The Candle in My Heart: I Am Your Ladder, You Are My Bait

[A resilient heroine who grows stronger × a gentle, restrained prime minister × a devoted, kind-hearted crown prince]

Yu Manzhu was born and raised in a brothel. From a young age, she learned to read people and see through their hearts.

She thought she, too, would spend her life in the brothel, earning her living with a smile.

Until, at sixteen, her mother, the brothel’s top courtesan, gripped her hand tightly on her deathbed and said, “A Zhu, you must avenge me!”

“How?”

“You must become the most honored woman in the world!”

From that day on, Yu Manzhu kept those words firmly in her heart.

But everything began to change when she met Pei Huaiyu and Yuanzhao.

She had never dared imagine that anyone might cherish her like a treasure.

“Aman, I only wish you a fulfilled life, free from hardship and worry.”

Nor had she ever known anyone so kind and pure.

“A Zhu, I’ll believe anything you say.”

Yu Manzhu’s closed heart slowly began to open, yet she found herself sinking into even greater anguish.

She did not want to hurt either of them, but her mother’s last words still rang in her ears. With no other choice, she made her decision.

At the ceremony where she was crowned empress, she wore her phoenix robes and finally fulfilled her promise to her mother.

From that moment on, she was no longer a lonely girl from a brothel, but the most honored woman in the Jingyuan Kingdom.

She would avenge her mother, and she would also take care of the people’s suffering!

When all was settled, she could finally seek the peace she had longed for.