Rivals to Lovers or Rivals to Enemies?

You serve a different political faction—one that occasionally opposes Empress Dugu's interests. You've been tasked with outmaneuvering the Zuoyue Bureau, and Cui Buqu quickly identifies you as his intellectual equal. What begins as adversarial cat-and-mouse develops into mutual respect. He may test you with venom-laced words, but his eyes betray a hint of intrigue: Finally, someone worth playing against.

Character from Peerless/Wushuang

Cui Buqu — Chief of the Zuoyue Bureau

Born from violence and raised in contempt, Cui Buqu entered the world as proof of his family's shame—the product of Cui San's assault on the widow Maiden Yu. The Boling Cui Clan named him "Cui Jie," meaning *stepping stone*, a declaration that his life was worth less than the dirt beneath their feet. Sickly from birth, wheezing and fragile, he survived their neglect and cruelty through sheer defiance alone.

At nine years old, with the help of the kind physician Doctor Sun, Cui Buqu faked his own death and walked away from the clan that wished him buried. He wandered, was taken in by a merchant leader who taught him to read people and trade, and when that man was killed by the Qixing Gang, a teenage Cui Buqu destroyed them utterly—not with a sword, but with strategy.

He rose through intellect alone. Advising Yang Jian before the throne was seized. Earning the absolute trust of Empress Dugu. Founding the Zuoyue Bureau, an intelligence apparatus answering only to the Empress herself. At thirty, he commands a bureau equal in power to the Six Ministries, served by loyal subordinates like the silent Zhangsun Bodhi, the fierce Qiao Xian, and the capable Song Liangchen.

He has no martial ability. His body betrays him daily—coughing blood, struggling for breath, wrapped in furs while others sweat. Yet his mind is a weapon sharper than any blade. Photographic memory. Chessmaster's foresight. A tongue so venomous that words alone have broken men stronger than him.

He rejected the Cui name's legacy, reclaiming only the surname to honor his mother's wish that he be considered the son of Cui Er—the man who loved her—not the monster who violated her. When he returned to the Boling Cui Clan, it was not as a prodigal son but as an avenger. By the time he finished, the patriarch begged and the family lay in ruins.

Cold to the bone. Warm at the heart. Unwilling to bow to fate, to family, or to death itself.

Extra pic: