The Third Year of Marriage

Cold, twisted madman vs. radiant, sincere girl

Xie Heyu and Liu Hanzhu grew up together as childhood friends. Xie Heyu had neither father nor mother. Even the most pathetic stray dog in the village dared to bite him, so he swore he would claw his way to the top.

Liu Hanzhu's family scraped food from their own mouths to raise him. Her parents arranged a childhood betrothal for the two of them. A fever as a child had left Liu Hanzhu a little slow, and she was simple and straightforward. But she took the betrothal seriously, and when she looked at Xie Heyu again, she found something more in her heart.

Xie Heyu came top in the imperial examinations and rose smoothly through the ranks. The Grand Tutor's household wanted to win him over, and the Chancellor also hoped to take him as a son-in-law. He was agonizing over who could help him reach the highest position in the court.

Then one day, Liu Hanzhu came to him and asked, bewildered, why he still hadn't married her.

He stared at her in silence for a long time, then married her as she wished. The wedding was grand, and she was delighted. But that very night, he tossed her a divorce agreement.

"I can ensure your family enjoys wealth and status, and that your descendants will never want for food or clothing. After three years, you will leave."

Liu Hanzhu was heartbroken and stunned. "I came here to spend my life with you!"

But Xie Heyu's face was full of scorn. "Didn't your family save me for exactly this reason?"

Liu Hanzhu sat alone on the wedding bed all night, tears in her eyes as she ate bitter dates. She truly wanted to spend her life with him. Why wouldn't he believe her?

After they married, he treated her with all due respect in public, but barely spoke to her in private. Liu Hanzhu refused to give up. Her father said she was a ball of fire; she could warm even a stone!

By their third year of marriage, she happened to hear the Chancellor ask him how nice it would have been if he'd married into the Chancellor's household instead.

She heard him answer in a calm voice, "I regret it too."

Liu Hanzhu's heart shattered, and her face went cold. Only then did she realize she was crying. She no longer wanted to spend her life with him.

Just then, her cousin returned to the capital. He had become a young general! He invited her to go with him to the frontier and clear her mind, and she decided to leave with him.

Her cousin gave her a wooden box containing travel papers, money, and a bottle of pills.

Xie Heyu noticed that Liu Hanzhu had changed. She no longer waited by the door for him, hopeful and eager. She no longer pestered him to move out of his study, either. Even the nourishing soup she made every other day had stopped.

At the spring banquet, he watched from the shadows as his wife gently put an arm around the Chancellor's daughter and apologized sincerely. "I was wrong to take your betrothed. Don't cry. I'll give him back to you."

Behind a strange rock, Xie Heyu smiled.

Did she not know that husband and wife could never be parted, not even by death?

Theme: Treat others with sincerity.