Shen Yun Zhao was reborn.
In her previous life, the Shen family was full of loyal heroes, yet they were falsely accused of treason and executed to the last. Her stepmother sold her into the palace, where she became a pawn in the empress dowager's hands. In the end, a cup of poisoned wine took her life. Only as she lay dying did she learn the truth: the empress dowager, the Third Prince, and Wang Chongwen had joined forces to orchestrate the shocking plot that framed the Shen family.
Reborn, Shen Yun Zhao would never again be anyone's pawn.
Her stepmother wanted to send her into the palace as a scapegoat? She turned around and exposed her stepmother's shameful secrets. Her half-sister wanted to steal her match? She smiled and let the scumbag go, then turned to climb a higher branch. The Third Prince wanted her on his side? She played along on the surface, but had already secretly thrown in her lot with the crown prince.
She laid her plans step by step: she went south to Suzhou to investigate the accounts, turned the Third Prince's trusted aide against him, rescued Zhao Chongde, the minister who had served the late emperor and been imprisoned for sixteen years, and obtained the late emperor's edict. One by one, she exposed the empress dowager and the Third Prince's crimes for all to see.
When the Third Prince fled in panic, the empress dowager hanged herself in the Cold Palace, and Wang Chongwen was led to the execution ground, everyone finally understood:
This woman, who had always been treated as a pawn, had been the one moving the pieces from the very beginning.
The crown prince asked her, "After all you've done, what is it you really want?"
Shen Yun Zhao gazed toward the Shen family ancestral hall and smiled faintly. "What I want is simple: let those who deserve to die, die; let those who deserve to live, live; and let the Shen family's innocence come to light."
From abandoned daughter to master strategist, from pawn to player...
When she stopped hiding her sharp edge, the whole world would make way for her.
It's time to come clean: I'm done pretending.
