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Heart Revealed

He Qiong was hailed as the strongest Demon King the demon realm had seen in a thousand years, and every demon expected him to lead them in an assault on the Nine Heavens.

Unfortunately, before that grand ambition could be realized, a beautiful young phoenix lured him into the Celestial Emperor’s ambush and his soul was destroyed.

I fought desperately to seize one fragment of his soul, then hid across the mortal realm like a hunted dog and nourished him with my heart’s blood for five hundred years until I finally brought him back.

Surely hardship revealed true devotion, and after everything I had sacrificed to save him, He Qiong would finally understand who truly loved him and who deserved to stand at his side.

I thought his return would begin a tale of the Demon King bathing the Nine Heavens in blood, but instead it became a tortured romance between him and the Goddess of the Nine Heavens-the little phoenix who had stabbed him in the back a thousand years ago killed herself for love afterward, and the moment he learned the truth, he forgave every betrayal.

Fine, they could keep their tragic, undying love; I knew when I had lost, and I wanted no part of it.

But the love belonged to them while the suffering belonged to me, because just before I left, He Qiong held the phoenix’s last soul fragment and said, “Du Nan, your heart’s blood brought me back after five hundred years, so you can bring her back too, can’t you?”

Jiaruo

The day I married into the Gu marquis’s household, my father-in-law died and my mother-in-law fell ill.

The wedding feast became a funeral banquet, and I was forced to take charge in the midst of the crisis, assuming control of the household and carrying the funeral through with composure.

My husband thanked me for preserving the Gu family’s dignity, yet never set foot in my room again.

In time, he filled the household with concubines and fathered a brood of sons and daughters by them.

I raised them conscientiously and planned for their futures.

Then I overheard my husband speaking to them behind my back.

“I have never met anyone as coldhearted as your mother. Your grandfather died, and she did not shed a single tear. You may call her Mother, but never learn from her. She is unworthy of the name.”

By then, a physician had already told me I did not have long to live.

Not one of those children came to visit me or bring me medicine; they simply left me to die.

With my last strength, I set fire to the Gu residence and burned that cold, loveless place to the ground.

When I opened my eyes again, I had been reborn.

The Gu family came to propose marriage, and as I looked at the refined, handsome man before me, we spoke the same words at the same time.

“I refuse.”

It turned out I was not the only one who had returned.

Green Branches

The Noble Consort resorted to every conceivable means to secure a baby boy, plotting to pass off another woman’s son as her own so she could regain the emperor’s favor.

On the day she gave birth, she sent her men to a secluded village, where they murdered a young couple and abducted their swaddled infant.

I survived by hiding inside a rice vat.

But what she didn’t know was that the village was called Half-Ghost Village.

Once its residents turned fifty, they began aging in reverse.

The baby her men had taken was my Great-grandfather.

Peach Blossom

In the third year after I married Zhao Yan, he made me Empress.

On one condition: I was not to lay a finger on the Imperial Noble Consort he held so dearly in his heart.

He seemed to have forgotten that I was his lawful wife first.

Gathering Love

I am the Deity of Marriage. One day, without warning, I fell into darkness.

On the day I became a fallen god, thirty-six phoenixes danced in unison above the Nine Heavens. Within Yuze Palace, divine light blazed, and auspicious homage arrived from every direction.

Li Lan was taking his Heavenly Consort as his bride.

The Temptation of Retribution

After my rebirth, that wayward young man whose fleeting impulse for fun had destroyed my family had already turned over a new leaf and redeemed himself. He was engaged to his childhood sweetheart and had become a young entrepreneur admired by all.

So I did everything in my power to marry him.

A Mountain in Bloom

In my last life, I saved He Yan, the young master of a marquis manor.

He took me as his wife, and for a time, our marriage was the talk of Shangjing.

But I had been born and raised in the countryside.

My manners were crude, and my reputation gradually soured.

He Yan, too, slowly grew distant from me.

I wept day after day, and before I even reached thirty, I died in misery.

Given a second chance, I swore I would never live that way again.

Only, after eating wild greens for three days straight, I realized I simply could not let go of the marquis manor’s soy-braised pork knuckle, sticky rice chicken, crab roe lion’s head meatballs, scallion-fried lamb…

The Sound of That Year’s Waves

On the day the Su Clan was raided and seized, Father dressed me in a magnificent gown and threw me in front of the soldiers.

“She is Su Yueying, the Eldest Young Miss of the Su Clan.”

Everyone said Father was a loyal servant.

When I saw him again, Father had become the New Emperor’s most trusted Divine Martial Great General.

Su Yueying had become Empress, the New Emperor’s one and only for the rest of his life.

And I was a courtesan in a brothel, a woman anyone could have.

To buy back my freedom, Mother dragged her gravely ill body to beg Father for help.

The gatekeepers beat her to death with two strikes of their staves.

I begged Su Yueying to let Mother be buried.

But she said, “There are plenty of untouched entertainers in the pleasure houses. If you had held fast to your principles, I might still have helped you. But you chose to debase yourself. I will not help someone like that.”

That very night, someone hacked off my limbs and sank me into the river.

When I opened my eyes again, I had returned to the day the Su Clan was raided.

This time, let Su Yueying go to the brothel herself and hold fast to her precious principles.

Lychee Cream

My elder sister loved sweets.

Every year, when lychee paste was sent from home, the first box was always hers.

As a child, I was greedy and stole a taste.

Mother frowned and said,

“Your sister is frail. Let her have it.”

Later, I kept giving way and giving way, until even my marriage was pushed behind hers.

When the Crown Prince came to consider a match, my elder sister disliked all the rules of the Eastern Palace and turned around to choose an Idle Prince instead.

So everyone’s eyes fell on me.

The Crown Prince said gently,

“The Second Young Lady will do as well.”

I married him.

After our wedding, he treated me well enough. It was just that every year, when lychee paste was presented as tribute, he would first send someone to deliver it to my sister’s residence.

I asked him about it once.

He smiled.

“Your sister loves this.”

“You’ve always been sensible. You won’t mind.”

Until, on his deathbed, he clutched my hand and suddenly called out my sister’s childhood name.

When I opened my eyes again, I had returned to the day the Crown Prince came to consider a match.

Mother pushed me forward.

I took one step back and said softly,

“This subject’s daughter already has someone in her heart. I fear I am not blessed enough to enter the Eastern Palace.”