After Losing My Memory, I Mistook My Nemesis for My Husband

My next novel will be The Minister and the Empress. The minister and the empress are mutually in love, a match made in heaven!

Shen Mingli was the apple of the Prince of Jing's eye: radiant, spoiled, and imperious.

She detested the cold and heartless chief grand secretary, Xie Qingyan, who monopolized the court's power. The two were always at each other's throats, utterly incompatible.

Then an accident left Shen Mingli with amnesia after she fell off a cliff. When she woke, she could only vaguely remember having a handsome, talented, and powerful fiance.

She looked up and saw Xie Qingyan before her, dressed in fine robes and as cool and ethereal as an immortal. Dazzled by his looks, she instinctively hugged him. "You're so handsome. You must be the fiance I've been looking for, right?"

His attendant was about to draw his sword and reprimand her, but then he saw Grand Secretary Xie, who was usually a clean freak, looking down at his mortal enemy as she gazed up at him in his arms.

After a long moment, he seemed amused and told a lie. "Yes. I've been looking for you for a long time, my wife."

At first, Xie Qingyan treated it as a game of cat and mouse, planning to keep her confined in his residence so he could torment her at his leisure. But before he knew it, tormenting her had fallen off the agenda, and he was growing more and more guilty instead.

Shen Mingli glanced at her real fiance while out, and Xie Qingyan submitted an impeachment memorial that very night, driving the man into ruin and away from the capital. Shen Mingli rubbed her head and casually said it hurt, and Xie Qingyan stayed by her side with a calming soup, coaxing and cajoling her.

Sometimes Shen Mingli would stare at him suspiciously and mutter, "I feel like we might have been enemies before?"

Xie Qingyan panicked inside, but kept a calm face as he pulled her into his arms. "Don't be silly, my wife. We were... deeply in love and trusted each other completely."

To keep one lie going, he had no choice but to tell a hundred more.

One day, Xie Qingyan returned from court to find a divorce agreement at his feet.

Shen Mingli played with the dagger he had given her, gritting her teeth as she said:

"Lord Xie, you've had a great time pretending to be my husband, haven't you? Now it's time to settle our old scores!"

Reading Guide:

One man, one woman. Happy ending. Slow burn, with a touch of ensemble cast.

This story is set in a fictional world, so please don't nitpick historical accuracy.

Things are not always as they seem.

The heroine is the only one who thinks they're enemies.

Radiant, spoiled princess x cool, scheming chief grand secretary

Long-laid plans / marriage before love / melodramatic amnesia / coercive possession / aloof mountain peak bows for love

#Why does the later arrival win? Because he fights and scrambles for her!

#Enemies are enemies. How could they possibly become spouses?

#Better to be spouses than enemies.

Theme: You have to fight for your own opportunities.