Chapter 1

“It wasn’t me! It was my sister!” Shen Yueru cried, her eyes rimmed red.

“The palace maid must have mistaken her for me. We look so much alike.”

“Everyone knows my sister is the famous Jade-Hairpin Beauty. She’s worn that pin since she was a child. My pin…”

She raised a hand to the one in her hair. “My ruby pin is right here.”

I looked up at the tray in the eunuch’s hands. On it lay a jade hairpin with a chipped corner and a scarlet undergarment embroidered with mandarin ducks.

Everyone present flushed at the sight.

My sister’s voice trembled.

“How could you do such a thing in the palace, Sister? You’re already betrothed… Could you truly not resist a few moments of pleasure?”

Cold, contemptuous, disgusted stares stabbed at me from every corner of the hall.

I remained on my knees, my nails digging into my palms. The sharp pain barely kept me steady beneath the humiliation.

The emperor thundered, “I shall ask one more time. Whose hairpin is this?”

Father dropped to his knees, shaking uncontrollably. “Y-Your Majesty, this pin…”

He glanced back at me.

Every eye in the hall returned to me.

Pei Yanzhi touched my arm in the shadows.

They were all waiting for me to admit it myself.

This was exactly how it had happened in my previous life.

I had seen the anguish and pleading in my parents’ eyes. I had heard them say, “If anything happens to your sister, we cannot go on living.” And I had gritted my teeth and accepted their filthy accusation.

They had promised that if I took the blame, they would take care of everything else.

And what had happened?

That very night, my legs were broken and I was thrown into Shuiyue Convent outside the city.

For three years, my wounds festered with maggots, my frostbitten fingers rotted, and the nuns burned my flesh with incense sticks.

I wrote countless letters in my own blood. None brought an answer.

When I finally dragged my ruined legs back to the Shen residence, I learned that my name had been struck from the family genealogy.

Hatred spread through me like fire, burning until my insides ached.

Filial duty. Reputation. The honor of the family. All the things that had bound me seemed now to be nothing but proof of my own stupidity.

This time, I would spare none of them.

“Shen Wantang!” The emperor’s voice bore down on me. “Is the pin yours?”

I bowed low, pressing my forehead to the cold imperial floor tiles. “The hairpin does indeed belong to me, Your Majesty.”

My sister’s sobbing faltered. Father’s brow relaxed.

Even Mother’s grip on her handkerchief loosened abruptly, her whole body going slack with relief.

Everyone in the hall thought I was about to confess.

Hidden in shadow, the corners of my mouth lifted. “But before we entered the palace today, my sister took it from me.”

I raised a hand and pointed to her hair.

“The red pin my sister is wearing is dull and has no gemstone’s luster. It is plainly an ordinary red coral pin someone gave her just now, not that celebrated pigeon-blood ruby!”

“Tell me, Sister—where is your ruby pin? Did you leave that too in the place of your disgrace?”