After the Cold, Powerful Minister Went Mad for Love

[Love Grows Over Time, Possessive Pursuit (Mild)]

Shen Yuyun is gentle and obedient. The daughter of a disgraced official, she has been forced into service as a bondmaid and condemned to low status for life. Her greatest wish is to clear her father’s name.

So when she accidentally comes across the refined prefect Mei Lanqing after he has been drugged, she loosens her sash and offers herself as the antidote.

But to her surprise, Mei, a man with a promising future, never once mentions her low status. He marries Shen Yuyun with all the proper rites, a grand bridal sedan, and installs her as mistress of his household.

Countless noble young ladies envy Shen Yuyun for having such a fine husband. Mei is as elegant as an immortal, enjoys the favor of the emperor, and is even willing to do his new bride’s makeup every day. But Shen Yuyun knows full well that this wonderful marriage began with her scheme and succeeded because of Mei Lanqing’s upright nature.

Shen Yuyun thinks that once everything is settled, she will give up her place as mistress of the household and find the refined Mei Lanqing a good wife. So after every night of passion, she secretly takes a contraceptive pill that tastes bitter to the very heart. She thinks they both understand this without having to say it.

But when her use of contraceptives is discovered, Mei Lanqing, who has always been as pure and bright as the moon, binds her hands and pins her to the bed.

Feeling Mei Lanqing’s burning desire, Shen Yuyun finally panics. She presses against his chest, trying to push him away, only for his grip around her waist to tighten. Scorching kisses, full of punishment, fall on her brow and neck, as if he means to burn her to ashes.

Shen Yuyun looks up and meets Mei Lanqing’s familiar yet strange eyes. In the gaze that has always held a gentle, clear light, she sees a surging dark fire she has never seen before.

At last, she understands. Beneath his cool, upright exterior lies a heart whose reason has been consumed by scorching love.

*

To everyone else, Mei Lanqing is a brilliant and gentle gentleman, but after failing the palace examination, he can only serve as a low-ranking county magistrate in Mingzhou. Everyone feels sorry for him, but he does not mind.

Shen Yuyun once did him a kindness, so when she is tricked into being sent to his home, he respects and protects her, treating her with the utmost tenderness. He is even quite willing to help her find her lover.

But he never expected that one brief separation would give the usually dispassionate Mei Lanqing his first taste of longing. As they spend day after day together after reuniting, he suddenly realizes that he cannot explain how it began, but he has already fallen deeply in love.

After an accident and a passionate spring dream, Shen Yuyun wakes with her hair disheveled and unmistakable marks on her body, sleeping peacefully at his side. Mei Lanqing is overwhelmed by conflicting feelings, yet he still welcomes her as his one and only bride with the most formal betrothal rites.

But a sorrow he cannot dispel always lingers between her brows. She respects him, but is not close to him.

It can only be because her heart belongs to her former lover. Mei Lanqing thinks they have plenty of time. One day, Shen Yuyun will forget that man. In the days and nights to come, he will be the one sharing books and tea with her, whispering intimately with her, and raising a houseful of children with her. He, Mei Lanqing, will be the one by her side.

Until he repeatedly catches Shen Yuyun meeting the man she loves, and discovers that she has been taking contraceptives behind his back. At last, the gentle facade he has maintained for years crumbles piece by piece.

Beneath the red bed curtains, his beautiful wife’s slender, pale wrists are bound to the bedpost with her sash. Mei Lanqing holds her slender waist firmly in his grasp, squeezing so tightly it seems he wants to fuse her into his very bones.

"Yuniang..." His eyes look bloodshot, the rims red, and his voice low and hoarse. "You’ve met with him in secret again and again, and taken contraceptives for him. Did you think I truly didn’t care? Or did you think I was a gentleman who would help you be with him?"

His fingertips brush her frightened eyes. His scorching kiss falls on the pulsing vein in her soft, pale neck, biting and lingering. Yet his voice is gentle, like a lover whispering softly into her ear. "You are mine. Since you tempted me, you will spend the rest of your life making it up to me. We will be together until death."

(The blurb has been revised. The main plot and the leads’ core characterization remain mostly the same; only the male lead’s way of going mad with love has changed.)

1. The male lead appears kind and gentle, but deep down he has the particular pride of a genius and looks down on everyone equally, except the female lead.

2. Because of her upbringing, the female lead does not recognize her own feelings and tends to avoid intimacy.

3. The male lead is reborn; the female lead is not.

Theme: Even when mired in hardship, never give up hope.