Short Story

After the college entrance exams ended, students leaving the test site were interviewed and asked how they felt in that moment.

A handsome boy with eyes like stars and moonlight looked into the camera and said calmly, “I only hope to realize my dreams.”

A moment later, he added in a low voice, “And meet the rainbow in my heart.”

The camera cut to a girl with dimples and a smile as bright as a blooming flower. A rainbow hair clip pinned in her hair caught the light in tiny, glittering sparks.

She stuck out her tongue playfully. “Oh no, I think I might not get into Q University! If I end up having to repeat the year, Pei Zhiyu, you have to wait for me!”

Pei Zhiyu was the person I liked.

But I was not that beautiful girl.

When that interview aired, I was hiding at home, sobbing my heart out because I had bombed the college entrance exams.

It looked like my life and my first love were both about to be completely over.

Chapter 0

Pei Qian forgot me. All because, on the eve of our wedding, he got drunk, took a fall, and forgot he was supposed to take a bride. Was I to believe that, or not?

Naturally, I believed it with the utmost gratitude. Since he had forgotten me, my marriage to him could be written off in one stroke.

I packed up my money and dowry. Boling was no longer an option, so for the time being, I settled down in Hedong.

If my father had not died so early, I feared I never would have come anywhere near the gates of the Pei Family.

My father died after taking elixirs and running naked through the streets. Everyone praised him for being romantic and unrestrained-a true eminent gentleman!

He had only been a concubine-born son of a collateral branch of the Cui Clan, yet within a few days of his death, he had somehow become the pride of the Cui Clan.

For a time, the worth of my sisters and me rose with the tide. The great aristocratic families all came asking for our hands. Mother even forgot to fake her tears. Every day, she beamed with joy as she received one guest and sent off another.

This world had gone mad, and so had the people in it.

After much careful selection, Mother chose Pei Qian, the Second Young Master of the Pei Clan of Hedong, for me.

Everyone said he was elegant, graceful, wild, and unrestrained-the foremost romantic figure of Great Wei.

At that, I thought of my father, sprinting along with all that pale flesh jiggling in the wind.

I despised these so-called eminent gentlemen from the bottom of my heart.

As it turned out, he would rather change his name and identity than marry me. Excellent. That suited me perfectly.

In the unluckiest year of my life, a wandering Daoist priest came to town.

He gave my father an idea: have me worship a Household Guardian Immortal to suppress my bad luck, and maybe I would live past the age of ten.

My father was a rough man who had made his fortune in troubled times by the barrel of a gun.

He called his adjutant over and did the math for him. “One Household Guardian Immortal keeps her alive to ten, two keep her alive to twenty, and twenty keep her alive to two hundred. Right?”

The adjutant counted on his fingers. “Marshal, your math is absolutely correct.”

My father hardened his heart and rounded up all the pigs, cattle, and sheep from miles around as offerings.

“My damn girl is going to live ten thousand years!”

That year, my father rode into the old mountain forest on a pig with me and took eleven Household Guardian Immortal into our household.

He flew into a rage. “Damn it, that’s still one short of the twelve zodiac animals!”

Later, who knew where he bought a Daoist boy from, but that made the twelfth.

Madam Shen was unable to bear children, so she wanted to buy a respectable concubine to carry on the family line for Eldest Master Shen.

A respectable concubine received two taels of silver every month, and even got to eat white rice with braised pork.

The moment I heard the news, I immediately told my mother to take me into the city to sign up.

My mother smacked me on the head and snapped, “I’ve given birth to three children, and you’re the stupidest of the lot!”

I have died seven times.

Every single time, I died on the day my husband asked for a divorce.

He doesn’t love me. Seven years of marriage proved to be fragile and worthless the moment his White Moonlight returned to the country.

The System told me that if I wanted to live, I had to defeat the White Moonlight.

Miscarriages, acting as a body double, framing her… my methods became increasingly ruthless.

However, just as I finally approached the finish line-when my Marriage Reconciliation Success Rate reached 99.99%-

I was the one who handed over the Divorce Agreement.

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.”

I met a girl at a bar while I was away on business and ended up sleeping with her.

I thought it was just a one-night stand.

Little did I know, it was the beginning of a nightmare.

Shen Shiji once saved my life, pulling me from a pile of corpses.

In the years before I was recognized by the palace and returned to my royal roots, he taught me to read and practice martial arts, treating me with the utmost tenderness.

That was until I killed the woman he had loved for years.

To avenge her, Shen Shiji became my Prince Consort.

He spent years plotting to turn everyone against me, stripping me of my allies and family. After subjecting me to every imaginable torment, he threw me back into that same pile of corpses.

Shen Shiji told me his greatest regret was saving me all those years ago.

And so, having been reborn, I scrambled out of that pile of corpses on my own, wasting no time.

Later, I heard that it rained heavily that day.

The usually aloof Young Marquis Shen ignored the filth and the mud, kneeling in the pile of corpses and digging until his hands were bloody and raw.

All just to find a Little Beggar.

I am a Bone Demon, trapped for countless years within that cold, desolate graveyard.

No one can see me, and no one can hear me. I have spent centuries in solitary silence.

Until one midsummer, when the sun was shining just right.

A young girl came to sweep the graves, but she mistakenly offered her tributes to me.

I took a bite of a crisp peach and said, “Truly sweet.”

She froze for a moment, then covered her mouth and stifled a giggle.

“Next year, I’ll come again.”

True to her word, she returned year after year, bringing me crisp peaches every time.

Later, she died, and her remains were carelessly tossed into the graveyard.

Her five-year-old daughter, clutching the hand of a younger brother who had only just learned to walk, came to the graveyard day and night to wail for their mother.

I couldn’t stand the noise.

I possessed her body, crawled out from the straw mat, and clumsily gathered those two little brats into my arms.

“Keep crying, and Mother will eat you.”

After I died, my bones became the sword in his hand.

Little did he know that I rarely exercised while I was alive, and I’d developed osteoporosis at a young age.

The sword forged from my bones was sharp enough, but it lacked resilience.

The very first time he used me, someone lopped off his head.