Updated regularly, and the rating will keep rising! The groveling ex trope + political intrigue. The leads are not each other's firsts, so please move along if that bothers you.
Shen Wenyu, Princess Yongning of the Great Yan, first met Xiao Lang, the third prince of Northern Shuo, at the Shangsi Festival lantern fair. He was gentle and refined, and risked his life to protect her. She gave him her heart, unwittingly inviting a wolf into her home. Three years later, cavalry stormed the palace gates. He stood before her in a black formal robe, smiling as he always had, though his eyes were full of ice. “I came to avenge the Xuan clan.”
He imprisoned her in Northern Shuo and humiliated her in every way. He personally fed her poison, forced her to listen to others making love, and gave her away to a vassal prince. Each cruelty broke another piece of her. She was rescued after being thrown into a lake, then strangled and sent to prison. By the time he faced his own feelings and began keeping watch outside her window night after night, she was already an empty shell.
On a snowy night at the Lanyui Pavilion, she faked her death and escaped. Cradling her “corpse,” he wept in anguish. Only then did he realize that the place in his heart she had claimed could never be carved out.
Three years later, a man known as “Mr. Hengwu” appeared at the Northern Shuo court. Wielding the secret network of former Great Yan loyalists, he made his moves step by step, devouring Xiao Lang's court, armies, and public support. At the autumn hunt, Xiao Lang, now an emperor, knelt and held the reins of her horse. When he looked up, his eyes were bloodshot. “You can take your revenge however you like, just don't tear my heart out with your death again.”
She looked down at him, smiling as she had when they first met at Qujiang. Her voice rang like shattered jade. “Your Highness, it's too late.”
She would return every bit of pain he had inflicted on her. And one day, that blood-soaked crabapple grove would bloom again beneath his feet.
