Also known as "Deceiving the Emperor" and "The Emperor's Lady-in-Waiting Has an Unusual Style"
Shen Yujie, the daughter of a merchant family, excels at music, chess, calligraphy, and painting. Her talent is renowned throughout the capital, and the emperor personally appoints her chief lady-in-waiting in the Palace Office. Her future looks bright.
But on the eve of entering the palace, Shen Yujie leaves behind a letter and runs away.
The head of the Shen family is so worried his hair turns white.
The steward recommends Shen Liuzhuang, the second branch's illegitimate daughter, to take the eldest daughter's place and assume the post.
To save the Shen clan, Lord Shen has no choice but to agree.
Shen Liuzhuang wails inwardly: Her big sister is a paragon of refined talent, but what about me?
I helped my uncle run his business and keep the books, learned self-defense from the household guards, and loved climbing trees for fruit and fishing in the river...
Palace etiquette? Poetry recitals? Official documents?
Will I be found out pretending to be the emperor's lady-in-waiting?
Before entering the palace, Shen Liuzhuang was an unloved illegitimate daughter of the second branch.
After entering the palace, she became a stand-in lady-in-waiting, working for the emperor, Lan Ge.
She only needs to last ten years. Once she turns twenty-five, she can leave the palace...
Lan Ge thinks the new "Lady Shen" is a little dark-skinned, but reasonably pretty, with a naturally spirited look about her. She is neither servile nor overbearing, and seems much more lively and interesting than the stiff, solemn, timid female officials who came before. His first impression of her is not too bad.
Over time, Lan Ge gradually discovers that his little lady-in-waiting has quite a few hidden talents. For example:
1. She can scale walls and leap across rooftops, like some legendary martial artist, to catch the cat causing trouble on the rafters of the imperial study.
2. She can jump straight into Taiye Pond to rescue an unlucky young eunuch who fell in while retrieving an imperial jade pendant. She is an excellent swimmer.
3. She can casually fix the broken Western music box on his desk, thanks to her mastery of mechanics and mathematics, or "accidentally" show off her fighting skills while stopping an assassin or teaching a bullying eunuch a lesson.
This little lady-in-waiting certainly does things her own way. She often makes Lan Ge so angry that he wants to punish this counterfeit "talent," who is so unruly and dares to deceive the emperor. Yet he is also impressed by her astonishing efficiency when she handles the accounts and audits palace affairs...
Theme: Even when playing someone else's role, you can still shine by being yourself.
