Beauty in a Chaotic Age: A Face That Could Topple a Kingdom

He was a brilliant student of military history in the twenty-first century, but unfortunately transmigrated to another world and became a woman. Once a royal consort, he was framed, and his entire family was implicated. To avenge them, he drew on his knowledge of military strategy and became a female Zhuge Liang in this otherworldly land. With feather fan and silk turban, he watched the enemy’s warships turn to ash.

The Holy Emperor, enamored of beauty, longed for a woman who could topple kingdoms. Though he ruled for many years, he could not find her. A daughter of the Gong family had just come of age, raised in the secluded inner chambers and unknown to the world. Born with beauty she could not hide, she was unlucky enough to attract the emperor’s favor. Her slender waist could be clasped in one hand, her face like a lotus blossom touched by spring rain. One glance and one smile brought a hundred charms to life, leaving every other woman in the palace without color. In the prime of her youth, her beauty earned the empress’s jealousy. A glint of dark silver shone from her jade hairpin. Emperors had always been heartless: a red beam three feet long and a length of white silk were bestowed upon her. From the depths of the inner chambers came a sigh, and soft cries reached the ears of passersby. If flowers could weep, they too would shed tears.

Thus, parents throughout the land came to value daughters over sons.