After Mistaking My Benefactor

Of all the women who admired him, Lu Fei disliked Shen Zhiyi the most.

It was only because her family was more powerful than his, and her father had the influence to persuade His Majesty to arrange their marriage. Once the imperial edict was issued, Lu Fei had no choice but to marry her.

But that didn't stop him from treating her coldly after they wed, making cutting remarks and often bullying her until she cried.

Later, he learned that she had married him because he had once saved her, and she had fallen for him.

Lu Fei scoffed. Countless women had tried to get close to him with such a clumsy excuse, so many that he could no longer be bothered to call them out.

But he alone knew that he had always hated getting tangled up in needless trouble, and had never saved any woman.

Shen Zhiyi was as soft and delicate as a flower, gentle in both body and temperament. No matter how he bullied and humiliated her, she would only soothe him in a soft voice: "Husband, don't be angry..." Then, almost as if to please him, she would indulge every cruel demand he made in bed.

In the end, Lu Fei fell for her.

He began to feel fortunate that Shen Zhiyi was so hopelessly infatuated with him, and convinced himself she would never leave.

Until one day, while they were reminiscing, she looked at him with shining eyes and vividly described every detail of how he had saved her back then.

He realized she was telling the truth.

It wasn't an excuse to get close to him. Someone really had saved her, but that person wasn't him.

For the first time, he tasted jealousy. Everything he had, it turned out, had originally belonged to another man.

But how could she treat someone else that way? She was only allowed to treat him that way!

Once, while drunk, he had lost control and questioned her. When he sobered up, he was drenched in cold sweat with fear. Fortunately, she hadn't grown suspicious.

So he would pretend none of it had ever happened.

A man as proud as he was had, for the first time in his life, done the thing he most despised: he had lied and claimed credit for saving her.

He thought that if he did this, he could keep Shen Zhiyi by his side forever.

Until the man who had truly saved her appeared.

Lu Fei wanted him dead.

Only the dead could keep a secret forever.

But fate had other plans, and the man narrowly escaped.

From that day on, Lu Fei lived on tenterhooks. Night after night, he watched Shen Zhiyi, unable to bear falling asleep.

But the day finally came. The man found Shen Zhiyi, the whole truth came out, and she left a letter of separation before going with him.

That very day, the renowned jade-like young master of the Lu family became a complete madman.

A month later, chains clinked in a hidden room of the Lu residence.

Lu Fei's eyes were red at the corners, his expression seemingly deranged. His long fingers gripped her chin, his gaze overflowing with a tangle of love and hate. "You were the one who came after me first. How can you say you don't want me now?"

"You made those vows of eternal love yourself. How can you break them? If you can't keep them, then I'll have to help you."

Theme: Try to take things in stride.