Chapter 1

Pawnshop Number Whatever existed in the void.

Our customers were people consumed by an obsession. When they fell asleep at night, their souls left their bodies and came here.

As the shopkeeper, I arrived in the same way.

To avoid running into anyone I knew, I usually dressed as a man and wore a white mask that covered my whole face. I even altered my voice.

When Mistress Wang from next door came in last night, she had no idea that the shopkeeper of Pawnshop Number Whatever

was that shrew of a Huo daughter-in-law who had chased her halfway down the street that very day, cursing her over a bunch of bent scallions by the wall.

“Shopkeeper, your mind is wandering.”

Tonight’s customer was my husband Huo Cizhou, away on campaign. His cold eyes narrowed slightly as he reminded me in an even voice.

I snapped back to myself.

I looked at him, a jumble of feelings stirring inside me.

“Sir, you said you wanted to pawn your wife outright?”

“Yes. I don’t like her.”

Liar.

Just a month ago, before leaving home, he had held me close on our bed, murmuring my name over and over, telling me how he adored the way I looked when I blushed.

The wretch!

Mother was right. A man’s mouth was full of lies.

“Certainly, sir. I’ll arrange that now. What would you like in exchange for your wife?”

He frowned in thought for a moment, then asked,

“What can I get for her?”

“One moment. Let me check.”

I gave the faintest twitch of my lips and opened the pawnshop’s rulebook.

“Here we are. If you pawn your wife outright, you may receive another six months of life, twenty taels of silver, or a cure for an illness of moderate severity.”

“A living person is worth so little?”

His brow tightened, and he gave me a hostile look.

“Your pawnshop is a swindle.”

The corners of my mouth lifted in a faint smile.

“Sir, you’re pawning a wife, not a concubine. Your wife is not your property. What belongs to you is the position of wife in your household. It’s only a position. Naturally, it isn’t worth much.”

Since ancient times, wives had been free persons under the law. They could regain their independence through a divorce by mutual consent.

Concubines, on the other hand, were their husbands’ private property, to be bought and sold at will.

“So that’s how it works.”

His expression darkened a little, and a shadow stirred in his eyes.

“Then I can’t pawn it. I need to keep the position of wife for the woman I love.”

The woman he loved?

I lowered my lashes, hiding the emotions churning in my eyes.

“Then you need only repudiate your wife or agree to a divorce. Why pawn her? Even one day of marriage leaves a hundred days of affection. Isn’t this rather ruthless, sir?”

Huo Cizhou remained calm in the face of my accusation.

He had fought his way through mountains of corpses and seas of blood. There was little he had not seen. Naturally, a few words from me would not bring his feelings to his face.

He met my eyes and raised his brows slightly.

“Ruthless? Shopkeeper, you immortals know nothing of mortal hardship. You wouldn’t understand why a man who doesn’t look out for himself deserves to be destroyed. Nor would you understand that with a wife as well regarded and well behaved as Fang Zhi, only her death can spare me the reputation of abandoning the woman who shared my poverty and ruining my prospects.”

Our emperor and his common-born empress were devoted to one another. Above all, they despised faithless men.

So, in Huo Cizhou’s eyes, death was the only future left to me?

What a fine calculation.