Just practicing my writing! Practicing my writing!! Practicing my writing!!! Don't read 😂
Shen Zhiwei died in the spring of Chengping Year Five.
The Cold Palace, an abortion potion, two lives lost.
When she opened her eyes again, she was back on the eve of entering the palace, with memories of being poisoned to death in her previous life still raging through her mind.
Shen Zhiwei gazed at her seventeen-year-old reflection in the bronze mirror, remembering the bowl of poison forced down her throat.
In her previous life, she had maintained the dignity expected of a fifth-rank official's legitimate daughter, never fighting or competing. Yet when she became pregnant, Consort Lin, the emperor's favorite, bestowed a cup of poisoned wine upon her.
In this life, she carefully put away her family's ancestral recipes.
If refusing to compete meant death, then she would fight for a way to survive.
She entered the palace as a Talented Lady. While others brought gold and silver jewelry, she brought the recipes and medical knowledge her mother had left her.
When the Empress Dowager suffered from headaches, Shen Zhiwei presented her with a soothing soup and made a name for herself in the Palace of Compassion and Tranquility.
When the Empress was frail, she simmered nourishing soup and earned the protection of the central palace.
When Consort Lin made things difficult for her, she smiled and calmly turned each situation around.
Until, at a palace banquet, the consort publicly accused her: "Talented Lady Shen is using her charms to bewitch His Majesty!"
But the emperor on the throne set down his jade chopsticks and took her hand. "Talented Lady Shen has served me well. Promote her to Beauty."
Later, she helped manage the six palace quarters and exposed a ten-year-old wrongful conviction.
On the day Consort Lin was sent to the Cold Palace, she screamed at her, "You're only the daughter of a fifth-rank official. What gives you the right?"
Shen Zhiwei stroked her slightly rounded belly and gazed toward the throne, where the man who had once gripped her hand during her difficult labor sat.
"Because I never fight for a fleeting favor. I fight for the women of this harem to have a chance to live."
Later, she ruled from behind the curtain, established a culinary medicine department, and founded a school for girls.
