She was a princess forced into a political marriage, but the man she married was a puppet emperor in name only.
On their wedding night, he coughed up blood as he told her, “Behave yourself, and I will keep your homeland safe.”
She smiled, a blade hidden in her eyes. “If Your Majesty can't even protect yourself, how can you protect Zhaohua?”
The powerful minister Wei Yuan held absolute sway over the court, ruling it by his word alone. The palace was his private garden.
Everyone said Han Congning was a sickly man, a puppet on Wei Yuan's strings. But only Wen Yutang knew
This emperor, who could barely stand without coughing, secretly studied military strategy in a hidden chamber at night. Whenever his fingertips traced the map, storms raged in his eyes.
“You want to seize power?” She handed him a cup of hot tea, watching his pale fingers clutch a secret letter.
He looked up, the scent of medicine still clinging to his lashes. “Dare you help me?”
“Let's take a chance.” Her lips curved. “If we win, you'll be the emperor, and I'll be Zhaohua's hero. If we lose…”
He took the tea. Their fingertips touched, and he trembled slightly. “If we lose, I'll go to hell with you.”
From then on, the inner palace became a battlefield without gunpowder.
Using her identity as a princess sent to marry abroad as cover, she carried messages for him, stirred up trouble in the harem, and sent Wei Yuan's spies running in circles.
Behind the disguise of a frail invalid, he secretly contacted his old allies and laid a vast, inescapable net, waiting for the right moment to strike like thunder.
When Wei Yuan's executioner's blade came down, when a neighboring nation's cavalry drew near, when the fate of Zhaohua hung by a thread
The emperor who was always coughing suddenly took her hand and raised his sword to the sky. “From this day on, I will defend my own realm. No one lays a hand on the people who belong to me!”
