[Noble, brilliant empress x sinister prince with a kindly face]
Cui Ying is the empress of the Great Yue dynasty.
Born into a noble family, she entered the palace at sixteen to become the old emperor's second empress, then gave birth to a son who was made crown prince.
The old emperor is well past forty. He is plain-looking, sinister, and violent, and favors Consort Li above all others.
But in public, he treats Empress Cui with considerable respect.
At the time, Cui Ying's brother urged her to endure: once the old emperor died and the crown prince came of age and took the throne, the empire would be in the Cui family's hands.
But things did not go as planned.
Cui Ying's crown prince gradually revealed himself to be foolish and incompetent.
Consort Li's third prince, on the other hand, was born with an air of effortless grace. He was brilliant, excelled in both literature and martial arts, and carried himself like a gentleman.
The old emperor began considering deposing the crown prince and naming another heir.
Dignified and poised, Cui Ying sat on the couch, coolly scrutinizing the third prince behind the curtain, who had been caught in a compromising situation over a trivial matter.
The youth had dark, elegant brows and red lips, his graceful beauty like jade from Kunlun Mountain.
Now his dark lashes lowered as he meekly accepted his punishment.
Cui Ying thought of the countless family letters and secret missives she had received lately, all urging her to make plans soon and eliminate Consort Li and her son.
But the truth was...
She admired the third prince, too.
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The third prince, Xiao Yu, was known for his handsome bearing and fine character. He was a graceful young man who would blush whenever court officials praised him.
In truth, he was calculating and vicious. Anyone who offended him would meet a terrible end.
For a time, Xiao Yu thought he had inherited his sinister nature from his father.
But his father could not appreciate his beautiful, noble birth mother.
As Xiao Yu knelt below the steps and felt the woman's cool gaze fall upon him, every part of him screamed for him to get closer to her, closer still.
His yearning for his birth mother to love him had long been carved into his bones, beyond any cure.
1. The heroine is unbelievably beautiful, clever, noble, elegant, and aloof, with sky-high self-esteem. She treats the hero poorly at first, and even after giving him a hard time, she doesn't think she's done anything wrong. A cunning concubine-born son tries to seduce his birth mother.
2. The heroine is not a virgin, but the hero is. The crown prince is the heroine and the old emperor's son. The hero is not the old emperor's biological son. The hero only takes the throne after the old emperor dies, so there is no ethical conflict.
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