Sweet but stubborn x meticulous schemer [This is a pure-sweet romance]
Long-planned courtship / marriage first, love later / winning by any means / stealing someone else's partner
> If you like someone, marry her and bring her home <
Years ago, a friendship between their grandfathers led the modest Jiang family to become engaged to the powerful Zhan family of the capital. Eighteen years passed, and the Jiangs assumed the Zhans had forgotten all about it. Jiang Lingzhen, who was engaged to the Zhan family's only son, ran off abroad with her boyfriend on a whim.
Who would have thought the Zhan family would call to remind them: the engagement ceremony was scheduled for a month later at Shannan Manor.
Her parents searched for Jiang Lingzhen for a whole month, but found no trace of her. With no other choice, they asked their younger daughter, Jiang Lingwei, to take her sister's place as the bride.
But Jiang Lingwei had only just turned eighteen. In midsummer, she'd received an acceptance letter from her dream university, and she had a boyfriend she was about to tell her parents about. What's more, her sister had told her that the Zhan family's only son, Zhan Xingyi, was savage and cruel, and hideously ugly.
The Jiang family spent the whole night awake. The next day, Jiang Lingwei and Zhan Xingyi got engaged right on schedule.
*
After they got engaged and registered their marriage, Zhan Xingyi was reserved and polite. He didn't restrict anything Jiang Lingwei did.
There was only one thing.
He said, “Now that you're married to me, I hope you won't do anything to bring shame on the Zhan family.”
He was talking about her “boyfriend,” who had been accepted to the same university as her.
Jiang Lingwei agreed, cautiously.
But her boyfriend couldn't accept that she'd suddenly gotten engaged to someone else, and deliberately tried to get her to do things she shouldn't.
One day, Zhan Xingyi took Jiang Lingwei to a room and made her watch her boyfriend making love to another girl.
He cupped her tear-streaked face and kissed away her tears.
“Don't cry. He shouldn't have come near you in the first place.”
*
The first time Zhan Xingyi saw the Jiang family's younger daughter was three years ago.
She sat in the garden with a book in her hands. As she read, she gradually fell asleep among the flowers.
A blush crept across her snowy cheeks. In the shimmering light, she looked like a still sea rippling in the sun.
But he was engaged to Jiang Lingzhen, the Jiang family's eldest daughter.
It was simple. Spread a few rumors about himself, then find someone to win Jiang Lingzhen's heart. The Jiang family would naturally send the girl he wanted straight to him, without a fuss.
*
/He thought she was a tranquil sea
But beneath those still waters, she ran deep/
*
Sweet but stubborn x meticulous schemer
Theme: Persistence is victory.
