chapter 1

I woke from the nightmare once again.

In the dream were both of my past lives, and an unknown voice told me over and over, “This is your last chance.”

I was the eldest legitimate daughter of the Cui family of Qinghe.

In my first life, I married Xie Pingqing, whose family had been on good terms with the Cuis for generations.

He spent my dowry, borrowed the Cui family’s influence, and used the political essays I wrote to climb, step by step.

And I spent ten years being worn down by my mother-in-law in the Xie household.

In the end, my own sister, Cui Shuran, sent a cup of poisoned wine to finish off the ailing me.

She leaned down with a venomous smile. “Sister, everyone says you’re better than me, but so what? In the end, I still won.”

Only then did I realize that the outwardly gentle and obedient girl had always resented me in secret, wishing nothing more than to be rid of me.

My soul lingered for seven days, and in that time I watched Xie Pingqing frame the Cui clan for treason.

He used two hundred and sixty-eight lives of the Cui family as his final stepping stone.

Except for Cui Shuran.

Because she had reported the crime and earned merit, she escaped disaster and became Grand Chancellor Xie Pingqing’s wife.

Burning with grievance and hatred, I was reborn back to the day I was betrothed to Xie Pingqing.

That was my second life.

I knelt before my father. “Father, I do not wish to marry.”

Puzzled, my father asked, “The Xie family has been close to ours for generations. Pingqing’s learning, appearance, and character are all excellent. Why would you refuse?”

I truly could not give a reason for refusing.

Even though I had no feelings for him.

My father frowned. “Are you saying you look down on the Xie family’s decline? To abandon them in poverty would be betrayal and ingratitude, hardly the conduct of a gentleman.”

I knocked my head heavily against the ground.

“I will not marry, Father.”

Enraged by my groundless defiance, my father had me punished by family law.

The board struck my waist, and the pain was almost unbearable.

But compared to those ten years in the Xie household and the anguish I felt after death, it was nothing.

My father still insisted that I marry.

I had no choice but to threaten death itself, defying all propriety and upbringing, before he finally relented for a time.

Not long after, an edict came from the palace, naming me a Noble Consort.

The previous dynasty had been corrupt. The late emperor had once run an armed escort service and been forced to turn outlaw, and who would have thought that within ten years he truly seized the realm?

But the great aristocratic families refused to serve the new dynasty.

Not long ago the Crown Prince had just ascended the throne, and the palace had only one Empress.

No doubt he wished to use marriage to mend ties with the great families.

But perhaps they did not know that the Cui family precepts held that we married no merchants and became no concubines.

Unfortunately, in my father’s eyes, this new sovereign hit both marks.

So he felt deeply humiliated and ordered me to kill myself to preserve the Cui family’s name.