The Substitute Crown Prince's Everyday Life is now underway~
[Coming soon: The Eldest Legitimate Brother's Cage. Please add it to your collection!]
Shen Xi was dazzlingly beautiful and came from a distinguished family. She was Chang'an's foremost beauty, and so many men sought her hand that they wore down her doorstep.
Prince Xu Shu of Jin was a modest gentleman, as refined as jade. Yet he had been frail and sickly since childhood, a sickly young man no one cared for.
By chance, Xu Shu rescued Shen Xi when she fell into the water.
To repay him, Shen Xi married him despite her family's objections.
But on the eve of their wedding, Shen Xi had a bizarre dream.
In it, she and Xu Shu were husband and wife, treading carefully through five years together amid the suspicions of the Crown Prince and Prince Qi.
Later, the Crown Prince and Prince Qi were defeated and died. The Shen family helped Xu Shu become Crown Prince, but once he had achieved his goal, he confiscated the Shen family's property, cast Shen Xi aside, and married her cousin instead!
Before she died, her cousin laughed viciously. "Shen Xi, he never loved you. He married you only to use your father and brothers' military power to become Crown Prince!"
Then he sent her and the child in her womb to their deaths with a cup of poisoned wine.
When Shen Xi awoke, she was horrified to discover that the events in her dream were coming true one by one.
Worse still, every morning when she opened her eyes, she saw her husband smiling at her from beside her pillow.
The more Shen Xi looked at him, the more she felt Xu Shu was figuring out how to kill her...
Unable to bring herself to ask for a divorce and afraid he would kill her to keep her quiet, Shen Xi could only carefully put on a show of being a loving wife every day.
"Husband, what do you think of this young lady? She's skilled in music, chess, calligraphy, and painting. How about taking her as a concubine?"
Xu Shu: My princess consort is so virtuous.
"Husband, I'm not feeling well today, so I can't attend to you..."
Xu Shu: Your health comes first, my princess consort.
"Husband, if I told you I didn't make this contraceptive soup, would you believe me? QAQ"
Xu Shu smiled like a spring breeze. "Of course I would."
Shen Xi breathed a sigh of relief, then secretly plotted her escape route that night.
But before she could even climb out the window, Xu Shu caught her and tossed her back inside.
The man roughly gripped her chin. His usually gentle eyes were tinged with a frenzied red as he sighed:
"Xi'er, could you please stop lying to me? I don't want to kill anyone again."
Shen Xi burst into tears. Who was deceiving whom, exactly?
[An innocent, uneducated beauty x a sickly young man who's ruthless and vicious beneath his gentle facade]
Content warning: The character profiles are already given. The heroine is not a clever, soft, innocent flower. If that's not your thing, please don't read. Please don't flame me, thanks. The bald author might have a heart attack.
Reader's guide:
1. The hero is reborn. The heroine only dreams of her past life, and there are misunderstandings about it. The heroine was not killed by the hero.
2. The hero has a fake-sweet and psychotic side (which will backfire on him later). He's only gentle with the heroine, but he's no good person and will kill people.
3. Both are virgins; one-on-one romance.
The Substitute Crown Prince's Everyday Life is now open for follows. Blurb:
Shen Yu takes the place of her gravely ill cousin and marries Li Xun, heir to the Prince of Wei.
Everyone says that Li Xun's one true love is her cousin, Shen Ruo.
They were childhood sweethearts, engaged for years, and a perfect match that made everyone jealous.
The usually rational and aloof man only ever showed a trace of tenderness when he was with her cousin.
As for Shen Yu, she was merely a convenient choice forced on him by circumstance. He despised and loathed her, treated her coldly, and left her alone on their wedding night. He had never once shown her the slightest kindness.
But Shen Yu didn't care about any of that.
She never expected Li Xun to love her deeply. After marrying into the prince's household, she kept to her place, offering him gentle companionship by lamplight at night and competently managing the household by day. She was obedient, sensible, and wonderfully easy to deal with.
But being humble can't make someone love you.
After the new emperor ascended the throne, Li Xun was made Crown Prince. So he could bring his true love into the Eastern Palace openly and honorably, Shen Yu was demoted from wife to concubine, becoming an object of ridicule in everyone's eyes.
Everyone thought she would cling to him and refuse to give up her position as primary wife, including Li Xun.
But Shen Yu showed no resentment or grievance. She calmly packed her things and went to a temple outside the palace, making way for her cousin.
At the time, Li Xun thought nothing of it, certain she would return to his side one day.
Then, on the night of the Eastern Palace wedding, as ten miles of wedding finery gleamed and festive candles blazed, the Crown Prince, who thought he had everything under control, received the terrible news that his Secondary Consort Shen was dead.
The woman as gentle as water had fallen into the icy river beneath a bottomless cliff, leaving him not even a corpse to bury.
Only then did Li Xun understand what he had lost...
*
If he could start over, Li Xun would give everything he had just to keep the young woman whose heart and eyes had once held only him.
Later, his wish came true. The young woman really hadn't died, but there was no longer any trace of him in her eyes.
He went mad trying to save her, stopping at nothing, but she lay in another man's arms, smiling tenderly.
When the man's mask fell, he revealed a pair of phoenix eyes almost identical to Li Xun's.
At that moment, Li Xun was struck as if by lightning, and finally understood:
She had never loved him. Her one true love had always been her gentle, refined eldest brother, the very brother he had always revered and respected, and believed he could never catch up to, even if he spent his whole life trying.
And he was only a substitute!
With his pride trampled underfoot, Li Xun swore he would cut ties with this fickle woman once and for all.
Later...
The Crown Prince: A substitute is still a substitute. The original is already dead, anyway.
Little extra scene
After the Crown Prince's wedding, palace attendants saw the usually ruthless and aloof Crown Prince personally doing his Crown Princess's eyebrows. The Crown Princess was thoroughly displeased, and His Highness actually looked wounded.
"Yu'er, are you looking down on me again?!"
[A rational, aloof, extremely possessive man x a gentle, composed, intelligent beauty]
Theme: Love leaves no room for deception or secrets.
The supporting actress must have received the script of a leading heroine! All kinds of escapes from death and survival from desperate situations. All appearances are highlights or dramatic climaxes.
An eldest daughter has developed a petty attitude. The author said before that the heroine will grow up. I am still waiting for the heroine to rise up. But in the end, she will just give in when trouble comes.
It would be better if there were more post-marriage extras. It's a pity that I didn't see the little bun born.
I checked the author's column and found out that I had read your book (Daily Life of the Prince's Substitute) before and that article was much better than this one. The author has made rapid progress in terms of setting and writing style, but this one is really bad and the characters are not likable.
The female protagonist starts off weak and ends up being weak. The so-called growth is just waiting for the hero to save her and then he
What the hell? The heroine is too weak
The female partner Shen is so lucky, she escapes every time she attacks.
I feel sorry for Concubine Zhao again. She offended whomever she provoked. It's so pitiful that her son has also been raised to be a big fool...
The pillow is thick. Does the prince want the heroine to get pregnant as soon as possible so as to keep her?
The blood relationship is not close. In ancient times, there were many cousins. The male and female protagonists are at most a generation apart. The male protagonist's aunt is the heroine's grandmother, and the male protagonist's cousin is the heroine's mother.