Mu Mingzhu

Xie Xi believes she should not enter public office, for three reasons:

Her father was a high-ranking minister, but he died suddenly before he could help advance her career.

After she returned from three years of mourning, her political rival, Prince Linzi, had helped his father ascend the throne. He was made Prince Rui and held power over the entire court.

She wanted to help the new emperor's eldest legitimate son stand against Prince Rui. Unfortunately, the prince was far too good at reading the situation. He cried, threw tantrums, and threatened to hang himself, until he forced the position of heir upon his younger brother. Prince Rui thus became the court's de facto heir.

Xie Xi: Fine. I'm just unlucky.

Worse still, she was hiding the crime of impersonating a man to deceive the emperor, making every step she took at court perilous.

Fortunately, she was a heaven-gifted genius, and time and again she emerged unscathed, rising steadily through the ranks.

Perhaps because he had been unable to deal with her for so long, Xie Xi noticed with satisfaction that Prince Rui's gaze grew more and more inscrutable whenever they were alone.

At first, Pei Xuan thought he would find some charge to exile Xie Xi three thousand li away.

After working together for a while, Pei Xuan thought that Xie Xi really did have talent, so assigning him to a post outside the capital would do.

Later, Pei Xuan decided that if Xie Xi could just change his ways, there would be no harm in letting him serve at court.

But in the end, after finally gathering enough evidence of Xie Xi's crimes, he saw Xie Xi kneeling before him to plead for someone else, and all he wanted was to lock Xie Xi firmly by his side.

Short scene

One day after court, Xie Xi ran into Prince Rui, and they fell into their usual verbal sparring.

She quickly gained the upper hand, and inspiration struck. She landed a decisive blow: "Your Highness, if you keep pestering me like this, I'll start thinking you're in love with me."

"Yes," she heard the man across from her say. "I am in love with you."

The courtyard fell abruptly silent. Xie Xi, who had prepared countless retorts: "...?"

After a long while, she silently turned around and fled for the first time in their war of words. "Your Highness really knows how to joke. Ha ha ha."

Theme: Rising straight to the top