The 1940s: The Young Bride in the Family Compound

This is an alternate timeline, so some details differ slightly from real history.

Jiangnan, 1949. Shen Qingyun, later renamed Lin Xiu, overhears a conspiracy: to curry favor with a warlord as they flee to Taiwan, her father and stepmother have decided to give her to sixty-year-old Commander Liu as his eighteenth concubine.

Overnight, she goes from being the daughter of a wealthy merchant to a family offering, sacrificed for their own glory.

Run! She has to get away!

On a rainy night, she crawls through the dog hole that has confined her for sixteen years and runs headlong into the unknown darkness.

At her lowest point, she meets Gu Yunshen. Steady and sharp in his military uniform, he shields her from the pursuers behind her and becomes the only light in her darkness.

With nowhere else to go, she accepts his protection. “Our marriage is only a temporary arrangement.”

With a marriage certificate, she becomes the military officer’s wife everyone envies. He heads to the front lines while she raises their child and keeps house at home, silently swallowing her bitterness.