Arranged Marriage

After my eldest sister took her own life, her marriage to the Heir of the Marquis of Changping was passed down to my second sister.

After my second sister took her own life, the original betrothal landed on my head.

Less than half a year after marrying into Changping Marquis Manor, I wanted to take my own life too.

Just as I was hesitating over whether to hang myself like my eldest sister or swallow gold like my second sister, the heir returned from disaster relief.

And he brought back a concubine.

I looked at the delicate, beautiful concubine and nearly wept with joy.

Wonderful. In this grand, suffocating mansion, I was finally not the only unlucky one anymore.

After my elder sister passed away, I entered the palace and became the new empress.

The emperor asked me to choose one of the princes to raise as my own.

The moment my fingers brushed against the two princes, I saw two chaotic glimpses of the future.

If I chose the Third Prince, he would one day ascend the throne, slaughter my entire family, and stab me to death.

If I chose the Ninth Prince, then after he became emperor, he would have me fake my death and confine me within the palace, turning me into a reviled temptress spat on by all.

I fell silent for a moment, then raised my hand and pointed at the little princess peeking in from behind the doorframe.

“Your Majesty, I believe I share a greater affinity with the Thirteenth Princess.”

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?

When I returned from recuperating at the country estate, there was already a new young lady in the household.

My elder brother protected her like she was a precious pearl.

My little sister had been bullied by her until she fell gravely ill.

With a bleak, bitter smile, she said, “Sister, let’s just accept our fate. Either way, we can’t fight her.”

No sooner had she finished speaking than a pretty, charming girl came out on my brother’s arm, the pearl-studded uppers of her shoes gleaming brightly.

“So you’re Second Sister?”

How beautiful. If only the fabric weren’t from the love-token handkerchief I had embroidered for my fiancé.

Seeing this, my brother immediately took her side. He said to me, “Yaoyao is spoiled, but she means no harm. Rongshu, let her have her way.”

Then he turned back and chided her in feigned anger, “Don’t make trouble.”

The girl didn’t take it seriously at all. Instead, she stuck out her tongue.

“It’s just a handkerchief. Brother Jingwen said it only looks beautiful when worn on my feet. Sister wouldn’t be angry over this, would she? How petty.”

I was indeed petty. So I raised the knife and brought it down.

The tip of her tongue landed on her shoe.

I was the daughter of a noble house, personally chosen by the emperor to enter the palace. With a single imperial edict, I was made Noble Consort. Everyone envied my good fortune, never knowing that within a gilded cage, even a sparrow cannot fly free. On the day I entered the palace, the matron attending my bath told me: “His Majesty is gentle and kind. Your Grace, do not be afraid.” But in this fathomless palace, the very earth was piled with bones. Every terror within these walls had been wrought by his own hand.

When my younger sister went to Songshan Temple to pray for blessings, she saved Prince Rui, who had been gravely wounded and fallen unconscious.

After Prince Rui woke, he left her a jade pendant as a token and promised that if she ever found herself in trouble, she could come to Prince Rui’s Mansion for help.

Two months later, I went to the mansion.

I said to Prince Rui: “Do you still remember what happened outside Songshan Temple?”

I claimed her deed as my own and successfully became his princess consort.

But in the second year after our marriage, my younger sister came to visit.

Right in front of Prince Rui, she took out that jade pendant.

Marquis Dingbei, Lu Chenzhou, had three wishes in life. First, a smooth career in court. Second, a prosperous household. Third, to marry the woman he loved. The first two were within easy reach. Only the third remained beyond him-unattainable, forbidden, inescapable. They said another man’s wife was not to be taken. But what if that woman was the wife he had divorced in his previous life?

I woke up in my arch-rival’s bed.

His clothes were in disarray, his body was covered in red marks, and his eyes were clouded with the lingering haze of intimacy.

Shocked and enraged, I pointed at him and yelled, “Traitorous Chancellor, how dare you defile me-”

“This Chancellor has fulfilled every custom from the three letters to the six rites. Why would I not dare?” he countered calmly.

“Nonsense!” My eyes widened. “When did I ever marry you?”

“Not long ago,” he said, his long eyes narrowing as he looked at me, “while you were suffering from amnesia.”

I was a female scripture teacher who recited sutras for the madam of the household.

Yet in the middle of the night, someone cornered me behind the incense-draped curtains and asked me who was better-looking: him or the Bodhisattva.

That night, I did not choose the Bodhisattva.

Unfortunately, after barely three months, he came to bid me farewell.

I thought he had simply grown tired of me, so I agreed without fuss.

From then on, he lived beneath the glow of red lanterns, lost in endless pleasure, while I returned alone to the ancient Buddha and my solitary lamp.

Who would have thought that later, when he learned I had been drowned in a pond… He went mad.

The Han army captured Luoyang. My husband, His Majesty himself, knelt at the rebels’ feet, trembling like a lamb waiting for slaughter.

“The Empress is in Jiaofang Hall. Please, don’t kill me…”

I had been married to him for five years and had given birth to our daughter, Princess Heqing.

Yet at the moment of crisis, he offered me up without the slightest hesitation.