Raising Chopsticks Toward the Realm

Liu Zheng is just a young woman selling rice cakes in Chaozhou City.

But her mother was the eldest daughter of the prime minister,

and her grandmother came from the imperial clan.

Every child in the family was graceful and elegant.

Then, in a single disaster, the family was torn apart. Some died, and the rest scattered.

Liu Zheng was born in a prison cart and grew up in troubled times.

When she was ten, the new emperor ascended the throne and granted a general amnesty.

The Liu clan were no longer the descendants of convicted officials.

The pardon had come at a heavy price. Liu Zheng traveled from south to north,

using her culinary skills to earn money for travel expenses and travel permits.

She had three things to do when she arrived in the capital:

first, find a resting place for her grandparents' ashes;

second, find the young aunt who had been sold into servitude;

and third, hang a prayer plaque for her parents on the Three Lives Stone.

But cemetery plots were expensive, finding people required bribes,

and a finely carved lacquer plaque cost three strings of cash.

Liu Zheng wasn't afraid. She made and sold rice cakes.

From a small basket slung over her shoulder to a shop serving all kinds of delicacies from across the land,

the Liu family took root in the capital once more, beginning with her.

He had never met the fiancee who had returned from a place of exile.

She was dark and thin, but her eyes shone like stars.

The first time Xiao Mi saw her, she was stripping clothes from a corpse.

The second time he saw her, she had gone into his family's estate to dig up a grave.

The third time he saw her, she was carrying a shoulder pole and calling out to customers in the street.

The fourth time he saw her, on a whim, he bought one of her rice cakes.

The umpteenth time he saw her, he finally couldn't hold back.

"Our marriage was arranged when we were infants."

The young woman blinked at him in confusion, then smiled knowingly.

"My parents never mentioned it. I suppose they thought you weren't good enough for me."

Theme: Peach and plum trees say nothing, yet a path forms beneath them