Lessons from the Pillow: A Prefect's Record of Disciplining His Wife

[I want her to look up and listen to me reprimand her every day, and lower her eyes to answer when I call her name every night.]

In the prefect's residence in Nandu, there is a young woman as soft and sweet as jade.

Her background is a mystery. She was raised from childhood in a private residence on the grounds, personally watched over by the prefect himself.

By day, she attends his lessons and copies his texts, calling him "Teacher".

By night, she prepares his ink and brushes, tends the lamp, serves him tea, and stays by his side as his ink attendant.

She always thought this was special affection, that the prefect was protecting her and taking pity on her loneliness.

Until one day, she sneaks out to enjoy the spring scenery with her closest friend.

In the gossip around town, she hears people talking about what it means to be a "bedchamber attendant of the brush and ink" and a "cultured concubine."

She freezes, her cheeks burning.

She remembers kneeling over his desk with a brush at night, and the intimacy she had long since grown used to and never refused...

That night, she comes home late for the first time.

Shen Huaishu holds a ruler, his gaze cool as he makes her kneel beneath the ancestral hall's lantern.

Her palms are punished until they are red and aching.

Yet he personally applies ointment to them, his eyes lowered. "Be good. Your teacher is teaching you the rules."

At last, she raises her tearful eyes and softly asks him, "What rule says I have to attend to your ink every night?"

Shen Ling'er: A mild-mannered scholar on the surface, but scheming and domineering underneath. Wields immense power later on.

Shen Huaishu: Fragrant, soft, clever, and quick-witted, but slow to understand matters of the heart. A sweet girl.

[Student by day, ink attendant by night / Past lives and present]

[One-on-one / Both leads sexually inexperienced / HE / Slow-paced sweet romance / Light supernatural elements]

Theme: Study for the sake of the people!