The Slave I Used and Abandoned Became Emperor

[This novel will be rewritten, and is expected to be around 300,000 words. I’ll post it as soon as it’s finished. After revisions, I’ll update the bonus chapters.]

As the only little princess of Great Jin, Xie Mingtang was born to wealth and privilege, a figure no one could hope to approach. She grew up cherished and adored, doted on by her father and brothers and beloved by the imperial consorts. Her standing in the capital was unmatched.

After an accident, she took in a slave.

He was tall and powerfully built, with sharply defined muscles. His exposed honey-colored skin was covered in scars, and his gaze was ferocious.

When he stood, he looked like a small mountain. When he looked at her, he was like an untamed, fierce hound.

He was nothing like the refined, elegant young masters of the capital, whose figures were perfectly proportioned. He had a charm all his own.

The slave was taciturn and poor with words, but surprisingly obedient and useful.

He learned quickly. From guarding the princess’s residence to taking care of her food, clothing, and daily needs, he did everything exactly as she liked. And after she trained him, he worked tirelessly and accepted her scolding and punishments without a word.

Even at night, he obeyed her like a dog.

Step by step, he made his way from the princess’s residence into the capital. Before long, he had distinguished himself in battle and proved adept at both letters and arms. No one in the entire capital dared speak of his slave origins anymore.

And his gaze toward the princess grew ever more ardent.

At last, Xie Mingtang discovered the intense, forbidden feelings in his eyes. She began playing the qin and painting with the eldest sons of illustrious families, letting them do her makeup and draw her brows.

Under his clinging gaze, she cast him aside and drove him out of the capital.

-

Who could have imagined that in less than a year, the emperor would die, rebels would rise, and the brother who had protected her would be buried on the northern frontier? Rebel troops surrounded the princess’s residence.

Alone and disheveled, Xie Mingtang sat on her seat of honor and watched a tall man approach her step by step.

Cold and deadly, his armor spattered with blood.

It was the very lowly slave she had taken in and then cruelly abandoned!

Days later, the rebellion was put down, but the princess’s residence remained under heavy guard. The new emperor imprisoned Xie Mingtang in her own home.

Rumors spread that the princess would surely be disgraced. After all, everyone knew that the current emperor had once been her personal slave.

He had combed her hair, drawn her brows, served her tea, done her laundry, and cooked her meals every day, all while enduring her abuse and beatings. Now that he had risen to power, surely he would make the haughty princess pay.

And yet.

On the bed inside the residence, Xie Mingtang watched him drop heavily to his knees before her. For the first time, he dared look her straight in the eye. “This slave was too late. I beg the princess to punish me.”

His dark eyes, deep as ink, gazed at her with devotion. He looked at her as if she were a goddess.

When he was a slave, he could only gaze up at his princess, letting her soft white toes press against his face as he kissed and licked them.

Later, he rose to a position of power and took control of the empire, yet still wanted nothing more than to be her slave, her dog alone.

After all, dogs are loyal and know their master.

[Reader’s Guide]

1. A pampered, headstrong little princess x a fierce, taciturn, devoted dog; includes a size difference and a difference in skin tone.

2. The synopsis may not be entirely accurate due to the limited perspective! The male lead is a good dog from beginning to end. Even when he holds the highest position, he’s still a dog in front of the princess (emphasis).

★ Coming Soon 1: "My Wife, Who Is Madly in Love with Me, Has Always Treated Me as a Substitute" A male substitute, with the man suffering

Everyone says that Song Wanqing is desperately in love with Wang Mingshen.

Song Wanqing was brought back from the countryside by the Song family. She always followed the rules and rarely appeared in public.

Until one day, at a palace banquet, she met Wang Mingshen and fell in love with him at first sight.

He liked quiet, so she climbed a tree herself to catch the cicadas that wouldn’t stop chirping.

He liked tea, so she traveled to a tea-growing region, coming back covered in cuts and bruises with the latest spring tea.

Whenever they met, she gazed at his face with adoration and called him “Brother Xingzhi” without asking.

Xingzhi was Wang Mingshen’s courtesy name.

But Wang Mingshen ignored her completely and met her with a cold expression. When he had no choice but to meet her, he called her only “Miss Song,” as etiquette required.

He was distant and indifferent, with a hint of annoyance.

Then, in an accident, Song Wanqing took a blade for him and saved his face.

Wang Mingshen finally accepted the Song family’s marriage proposal and married her.

On their wedding night, he lifted her veil. His features were cool and aloof as he said flatly, “I’m only repaying you for saving my life.”

Song Wanqing didn’t mind. She smiled and agreed, gazing intently at his face, her eyes full of love and delight.

-

After they married, they treated each other with courtesy and respect.

Wang Mingshen had just taken up his post as Minister of the Court of Judicial Review. Buried in work, he often stayed out all night.

Song Wanqing never complained that he was busy or rarely spent time with her. She quietly took care of everything, managed the household, and never gave him cause to worry about home.

His friends at the government office envied him for having such a virtuous wife, who never got jealous or made a fuss.

Six months passed like this.

Wang Mingshen sometimes felt guilty and began to think he should make a real life with her.

He started coming home early, spending every night with her, remembering her monthly cycle and reminding her to dress warmly when the weather turned cold. He remembered what she liked and always took her side.

But whenever he did these things, his wife would look surprised, as if she couldn’t accept it, and urge him to put his work first.

Wang Mingshen assumed his wife was reserved and shy, and thought nothing of it.

Until another palace banquet.

The newly appointed top scholar strode in wearing a robe of deep vermilion, dressed in a way that looked remarkably like Wang Mingshen had in his younger days. All eyes were drawn to him.

His reputation for talent swept the capital, and people gradually began putting him and Wang Mingshen side by side, calling them “the Twin Jades of the Capital.”

Without exception, everyone at the banquet was watching the new top scholar.

Wang Mingshen only glanced at him and thought nothing of it. He turned to murmur to his wife as he usually did.

But when he looked at Song Wanqing, he found that the woman who had always gazed at him adoringly was staring blankly at the top scholar, tears in her eyes as she softly called, “Xing Zheng.”

It was said that the new top scholar was named Xing Zheng.

Wang Mingshen suddenly understood. He crushed the cup in his hand, and the calm, composed expression he always wore crumbled piece by piece.

No wonder his wife treasured his face so much that she had taken a knife for him and been injured. It was because his face looked almost exactly like that man’s.

No wonder she never complained like other wives when he stayed out all night, and never got jealous. She simply didn’t care about him. All she wanted was to look at his face.

No wonder she clung to him at night, kissing his face and asking him to wear his vermilion official robes. It was only because that made him look most like the other man.

She had always treated him as a substitute for someone else!

So when she held him every night and murmured “Brother Xingzhi,” who had she really been calling for?

#She loves me, she’s just pretending. Turns out she doesn’t love me; she’s only treating me as a substitute for another man.

#At first, Wang Mingshen wanted to kill Song Wanqing. Later, he wanted to kill Xing Zheng and take his place. Later still, a living white moonlight is better than a dead one.

#I may have treated you as a substitute, but I really was good to you! OvO

#The aloof beauty has been trained into a dog! TvT

[Reader’s Guide]

1. The male lead is a substitute. The female lead really does treat him as one at first, and truly loves her white moonlight. The romance will probably be angsty for the male lead. The male lead is in deep denial: he falls early but refuses to admit it and is stubborn about his feelings. Includes a groveling arc and romantic rivalry.

2. A mix of melodrama and true love, one-on-one romance.

★ Coming Soon 2: "After the Villainess and Her Master Share a Dream" An older-man/younger-woman master-disciple romance

Xi Shi was the only disciple of Qingxu Sword Sovereign. Her talent was ordinary and she was spoiled, but she was beloved within the sect and got along just fine.

Until one day, she had a dream.

In the dream, she was an arrogant, vicious villainess. Her senior and junior fellow disciples loathed her, but pretended to treat her well. They only wanted to refine her into a sacrifice to resurrect their white moonlight.

In the dream, she was locked up in front of the Demon-Suppressing Tower and suffered endless beatings and abuse. Not one person came to help her.

Xi Shi, who had just learned she was the villainess: Damn.

As she lay dying, she saw a figure.

It was her unreachable, stern, taciturn master.

Xi Shi knew he was a man of noble character who valued cleanliness above all.

But in the dream, his normally immaculate robes were soaked through with blood. Black qi seeped from his eyes; he had clearly fallen into demonic corruption. He swung his sword and cut off the heads of his fellow disciples, blood flowing across the ground.

Half-kneeling in the blood, he held her corpse tightly, his breath hot against her as he whispered, “A Shi.”

-

When Xi Shi woke up, she gritted her teeth and decided to get revenge on everyone, one by one. Before she acted, she thought again of her master.

Jiang Ningyan.

Aloof and distant, an untouchable beauty with unfathomable cultivation, he always kept to himself.

Xi Shi had always thought he disliked her.

After all, he was a genius and she was a failure; he was composed and she was flighty; he had the greater good at heart, while she was selfish and willful. They were opposites in every way.

But when she remembered the man who had gathered her corpse and sought revenge for her all by himself that night, Xi Shi hesitated. She decided to work hard at cultivating and become a good disciple.

So she tried every way she could to be good to him.

At the sect competition, she did her best to place well and bring him honor.

When her master was struck with a freezing poison, she ran all over to gather the ingredients for his medicine.

At last, Xi Shi’s reputation in the sect improved, and wherever people saw her master, they praised him for raising such a good disciple.

But by then, Xi Shi had begun to notice that something was wrong.

By day, her master was aloof and stern, never smiling at her. But when night came...

In dream after dream, her master looked at her with a gaze that grew more and more feverishly possessive, as if he meant to drown her in it.

There, they did every sort of shameless thing.

Xi Shi’s earlobes flushed red, and at last she understood.

This wasn’t a prophetic dream at all. It was her master’s dream!

She struggled to control her increasingly rapid heartbeat. No, this can’t go on.

But then she realized...

It was over. Her master was acting differently in the daytime, too...

Theme: Stand on your own and grow stronger together