Jiang Ciwan transmigrated into a book, into the role of a low-ranking palace maid who wouldn’t survive past chapter three.
The original owner was the orphaned daughter of a disgraced official. She had concealed her identity for seven years, but because she looked like the late Empress, the Empress Dowager had set her sights on her. Her death countdown: three days.
To stay alive, she needed the protection of someone the Empress Dowager wouldn’t dare touch.
She set her sights on the young emperor, reputed to be sinister and ruthless.
At their first “chance encounter,” she pretended to faint. He crouched down, lifted her chin, and asked, his fingers trembling, “What’s your name?”
Her heart skipped a beat. Why didn’t his gaze look murderous? Why did it look like he had found something he’d lost?
Later, she was reassigned to serve tea before the emperor. When she burned her hand, he personally applied medicine and blew on it. When others gave her a hard time, he stood in front of her. “She is mine. Anyone who lays a hand on her dies.” When he was exhausted, he rested his head against her waist and murmured, “Only here, with you, can I rest for a while.”
She thought he merely saw her as a substitute.
Until one day, when he was drunk, he pulled her into his arms, eyes red. “I like you, not because you look like someone else. It’s because you blew on my hand, let me lean on you, and told me, ‘This servant will stay by your side.’ It’s because you made me feel that maybe this deep palace isn’t quite so cold.”
Later, the Empress Dowager fell from power, the Jiang family was vindicated, and she became empress.
At the enthronement ceremony, he made room for her on the dragon throne. “Sit here. I’ll hold you while we listen to court affairs.”
She whispered, “That’s against the rules...”
He raised an eyebrow. “I make the rules. If I say it’s allowed, then it’s allowed.”
Everyone thought the emperor’s affection for her was just an act.
Until he risked his life for her.
