Back to My Late Wife's Youth

[Sweet, Sensitive, Black-Bellied Little Mute x Traditional, Wife-Doting Big Daddy]

Yan Min had been raised in the Cui manor by his father since he could remember.

His father treated him wonderfully, using precious medicines every day to nourish his body and sending box after box of jewels and treasures to his room. He had so many ornaments made for Yan Min that he couldn't count them all.

Yan Min thought he must be his father's most cherished child.

But the servants said he wasn't his father's son, just a mute slave he'd picked up.

Yan Min didn't believe them. They had to be lying to him on purpose.

Otherwise... otherwise, why would his father treat him so well? Why would he raise him?

But Yan Min couldn't speak, so he couldn't argue back. He could only hide away and cry under his blanket. He cried until he worked himself into a faint.

When he woke again, he was in a man's arms. He rubbed his little face against the warm embrace and murmured drowsily, "Da... Daddy."

"That's not right." Cui Zhi pinched the tear-reddened cheek in his arms. "Not Daddy."

"Husband."

*

Cui Zhi was the regent, a man with power over the entire court. Though still young, he held the power of life and death, yet had never taken a wife.

The officials had urged him to marry openly and in private countless times. Even the Empress Dowager was eager to find him a match herself, but he always brushed them off with, "I, Cui, already have a wife."

Everyone exchanged bewildered looks.

Cui Zhi added, "My wife died many years ago. She's just turned eight."

Everyone: ???

*

Cui Zhi was reborn.

In his previous life, he had a wife twelve years younger than himself.

His wife was a mute slave presented by the Chiyan Kingdom. Poison had ruined his voice when he was young, and he was a sickly child who wouldn't live long. The regent doted on him and spared no expense, even emptying his treasury to recruit renowned physicians to treat his wife.

But chronic illness was hard to cure, and his wife eventually died in agony in his sickbed.

On that same day, the regent Cui Zhi died suddenly. Everyone who lived through it sighed with sorrow.

When he awoke again, Cui Zhi discovered that he had returned to the day he was first appointed. Ignoring the officials' objections, he personally led an army against Chiyan, conquered the enemy kingdom, and found his still-young wife in that man-eating hellhole.

As a child, his wife was like an abandoned kitten, pale and frail. Cui Zhi carefully raised and protected him. Since he couldn't speak, Cui Zhi taught him one word at a time, swearing he would never let him suffer as he had in his previous life.

Cui Zhi kept waiting for his wife to grow up.

But the first thing his wife said was "Daddy."

That night, the regent tossed and turned and didn't sleep a wink.

*

As an adult, Yan Min noticed that Daddy had changed. Not only did he stop letting Yan Min sleep in his arms, he also brought in all sorts of strangers, saying they were there to find him a husband.

At night, Yan Min secretly climbed into the man's bed and nuzzled against him in distress. "If I marry someone else, does that mean I can't sleep with Daddy anymore?"

"I don't want anyone else. I only want you, Daddy. Can I marry you?"

The regent's manor was decked out in festive decorations. On their wedding night, the regent taught his wife, word by word, to call him something else: "Say 'Husband.'"

"Daddy!"

"...It's Husband."

"Daddy... is Husband!"

Cui Zhi: (This feels weird, but somehow it doesn't seem wrong.)

P.S. They only get together after Yan Min is an adult. Yan Min is reborn too and will recover his memories.

Inspired by the alternate storyline of the neighboring novel, After My Archenemy Set His Sights on Me. So the younger partner isn't just a soft, sweet little flower. (I can't help it, I love black-lotus bottom characters, orz.)

Theme: Cherish life