Falling for a Terrible Man

Blurb:

Before Lin'an fell, Zhao Liangyi was the least favored little princess in the imperial palace.

Her birth mother was a concubine servant and had never been favored. In the palace, anyone could bully her, whether it was her brainless imperial brother or her arrogant imperial sister.

To survive, Zhao Liangyi put on a domineering act every day, like a paper tiger that would fall apart if anyone poked it.

She seemed to have relatives everywhere in the palace, but in reality she had nothing.

Until one day, she brought home a worthless slave from the imperial prison.

She called the slave A Yun.

She took good care of him and made him her most presentable male companion.

Zhao Liangyi wasn't greedy.

She never planned to give the slave her true heart. She only wanted to use him to improve her image.

Later, when Lin'an fell and A Yun transformed into the new emperor, Zhao Liangyi learned that her A Yun was actually Xie Jingyun, the third son of the King of Xiyue, whom her father had executed years ago. Damn it, he'd been lying to her all along too.

He wanted to kill every member of the Zhao family.

Including her.

Zhao Liangyi was quick to prostrate herself. To survive, she personally killed her two brothers and presented Xie Jingyun with her pledge of allegiance. She became the first person to curry favor with him, flattering him to the utmost. But the man had a heart of stone, and every few days he still threatened to take her life.

Zhao Liangyi was anxious.

Being near the ruler is like being near a tiger.

So one dark and stormy night, she stuffed herself with gold and silver, changed into a eunuch's clothes, and prepared to run away.

But halfway through her escape, she ran into Xie Jingyun and the carriage of his rumored fiancée. A nearby bodyguard with poor eyesight mistook her for an assassin with ill intentions and shot her through the heart.

Before she fell, Zhao Liangyi looked up and saw Xie Jingyun's amber eyes and blood-red gaze.

Then, with the last of her strength, she spat at him and softly called him a liar.

*

P.S. The faked-death trope: the heroine is pretending, and she's in cahoots with the bodyguards.

They're both awful people. The awful-people-fall-in-love trope.

Theme: Peace and prosperity