The Legitimate Daughter's Gambit: Clouds and Smoke Shroud the Old Court

Forced by her family’s schemes to marry into the Yongning Marquis’s household, Jiang Qingyuan endured contempt and was cast aside as a divorced woman. When a bowl of poison was brought before her, she returned from hell, vowing to make her enemies pay in blood.

For three years, she lay low and studied a lost medical art. When she finally revealed her skills, she stunned the capital. Everyone who had once bullied and humiliated her was trampled beneath her, one by one, through her medical expertise and wisdom. A blood test exposed a beloved concubine’s shocking fraud; her miraculous healing brought the powerful Prince Jing back from the brink of death. From establishing herself as a “divine physician” to taking charge of the empire’s medical affairs as its “Holy Maiden Who Protects the Nation,” every step she took resounded with strength.

On her path of revenge, she encountered Xiao Jue, the powerful, cold, and calculating Prince Jing. He wanted her medical skills, while she made use of his influence. They went from exploiting each other to entrusting each other with their lives. He promised they would stand side by side; she helped him purge the imperial court. When long-buried imperial secrets and the bizarre poison known as “Carefree Powder” came to light, they joined forces to bring down the mastermind, and amid the bloodshed and turmoil, they etched themselves into each other’s very bones.

In the end, she wore the ceremonial robe and nine-pheasant, four-phoenix crown of a princess consort, and was granted the extraordinary title of “Supreme Holy Princess Consort of Prince Jing, Protector of the Nation.” She received the highest honors, including permission to walk without hurrying in the palace and to be praised without having her name announced. From a cold, secluded courtyard to the heights of the imperial palace, from healing the sick to ruling the world, Jiang Qingyuan proved with her life that women, too, can command the world. Compassion and medical skill are the sharpest instruments of power there are.