Plucking the Golden Bough

The day Lin'an fell, I was the only one left by my imperial brother's side who had not abandoned him.

I stood before him with my sword drawn.

The enemy general wore an amused smile. "I thought the princess of Dayuan could only wield an embroidery needle. Turns out you can handle a sword, too?"

A murderous chill swept in on the wind. The newcomer stepped onto the stone stairs before the hall. Without turning his head, the general smiled and said, "Shen Yu, this princess is mine."

"You can't have the mother of my son."

I looked up. He held a sword in his left hand and a little boy in his right arm. His armor was stained with blood, and he cut a valiant figure, utterly unlike the graceful, moonlit man he had once been.

He looked at me. "Zhaohua, if we hadn't happened to run into each other today, were you planning to hide this child from me for the rest of my life?"

There was no need to explain the relationship between Heng'er and Shen Yu. Anyone who saw him would say at once that he was Shen Yu's spitting image.

Now that Shen Yu was certain Heng'er was his own flesh and blood, he wouldn't hurt him.

I didn't rush to take my child back. Still stubbornly, I held my sword across my imperial brother's path.

"My imperial brother is frail and ill. He poses no threat to you. Let him leave Lin'an."

A short story I wrote for fun. It'll be finished in under 30,000 words, with updates every day at 7:00 p.m. It should take no more than a week to complete.

My new long novel, "Jinxiu, Your Husband Is Not Doomed to Bring You Misfortune", is currently in preparation. I'll start posting it by next week at the latest. If you're passing by, please add it to your favorites. Wishing all my lovely readers comfort and good fortune every day.

Here's the blurb:

Jinxiu is reborn on the day she finds Shen Zhan.

In her previous life, she was captivated by his looks and trusted his disguise. In return, her father died at sea and her entire village was slaughtered.

In this life, she watches coldly as he lies on the beach, pretending to have lost his memory. Without a word, she drags him straight back into the sea. "What kind of plague-bringer are you? Go back where you came from!"

Shen Zhan is reborn, too.

He'd planned to keep pretending to have amnesia and acting devoted, trick her into revealing the whereabouts of the Mermaid Emperor's Pearl, then leave.

But in this life, Jinxiu...

When he falls into the water, she offers him a knife, not a hand.

When he whispers sweet nothings, she rolls her eyes instead of blushing.

She even keeps bringing in fortune-tellers to read his fate: "You're cursed by heaven and earth, born with a baleful aura. Stay away from me!"

Shen Zhan: ...? How am I supposed to play along with this?

*

The world's pearl beds are divided into four, and the Shen family of Hanchuan controls one of them.

Shen Zhan, young master of the Shen family, loves romance. With a single brush, he can paint every brilliant blossom under the sun.

The women of Hanchuan can't have him, but they can at least beg for a flower of exquisite beauty from his brush.

Everyone in Hanchuan knows the Shen family heir is a spoiled playboy, but they also know that the man who controls Hanchuan's pearl-diving trade is no real wastrel.

He schemes in secret to change the rumors about his fate, and pretends to marry Jinxiu so he can uncover the secret of the underwater pearl caves.

But as their pretend marriage turns real, he loses his composure for the first time.

He had planned for everything, except that he would fall in love.

When he disappears once more and Jinxiu and her father fall into danger, he rushes back, only to find her eyes full of tears, a pearl hairpin pointed at his heart.

"You little scoundrel, if you deceive me again, I'll kill you like a fish."

He clasps her trembling hand and smiles. "If you kill me, who will shield you from the storms, quell your troubles, and protect your peace for the rest of your life?"

After disaster strikes the Jin family, he takes her back to the Shen family in Hanchuan. Despite the whole clan's objections that they are not a suitable match, he cherishes her above all else.

Everyone mocks her as a crude fisherman's daughter, so he makes sure the whole world knows she is the beloved wife treasured by Hanchuan's young master.

Everyone fears that she is haunted by the sea's resentment, so he cuts through every scheme to keep her safe.

*

Jinxiu senses that someone else seems to live inside her. That person is her, and yet not her, leaving her anxious and unsettled day after day.

Shen Zhan kisses her between the brows, his voice hoarse as an echo from the deep sea.

"No matter which version of you it is, you're my one and only wife."

Two reborn leads + dual personalities + he defies fate for her

A scheming young master who plays the pig to eat the tiger x a bold, forthright fisherwoman reborn

"I meant to deceive you for a lifetime, but ended up giving you mine."

Theme: When every identity is revealed as an illusion, only the true self remains real.