The BE Empress and Emperor Are Reborn

Xie Wanyi married Zhao Huaijin at fourteen. They were young lovers who pledged to stay together for life. Later, Zhao Huaijin ascended the throne, and she was named empress as his first wife.

Along with the edict naming her empress came an imperial decree bringing the legitimate daughter of the Xie family into the palace as a consort.

Though everyone knew the new emperor had been in love with the Xie family's legitimate daughter since his youth, they still all sighed over Xie Wanyi's good fortune.

Born an illegitimate daughter, she was now empress, mother of the realm. Even the Xie family's legitimate daughter, once famous throughout the capital, could only serve as her consort. What glory!

They said that even though Xie Wanyi came from such a lowly background, the new emperor had insisted on making her empress and placed the Xie family's legitimate daughter beneath her, proof that a husband and wife who had grown up together shared a deep bond.

Xie Wanyi thought so too.

Until the day she heard Zhao Huaijin say in the imperial hall that he had never considered her his wife. He gave her the throne of empress only because she had accompanied him for ten years, and he pitied her wretched fate.

That year, Xie Wanyi was twenty-four. She had been married to Zhao Huaijin for ten years.

For ten years, she had been his wife, tirelessly worrying over him day and night. She had gone through a near-fatal labor during the war and could never conceive again. Their only child had also gone missing.

In the end, all she received in return was his pity.

From that day on, the fourteen-year-old Xie Wanyi was buried forever within the palace walls. The one who survived was an empress as cold as a jade statue.

She watched one wave of consorts after another enter the palace, watched Zhao Huaijin father child after child, and played the part of the most virtuous and benevolent empress.

Not even the most exacting court historians or the most caustic remonstrators could find a fault in her.

Another ten years passed. The border fell into turmoil, Zhao Huaijin led the army in person, and Xie Wanyi lay gravely ill, on the brink of death.

The deep palace walls had locked away every joy and sorrow of her life.

At the moment her life flickered out, Xie Wanyi felt only relief.

She thought that if there were a next life, she would find a man whose heart and eyes held only her. She would never marry Zhao Huaijin again, and never be empress again...

*

She died too soon to see him ride a thousand miles through the snow, his winter clothes stained with blood, just to see her one last time.

Nor did she know that later Zhao Huaijin would abandon the dazzling path of an emperor and pray for a chance to be with her in the next life...

Theme: The world is veiled in countless mists. May we see through them to the truth in our hearts