Synopsis
[The disgraced minister's surviving daughter x the frontier general]
Before entering a pleasure house, Yue Yan was the envy of everyone in the capital, a noble young lady from a distinguished family. Her grandfather held the highest office as chancellor, and her family's pedigree was peerless.
She was gentle and elegant, accomplished in music, chess, calligraphy, and painting, and impeccable in word and deed. She was the ideal woman, desired by countless young masters from noble families.
It all ended on the day the Jing family was convicted of treason and executed to the last member.
Her maid, who had been by her side since childhood, took her place in death. Yue Yan fled under an assumed name all the way to the northwestern frontier, where she became a courtesan who played the pipa, barely scraping by.
One day, a drunken soldier harassed her, and a general rescued her like a god descending from heaven.
After that, Mu Yuzhao often came to listen to her play. When she was forced to receive clients, he bought her freedom and welcomed her into his home as his wife.
He kept her by his side, but never touched her.
He only watched her play the pipa, and sometimes slept beside her. Years passed like this.
Until her general died in battle.
That day, snow blanketed Yuancheng, just as it had on the day the Jing residence was drenched in blood.
Everyone said her husband had lost the city and his life because he was a poor commander.
Only she happened to learn the truth: the emperor feared him and had ordered his secret assassination.
She stole the evidence and returned to the capital alone. She would clear her husband's name.
But she never expected to discover that the Jing family's treason charge had also been fabricated by the emperor.
Bearing two blood feuds, she entered the palace.
On the night she was summoned to the emperor's bed, a fire consumed the entire bedchamber.
In the flames, she saw snow falling across the sky again, and her husband lying in a pool of blood, clutching a jade pipa pick.
Before the flames swallowed her, she prayed to the heavens that if she had another life, she would be his wife again and ask him: Mu Yuzhao, did you ever love me?
-
The night Yue Yan was reborn was one year before Mu Yuzhao's death.
That night, he had drunk too much and fallen asleep beside her.
Her sobs woke him, but she climbed onto his waist, her face wet with tears, and asked, "Mu Yuzhao, do you love me or not?"
His lips pressed tightly together. He didn't dare answer.
She threw herself at him, pulled open his robe, and caressed his smooth, unscarred chest. "Let's truly be husband and wife."
As their bed curtains billowed and passion swept over them, Yue Yan clung to Mu Yuzhao's sweat-damp shoulder, gazed at him through tearful eyes, and whispered hoarsely, "Mu Yuzhao, I love you so much. Don't die."
He lowered his head and tenderly kissed away the tears at the corner of her eye, promising, "An'an, I won't die."
Yue Yan froze.
Jing An, her real name.
Only then did she learn that he had known everything all along.
In her previous life, after returning to the capital, she met Mu Yuzhao's childhood friend, Prince Wen. He told her the emperor had orchestrated the Jing family's treason case.
Prince Wen said someone had asked him to clear the Jing family's name.
It turned out that "someone" was Mu Yuzhao.
-
Jing An didn't know that the Jing and Mu families had once planned to join their families through marriage.
If Mu Yuzhao's father hadn't died in battle.
If the Jing family hadn't been executed to the last member.
They would have been childhood sweethearts, carefree companions who married young when they came of age and spent their lives in love.
Blurb written on March 21, 2026
Theme: The truth will always be borne witness to by wind and snow
