Chapter 3

Chapter 3

When I married him, I was only sixteen.

On our wedding night, he did not consummate the marriage with me. The reason he gave was that I was young, and he could not bear to make me suffer.

I thought he cherished me, so I placed my whole heart on him.

I managed the household for him and kept everything in perfect order.

In the eyes of outsiders, we were a deeply loving couple.

For two years after the wedding, he remained clean and self-restrained.

When colleagues invited him to drink with courtesans, he refused every time and even said there was a fierce wife at home.

For a time, it became a much-praised story.

Even though he had always treated me coldly at home, I never doubted his feelings for me.

I thought he was simply cold by nature.

Until I turned eighteen, and he still had no intention of consummating our marriage.

I was a young woman. My birth mother had died early, and my father had passed away. I did not even know whom I should ask about such matters.

Later, I gathered my courage and imitated the women of the pleasure quarters. I prepared a table of wine and dishes and invited him to drink. During the meal, I loosened my clothes halfway and sat in his lap.

But he shoved me away and asked where I had learned such filthy tricks.

He said they made him sick.

I will never forget the way he looked at me then.

Three parts contempt, three parts disgust, and twelve parts condescension.

As if in his eyes, I were something lowly and filthy.

Ashamed and angry, I stood there at a loss as he swept his sleeves and left.

For a very long time afterward, he ignored me.

Though we lived under the same roof, he treated me as air.

Even looking at me once seemed to dirty his eyes.

At that time, I was too young. I did not know this was his way of training me.

He was grinding down my pride and trampling my dignity.

He wanted to turn me into a pitiful creature in the inner residence who could only grieve over myself and follow his lead in everything.

Back then, I did not know what to do. Every day, I only dared hide under the covers and cry in secret.

Thinking of this, rage rose in me again, and I slapped Shen Xu once more.

He caught my hand and warned me not to push my luck.

“Do you truly think I would not dare hit you?”

I stroked his face and laughed softly.

“Then hit me. If you strike me today, tomorrow I will make sure the entire world knows that the Tanhua Scholar abuses his lawful wife, and that wife happens to be the daughter of his benefactor. I wonder whether His Majesty would like such a rumor?”

Anger churned in Shen Xu’s eyes, but in the end, he did not dare move.

I knew he did not dare hit me.

At this moment, his whole heart was set on climbing upward for the sake of his Empress.

His reputation could not tolerate the slightest flaw.

It was hard for him, truly, to lower his head and pretend to be deeply affectionate. He rubbed his cheek against mine intimately.

“Kezhen, have you misunderstood me, or perhaps listened to some slander?”

“You and I grew up together. You should know my heart is filled only with you.”

“My birth was not illustrious. To reach where I am today was not easy.”

“As husband and wife, we are one body, sharing honor and disgrace. I devote myself to my career only for the sake of your future dignity.”

“Since you are my wife, you should manage the inner residence well for me and leave me with no worries behind me.”

Shen Xu had a pair of affectionate eyes.

When he looked at someone intently, it was hard not to feel the illusion that you were the only person in his eyes.

If I were still the Su Kezhen of my previous life, after hearing these words, I would probably have crossed mountains of knives and seas of fire for him.

Unfortunately, that Su Kezhen was already dead.

The one standing before him now was a lonely ghost who wished she could grind his bones to dust.

And he only soothed me because he could neither divorce me nor do without me as a puppet.

I stroked his face, then slapped him again. “What a pity. A lowly thing like you, born of your mother’s adultery, is hardly worthy of loving me.”

Shen Xu stared at me, wishing he could swallow me alive.

But in the end, he only gritted his teeth and left.

I sat on the bright red wedding quilt and watched his back, my mind filled with ways to send him and Meng Han to their deaths.

Since they loved each other so much, would it not be a shame if I did not make their love known throughout the world?