Spring Tide Teases the Oriole

✔ Complete [Not-quite-step-siblings / Taking by force]

Blurb:

The Marquis of Zhenbei sent out wedding invitations far and wide,

but the groom was not the marquis's marriageable young heir. It was the aging marquis, nearing fifty.

Everyone in the capital was astonished, wondering which noblewoman the old marquis had taken as his second wife.

After making inquiries, they learned she was merely a low-status singer from Langyuan...

"How strange. A songstress can actually become the marquis's wife?"

"Exactly. And she even brought a burden with her when she entered the household. The mother and daughter are both shameless seductresses. They say the younger one is even more wanton. She used to work in a brothel, so she must be skilled in bed."

"What a disgrace. Why doesn't the old marquis think about what this will do to his heir's reputation..."

Red silk fluttered in the front hall, and drums and gongs rang out.

Qing Yuan, the heroine who'd been slandered, was trapped in a shadowy corner by a pair of large hands. She couldn't even watch her mother fulfill her wish and marry in a wedding dress.

In the dark study, like a prison cell, she was forced onto the Marquis's heir's sandalwood desk, her eyes brimming with fearful apprehension.

"I did what I promised. What about what you promised?"

Qu Ya Wenqing's dark eyes were deep and impenetrable. When he looked at her, they were like a bottomless abyss.

She knew that from now on, she would be a bird he kept in the palm of his hand.

Later, the old marquis intended to find Qing Yuan a good match.

The chosen young man was kind, gentle, and honorable. He was instantly captivated by Qing Yuan and planned to propose after just one meeting.

Qu Ya raced back to the capital and found Qing Yuan at a residence outside the city. He pinned her against the bed, his gaze frighteningly dark.

He asked in a sickly, taunting voice, "Does he know you've shared a bed with me?"

*The heroine's identity will be revealed later. She isn't related by blood to the mother who married into the marquis's household, nor is she related to the hero. There is no inappropriate grooming or guidance!!

*Both leads are sexually inexperienced. Sweet romance, focused on their relationship.

>>> Add upcoming novel "Held Hostage in the Rebel Leader's Camp" to your reading list <<<

Blurb:

Shangguan Yuan had lived carefree for seventeen years as the beautiful, beloved daughter of a county governor. She was breathtakingly lovely, more beautiful than a celestial maiden. She had only just reached marriageable age, and the matchmakers were already wearing down the threshold of her home.

Then disaster struck.

Rebels raised their banners and stormed the city. To save himself, her father offered her up and sent her to serve as a hostage in the rebel leader's camp.

Shangguan Yuan thought she was only being held temporarily. But her father played a trick: after making an alliance with the rebel general Wei Che, he switched sides at the last minute and fled to join another faction, treating his own daughter as a disposable pawn.

That night, the furious Wei Che stripped Shangguan Yuan naked and whipped her once.

She had fallen from heaven into hell. Everyone thought a sheltered official's daughter like her, despised by Wei Che, wouldn't survive more than a few days in the military camp.

But she survived.

She used every means at her disposal to cling to the only lifeline within reach, showing fierce resilience.

People speculated that Wei Che was keeping her only so he could trade her for the city and soldiers of her fiance.

But when the time came, Wei Che broke the deal first.

He gave up an easy chance to enter the city and chose to lead his troops in a bloody siege instead.

His strategist was baffled, and Wei Che despised himself even more.

He refused to admit he'd fallen for a woman.

No one knew how, through countless nights in the camp, that bewitching woman bared herself to him and coquettishly tempted him, slowly wearing away his will until he was completely addicted to her and under her spell.

Wei Che ended up eating his words, but Shangguan Yuan never gave him her heart.

In a chaotic age, a woman has no one to rely on. Since her own strength is so limited, she might as well make the strongest man do her bidding.

Later, she could order Wei Che to do anything for her, but she could never make him let go of her waist.

*A story about a powerful warlord willingly bending the knee. Happy ending.

*Both leads are sexually inexperienced. Don't be put off by the blurb. It's a sweet story, and the heroine won't suffer. Read with confidence.

(If you're interested, please add it to your reading list!)

Theme: Refuse to submit to fate