*Please add my upcoming novel, I Wore the Plot After the Male Lead Was Abandoned by Everyone, to your collection.
For generations, the officials of the Ming Dynasty had believed they possessed strong hearts.
The emperor had been "captured by the enemy on a northern campaign"? No problem. They installed Prince Cheng as emperor and honored the previous ruler as the Retired Emperor. The new emperor wanted to appoint a different crown prince? No problem. Everyone could choose sides in advance. What? The Retired Emperor had launched a coup to reclaim the throne? No problem. They'd dealt with that sort of thing before...
That was until the first Crown Princess in Ming history appeared.
All the ministers fell to their knees and refused to attend court for three days. An elderly official clutched his chest, lowered his head, and charged toward the Censorate, ready to die in protest, shouting at the top of his lungs.
"The child is young and ignorant, and she's throwing the court into chaos. Today, I shall spill three feet of blood to make my plea heard by Heaven!"
"When a hen crows at dawn, the family is doomed! The chaos caused by Empress Wu is a warning to us all. Its poison spread throughout the land and brought disaster upon her descendants! I risk my life to advise Your Majesty: please reconsider the matter of the Crown Princess!"
Later, they had the first empress in Ming history.
At her enthronement, the assembled ministers knelt and cried, "Long live the emperor!" They all submitted to her.
--
Zhu Jianxi, an ordinary college student, underwent surgery and woke up in the body of Princess Gu'an, the legitimate daughter of Zhu Qiyu, the Jingtai Emperor of the Ming Dynasty.
She gained a card-drawing System with countless cards. She could summon wind and rain, observe the stars at night, and even cross a thousand miles in a single step.
From then on, the little goddess at the Zugu Temple in Guangxi, the Holy Maiden at a White Lotus Sect altar, and the hidden hand behind Jiangnan's tea merchants... all seemed to be her secret identities.
At first, she only wanted to eat, drink, and live a lazy life. But the Oirat had designs on the throne, her half-brother pressed her at every turn, the Yingzong Emperor watched her from the shadows, and her father was a foolish, incompetent ruler...
Then one day, she suddenly thought:
Why shouldn't I be the one to rule this land?
Everyone in court knew that Yu Mian, son of Yu Qian, the Grand Protector, had been raised by his father's example. He was upright, self-disciplined, and restrained, with the bearing of a gentleman. The rules were etched into his bones, and he never deviated from them in the slightest.
But in those days no one knew of the unspeakable, outrageous longing he kept hidden. Like an obsessive, gloomy mad dog, rebellious to the core, even if every bone in his body were broken and crushed, he had only one thought:
I want that moon hanging high in the sky to shine on me alone.
[Reader's note: The romance comes later.]
*
"Ming Taizu, eldest daughter of Emperor Jing. Born with divine insight, she could speak at a tender age; as a child, she was quick to learn, and as she grew, she became kind and perceptive. Upon reaching adulthood, she was wise and brilliant. When the emperor was young and took the throne, her profound virtue moved Heaven, and rain fell in response to her prayers. She encouraged farming and promoted harvests, and every trade flourished.
"In that age, the emperor received Heaven's mandate, crushed the enemy at Tumu, watered her horses in the Wunanshui River, drove the Oirat far away, and brought the Tatar tribes to heel. Her heavenly might reached everywhere, near and far. How glorious!"
--Veritable Records of the Ming
① From Records of the Grand Historian, "Basic Annals of the Five Emperors," describing the legendary ancestor of Chinese civilization, the Yellow Emperor.
Theme: Power is the true tonic.
