[Substitute Bride] [Rivalry for a Man] [The Pursuit of His Wife's Crematorium] Gu Zhaoxue lost her parents young and lived with her maternal uncle, the Marquis of Weiyuan.
Her eldest cousin, Shen Qinglan, was engaged to Li Changlin, the powerful Prince An. Three days before the wedding, Prince An suddenly fell gravely ill and was on the brink of death.
Unwilling to marry him and spend her life as a widow, Shen Qinglan drugged Zhaoxue and sent her off in the bridal sedan chair on the wedding day.
On her wedding night, Zhaoxue looked at the unconscious Prince An and remembered her wet nurse's advice: if she had a child, she would have someone to depend on for the rest of her life, even if Prince An died.
She dug out a guide and prepared to get started. Then Prince An woke up.
The Prince An before her was gentle, considerate, witty, and well-read, and he cherished Zhaoxue deeply. He told her that he had to conceal the fact that he was conscious so he could draw out the person who had tried to harm him.
Zhaoxue believed him. From then on, she pretended to be weak and pitiful by day to fool the servants, and shared tender moments with Prince An at night.
A month later, Prince An was forced to wake in the daytime to save Zhaoxue from being bullied.
From then on, Prince An changed.
He became cold, ruthless, sinister, and obsessive, treating Zhaoxue with nothing but loathing. He sent her to the most remote courtyard in the manor to fend for herself.
One time, after being drugged, he climbed into Zhaoxue's courtyard.
After that, he was the violent Prince An by day, but at night, on her bed, he would ask with red-rimmed eyes: who did she really love?
Zhaoxue thought Prince An was ill, and that he would return to his former self once he recovered.
It wasn't until her eldest cousin came to see her that she learned the truth: the gentle Prince An was only a stand-in. She had mistaken the stand-in for the real Prince An, and was no longer worthy of being his princess consort.
She was a stain on Prince An's reputation. Her cousin was just waiting for her to die so she could take her place as his princess consort.
Zhaoxue burned her past to ashes and faked her death to escape.
Later, she heard that the emperor had found the Fifth Prince, Prince An's twin brother, who had been lost among the common people.
