To Keep His Kingdom from Falling, the Tyrant Starts Courting the Empress

Both are faithful to each other. A tyrant is bound to a conquest System and forced to dote on his aloof empress, who did not enter the palace until she was twenty-four.

He checks in right on time every day and gives her exactly the right gifts, like a conquest machine without feelings.

Until one day, when a headache strikes, she quietly takes his hand. “Your Majesty, are you... not acting of your own free will?”

I was forced by the System to win over my empress.

Feng Jianzhou is bound to the “Emperor Conquest System.” Whenever he fails a task, he suffers heart palpitations and piercing pain.

He has no choice but to check in at the empress’s chambers at the same time every day, give her the paintings and books the System says she likes, and say sweet nothings he does not mean.

Shen Zhaoxi entered the palace at the “advanced age” of twenty-four. She watches the emperor’s bizarre behavior with calm scrutiny:

Why does he arrive exactly at the start of the You hour and leave exactly at the start of the Xu hour every day, as if completing a task with clockwork precision?

Why are all the gifts he gives her rare books and ancient paintings she has searched for in private for years?

Why does every headache strike him just after he says a certain “sweet nothing”?

At last, when he falls ill, she asks softly, “Your Majesty, are you... being controlled by something?”

Feng Jianzhou’s pupils contract sharply.

Later, the System forces him to get her pregnant.

For the first time, he resists a task, coughing up blood from the pain.

But she takes his hand of her own accord. “We’ll complete this task together.”

Later still, the System disappears.

He continues visiting her chambers every day, no longer because of a task, but because he wants to see her.