Romance

Before the Divine Lord descended to the mortal realm to undergo his trials, he gave me his Little Carp as a love token.

To my surprise, the carp leaped out of the fish tank and followed him into the mortal world.

In my panic, I followed suit. Eighteen years later, amidst a vast expanse of heavy snow.

Standing atop the city walls, Crown Prince Wei fired an arrow that pierced straight through my bridal sedan.

“Yue Nu, it is you who are shameless, insisting on marrying me. I already have someone in my heart.”

The woman in red he held in his arms was that very Carp Spirit. I knew mortals could not see through her disguise.

To help him complete his trials, I stepped out of the sedan and entered the Wei Palace on foot.

Three years later, the Carp Spirit became pregnant, triggering a Heavenly Punishment.

Believing slanderous lies, Crown Prince Wei had me bound to the city walls to endure eighteen strikes of Heavenly Thunder in her stead.

At that moment, my heart turned to ash. I summoned Siming Jun. “Siming, it is time to return to the Nine Heavens.”

During our sophomore year of high school, the underprivileged student my childhood friend had been sponsoring transferred to our school.

She was plain, rustic, and awkward, yet her eyes carefully concealed a crush on Xiao Yunzhou.

Everyone at school mocked her for her wishful thinking, and they warned me with heavy hearts:

“Huaishan, you’d better be careful. Having Wei Xiaoyun stick to Xiao Yunzhou is like getting a piece of gum caught in your hair-you’ll never get rid of her.”

“Having someone like that hovering around your childhood friend every day is honestly disgusting.”

“Exactly, Huaishan. It’s not the thief you should fear, but the one who’s always watching. Sooner or later, you’re going to suffer at Wei Xiaoyun’s hands.”

After graduating from college, I moved into a shared rental with my rich second-generation boyfriend and started a business from scratch.

I was the one building the company. He was the one suffering through it with me.

Every day, I came home exhausted to our small apartment.

And every time, he would have a fragrant, steaming meal ready for me.

Life was hard, but we both felt happy.

Until one day, I saw the barrage comments:

[Oh my god, the male lead is still here suffering through this startup with his ex-girlfriend. When is the female lead finally going to show up?]

[The male lead is still too young. His parents already paved a golden road for him, but he refuses to take it and insists on staying in a rental eating instant noodles with his ex.]

[It’s fine. Once the ex-girlfriend’s startup fails and she starts drinking and getting violent, and later even cheats on him right in front of him, he’ll obediently go back and inherit the family business.]

[But honestly, summer, a rental apartment, bare skin, heads down and working hard… the sexual tension between these two is insane.]

My brother once forced me to swear that I would never harbor any immoral thoughts about him in this life.

I did as he asked.

But he didn’t know that we were living inside a PO novel.

If I failed to win him over, I would be replaced by a new little sister.

Ever since Noble Lady Lin fell into the water, it was as if she had become a different person.

She had originally been born lowly and kept to herself, so much so that the Emperor barely noticed there was someone like her in the Harem.

But now, she had won His Majesty’s favor.

In just half a year, she was exceptionally promoted to Noble Consort.

Whenever it was just the two of us, she would flash me a brazen smile.

“Lu Lan, sooner or later, your seat as Empress will be mine.”

She was a transmigrator. I couldn’t beat her.

So the next day, I pushed another consort into the water.

And just like that, in the Harem under my command, there were now two transmigrators.

A year after I married Xie Yunye, he met with danger at the border and was saved by a passing female physician.

To repay her for saving his life, he brought her back to the manor and took her in as his sworn sister.

Gu Qinghan never married after that. She practiced medicine all her life, healing the sick and earning the people’s deep respect.

Later, when Xie Yunye was poisoned, she tested medicines day and night. In the end, the accumulated poison took her life.

And I became the Old Madam of the Marquis Manor for fifty years.

My son was afraid I would be hurt, so he never let me enter the ancestral hall.

Only when I was on my deathbed and wanted to offer Xie Yunye one last stick of incense did I discover that a memorial tablet had appeared in the hall. On it were the words: Wife of Xie Yunye, Gu Qinghan.

My son sighed helplessly. “Mother, Father said before he died that only after meeting Aunt Gu did he understand who his true love was. Sadly, Aunt Gu was too proud to become a concubine, so he promised her burial beside him as his lawful wife.”

“Mother, it is only a title. Once a person dies, everything is empty. Please let Aunt Gu have it.”

When I opened my eyes again, I had returned to the day Xie Yunye brought Gu Qinghan home.

“Rong Yu, Qinghan has no father or mother. I want to take her in as my sworn sister. You…”

My expression was indifferent. “As you wish, my lord.”

“I once blew thirty-five thousand on a man in a single night.”

Everyone thought I was drunk and talking big, and the room burst into laughter.

Only one person remained expressionless. He was the star of the night.

The entire department had taken turns playing Truth or Dare, all for the sake of buttering him up and securing the seven-figure ad placement case in his hands.

When the drinking was over and everyone had left, the man looked at me, the only one who had stayed behind.

His gaze was indifferent, his tone laced with mockery.

“Director Yu, how many years ago was that? And you still remember it so clearly?”

I’m a good-for-nothing.

My husband, on the other hand, is a golden boy who has appeared on the cover of a finance magazine twelve times.

Later, he told me all of those covers had been bought and paid for.

Then, claiming he didn’t want to drag me down, he decisively asked for a divorce.

Wait… did I marry into a fake wealthy family?

I was airing out my belongings at home when a messenger suddenly arrived from the Capital, bearing news that the General’s Wife was gravely ill.

On her deathbed, she wished to see her best friend one last time.

By the time I rushed there, I found my dear friend lying on her sickbed, her life hanging by a thread.

Her husband hadn’t visited her even once.

Instead, only his favored concubine came every day to gloat:

“Sister is truly pitiable. You’ve feigned illness so many times that now retribution has finally caught up with you.”

My friend gripped my hand, her voice dry and raspy.

“Ah Fu, I’m dying.”

“I’ve left some things for you. You must…”

“I don’t want them.”

I interrupted her, casually picking up a gold hairpin and plunging it into the concubine’s throat.

“I’m here to settle your scores.”

“Sis, you can have the female lead role!”

At the wedding venue, I clutched the hand of the male lead’s unattainable first love, sobbing my heart out.

“Whoever wants it can take it. I sure don’t!”

After transmigrating into a docile-wife romance and learning that I was expected to give the male lead eighteen children, I immediately started looking for someone to take my place.

Who would’ve thought that the frail first love, who’d always seemed one breath away from death, would sit bolt upright from her sickbed and cry: “If you don’t want it, then I don’t want it either!”

As if by tacit agreement, our gazes both turned toward the trembling third female lead.