Ranking

On the day of the grand wedding, every guest in the hall witnessed Ah Ying take a sword strike intended for Gu Yanzhi.

No one knew that the blades, arrows, and poisons she had endured for him throughout her life were already enough to have killed her many times over.

All she had ever waited for was to die in his arms and hear him call her name just once.

Li Xiuyi was my fiancé.

Yet, at his own birthday banquet, he announced that he was marrying another woman.

Everyone turned to look at me, their eyes filled with uncertainty.

Amidst the awkward atmosphere, I was the first to start clapping.

I even presented a ring as a blessing.

“I wish you a long and happy marriage, and may you be blessed with a child soon.”

In the third year of my secret crush on Zhou Jinghe, we got married. A year later, at a ski resort, his close friend and I both found ourselves in danger at the same time. Zhou Jinghe rushed over, shielding that female friend as they tumbled to the ground. As I fell onto the snow, I suddenly felt that everything was utterly meaningless. And when something is meaningless, it should simply be thrown away.

I had been married to the heir of the Jiang Group for two years, and during that entire time, he had treated me with nothing but cold indifference.

Then, in the middle of the night, I got out of bed to use the bathroom when he suddenly grabbed my hand.

I turned around to find the man before me with the corners of his eyes flushed a faint red, his voice trembling.

“Shen Tingwan, are you trying to leave me behind again?”

After discovering yet another mistress Jiang Chengning was keeping outside the estate, I asked for a divorce.

He looked at me coldly and did not say a single word to make me stay.

I went to another town and rented a house. That very night, some lecher crept into my bedroom.

In my panic, I smashed his head in and killed him. His family was determined to make me pay with my life.

But I did not die. I spent a month in prison. When I was finally released, the daylight was so blinding I could hardly open my eyes.

Jiang Chengning’s face was a blur before me.

“Yingying is a woman living all alone out there, and surviving is as difficult for her as it was for you. Now that you’ve experienced it yourself, can you understand her?”

This time, I did not raise my voice and argue as I used to. I only stayed silent. His voice softened.

“I never truly wanted to divorce you. I only wanted to teach you a lesson. From now on, don’t make trouble with me over Yingying again. She has not had it easy.”

I nodded obediently. Jiang Ying had not had it easy.

And Jiang Chengning could just as easily make sure I did not have it easy either.

I returned to the Jiang Family and became his wife again. Once more, he brought up taking Jiang Ying as a concubine.

This time, I agreed. Not only did I feel sorry for Jiang Ying, that poor woman-I went on to feel sorry for one woman after another.

Only much later did Jiang Chengning realize something was wrong and demand to know why I no longer cared about him the way I used to.

I sighed and explained, “None of them have had it easy.”

On the day my lady and I fled, I went east while she went west.

Dressed in her clothes and carrying her token, I drew the pursuers away for her.

At death’s door, I was rescued. My lady’s betrothed mistook me for her.

Badly wounded and stripped of my memories, I was cherished by him and carefully nursed. He even married me.

Five years later, he brought back a battered woman. It was my lady. Convinced that I had deceived him, Qi Yu hated me to the bone and sent me to my death with a cup of poison.

When I opened my eyes again, I was back on the day I lured the enemy away for her.

I returned her clothes and token, then smiled and told her: “Go east. And don’t look back.”

Crown Prince Bai Xiuzhu had been afflicted with the Southern Border Love-Forgetting Gu.

Every time he clawed his way back from the brink of death, he would forget the person he loved most. The first time, he forgot his mother.

The second time, he forgot the marriage vows we had exchanged before Heaven and Earth at the border.

The third time-after I had slit my wrists to feed him my blood and save his life-he sat high atop his throne in the Hall of Golden Chimes and personally marked my death warrant with a stroke of vermilion ink.

I waited bitterly for Qu Huang for three years, only to receive a letter of divorce.

When the message arrived, I was still wiping down his bedridden mother.

It was March, and the late spring cold had returned, yet I was drenched in sweat from exhaustion.

My hands shook so badly I could barely take the thin silk letter the attendant handed me.

“Where is my husband?”

“The young master has already arrived in the front hall.”

I sighed, set down the damp towel in my hand, and smoothed back the stray hair at my temples.

“Very well. I’ll go with you.”

I was a widow starved for a man.

While I was burning incense and praying for a good match, some villain broke into my boudoir.

I knocked him out with a vase.

Then I took a look and-oh. A beautiful man.

So I tied him up, hid him in my little courtyard, and had my way with him every day…

Later, he ran off.

When we met again, I knelt on the ground and stammered in terror, “Th-this humble woman greets His Royal Highness the Crown Prince…”

I have slaughtered pigs in the palace for four years; wherever my axe struck, none survived.

With every pig I killed, I recited “Amitabha.”

My skilled butchering caught the attention of the Prince, who took me as his trusted aide.

I became the deadly butcher’s knife; he became the executioner who wielded it.

Killing and beheading – “Amitabha”; burying them on the spot – “well done, well done.”

On the day I was deposed and consigned to the Cold Palace, Yan Yuheng came personally to see me off.

Before the palace gates were locked, he asked whether I hated him.

I touched the old gold hairpin hidden in my sleeve and smiled. For three years as Empress, I learned to speak like her, to carry myself like her, and to love him the way she once had.

But even as I was dying, he never understood: I was never like Shen Zhaotang. I had only acted too well.

I am Cui Yin, the eldest daughter of the Vice Minister of Rites.

I was raised in my maternal grandparents’ home since I was a child.

When I was seventeen, they brought me back to the capital, each of them appearing kind and benevolent.

But in private, my grandmother was indifferent, my father despised me, and my Stepmother Su hid a dagger behind her smile.

My older brother, born of the same mother, warned me, “Cui Yin, you must know your place and behave yourself. Otherwise, I will not show you any mercy.”

My innocent and romantic younger sister said with a beaming smile, “Sister, you grew up in a rural manor, and the clothes you’re wearing are quite out of fashion. I’ve gathered a few pieces I no longer wear to give to you.”

They even planned to marry me off as a successor wife to a profligate from the Commandery Duke Manor, a man who had beaten his first wife to death. …

Before entering the capital, I had originally intended to hang myself.

It was my maid, Huaihua, who desperately clung to my legs.

“Miss! Miss, don’t die! People from the Cui Family of the Capital have arrived. Let’s go to the capital and find some fun!”

I am ill; I suffer from hysteria and have no interest in life.

When I lose my mind, I only find pleasure through killing.

Well then, I hope they can bring me some joy.

The princess ran away with her lover, leaving me behind with a male concubine and orders to impersonate her.

Terrified of being exposed, I had no choice but to play the part as convincingly as possible.

By the time the princess returned, I was pregnant.

She looked at me in shock. Why didn’t you use the male concubine I gave you? Do you not like him?

I was stunned.

If that’s the case, then who was the man making me beg for mercy every night?

Just as I was preparing to flee, that person returned in the middle of the night. Wait… why are there two of them?

After fifteen years of marriage, Meng Ye had taken a mistress-a flamboyant young woman he kept on the side.

Cradling her pregnant belly, she stormed into my presence to demand a formal title.

“You’re a fading beauty with one foot in the grave, and you haven’t even produced a son to see you off. What right do you have to cling to the position of Madam?”

Amused, I looked past her at Meng Ye and asked, “Well? You tell her. What right do I have?”

He didn’t dare answer. He knew that if I, a Tiger Woman of a General’s Family, ever lost my temper, his little girl wouldn’t even dare to cry out loud.

A year ago, on a whim, I told my wife a story.

Because the content was bizarre and the details were too realistic, she was scared out of her wits.

Afterwards, I deeply regretted it and emphasized countless times that the story was made up. But her trust in me had already collapsed, and the look in her eyes was filled with fear.

That night, she ran into the bathroom, locked the door, and called the police.

As a result, I ended up in jail.

Now, I am sorting out the whole incident as follows.

When I was a child, I fought with wild dogs for food. On the verge of starvation, someone shared half a steamed bun with me.

To repay his kindness, I disguised myself as a boy and stayed by his side as a servant.

This man was once the most noble Crown Prince of the dynasty.

One day, he fell from grace, reduced to ruin, and was humiliated and trampled by his lifelong enemy.

Later, he became the mad emperor whom everyone feared.

Yet on a snowy night, he took his own life, and before his death, pleaded desperately:

“Yunling, don’t look at me… I’m so filthy.”

When I opened my eyes again, time had rewound twenty years.

The Imperial Tutor harbored the ambitions of a Wolf, the general eyed the throne like a tiger, and the imperial brother plotted in secret.

Only the Little Highness remained innocent and pure, completely unaware.

In this life, I have come only to protect him.

At thirty-five, I experienced a cliff-drop divorce.

In truth, it wasn’t entirely without warning.

I am a police officer and Liang Xu is a prosecutor; in the eyes of others, we were a match made in heaven.

Late one night, Liang Xu turned off the light, climbed into bed, and spoke slowly.

“I feel like my life right now is nothing more than a pool of stagnant water.”

After that, he changed careers to become a lawyer, specializing in litigation for the wealthy.

We changed houses, and we changed cars.

The day our son started elementary school, he asked me for a divorce.

“Even though we have sex once a week, it feels like a routine chore.

“Perhaps you should try someone else, too.”

And I really did.

But then Liang Xu lost control of his emotions, grabbing my shoulders and shaking me violently.

“You’re a cop and he’s a crook! Can you please wake up?!”

With a swift counter-move, I pinned his arm behind his back.

“I got used to drinking lukewarm water, so now I want to taste some strong liquor. He’s rich, handsome, and young-what could he possibly want from me other than myself?”

When I married Pei Miao, everyone praised our union as a match made in heaven. Our honeymoon bliss lasted less than three months before I discovered he had a soulmate. Pei Miao cherished and adored her, even setting up a private residence for her outside our home. When I confronted him, he coldly rebuked me: jealousy was unbecoming of a virtuous wife. So I learned to be magnanimous, until I too stepped beyond the boundaries of marriage and forced him to taste the same pain he had given me.

I never expected that I would accidentally end up becoming colleagues with my ex-husband. After all, it had only been three months since we finally ended our miserable three-year marriage-a marriage that was nothing but mutual torture.

Before the war between our two countries, my Consort suddenly became close to me.

He was no longer distant and respectful, and even took the initiative to share my bed.

Someone warned me: “Princess, those who are not of our kind must have different hearts. You must be careful.”

At night, I asked my Consort, “Will you… always stay by my side?”

He kissed me and said, “I wish to be with the Princess, night and day, for all lifetimes to come.

If I ever break this vow, may I never be reborn.”

Because of a bet, Jing Shaochuan lost me to his twin brother.

I acted as if I knew nothing and spent a night of reckless entanglement with his brother.

The next day, I blushed and asked Jing Shaochuan to buy some ointment for me.

“Where are you feeling unwell?” He frowned slightly, his voice deep and cold.

I murmured softly, “You were too rough last night. You hurt me.”

Jing Shaochuan froze visibly.

I took a step forward, hugging him gently and intentionally acting sweet and spoiled.

“But, you were so different last night compared to how you usually are… I really liked it, though.”

My boyfriend insisted on a Platonic relationship, believing that carnal desire was a sin.

Just for trying to kiss him, he sent me away for “spiritual purification.”

The purification worked.

I no longer felt any desire for him.

However, my desire for other men doubled.

Later, as he stared at the hickey on my collarbone, he started acting like a lunatic in public again.

“Must you insist on falling into the abyss of sin?!”

His friend pulled me onto his lap, kissing my hand with a smirk. “I’ve committed a crime. Why don’t you call the police and have me arrested?”

The Crown Prince had always been generous.

When we were four years old, I noticed his body had one more piece of equipment than mine.

I told him I wanted one too.

He pulled down his trousers and was just about to snip off half to share with me when the palace servants discovered us. That year, I nearly passed away at the age of four.

And he nearly became Nine Thousand Years Old.

Marquis Dingbei, Lu Chenzhou, had three wishes in life. First, a smooth career in court. Second, a prosperous household. Third, to marry the woman he loved. The first two were within easy reach. Only the third remained beyond him-unattainable, forbidden, inescapable. They said another man’s wife was not to be taken. But what if that woman was the wife he had divorced in his previous life?

My husband Chen Jing and I lived in harmony as a married couple, raising a son and a daughter.

Everyone said that for a merchant’s daughter like me to marry Chen Jing was a stroke of divine luck.

I deeply believed that too.

Reborn back to the year I turned sixteen, I held up the embroidered ball, waiting quietly for the new top scholar as he made his triumphant ride through the streets.

But Chen Jing waved the embroidered ball away.

He didn’t even care who the ball hit. It was as if, in this life, whoever I married had nothing to do with him.

I suddenly realized with a start- In this life, Chen Jing wanted a different wife.

Later, the good man I married was the very one he had caused the embroidered ball to strike.

I spent eighteen years in a Buddhist temple.

Eighteen years later, I returned as Princess Chang’an. To compensate me for those lost years, the Empress Mother made a public promise: she would grant me any one thing I desired.

I looked around the room, my gaze landing on Wei Zhao, who shone brilliantly amidst the unremarkable crowd. Pointing at him, I declared, “I want him to be my Imperial Son-in-Law.”

Only later did I discover that Wei Zhao and my younger sister, Princess Kangle, were childhood sweethearts. They were a mere imperial decree away from being wed.

But what of it?

Even if I had known from the start, I still would have claimed Wei Zhao as mine!

I transmigrated into a tragic romance novel as the female lead’s sister.

In the original plot, I spent my time abusing her daughter while simultaneously trying to seduce her husband.

Ultimately, I groomed her daughter to become the next generation’s tragic heroine, while I met a miserable end myself-tossed into the ocean to feed the fish.

Now, looking at the innocent Little Bean Bun standing before me, I said: “If you love suffering, you’ll have a never-ending supply of it. So, do you want to swallow that bitter pill, or are you going to speak up for yourself?”

“Go up there and give him a piece of your mind. If you win the argument, I’ll buy you a burger; if you lose, I’ll buy you a drink.”

“What? You’re afraid to win? Do you really love being a perpetual runner-up that much? You don’t have to be number one, but you can’t settle for second best, and you certainly can’t be a pushover.”

“Your mother brought you into this world to enjoy life, not to suffer. Go compete, go grab what’s yours, and be brave! Go get ’em, baby!”

As the School Belle, I swapped souls with the fattest and poorest girl in the whole school.

We exchanged secrets, shared our lives, and tried hard to return to our original selves.

Until one day, she disappeared.

The teacher said her whole family had moved abroad.

I saw her again ten years later.

She was standing beside my Childhood Sweetheart, having become the CEO’s Wife.

It was the fourth year of my relationship with Fu Jingsen.

He had grown tired of my dullness and lack of change.

A young, trendy girl had successfully seduced him, leaving him infatuated.

Yet, he told his friends,

“It’s just a little fling to try something new.”

“When it comes to marriage, of course, you still choose a Good Girl like Shen Ci.”

With the wedding fast approaching, everyone urged me to consider the bigger picture.

However, Chen Xu, the most notorious playboy in our social circle, stopped me. “Hey, Good Girl, do you dare to be rebellious for once?”

At the wedding three days later, Fu Jingsen stared at the hickey on the side of my neck. He was so furious that he couldn’t even hold his bouquet steady.

I gave him a faint smile.

“Just trying something fresh. Why are you so angry?”

“Only after trying it did I realize how boring you actually are. You don’t have nearly as many tricks as he does.”

Young General Yan was having a spat with the girl who held his heart.

During the night banquet, he had hidden a stem of Evening Magnolia.

He declared that whoever found that flower would become the General’s Wife.

The noble ladies all turned their heads, scanning the room to see where the Evening Magnolia had landed. I remained silent.

I simply used my foot to quietly kick away the flower lying behind my seat.

A moment later, Yan Ci’s nonchalant voice rang out. “I wonder which lady has picked up my flower?”

Shen Shiji once saved my life, pulling me from a pile of corpses.

In the years before I was recognized by the palace and returned to my royal roots, he taught me to read and practice martial arts, treating me with the utmost tenderness.

That was until I killed the woman he had loved for years.

To avenge her, Shen Shiji became my Prince Consort.

He spent years plotting to turn everyone against me, stripping me of my allies and family. After subjecting me to every imaginable torment, he threw me back into that same pile of corpses.

Shen Shiji told me his greatest regret was saving me all those years ago.

And so, having been reborn, I scrambled out of that pile of corpses on my own, wasting no time.

Later, I heard that it rained heavily that day.

The usually aloof Young Marquis Shen ignored the filth and the mud, kneeling in the pile of corpses and digging until his hands were bloody and raw.

All just to find a Little Beggar.

Discovering my husband’s affair was a trivial matter.

At a dinner with friends, he, who had always been aloof, suddenly took the initiative to serve food to everyone at the table.

Later.

I heard him softly reciting a line from Roman Holiday in the study.

“In order to shake your hand, I shook hands with everyone.”

Ha!

My boyfriend asked me to help him shut down his computer.

That was when I saw his chat logs.

A girl named Qingqing had messaged him: “So, when are you coming to marry me?”

While the concubines of the harem fought for favor, the Empress was wondering when the emperor would finally die.

The emperor and I had been married since our youth, but ours was a match arranged without either of us having any say.

After all these years, we had only ever treated each other with distant courtesy.

And as my son grew older by the day, I found myself hoping more and more that His Majesty might depart this world sooner rather than later-if only so all my years of diligently managing his harem would not have been in vain.

I had been with my boyfriend for three years.

During that time, I discovered that his handle on every social media platform was July.

I assumed he simply had a deep-seated love for the romantic month of July, so I never pried into it.

It wasn’t until our wedding day, when his ex-girlfriend sent a gift, that I saw the name signed on the box-

Qi Yue.

In that moment, I finally understood. It wasn’t the month of July he cherished; it was Qi Yue.

My heart sank into an abyss…

In 2004, he used my body to pay off his gambling debts.

I didn’t blame him.

I only remembered that clean-cut nineteen-year-old boy back in 1997, and the purity in his eyes when he handed me a White Rabbit Milk Candy.

Later, he became successful.

He replaced the faded fake around my neck with a heavy gold chain.

He used a three-carat diamond ring to buy my silence regarding the women he kept on the side.

Later, when a business partner groped my thigh, he simply turned his head away to light a cigarette. “It’s not like you’re losing a limb.”

I dragged my suitcase into the rain and never looked back.

After that, I went on blind dates, got married, and spent my days in a cubicle, studying for certifications and working overtime.

He eventually found me, looking like a gambler who had lost everything, his eyes terrifyingly bloodshot. “Since you’re willing to marry just anyone from a blind date… then, why couldn’t that person be me?”

I smiled.

Elder Brother, I never wanted any of those things.

I only wanted that summer in 1997, before that piece of candy had even melted in my palm.

I have become my own shore; no one can push me into the sea ever again.

During the year our love was at its peak, the young general whose name shook the borderlands used all his military merit to petition my Imperial Father for my hand in marriage.

But three years later, a woman arrived at our door clutching a child, weeping and begging me to take them in.

My husband claimed he had simply had too much to drink and made a terrible mistake.

My mother-in-law said that since I had already ruined my husband’s career prospects, I could not go so far as to sever his bloodline as well.

My closest kin advised me to be magnanimous, telling me that this was simply how every mistress of a household in the capital lived.

Only my sister, with whom I had never seen eye to eye, patted my back and told me: “In the past, you let your Imperial Brother make your decisions for you.” “Later, you let your husband make your decisions for you.” “Now, it is time you learned to grow up on your own.” “After all, you have a little girl of your own now.”

I looked down at the tiny daughter in my arms, who was still sucking on her fingers.

I understood that if I were weak, my daughter would never know how to be strong.

If I were easily bullied, my daughter would never know how to be independent. This time, it was my turn to act.

I was in the middle of feeding the pigs in my village when I suddenly saw a Danmaku.

[Is this bystander the villain’s younger sister?]

[She still thinks she’s an orphan. She has no idea that the villainous Chancellor is actually the brother she got separated from back then.]

[It’s a pity the villain lost to the male lead. He’s about to hang himself.]

[The villain only became an official to find his sister in the first place. If they could just meet once, maybe he wouldn’t have to die.]

What?!

I immediately sold my pigs to scrape together some travel money and rushed to the Capital overnight.

I knocked on the gates of the Prime Minister’s Mansion.

A pale man draped in a heavy cloak stood at the entrance, his gaze deep and haunting.

I lunged forward and threw my arms around his legs, wailing, “Brother! Wang Ergou from the village is trying to force me to marry him!”

My ex-boyfriend turned my ashes into a necklace and hung it around his son’s neck for eighteen years.

For those eighteen years, my soul remained trapped by the boy’s side.

Then one day, out of the blue, the boy told me something.

He said he wanted to marry me.

Should you take the initiative to add a stranger’s number that you saw in a dream?

Absolutely not!

Because you’ll never be able to guess what might be on the other end!