The Second Year After the Princess Consort Died

When Hua Wushuang died, a red moon rose over the Sixteen Prefectures of Yunhai.

At the time, she was not yet a princess of noble standing, but a lone girl with no knowledge of proper etiquette, brought back from a mountain valley by the Prince of Shuoyang.

/

She never liked being a princess consort.

She was scolded for disregarding propriety and bringing disgrace upon the royal family, and mocked as a wild mountain flower unfit for high society.

None of it frightened her, because he treated her so well.

So well that he didn't mind when she bore him no children for three years.

She was easy to placate then, and thought this was what love felt like. That was until he brought back his childhood sweetheart, a woman who looked seven parts like her.

Only after this woman arrived did she understand that his three years of affection had all been part of another scheme.

He said, "You have served your purpose as a pawn."

/

On the night she died, the cold moon was like blood.

He rode off to attack the Eastern Palace of the Crown Prince, passing her corpse without so much as glancing at her.

·

Later

When the cold moon rose and its brilliant light poured down,

the man who had become emperor as he wished suddenly realized the night wind was blowing through the hollow place in his heart, and it was bitterly cold.

/

In the second year after the princess consort's death, beneath the dazzling red moon,

he finally saw the clear-eyed woman again.

He trembled as he pulled her into his arms.

And she, holding a blade, slowly twisted it through his heart.

Yet even as he bled his last drop, he still could not bear to let her go.

·

[Reading Guide]

1. An alternate world, very much so.

2. The heroine is reborn in the past. The hero is reborn to the past in the second year after her death.

---- Coming Soon: The Third Year in the Cold Palace ----

When Su Yeqi entered the Cold Palace, the music for the empress's investiture ceremony began to play.

-

She was the seventh adopted daughter the Su family had sent to the palace, an inside agent meant to help them prop up a new puppet emperor.

The Ninth Prince, Xiao Chuchen, was proud and unruly, hardly a suitable puppet.

She taught him to hide the sharpness in his eyes and learn to read the times. She helped him dismantle the Crown Prince's faction and uproot the other princes' supporters.

She spent ten years navigating the treacherous, bloodless killing ground of the imperial palace, finally helping Xiao Chuchen, a boy from the Cold Palace, ascend the throne.

He grew into a wolf with sharp claws and fangs.

And every evil deed she had committed for him became evidence he could use to bring down the Su family.

She was accused of framing princes and poisoning the empresses... Ministers declared that she was a wicked woman planted in the harem by the Su family and deserved to die.

Her heart was still as calm as water when the decree banishing her to the Cold Palace was read.

Only then did Su Yeqi come to her senses. "You promised that after bringing down the Su family, you'd give me my freedom."

"I am already showing you mercy by sparing your life." The emperor's voice was vast and solemn, cold and detached.

-

Over the next three years, the young emperor put an end to factional strife and reduced taxes and labor duties. Under his rule, the land enjoyed peace and prosperity.

But once the clamor had died away, Xiao Chuchen realized that even a flourishing realm could not fill the emptiness in his heart.

In the darkness of the Cold Palace,

Xiao Chuchen held the gaunt woman tightly in his arms and, his voice trembling, asked the question he had avoided for thirteen years: "Qiniang, did you ever love me?"

"You promised to give me my freedom." Her voice was as placid as an ancient well, utterly calm.

Theme: Love with a kind heart and grow with courage.