The Noble Consort Shen's Daily Struggle to Survive

[Serializing before the final revision, with chapters saved]

Blurb

Xuanli, the eldest daughter of the Shen family of Wuxing, was beautiful and graceful. Though her father had died young, her mother cherished and protected her, hired tutors at great expense to educate her, and received much care from the elders of her clan.

When she came of age, however, she received an imperial edict summoning her to the selection of palace consorts. She was named Consort Xi and sent to the palace with eight other women.

People of the time said the eldest Shen daughter was doomed. The Shen family had barely sent their daughter into the palace before they would have to prepare two coffins to bring Shen Xuanli home for burial. Madam Shen wept as she bid her daughter farewell, clinging to her and praying only that she might live long and remain safe in the palace.

There was good reason. The emperor had been on the throne for only ten years, yet he had already killed his first empress. Several consorts had since died or been injured. For an unloved consort, being shut away in the Cold Palace was already the best possible outcome.

Shen Xuanli had thought the rumors might be false, but after entering the palace she discovered that the stories circulating among the people were not baseless. She wanted to live, and she could not bear the thought of her mother worrying about her outside the palace. So she began to tread carefully, learning to be a perceptive and understanding companion to the emperor.

Among the women selected alongside her were one who became empress but died after being abandoned in a fire, another who bore the crown prince but spent her days in terror before eventually dying of illness, and one who was beaten to death for a misstep before she ever received the emperor's favor. The consorts around the emperor came and went, but she remained steadfast, firmly establishing herself in the world of the imperial harem.

Many years later, Shen Xuanli sat high upon the throne of Noble Consort. As she watched a daughter with no blood relation to her bow in greeting, she couldn't help marveling at how unpredictable life was. Who could have imagined that the young Shen girl born in Jiangnan would one day become the most powerful woman in the harem?

But at first, all she wanted was to survive.

(Blurb captured on April 3, 2025)

Theme: I wish to illuminate the mortal world, smiling as life and death come and go.