Tragedy

My father was a treacherous official.

The man who raided my home was my fiancé.

When he slipped the iron chain around my neck, his touch was even more tender than the year he placed a flower wreath upon my head.

On the day my father was beheaded in public, I was calmly picking lice off my mother. I remarked, “If I had a fire, I could stir-fry these lice and pair them with a pot of wine.”

Unexpectedly, my words drew a laugh from the young general in the neighboring cell, despite the hooks driven through his collarbones. Was it that funny?

The tattoo on the back of Wei Yan’s neck was the initials of his ex-girlfriend’s name.

The only reason he had spared me a second glance in that vast sea of people was because my eyes and brows bore a striking resemblance to hers.

My father was the most formidable businessman in the Republic of China. On my seventh birthday, the gift he gave me was a handgun.

I blinked at him. “But Papa, I’m a girl.”

Father pondered for a moment, realizing that it was indeed inappropriate. He then turned to the butler and ordered, “Go have a custom gun made for the Young Miss. Make it pink.”

In the third month after our wedding, Shao Zhi took me back to Luoyang to pay respects to his clansmen. Along the way, he carefully explained the web of interests within his clan.

When he mentioned his eldest brother, his face filled with pride.

“My eldest brother is a very good man. He taught me riding and archery himself! ”

Now he serves in Luoyang as the Central Army Commander.

He is the one we are going to meet today.

” I hated Luoyang. There, someone had once forced me to drink a ladle of water from the Luo River and swear an oath: from then on, we would each marry another and never disturb each other again. Clutching the konghou in my arms, I only lowered my head and tried to refuse. ”

Ah Zhi, I was once a music courtesan.

I fear I might sully your honored brother’s eyes and ears.

It would be better if I did not meet him…

” Shao Zhi gathered me into his arms with pity and held my hand, telling me not to worry. ”

He won’t mind. I’ll secretly tell you a bit of gossip about my brother.

Before he married my sister-in-law, he once turned the whole world upside down over a music courtesan who played the konghou.

Later, afraid my sister-in-law would grow jealous, he forced that courtesan to drink from the Luo River and swear that they would each marry another and never disturb each other again.

“Besides, you are my wife now, and you play a fine twenty-three-string konghou. For my sake, my brother is sure to like you.”

Elder Sister was a physician.

After she treated the Noble Consort, the Emperor praised her for having a “miraculous touch.”

Consumed by jealousy, the Noble Consort had Elder Sister’s hands severed.

She smiled and said, “I hear Doctor Song’s medical skills are peerless. In that case, heal your own stumps.”

She denied Elder Sister water and medicine, watching as she slowly succumbed to the agonizing pain.

Six years later, the Noble Consort contracted a strange illness that left her wishing for death.

I stepped forward and reported, “There is one person in this world who can cure this ailment.”

Hope flared in the Noble Consort’s eyes. “Bring this divine physician here at once! I will pay any price!”

I shook my head with regret. “Six years ago, Your Ladyship killed her with your own hands.”

There is no spring in the Sea of No Return.

On the eve of our wedding, Shang Wujiu personally gouged out my Heart Lamp and sealed me within the Sea of No Return.

Three hundred years later, he knelt by the shore, begging me to return.

But he didn’t know that the lamp-the very thing that had extended his life-had long since burned into ash at the bottom of the sea.

The boy I loved died in the prime of his life.

So, I traveled back twenty years, giving everything I had to bring him even a single glimmer of hope.

Gu Zhixian, you probably won’t believe me, but I’m your future wife…

Gu Zhixian, the future you is a wonderful, kind-hearted person.

Gu Zhixian, we’re going to have a precious child in the future. They’ll have your eyes and my eyebrows.

So, please don’t give up on yourself, okay?

The boy I loved believed me.

As the clock prepares to strike midnight, it’s time for me to go.

I’m sorry. I lied to you. I am not your wife.

And in our future, we will never meet again.

After my Imperial Mother Consort died, I was given three foster mothers in succession.

Of those three foster mothers, some were deposed, and the others were ordered to die.

In the end, I landed in Beauty Lin’s care.

For three years, she and I lived together in peace, without incident.

Until she offended the wrong person and was thrown into the Office of Punishment.

My heart gave a jolt. Oh no. It looked like I was going to have to change foster mothers again.

Worse still, this time, she was the only one I wanted.

July 14, 2018. My flight was delayed due to weather, and I didn’t land until three in the morning.

As soon as I turned on my phone, I received a call from my senior. He told me to get to Baoshan Hospital immediately. Now!

I asked him what was wrong, telling him to explain himself first.

“Xiaoyu,” he said. “Something happened to Xiaoyu.”

My ears began to ring, and a splitting headache took hold.

That day was the third anniversary of my relationship with Qiu Xiaoyu. If the plane hadn’t been delayed, I would have proposed at midnight.

At four-thirty in the morning, I saw her at the hospital.

She was covered with a white sheet. Her exposed skin was deathly pale, and when I took her hand, it was cold and stiff.

It didn’t feel like Xiaoyu’s hand at all.

But the autopsy report stated it clearly: Qiu Xiaoyu had died in a car accident at 6:10 PM at the intersection of Qinghe Road and Wenshuo Road.

“It was a truck. The driver was exhausted and didn’t slow down before… Li Tong!” My senior suddenly grabbed my hand tightly.

My hand was just about to lift the white cloth covering Xiaoyu’s face.

“Let go,” I said.

“Li Tong, it’s better… if you don’t look.”

Choking back a sob, I repeated, “Let go.”

He stopped blocking me.

I slowly pulled back the sheet.

She was still beautiful, her features soft, just like when she tried to sleep in every morning.

Only, there seemed to be a wound on her neck.

And that wound extended downward. It grew deeper and larger, until her entire body…

Was completely destroyed.

I collapsed to my knees.

It felt as if a knife had been driven through my heart. My eyes stung, but there were no tears, and I couldn’t make a single sound.

“Did you forget our anniversary? You have to make it up to me tomorrow.”

I knew it was an auditory hallucination; those were the words from the WeChat message Xiaoyu had sent me.

The final WeChat message of her life.

Our entire story had somehow ended on such an unremarkable sentence…

Suddenly, my throat tightened, and I retched, vomiting up mouthfuls of bile.

It has been three years since I transmigrated into this brothel.

I have mastered the arts of seduction, and no one knows better than I how to make a man lose his very soul in ecstasy.

But then, I overheard a group of new girls gossiping.

“It’s hilarious. Our Flower Queen really thinks she’s living in ancient times.”

“A refined Female Doctor, tricked into working as a whore for three years. These rich people really know how to have a good time.”

“Do you think she’d go insane if she found out this was all orchestrated by her ‘Young Marquis’?”

“Shh! Every actor who comes in here has signed a life-and-death waiver. Who would dare let her know?”

I froze in place, as if plunged into a pit of ice.

Could it be that these three years of transmigration were nothing more than a scam?

Before I could regain my composure, the Young Marquis’s cold voice suddenly rang out from behind me.

“Fudong, what are you doing here?”