Cunning Protagonist

I was never born to be harmless.

At three, I stabbed the young master next door in the eye with a hairpin, simply because he had peeped at my mother while she was bathing.

At five, I set fire to a theater, merely because I saw the troupe buying and selling children.

At ten, I secretly brought people with me and crippled the censor’s grandson.

Who told him to harass my elder sister in the street?

There were countless incidents like these… Later, I married a good man.

Everyone in his family was kind and decent, and I nearly died of boredom in the inner household.

When I was reborn on the day the Emperor granted marriages to my elder sister and me, I decisively swapped marriages with her.

In my previous life, less than two years after my sister married into the Duke’s Mansion, she passed away like a withered flower.

My sister had been reborn too.

With tears in her eyes, she said, “Second Sister, the Duke’s Mansion is a death trap! You can’t marry into it!” I was thrilled. “But… Sister, I was born a bad seed.”

On the day of my wedding to my husband, a female warrior barged in.

She lifted my bridal veil, pinched my cheek with a grin, and praised, “What a tender little bride!” Then she drifted away as lightly as she had come.

From that day on, a black ink stain appeared on my face. No matter what I tried, I could not wash it off.

My husband despised me and never once set foot in my room again.

My mother-in-law resented me for occupying the position of mistress of the household while failing to bear any children.

Even my sister-in-law sighed over her brother’s miserable fate, saying he had married an ugly woman.

I became the invisible mistress of the Marquis’s Mansion.

I worked without complaint and managed the household affairs.

I raised the son adopted into our branch and devoted myself wholeheartedly to planning for the Marquis’s Mansion.

Only when I accidentally saw my husband and the female warrior admiring flowers together on a spring outing did I finally learn the truth.

My husband and the female warrior had fallen in love at first sight long ago.

Unwilling to be bound by the rules of the Marquis’s Mansion, the female warrior had abandoned my husband and left. Yet she could not bear to hand the man she loved over to another woman, so she used a secret drug to ruin my face.

And my husband had found the female warrior long ago. He had obtained the antidote, but under the spell of her tears and tenderness, he threw it away and promised her that his heart would never waver.

For her, he kept himself pure in the Marquis’s Mansion. Outside the estate, he lived in perfect harmony with her, and they had a son and a daughter.

Their son was given to me to raise so he could inherit the Marquis’s Mansion’s estate.

Their daughter stayed by their side to bring them joy, and in the future, they would recruit a husband to marry into the family for her.

All these years, they had lived in bliss. I was the only one who suffered.

I secretly drugged the female warrior with Soft Tendon Powder, then set the villa on fire. After notifying my husband and son to come put out the flames, I had them bound up like thieves and thrown into the burning villa as well.

Knowing I had committed a capital crime, I wrote a petition in blood and struck the Dengwen Drum, accusing the Marquis’s Mansion of favoring an outside mistress and abusing the lawful wife.

The Marquis’s Mansion was stripped of its title and demoted. I was sentenced to death.

The Empress pitied me and granted me a divorce before I died.

From then on, I was no longer a wife of the Lu family. I was only a daughter of the Li Family.

After my death, I saw the masses spit curses at the Marquis’s Mansion. I also saw them call me a venomous woman.

Right and wrong, truth and blame-let others say what they pleased. But my life had indeed been wasted.

When I opened my eyes again, I had returned to the day of my wedding.

The female warrior flew straight toward me with a cheerful grin.

I yanked my husband in front of me as fast as I could.

This time, it was my husband’s face that was stained with a large black mark.

When he called out his first love’s name in the heat of passion, I knew that woman had to die.

The General and I were wed by imperial decree, our families perfectly matched in status. In a marriage like this, I never expected much in the way of affection.

Yet, he brought back a woman from his past-his “white moonlight.” She was pregnant, and he even intended to raise her status to that of an Equal Wife.

He does not understand me. Though I am a virtuous and kind wife, I will never allow another woman to claim a share of my husband.

I am the female lead of a PO novel, thrown into a clean romance novel by the system to be reformed.

Hilarious. I walked straight up to the male lead and said, “Hey, wanna kiss?” The male lead threw me in jail, claiming I had sexually harassed him.

Later on, he became even more unhinged than the male lead of a PO novel.

In my previous life, a woman armed with a conquest system won over my parents, my brothers, and my fiance one after another.

They adored her, indulged her, and let everything go her way until she stood at the height of favor.

As for me, everyone despised me.

I was imprisoned in a secluded palace alley for life, forbidden to take even half a step beyond its gates.

Only after I died did I learn that she had come from another world, and that every bit of my suffering fed her luck. Reborn, I traded away a lifetime of love for a single wish.

The Bodhisattva asked me, “What do you want?”

I whispered, “I want everyone she targets to know that she is here only to conquer them.”

And from that moment on, they could all hear her conquest alerts.

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.

I found a Bluetooth remote control in my husband’s bag.

I didn’t make a scene. I didn’t even confront him.

I just secretly paired it with my phone.

The next day,

at my younger brother-in-law’s wedding,

my husband’s scream rang out from beneath the bride’s skirt.

My younger sister eloped with a penniless scholar, and her cold-hearted fiancé broke down my door, demanding that I take her place.

I was so scared I clutched my waistband and begged for mercy.

“Brother-in-law, how can you blame this on me?”

The two cinnabar moles beneath his eyes were as red as blood, and his tone was utterly indifferent.

“An elder sister is like a mother. In other words, every grievance has its culprit, and every debt has its debtor.”

“So, are you coming with me on your own, or am I dragging you away?”

Th-thrilling. Was this the domineering forced-love plot they wrote about in storybooks?

The weak could not fight the strong, so I was just about to get out of bed when I realized my sister had run off wearing the only pair of padded winter pants in the house.

Left with no choice, I lay right back down.

“Forget it. It’s freezing out, so let’s not move.”

“If you’re going to seize me, then seize me. Hurry up, while the blankets are still warm…”

“…”

-A laid-back heroine who sleeps through the abduction x an action-oriented hero who carries on abducting while she sleeps.

On the day my elder sister died of illness, I took my nephew to the Marquis’s Mansion to claim kinship.

The Second Young Master of the Marquis’s Mansion was in the middle of his wedding, and the place was bustling with celebration.

When the Marchioness saw the jade pendant I brought out, she nearly fainted.

She hid behind a screen and, suppressing her anger, said, “If the Chancellor’s Daughter finds out about the evil deed he committed, this marriage will be ruined!”

An old nanny offered her advice in a low voice.

“Madam, don’t panic. Back then, the Second Young Master said that woman had been drugged and never saw his face clearly.

“It was only because he left in such a hurry that he dropped this family heirloom jade pendant and gave someone leverage over him.

“Since this woman has come looking for us, we can simply pin the whole matter on the Eldest Young Master.”

I had possessed astonishingly sharp hearing since childhood, so I heard every word of their little conspiracy.

In truth, whether it was the Eldest Young Master or the Second Young Master made no difference to me.

It did not matter who became my husband.

What mattered was that my nephew would have a good place to study.

The Marquis Manor Clan School had a great scholar of the current dynasty presiding over it.

It would not waste his natural gifts.

When Xie Yan was diagnosed with stomach cancer, I was abroad, clearing my head.

He was calling for the hundredth time when my secretary-a man standing six-foot-two-finally picked up the phone.

“Where are you? Who is that with you?” I heard his voice crack over the line, sounding like he was on the verge of a total breakdown.

I couldn’t help but let out a mocking sneer. “Didn’t we agree to stay out of each other’s business? Why are you acting like such a sore loser now?”