[Clear-headed, independent female chancellor x a modern “soft husband” who plays the pig to eat the tiger]
[Women-focused + female lead reborn + male lead transmigrates + ambitious heroine in the imperial exams + political intrigue]
In her previous life, Lu Minghua gave away her entire fortune and spent every connection she had to force the impoverished scholar Liang Shuche into the position of chancellor.
In return, he personally submitted evidence against her, condemning the entire Lu family to exile, then turned around and married a high-born heiress.
Reborn, she returns to the day their marriage was being arranged.
Her scumbag ex speaks gently, painting her a rosy picture: “Minghua, just take good care of the family business. Once I pass the exams and earn a title, I'll be your support.”
Lu Minghua sneers and tosses her own student registration certificate in front of everyone. “What a coincidence. I can earn my own future!”
She decisively calls off the engagement, then turns around and takes in a poverty-stricken scholar with nowhere to go as her live-in husband.
On the eve of their wedding, her husband, a copyist, is already straddling the wall and making a midnight escape. She catches him at the foot of it.
Lu Minghua tosses him a stack of silver notes and a contract. “Marry into the Lu family. Room and board included, plus twenty taels a month.”
Ji Zhiyan, a modern office worker who has just transmigrated into a book with not a penny to his name, looks at the silver notes and quietly pulls his leg back from the wall. With utmost sincerity, he says:
“Actually, my stomach isn't very strong. Rich older sister, do you think I could live off you for the rest of my life?”
And so, the Great Zhou Dynasty gained a most unusual couple.
Her scumbag ex-husband seethes with jealousy, waiting for Lu Minghua to fail the imperial exams and come crawling back to him in tears.
Instead, she becomes a blade, earns the top honors in all three stages of the exams, and becomes Great Zhou's first female chancellor, crushing her ex-husband's path to glory for good!
Liang Shuche falls into the dust, kneeling outside the chancellor's residence in bitter regret. “Minghua, I was wrong...”
Her live-in husband wraps an arm around the female chancellor's waist, his expression dangerous. “Show some respect, big brother!”