The Tyrant Is Still Young, Better Drive Him Out Early

Blurb screenshot saved When Kong Lingjia was twelve, her father brought Chang Xuanyu home. The family was so poor they could barely put food on the table, and her younger siblings were still crying for food. Kong Lingjia assumed Chang Xuanyu was the illegitimate child her father had brought home after a fling. She wouldn't let her younger siblings get close to him. In winter, she made him wash clothes in the icy well water. In summer, she made him cook over a fire in the hot, airless kitchen. She took the money he'd earned from doing odd jobs and tore up the letters his mother sent him... Kong Lingjia never imagined that Chang Xuanyu, who had meekly put up with everything, would one day become a cruel tyrant feared throughout the realm. After the new emperor ascended the throne, he purged his rivals. Everyone who had offended him in the past met a miserable end. Some were hung from the city walls as a warning; others endured the Ten Great Tortures. For a time, the court was gripped by fear, and everyone lived in terror. Kong Lingjia fled through the night with her younger siblings, playing cat and mouse with Chang Xuanyu for half a year. They lived worse than animals, while Chang Xuanyu took pleasure in watching them barely scrape by, day after day. Reborn, Kong Lingjia returned to the age of twelve. A month had passed since Chang Xuanyu was brought through the Kong family's gates, and she'd been making life difficult for him for that entire month. It seemed everything could still be put right, and yet maybe it couldn't. Kong Lingjia spent a dazed, restless night in bed. When she opened the door at dawn, she remembered that the night before, she'd ordered Chang Xuanyu not to sleep and to chop wood in the courtyard all night. On that cold winter morning, sweat had soaked through his long robe. Hearing movement at the doorway, he turned to look at her, his eyes a little timid and a little ingratiating. "Sis, I've finished all the work." Someone else stood in the courtyard: Chu Qiuying, the young daughter of the wealthy family next door. Chu Qiuying was beautiful and kindhearted, and she'd always liked helping Chang Xuanyu. The warm buns in his hands were the ones Chu Qiuying had just bought for him. As the savory scent of the meat buns reached Kong Lingjia, she suddenly remembered that the day she starved to death was the day Chang Xuanyu married Chu Qiuying in a grand procession. Theme: A loving family