Back to the Palace

Everyone in the capital knew: the Third Princess, who had lived among the common people for fourteen years, had returned to the palace.

With no memories and nowhere to call home, Su Su had lived through famine and was sold by her adoptive parents to a butcher to be slaughtered for meat.

After narrowly escaping death, she was taken in by Linglong Cove. The noble families kept informants to serve their interests, and Linglong Cove was the Duke of Ying's intelligence agency.

She became a spy for Linglong Cove and served her master, Lu Wujiu.

Forced by circumstance, Lu Wujiu ordered her to marry into the duke's household as a shield.

After the wedding, her mother-in-law made things difficult for her, her sister-in-law insulted her, and people who admired the heir plotted against her. She handled them all deftly and earned a reputation as a virtuous wife, but life in the inner household was truly agonizing.

For his sake, Su Su was willing to risk her life for him, even when she was mired in the mud.

Yet her wholehearted devotion was repaid with a letter of divorce and an expulsion.

On the day she left, tears slid down her cheeks, and she choked out, "Lu Wujiu, I owe you nothing anymore."

The emperor held a grand banquet to welcome the princess back to the palace and restore her to her family.

At the banquet, an official asked about the princess's life among the common people. Su Su glanced calmly across the assembled civil and military officials beneath the golden palace roof and brushed the question aside. "There is nothing worth remembering."

But in a corner, someone noticed that Lu, the young heir, a refined and unblemished fourth-rank supervisory secretary who had recently become the talk of the capital, looked displeased throughout the banquet.

Asked why, the drunken Lu Wujiu simply stared at the princess in the hall without saying a word, his reddened eyes brimming with emotion.

Outsiders did not know that only days ago, she had nestled in his arms, her jade-white arms around his neck, her cheeks flushed as she whispered, "Husband, be gentle."

They also did not know that he had written the divorce letter himself and cruelly broken her heart.

After the banquet, Lu Wujiu pulled her into a rock garden and, unable to restrain himself, kissed away the delicate color on her lips.

Lu Wujiu said hoarsely, "If His Majesty chooses a husband for you, would you consider me again?"

But Su Su pushed him away and wiped off the last traces of her lipstick. "Young Master Lu, please behave yourself."

Reader's Guide:

Both leads are sexually inexperienced. Happy ending.

A down-and-out princess who has lost her memory x an aloof beauty devoted to his career.

The female lead is devoted to repaying a debt of gratitude; the male lead falls in love first. There is another reason he divorced her.

Next novel: My Brother-in-Law

Qing Yan lost her memory. Everyone said she had lost it because she couldn't bear the soul-crushing grief of her husband's death.

Qing Yan believed them too.

Qing Yan and the eldest son of the Yan family were a match made in heaven. They had been married for three years, living together in perfect harmony and treating one another with respect. Sadly, Yan Shubai had been chronically ill for a long time and passed away.

"They said the marriage would bring him good luck! I say she cursed Shubai to death!"

After three years without children, Qing Yan was thrown out of the house a month after Yan Shubai's death.

Not long afterward, she discovered she was pregnant with Yan Shubai's posthumous child.

The Yan family sent a sedan chair to bring her back, but there was another person in the household now.

Her husband's younger brother, Yan Changfeng, who was also her brother-in-law.

Yan Changfeng was arrogant and cruel, and could skin a person with his bare hands. He was the living King of Hell of the capital, feared by everyone.

Qing Yan only wanted to rest and give birth to Yan Shubai's heir.

Yet these two people, who had nothing in common, kept running into each other.

When the child began to speak, he pointed at Yan Changfeng and said, "D-Daddy."

Qing Yan corrected him. "Lin'er got it wrong. You can't call him Daddy. Call him Uncle."

Yan Changfeng only smiled without a word.

One day, Qing Yan happened to see the living King of Hell, the man who terrified everyone in the capital, holding a rattle drum and soothing the baby in his crib with a loving expression.

"Be good, Lin'er. Call me Daddy."

[Blackbird Startles the Spring]

[Second Male Lead Takes the Lead]

On a cool night, the princess's husband lifted the mandarin-duck floral bed curtains.

His gaze turned icy as it fell on Shen Wenying's pale wrist and the white-clad man beside the bed.

"When did the princess find herself a fake who looks like me, just to make me jealous?"

Later, after learning the truth, he saw her nestled sweetly against his younger brother.

Clutching the letter of separation bearing Shen Wenying's name, he trembled as he said,

"Nannan, I won't deceive you anymore. Come back to me."

Theme: Don't focus only on temporary hardship; take the long view.