During the Dali era of the Li Kingdom, Emperor Lin Yu fell gravely ill. The demon empress, Qin, seized control of the court and persecuted the imperial heirs.
The emperor had seven sons. Apart from Lin Chengyun, the legitimate son of the demon empress Qin, only the sixth prince, Lin Chengyou, born to Consort Rong, and the seventh prince, Lin Chengping, born to Lady-in-Waiting Wang, remained alive.
The sixth prince had been sickly since childhood and nearly died several times. The seventh prince was born with a crippled right leg after the midwife pulled him out too roughly.
One was frail, the other disabled, so the demon empress paid neither of them any mind.
Consort Rong knew the palace was fraught with danger and feared the demon empress would murder the sixth prince. She enlisted Imperial Physician Shen Lin'an's help, and with support from the Shen family and her own family, arranged for the prince to be fostered by Shen Weitu, the former head of the Imperial Medical Academy in Jiangnan.
The sixth prince grew up alongside Shen Zhiyun, the Shen family's youngest daughter, and Rong Yiyang, the Rong family's legitimate son.
After the Rebellion of the Two Princes, the sixth prince was placed on the throne, while Shen Zhiyun became engaged to Mu Wuwei, the martial arts champion at the time.
Everything seemed to be going well, but Mu Wuwei's eldest brother worried that a marriage alliance with the Shen family would make Mu Wuwei too powerful and difficult to control. So, on the wedding day, he switched the groom.
And that was how Shen Nanfeng came to be.
She is the only person in the Li Kingdom today to bear her mother's surname and hold the title of commandery princess. Shen Nanfeng was originally the eldest legitimate daughter of the Mu family's second branch. The Mus were no royal house, yet because of her mother, Shen Nanfeng was granted the title of commandery princess.
Heartbroken, Shen's mother obeyed an imperial decree and went into business, making her home wherever her travels took her. Unable to face his mother, Mu Wuwei volunteered to serve on the northern frontier and never married.
When war broke out on the northern frontier, Mu Wuwei, a general defending a city, disappeared. The news reached court, and the emperor flew into a rage. The third prince pleaded on Mu Wuwei's behalf and was punished with fifty strokes of the cane. Shen Nanfeng happened to pass by and saw him. From then on, a special affection grew between them.
