The Third Year of My Escape

(Main story complete) Shen Jingtang, wife of Pei Lang, the Prefect of the Capital, was an utterly ordinary woman. She had an unremarkable face, a common background, and a timid, unimpressive manner. In a crowd, she was the sort of person you would never notice. No one knew that Shen Jingtang had a secret. She had once been Cheng Wang's favored concubine. Three years ago, she escaped, changed her name and appearance, and went into hiding in the capital, hoping never to have anything to do with him again. Cheng Wang was a feudal prince with a powerful army, his sights set on the throne. He was strikingly beautiful, yet wantonly cruel, and his beauty was matched by his wicked reputation. He was known throughout the realm, and no one would ever have connected him with plain-looking Shen Jingtang. Only Shen Jingtang knew how, through countless nights when passion surged, she had been forced into an intimate entanglement with him until she was utterly broken. The ailing emperor summoned Cheng Wang to the capital to attend to him. Cheng Wang lodged at the Pei residence, and Shen Jingtang trembled as she hid from him at every turn, terrified he might notice something amiss. Fortunately, Cheng Wang seemed to have forgotten that he once had a favored concubine. When the emperor recovered, Cheng Wang finally departed. Shen Jingtang was relieved, thinking her nightmare was over. Then a crisis erupted in the capital: Cheng Wang forced the emperor to his death, seized the imperial city, slaughtered the princes and royal heirs like chickens and dogs, and threw countless officials into prison. Among them was Shen Jingtang's husband, Pei Lang. In the pouring rain, Shen Jingtang barged into the Regent's residence. Her dress was drenched and clung to her body, and she looked utterly wretched, yet she made it straight to his most private chambers without hindrance. With nowhere else to turn, she begged him to spare her husband.