Josei

The first wife said that a concubine’s daughter ought to become a concubine herself.

She used my mother’s life to force my obedience.

A little sedan carried me into the prince’s household, where I was to help my elder sister secure his favor.

I schemed and plotted, watching every step, until my hands were steeped in blood.

My sister, meanwhile, remained pure and unsullied, radiant as the moon.

In that life, I harmed far too many people.

And others harmed me in return.

On the day I died, Mother told me she was not my birth mother.

The first wife had poisoned my real mother the very day she gave birth to me.

The woman who raised me was merely a pawn the first wife used to keep me in her power.

Given a second life, I turned my schemes upon my sister instead.

Have you ever seen the moon fall into the mud?

It must be a lovely sight.

I was born with a honeyed tongue.

I knew how to win people over.

As a child, I coaxed my father’s wife from despising me into loving me as her own.

After I married, I charmed my icy mother-in-law into treating me like her own daughter.

But it didn’t work on my husband.

He had a woman he loved and could not have.

In two years of marriage, he had never so much as touched a finger of mine.

Once again, at my mother-in-law’s bidding, I took a nourishing soup to his study and tried to coax him into sharing my bed.

He shoved me away in disgust and flung the soup aside.

“Wen Xiaoxiao, spare me your honeyed words and hidden knives.”

“I’d sooner die than touch you.”

Oh, well.

There really was nothing I could do.

If he wouldn’t be charmed, I would simply have to charm someone else.

The Noble Consort wants the emperor’s heart.

Qingtang, her maid, thinks authority over the harem matters far more.

When her mistress’s reckless devotion threatens her own future, Qingtang decides that if a fool can become Noble Consort, there is no reason she should spend her life as a servant.

A man of insatiable desire loses his manhood, but never his craving for his wife.

Jiang Youze, the legitimate son of the Jiang household, was as graceful as an orchid, as splendid as a jade tree.

He placed first in the imperial examinations at sixteen. Accomplished in both letters and arms, he had outshone his peers since childhood.

Si Yan, the only daughter at the minister’s residence, was treasured beyond measure, the moon around which every star revolved.

She and Jiang Youze had grown up together, their affection mutual.

Cool and difficult to approach, he reserved all his closeness and tenderness for her.

Everyone called their betrothal a perfect match between families of equal standing, a marriage made in heaven.

Then, the year after Jiang Youze’s triumph in the examinations, everything changed.

The Jiang clan was condemned on a fabricated charge of treason. The entire household was executed, its blood staining the long street.

Jiang Youze alone was spared, sentenced to castration and service as a palace eunuch.

The once-celebrated son of the Jiang family became, in an instant, a ruined man whom everyone shunned.

On the day he was imprisoned, Jiang Youze paid some unknown price to have a letter written in blood delivered from his cell to Si Yan.

Every line was written with her future in mind. He plainly offered to release her from their betrothal, yet every word bled with anguish.

Si Yan, however, found only the repeated endearment “Qingqing” an intolerable eyesore.

After reading the bloodstained letter, she turned and tossed it into the brazier of fine charcoal.

She had intended to call off the engagement on the very day the Jiang household was executed.

But the night before, she had a dream.

She dreamed that Jiang Youze would one day wield power over court and country, and that he would imprison and humiliate her, shutting her behind the palace gates forever…

I’ve loved money since I was little.

After I started dating a rich heir, I discovered that his best friend was even richer.

Lately, that friend has been pursuing me behind his back.

I know.

It’s a trap, designed to show my boyfriend what I really am.

But all I can think is: He actually hasn’t recognized me.

I’ve had plastic surgery.

Years ago, he pretended to be poor when he dated me.

The morning after I slept with him, I told him I was going downstairs to buy him soy milk.

Then I vanished.

I’m the first love he’s hated ever since.

Now, out of sight of the crowd, he asks me quietly: “Break up with your boyfriend.

I’ll do anything you say.”

The whole capital knows Zhao Qingzhi as a jealous woman.

Only young General Pei dares to marry her, declaring that a man who can catch tigers and kill bandits has no reason to fear a fiery wife.

After the wedding, he proudly tells his friends he has tamed her.

But one friend knows the truth: the maid Zhao Qingzhi had beaten was her father’s illegitimate daughter, and the story behind her jealousy is far more painful than the rumors suggest.

Humiliated by the correction, the young general decides to prove who rules his household.

The next day, he brings that very maid home.

Ever since my husband brought his mistress home as an honored concubine, I had been living like a goddess.

Getting up at the fourth watch every morning to prepare him for court?

The concubine’s job.

His clothes, his meals, his daily needs.

Taking care of him when he was drunk or ill.

The weighty business of attending to his parents—all hers.

So were the marital bed and bearing children.

When I asked her, yet again, to make shoes and socks and do the other needlework, I told her, “You’re an honored concubine, practically half a mistress of the house.

These are a mistress’s duties.

If you won’t do them, who will?”

She looked at me, dressed to the nines and ready to go out.

Seething with resentment.

Then her child was registered as mine.

And she became more respectful and obedient by the day.

I was perfectly happy with the arrangement.

My husband, however, began to grow restless.

After Grandfather passed away, I traveled to the Capital to seek refuge with my Fiancé.

I had heard that he was proud and aloof, already enamored with someone else, and looked down upon me, his country-bred fiancée.

Anxious all the way, I only realized upon meeting him that the rumors were false.

He was clearly upright and self-disciplined, gentle in temperament, and not only handsome but also cherished me deeply.

I married him with peace of mind.

Three months after our wedding, his nephew, who had just returned to the Capital from his studies, came to pay his respects and stared at me in a daze.

Later, I happened to witness him confronting my Husband at our door, his face full of disbelief.

“Second Uncle! How could you impersonate me and marry my Fiancée?”

0

In the fourth year of our marriage, both Lu Jingli and I had affairs.

He kept a female college student, treating her like a treasure.

Behind his back, I supported a pure-hearted male college student, reliving the passion of youth.

I had thought he was already tired of this messy marriage.

But on the day he discovered my betrayal, he went crazy, insisting that we return to our family together.

During an online meeting, the new intern accidentally turned on her camera.

Just as I was about to remind her, her boyfriend appeared on screen.

Oh, isn’t that my husband who’s been away on a business trip for a week?