chapter 1

“Xiangyi, what’s wrong?”

When I remained where I was, my elder sister’s gaze flickered.

“Haven’t you always loved this fruit wine?”

I tugged at the corner of my mouth, but I could not smile.

After I was framed in my last life, I had never understood why.

I was ordinary and had never offended anyone. Who would go to such lengths to ruin me?

The only unusual thing that day had been the cup of fruit wine my sister gave me.

Now that I had been granted another life, the same cup was being offered to me again.

Cold sweat dampened my palms.

When I still did not move, my sister grew anxious and pressed the cup into my hand.

“I had the servants brew this batch especially for you. You must taste it and tell me what you think.”

I lowered my eyes and accepted it.

“All right.”

The moment I spoke, I swayed violently. The wine nearly spilled onto the ground.

My sister paled and hurried to steady me.

“What happened?”

I forced a smile.

“Perhaps the heat has made me faint.”

Her anxiety sharpened.

The banquet was already half over. If I did not drink the wine on schedule, how was she supposed to bring witnesses in and catch me in bed with her husband?

She turned to her personal maid.

“Quickly—go fetch some mint pills for Second Miss.”

That left no one at her side.

As the hostess, she could not stay away from the banquet for long. Soon, a servant came looking for her.

My sister kept glancing back, but her maid had not returned.

I watched her with an unnatural calm.

“Go on, Sister. I’ll wait here.”

After a moment, she gave me repeated instructions.

“Don’t wander off. I’ll be right back.”

I agreed and hid the cold glint in my eyes.

As soon as she left, I took the cup and went in search of Xie Wanning.

She was Liang Yanxiu’s cousin.

After Xie Wanning’s mother died, Madam Liang sent people to bring the young girl to the capital for a short stay.

At first, everyone assumed the Liang family pitied her and could not bear to send her away.

But that short stay had already lasted a year.

Miss Xie was delicate and beautiful. My sister disliked her intensely and was forever trying to arrange a marriage for her, but Madam Liang refused to agree.

Before long, everyone understood.

The Liang family was likely keeping Miss Xie in reserve as a high-ranking concubine for Liang Yanxiu.

That sent my sister into a panic.

She had once been renowned throughout the capital, but youth had passed her by and her beauty had faded. Xie Wanning was lovelier than my sister had ever been.

When my sister later fell ill, she stopped openly fighting with Xie Wanning.

She had begun to fear what would happen after her death. She feared her husband would marry Xie Wanning as his next wife.

Terrified that Xie Wanning would mistreat her only son, she repeatedly returned to our parents and begged them for a solution.

Soon afterward, I inexplicably passed out at the banquet.

I awoke beside my brother-in-law, Liang Yanxiu, with a crowd catching us in bed.

My reputation collapsed overnight.

My fiancé ended our engagement before dawn.

My parents said I had disappointed them beyond measure, and everyone accused me of shamelessly seducing my own brother-in-law.

Only my sister professed to believe in my innocence.

My family bundled me into a little sedan chair and hurried me into the Liang household as Liang Yanxiu’s concubine.

By birth, I was more than qualified to become his lawful second wife.

But my sister feared that if I became his wife and bore children of my own, I would neglect her son.

She persuaded our parents to marry me off as a concubine instead, then forced Liang Yanxiu to swear at her sickbed that he would never elevate me to wife.

I remained a concubine all my life.

I raised my sister’s son to adulthood and helped him place first in the imperial examinations.

I lived every day on a knife’s edge until years of exhaustion broke my health.

As I lay dying, I heard my parents whispering with my nephew, who had just achieved the highest honor in the examinations.

“Your mother was gravely ill and feared no one would care for you after she died, so she drugged your aunt’s wine. Looking back, it was the right decision.”

My nephew’s voice choked with tears.

“Now that I have taken first place, Mother can finally rest in peace.”

I died in disbelief, my final breath forced from my lungs.

Qin Xiangyi had died with her eyes wide open in her last life.