The Number One Scholar's Remarkable Second Sister-in-Law

Meng Qing is an ordinary transmigrator, born into the Tang dynasty as the eldest daughter of a paper horse shop in Suzhou, Jiangnan. She has lived a comfortable life for eighteen years and chosen a promising marriage for herself.

In an era that favored agriculture and suppressed commerce, Meng Qing is a merchant's daughter. To improve her family's social standing and give her children a chance to study and enter officialdom, she invests in the right prospects and marries Du Li, the second son of the impoverished scholar Du Min, who regularly tops the exams at Chongwen Academy. She brings a generous dowry with her.

In the second year of their marriage, after giving birth, she has a dream. In it, her brother-in-law Du Min places first in the imperial exams three years later, rides through Chang'an picking famous flowers, and brings the Du family great renown. Yet the reputation of her investment suffers, and she becomes known as the awful second sister-in-law of the top scholar, despised by everyone.

First, she's called mean for making such a fuss over giving her brother-in-law two taels of silver that the whole village hears about it, humiliating the young scholar.

Second, she's accused of being greedy for quick gains, using the scholar's name to drum up business for her family and embarrassing him in front of his classmates...

Third, she's called a homewrecker for turning her husband Du Li against his parents, making him favor her and her family.

And worst of all, in the dream she irrationally insists on adopting her child to her brother-in-law!

Meng Qing wakes with a start. Thinking of the dream, she laughs. This is getting interesting.

Du Li's family is poor. To support his exceptionally studious third brother, Du Li is over twenty and still unmarried. He knows full well that his own marriage will be used as a bargaining chip to fund his brother's education.

To keep both himself and his future wife from becoming the family's workhorses, he secretly sabotages two marriage arrangements that are nearly settled.

When Meng Qing deliberately engineers a chance encounter with him, he knows exactly what she's after.

Du Li knows Meng Qing, the eldest daughter of the Meng family's paper horse shop. She's quick-witted, charming, and a shrewd businesswoman, known as the prickly flower beneath Ruiguang Temple.

But she doesn't know him.

Du Li understands that Meng Qing isn't smiling at him because of his handsome face. Like him, she's after the fame and power his third brother will gain in the future.

But he doesn't mind. A thorny flower has landed in his hands. He'll be the one she pricks, he'll be the one who hurts, and he's happy with that. He is willing to be pricked and gladly accepts the pain.

Coming next: The Farming and Herding Life of Luoyang

Fu Ruyi transmigrates to the Northern Wei period, settling in Luoyang, where nomadic and agrarian cultures are deeply intertwined. She lives in the countryside, where education is scarce and people are strong.

In the Northern Wei, different peoples live together, and Hu and Han cultures intermingle.

In the countryside, farming is backbreaking, while taxes and labor service are crushing.

Fu Ruyi is trapped in the hardship of primitive farming and hates the toil of bending over the earth all day.

When she comes of marriageable age, she tells herself she must find a strong, hardworking husband who knows farming and can toil like an ox.

But on the day she goes to meet a prospective match, she encounters the new neighbor who has just moved in next door to the groom's family. He's a tall Xianbei man with golden hair, a high nose, deep-set eyes, and fair skin. His gray-blue eyes brim with tenderness. The moment their eyes meet, her heart goes haywire, and her criteria for a husband collapse.

The Xianbei man doesn't speak Chinese, but he has a handsome face...

The Xianbei man isn't good at farming, but he has a handsome face...

The Xianbei man doesn't know the farming seasons, but he has a handsome face...

The matchmaking visit ends without a result. On her way out, Fu Ruyi takes the matchmaker's hand, promises her a sheep, and asks her to go next door and inquire about the man's prospects.

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And though the Xianbei man isn't good at farming, he's skilled at raising livestock, strong and well-built... and handsome!

The one sheep Fu Ruyi promised brings back a whole flock.

Theme: Love yourself a little more.