Yan Bids Liang Farewell

Shen Qingyuan was injured and left to wander the streets at the coldest time of year in Shangjing.

As she teetered on the brink of death, a jade-adorned carriage passed by. The freezing wind lifted one corner of its curtain, and through her haze, she glimpsed an immortal.

The immortal saved her

Pei Zhan took her in simply because her eyes looked so much like the cat he had raised as a child.

After her injury, Shen Qingyuan became more naive than most people.

Later, she was drugged with an aphrodisiac, and by a twist of fate, Pei Zhan became her antidote.

After their wild night together, Pei Zhan woke up furious that this lowborn simpleton had defiled him. But anything he had touched was his, and even if he did not want it, he would not let anyone else lay a finger on it.

And so Shen Qingyuan stayed by his side.

Though naive, she was not ignorant of love between a man and a woman. She loved him and obeyed his every wish. No matter how cruel his demands, she would softly agree and obediently do as she was told.

His parents had never shown him the slightest warmth. The only place he had ever felt such passionate, unreserved love was with Shen Qingyuan.

She might be lowborn and simple, but he thought she was different after all.

For the sake of his family's interests, he would surely marry a noblewoman someday. Once the marriage was settled, he could still give Shen Qingyuan the status of a concubine.

When the Marchioness heard that Pei Zhan had been doting on Shen Qingyuan without restraint, she warned him, "Being too deeply entangled is a bad thing. If she distracts my son's mind, she will have to go."

Pei Zhan gave a half-smile. "You're worrying too much, Mother. She's just a lowborn simpleton, a plaything. I won't let a plaything distract me from what's important."

Just then, Shen Qingyuan came looking for Pei Zhan and overheard them. At the time, she was too naive to know what a plaything was, but a dull ache stirred in her chest.

Later, a renowned physician finally cured her, restoring her mind. Remembering everything that had happened, she finally understood what it meant to be a plaything. In Pei Zhan's heart, she had always been lowborn. He had never had a shred of genuine affection for her.

She wanted to leave him.

She pretended to agree to become his concubine, playing along with him while secretly plotting her escape.

At last, on the day Pei Zhan got married, she found a chance to leave the manor. The woman he was marrying could help him achieve his ambitions, and Shen Qingyuan wished him all the best.

But later, she heard that the Heir Apparent Pei had gone mad on his wedding day. It seemed he had lost someone, and he refused to go through with the marriage.

Reader's note: The leads are each other's only partners, and the ending is happy. The story first puts the heroine through the wringer, then the hero. The heroine isn't a fool who knows nothing. After her injury, she's simply more naive and a little slow than most people. She doesn't understand idioms or words with hidden meanings, but she knows about relations between men and women and is aware of her feelings for the hero.

Theme: Learn to take things in stride.