Jiaojiao

[The title and blurb may change when the story is posted]

Jiaojiao is the only child of Commandery Princess Futai and the Duke of Yingguo, as well as the only granddaughter of Grand Princess Anle.

Though her scumbag father made his green-tea mistress his wife after divorcing her mother, and even had a holier-than-thou daughter who constantly made trouble for Jiaojiao, at least her mother and grandmother doted on her, and her imperial-uncle the emperor treated her well. Life was still pretty sweet for her, until she married that bastard Situ Dan in her previous life.

In her previous life, she married Situ Dan, a concubine-born son of the Marquis of Dingyuan. He was an ambitious, calculating, and ruthless bastard. He already had a beloved cousin, yet he deceived her into thinking he loved her and married her as a shield. And he was capable, too: he earned himself the title of Duke of Wei, later became a prince with real power, and eventually even rebelled and became emperor.

After all those years married to him, Jiaojiao never got to enjoy any of his success. Situ Dan became emperor, but she never became empress. While Situ Dan was being enthroned in the imperial palace, just two days later, Jiaojiao was poisoned to death in the prince's residence by his beloved cousin and his birth mother working together.

Damn it! I'm furious!!!

Jiaojiao was so mad she nearly exploded. When she opened her eyes again, she discovered she had returned to the age of sixteen.

Her mother's hair was still black, her grandmother was still hale and hearty, and Jiaojiao herself was in the bloom of youth, as beautiful as a peach blossom just opening in spring.

There was only one thing to do: she absolutely couldn't repeat the miserable fate of her previous life!

So when her mother gently stroked her hair and teasingly asked what kind of husband she wanted, Jiaojiao raised her hand and loudly answered without a moment's thought: "Someone gentle! The gentlest, kindest man there is!"

After looking high and low, Jiaojiao decided that the gentlest, kindest gentleman in history had to be her late eldest cousin, the Crown Prince Mingde Ciwen.

Her eldest cousin was frail, gentle, refined, benevolent, and authoritative. He was the finest man in the world. If he hadn't been assassinated and died young in her previous life, he surely wouldn't have let her be bullied later on.

Jiaojiao was overjoyed. From then on, she racked her brains and did everything she could to follow her eldest cousin around like a little shadow, helping him avoid assassination, treating his illness, and bringing him flowers. In the end, she even got to marry her beloved crown prince cousin, securing herself the best iron rice bowl and the strongest backer...

Yet many years later, after becoming empress, she was caught and called to account for all the handsome young men she'd admired in the past. Only then did Jiaojiao discover, to her shock, that the eldest cousin she'd thought was so gentle, tolerant, good-tempered, and easy to bully... might not be any of those things after all (OvO).

[An extremely sweet novel. Blurb saved as a screenshot.]

Theme: Mutual love