After Breaking Off the Engagement, My Possessive Childhood Friend Won Me Over

The next book, How to Drive the Ice-Cold Beauty Mad, starts in May (•̀ᴗ•́)و̑̑

Spoiled young lady × devoted childhood friend who turns into a madman

The day Prince Yan broke off their engagement, Miss Song cried at home for half the day.

Once the news got out, suitors came one after another to propose, all young talents. But in the end, none could compare to Prince Yan.

Song Xiangling couldn't make up her mind, so she asked Rong Yihuai, whom she had known since childhood, to help her choose.

Rong Yihuai was the only son of the Chancellor, and was famous for his aloofness and cold, distant manner.

But that day, after glancing over the stack of betrothal proposals, he gritted his teeth and pressed her for an answer: "In family background and looks, I'm no worse than Prince Yan."

"Why can't you see me, Miss?"

-

Rong Yihuai's proposal came out of nowhere, and he had always been so inscrutable that Song Xiangling couldn't figure him out.

Then one day, she heard that he was investigating a case in the northern borderlands and needed the General's residence to help him.

Song Xiangling: I see. So that's what this is.

They could each get what they wanted. No need to fall in love at all :)

But she forgot that after they married, they would still have to fulfill their marital duties.

On their wedding night, she shut her eyes and endured it. An hour later, Miss Song could take no more and bit his shoulder.

She saw that Rong Yihuai's eyes had somehow turned red. He stared at her, his voice thick with possessiveness: "If our engagement hadn't been called off, would you have been this disobedient in front of Prince Yan, too?"

Song Xiangling: ?

-

Having finally married the woman he had loved for years, Rong Yihuai was on top of the world.

Until one day, he overheard his wife explaining to a friend, "You don't know, we have no feelings for each other. We're just each getting what we want. I don't even like him..."

Only then did he realize that, to her, the deep affection he had carried in his heart was nothing but a transaction in which they each got what they wanted.

That day, after Song Xiangling saw her friend off, she turned around and found herself caught in a pair of sinister eyes.

Rong Yihuai's lips curled up. He was smiling, but his gaze was ruthless. "You don't like me?"

"A Ling, if you've forgotten what I taught you to say last night, I don't mind helping you go over it again."

Note: The male lead has secretly loved the heroine for years, while the heroine falls in love after marriage.

The next book, How to Drive the Ice-Cold Beauty Mad

Gu Juezhou was born into the prestigious Pingyuan Marquis's household. Handsome beyond compare, noble and aloof, he had long enjoyed the emperor's favor, with a bright future ahead of him.

Most of the young noblewomen in Yujing had dreamed of marrying him. Yu Man was one of them.

On the day she first arrived in the capital from Yangzhou, she lifted the curtain of her sedan with her slender hand and saw a graceful young man on horseback. Even the bright spring sunlight seemed to favor Gu Juezhou, falling especially warmly on him.

She thought then that he had a fine face.

-

Gu Juezhou disliked Yu Man and found her irritating.

She was too delicate and didn't act like a proper young lady. Soon after arriving, she had the whole capital asking after her and pursuing her. She was also from Yangzhou, where Gu Juezhou's most respected elder brother had died.

But Gu Juezhou also knew that Yu Man truly liked him.

She searched all over the capital for the finest bow for him and secretly kept portraits of him in her boudoir. She liked him so much that her devotion became the talk of the capital.

The rumors and gossip were an endless nuisance, making Gu Juezhou even more impatient and irritable.

Until, at a banquet, he drank a cup of wine laced with passion, and her skirt and jeweled ornaments trailed across the floor.

Yu Man wept and insisted on returning to Yangzhou, but Gu Juezhou appeared on horseback and blocked her way.

Riding against the light, he frowned. "Who said I wouldn't marry you?"

When others asked, Gu Juezhou simply said, "It would damage my reputation to ruin a woman's virtue and then refuse to marry her."

-

Gu Juezhou had planned to take the marriage lightly, treating it like any ordinary furnishing in his room.

But he ended up enjoying a comfortable stretch of time. His career went smoothly, and he was pleased with his success. At home, his beautiful, gentle wife gradually softened his manner.

Until one day, he saw the portrait his wife was rumored to keep hidden.

Only then did Gu Juezhou realize, to his shock, that the person in the portrait wasn't him.

She had merely been using him as a stand-in for the elder brother she loved!

When he confronted Yu Man, she smiled, as if she couldn't care less. "Now that you know, let's divorce."

"Besides, apart from your looks, you and he are nothing alike."

The usually proud and noble darling of the heavens swayed on his feet.

Summoning every last bit of self-control, he managed only to say, "If that's how it is, then from now on, we'll have nothing to do with each other." Then he stormed off in a rage.

Not long afterward, the eldest son of the Gu family, who was supposed to have died five years earlier, suddenly returned. His parents were overjoyed, and the family held a grand banquet.

But that night, Gu Juezhou stood in front of her, dressed in finery, his eyes bloodshot. He gripped her waist, his voice low and trembling. "You really don't want me anymore?"

Yu Man pried his fingers away one by one, her expression somewhere between a smile and a sneer. "Second Master Gu, didn't we agree not to interfere in each other's lives?"

#If he doesn't interfere, she's afraid she'll become his sister-in-law#

Theme: As the heavens move with vigor, a gentleman should strive ceaselessly to improve himself.