[Mutual pining, the aloof beauty descends from her pedestal, both each other’s first, sweet romance, husband chases wife to win her back]
The crown prince of the dynasty, Lu Huaijin, was as bright as the moon and born to the highest station. Yet one day, a little sparrow pecked him in the eye, and he ended up locked in a jail in a poor backwater three hundred miles from the capital. He shouted that he had been wronged, claiming he was the crown prince. The impatient young constable Xu Yueqiao knocked on his cell door.
“Quit shouting. There’s another guy next door claiming he’s the emperor!” Lu Huaijin looked toward the neighboring cell and burst into tears. Wasn’t that his father, the emperor who had been missing for days?
Father and son embraced and wept!
Xu Yueqiao expected to be punished, but instead, the emperor issued an edict praising her for saving him and rewarded her with ten thousand taels of gold, inviting her to serve in the palace.
That night, Lu Huaijin claimed there was an assassin and tricked her into coming over. He pinned her to the bed and kissed the tiny red birthmark on her skin. With a dark look in his eyes but a perfectly serious tone, he said, “There’s no hidden weapon here, either!”
She wasn’t annoyed. Instead, she hooked an arm around his neck and pretended to move in for a kiss, then stopped short. With a mischievous, teasing smile, she said, “I thought the crown prince, so pure and composed, would have more self-control!”
