me off this precious boy planet?]
[#5: Clicked in and have no idea what the angst is about. Someone grew up in luxury doing whatever he wanted. So what if his birthday isn't celebrated on the actual day? Give me five million and I'll happily never celebrate a birthday again.]
[#6: If you can stomach shipping Ye Zheng with that toxic masculinity drama queen, you get this (thumbs up emoji). Me? I'm this (thumbs down emoji).]
[#7: Ye Zheng merely sharing a birthday with Sykes counts as hurting Sykes, so what does Sykes grabbing Ye Zheng by the throat and slamming her into a wall count as?]
[#8: It counts as Ye Zheng and Zheng fans having good tempers and high class.]
[#9: I'm literally about to cry. Back when Zheng fans brought this up, they were called dramatic. "Fighting is normal in an ability-based world." So Sykes not celebrating his birthday is somehow a big deal? People get triggered that easily?]
[#10: Between the two sharing a birthday, the one who actually has it worse is Ye Zheng. Empress Ye's birthday just got latched onto by that jinx of a rival.]
[#11: Our Zheng is kind enough already—on her own birthday, she's still inviting Sykes and offering to help restore his memories. The people bashing her truly have no heart...]
[#12: Without Ye Zheng, Sykes couldn't possibly recover his memories. She's already this kind, and some people still want to nitpick. Peak ingrate mentality.]
...
[#121: That said, Zheng is definitely not doing this out of kindness lol]
[#122: Someone next door said Ye Zheng is using memory restoration as an excuse to trick Sykes into attending her coming-of-age ceremony, just to show off in front of him and hurt him. I literally can't (facepalm.jpg)]
[#123: They really are underestimating our number one villain!]
[#124: I don't know what Ye Zheng's goal is, but I have a vague feeling she's about to cement her title as Your Gui's number one villain.]
[#125: I feel like Ye Zheng is going to tell Sykes: Watch closely. I'll only teach you once. This is how you play the villain!]
[#126: Does nobody remember Old Uncle's spoiler from last week? An important character is about to die. The lucky winner isn't actually Sykes, is it?]
[#127: Hard to say if it's Sykes, but I'm guessing something big will happen at Ye Zheng's coming-of-age ceremony.]
TN:
As you've all noticed, we've recently started translating two new novels.
One is the latest work from the author of The Manga Pariah's Guide to Self-Salvation, which is still ongoing.
The other is a new title chosen by our newest team member.
You can head over to NovelsUpdates novel page to check out the synopsis and see if it's the kind of story you enjoy:
We'll continue to focus on translating female lead no-CP (non-romantic pairing) works.
We'd really appreciate it if everyone could add our new works to your reading lists and leave reviews — it means a lot to us!
Thank you for your continued support!
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