Domestic Affairs

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.

My husband brought home a child.

I raised him as my own, teaching him poetry, books, and proper etiquette.

I molded him into a noble young gentleman skilled in both letters and arms.

Years later, when he had risen to the highest ranks of court, he locked me away in a dark dungeon.

With both hands, he crushed my jaw. “My birth mother was Shuang’er, the woman you murdered.”

“A venomous woman like you thinks she deserves to be my mother?”

My husband stood by and watched, his palms pressed together in prayer.

“Shuang’er, may your spirit finally rest in peace.”

After being tortured to death, I was reborn.

Faced with the child my husband had brought home, I still smiled and said, “Of course. From now on, he will be my own son.”

I found a chat log on Sheng Jing’s phone.

He had sent his female assistant a video of me helping Jiu Jiu with her homework and losing my temper.

“This is why I’d rather work overtime at the office than come home.”

The young assistant replied with a “poor you, sending hugs” sticker. “Manager Sheng, you have it so hard.

Work is exhausting enough, and then you have to deal with all that when you get home.”

My wife is the kindest person in the world to me.

I know I should cherish her, but looking at her body, which has been out of shape since she gave birth, I honestly can’t muster a spark of interest.

I ended up keeping a mistress on the side. She’s been pressuring me to get a divorce, but I refuse.

I tell her that my wife loves me too much-that she wouldn’t be able to survive without me.

I’ll stay in this marriage out of pity for her.

On the day my mother divorced, she held me in her arms and tore down the notice from the Marquis Mansion.

The Marquis Mansion was looking for a successor wife, which also meant finding a stepmother for the Young Heir.

A crowd of young women in the prime of their youth, as beautiful as flowers, stood at the mansion gates. They were waiting for the Old Madam to look them over, hoping to enter the household and live a life of comfort.

My brother and father mocked Mother for her wishful thinking.

“Mother has no shame, trying to remarry at her age while dragging along a burden like my sister.”

“Sang Zhi, do you think the Marquis Mansion taking a wife is like buying someone at the village entrance? Do you think being a successor wife or a stepmother is easy?”

I knew I was the one holding Mother back from remarrying, and I sobbed until I was out of breath. “M-Mother, Tao Tao is a burden. Don’t worry about Tao Tao anymore.”

Mother knelt down, gently wiping away my tears as she comforted me earnestly. “Tao Tao isn’t a burden. Tao Tao is Mother’s most precious treasure.”

Matron Deng, the steward of the Marquis Mansion, held the register and lifted her chin arrogantly. Her sharp eyes coldly swept over the group of anxious, quiet young women. Suddenly, she spotted Mother, who was wiping my tears and speaking in a soft, gentle voice. She gave a nearly imperceptible nod.

“Write her name down as well. She actually looks like a mother.”

“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?”

The woman who lived across from us was beautiful, with a captivating, mature allure.

Every man in the building was bewitched by her. Only my husband scoffed.

But when the elevator suddenly plunged,

he completely forgot about me and our daughter. He turned around and pulled her tightly into his arms.

So tightly it was as if he wanted to press her into his own body.

I am a mushroom. But my master doesn’t see it that way.

Whenever I tell him I’m a mushroom that gained sentience, he just lets out a long, heavy sigh.

Aside from that, he’s very good to me. He cooks for me, buys me clothes, watches boring arthouse movies with me…

On every late night I spend curled up in the corner, after he gets home from working overtime, he quietly carries me back to bed.

He even told me he wanted to have a child with me. At that, I clutched my stomach and burst out laughing.

“Please. How could a human and a mushroom possibly have a baby?”

We reproduce by spores. Have you never heard of reproductive isolation?

…

Until one day, I stared at the pregnancy test with two bright lines on it and completely short-circuited.