The Beauty of Her Alone

Chasing-her-back groveling, coercive possession, the moonlight's substitute trope, and old-school melodrama.

Xiao Yunjian loved someone who was close enough to touch, yet as untouchable as the bright moon in the sky.

He loved her until he was obsessed, yearned for her until he was consumed, but had nowhere to release those feelings.

Then, returning to the capital after reporting on his work, he met Shi Yanxi, whose appearance was strikingly similar to hers, and was beside himself with joy.

Shi Yanxi was born with exquisite beauty. After getting engaged to her childhood sweetheart, her dazzling looks brought disaster upon her friends and family.

She went to Xiao Yunjian for help and lost her innocence. To seek his protection, she had no choice but to accompany him back to the capital.

To marry her, Xiao Yunjian was made to kneel in the ancestral shrine and whipped, yet he never wavered in his determination.

He cooked for her, drew her brows and colored her cheeks, played the qin and the sheng for her, and obtained a letter from her childhood sweetheart.

As long as it made her happy, he was willing to lower himself, serving her like an ox or a horse.

His cherishing devotion warmed Shi Yanxi's heart.

He said he wanted a child, so Shi Yanxi became pregnant for him. Though she was cared for in every way, she still lost the baby.

As she lay by the bed, wailing in pain, he barged into the general's funeral hall and brought the newly widowed lady back to his manor.

Only then did she learn that Xiao Yunjian was obsessed with nothing but her face. The disasters that had befallen her friends and family, and the loss of her innocence, had all been part of his schemes.

When she was threatened by the powerful, harassed by officials' wives, or humiliated by her elders, he had stepped in to protect her only so he could keep her in a separate residence and admire her all to himself.

Even the child in her womb had been deemed unworthy of living simply because the woman Xiao Yunjian loved had miscarried.

After yearning for the bright moon for years, Xiao Yunjian finally got what he wanted and drew her into his arms, letting a great fire erase Shi Yanxi's very existence.

At first, he thought little of it. But he thought of her over tea and meals, and she was everywhere in the old courtyard.

He heard her in his ears, and even everyone he saw seemed to look like her. He was bewitched, his heart in chaos.

Later, she stood with that bright moon in a place where all life had been extinguished and asked him, "Will you save her, or me?"

This time, he chose her. But on their wedding night, he saw her hair had turned completely white, and her gaze was cold and stern.

After all those years, he had finally lost her.

The peach blossoms in Yangcheng have bloomed several times already. Tell me, why hasn't he come to marry me yet?

The preview for my upcoming novel, "Folding a Beauty into an Empty Boudoir," is below:

Ye Qishuang was born in the Northern Wasteland. Though she looked gentle and delicate, her temperament was far too carefree and uninhibited. On her first return to the capital, she happened to meet Fu Wenlun, the marquis's heir. She thought he had the slender waist and handsome temples of Pan An, with an immortal's grace, unlike any man she had ever seen.

At first sight, she fell for him. She tried every way to please and flatter him, but only embarrassed herself and made Fu Wenlun dislike her even more.

Just as Ye Qishuang was giving up, Fu Wenlun came to her himself and asked for her hand in marriage.

Ye Qishuang gladly agreed. Even though Fu Wenlun wanted only the imperial edict in her possession, she married into the Fu household, put away the sharp edges of her free-spirited nature, and clumsily learned to be gentle, respectful, modest, virtuous, and proper.

In the three years that followed, Ye Qishuang took concubines for him and treated his illegitimate son as her own. She thought that if she loved him passionately enough, she could eventually warm Fu Wenlun's heart, which was as cold as ice toward her.

But just as Ye Qishuang eagerly wanted to tell Fu Wenlun she was pregnant, the household was decked out in red decorations. He had secretly welcomed the woman he had kept as a mistress, his moonlight, into the household as his equal wife.

It turned out that a love like a moth flying into a flame was doomed from the start. She had sacrificed her pride for Fu Wenlun, only to make a laughingstock of herself.

Later, Fu Wenlun searched all over Yejing, but lost his soul when he saw her whispering intimately with another man.

He said, "Shuang'er, I was wrong. Please don't use this sort of trick to make me angry, all right?"

This was the first time he had called her by such an intimate name, but he had already lost the right to share the rest of her life.

My dear friend's upcoming novel, "A Branch of Resentment," is by Yan Shi Chen Xian. Please add it to your collection!

Before meeting Qu Yue, Qi Rou survived by sneaking scraps and eating leftovers.

Qu Yue took her in and kept her by his side, treating her incredibly well.

She had enough to eat and warm clothes, and someone to protect her. When she was bullied, she no longer had to kneel and beg over and over.

Someone stood up for her and had her back.

At last, Qi Rou learned what it meant to have a place to call home, a means of making a living, and a shred of dignity.

To repay Qu Yue,

this little girl, who feared pain and hardship more than anything, forced herself to take medicine three times a day to build up her strength, risking her life to bear him a child.

When her time came, she awoke from her dream and finally understood.

It had all been a reflection of flowers in a mirror, the moon in water.

All the hopes she had poured into her ten-month pregnancy were meant only to cure the woman he loved. That woman was hidden in a secret chamber, a forbidden place no one was allowed to enter.

He gave Qi Rou a place to live and food to eat, and cared for her attentively.

He raised her, doted on her, and stood up for her, all to mislead his enemies who came looking for him.

Qi Rou had not forgotten how she had been captured, tortured until she was near death, and crawled back. Yet he offered not a single word of comfort.

He held Miss Lu and said she was delicate and must not be frightened.

Yes, Qi Rou came from the streets, filthy and low. How could she compare to a sheltered young lady, pure and noble?

She could be summoned and dismissed at will, unlike a respectable young woman whose clean and distant manner and soft words could tantalize his heart.

To bring him and Miss Lu together, and to repay his kindness,

the nameless young girl who had lost her heart leapt alone into the cold and lonely river.

In that bitter winter night, surely the wind and fog had been too heavy, blurring her eyes and conjuring a hallucination.

In the hallucination, Qu Yue roared in despair. He called her Rou'er again.

After Miss Lu came back, Qi Rou had never again heard him tenderly call her by the name Qu Yue had given her.

His face was twisted with terror, as if someone had taken the person dearest to his heart. He begged Qi Rou not to die, then leapt after her, only for others to pull him back.

His heart-wrenching, utterly devastated appearance left Qi Rou dazed.

Could he cry, too?

She thought Heaven must have taken pity on her.

How could Qu Yue love Qi Rou? He was the emperor's younger brother, second only to one and above ten thousand. He was so proud and haughty, a man with the hardest bones.

After Qi Rou died, Qu Yue's heart palpitations and nightmares grew worse.

He kept dreaming of the little girl who leaned against his bedside, tugged at his sleeve and acted spoiled, and blushed whenever he kissed her.

The little girl who sweetly called him "my dear" again and again.

Message: Even in adversity, one should still turn toward the sun and live.