Butterfly Dreams, Qingyang

Story Background:

In the autumn of the eighth year of Yuan'an, Emperor Suzong traveled incognito and encountered an exceptionally beautiful woman among the common people. Upon returning to the palace, he made her a Noble Consort and granted her the title Consort Qing.

In the spring of the tenth year, the emperor's uncle, the Prince of Fenzhou, who had plotted for a decade, joined forces with foreign tribes and launched a rebellion to seize his nephew's throne. Flames of war spread rapidly, affecting more than a dozen prefectures and counties. For a time, the rebels were at the height of their power.

General Yu Hexun, stationed on the northwestern frontier, had spent years rigorously training his troops, forging an army of elite soldiers and fierce generals. Now entrusted with the task in a time of crisis, he showed no hesitation or confusion. He led his army to Fenyang Pass and split his forces in two, holding off attacks from within and without. First, he swiftly routed the main force of the Prince of Fenzhou's rebel army with his elite troops, and the prince was killed. Then his army counterattacked, dealing the foreign tribes a crushing blow! The war was quelled, and order was restored amid the chaos...

In the spring of the eleventh year, General Yu returned to the capital at the head of his victorious army and was granted the title Great General Who Protects the Nation...

He was the supreme ruler, benevolent and gentle, devoted and faithful in love. But one mistaken move turned into an everlasting regret! After several reversals, he went from valuing love and loyalty to becoming cold and faithless, from benevolent and gentle to cruel and ruthless...

He was the Great General Who Protects the Nation, devoted to his country and people until his dying breath. A master of both civil and military arts, he was exceptionally talented and had won countless victories, turning the tide when all seemed lost. Yet he was domineering and extreme, despised every woman in the world, and was especially merciless toward so-called femme fatales, using brutal methods. He even dared to defy the emperor's authority and ask for the emperor's beloved consort as his reward! And with that one move, he fell into a trap of his own making...

She possessed peerless beauty and unsurpassed grace, with a clear, cool heart, serene and detached. Her love was as light as drifting clouds and as steady as a gentle stream. Faced with the emperor's all-consuming favor, she remained clear-headed and cool, never moved in the slightest. She was willing to drift from place to place, neither feeling sorry for herself in the moment nor pitying herself for life, all to preserve the freedom and ease deep within her heart... She had thought she could find someone who understood her, someone with whom she could grow old, both hearts united. But the rise and fall of fate was never hers to command. The fluttering butterfly: where would its heart finally find a home...

The ruler who restored the empire would leave a flourishing age remembered for all time;

loyal ministers and valiant generals would see their merits and failings vanish without a trace;

a generation's empress would live out a legendary love story...

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