The Cousin Is Sweet and Sly, and the Capital’s Powerful Men Fall at Her Feet

[Scheming villainess + female rivalry + one-on-one, both protagonists pure + groveling pursuit + aloof prince falls from grace]

After a lifetime spent dreaming, Shen Qingli finally realized she was a sacrificial pawn in a story, there to make the prime minister’s legitimate daughter, Shen Yuyao, shine.

She was framed for seducing Shen Yuyao’s fiancé at a matchmaking banquet.

The powerful suitors vying for Shen Yuyao spread rumors about her until her reputation was in tatters and no one dared marry her.

Her gentle, refined aunt even knocked her unconscious under cover of night, staged her suicide, and drowned her in a lotus pond...

Shen Qingli had always avoided conflict and followed the rules. How had she ended up with such a gruesome fate?

Reborn after her dream, Shen Qingli was determined to shed the restraints of a noblewoman’s upbringing and become a villainess who put herself first!

She set her sights on her brilliant, refined cousin, the top scholar from the prime minister’s residence, and trampled every powerful man who had harmed her for Shen Yuyao beneath her feet!

When the light of the prime minister’s inept cousin was no longer hidden, everyone finally saw how dazzling she was.

Even the aloof crown prince, who had once called her coy and affected and treated her like she didn’t exist, began looking at her differently...

On the day she was to marry her cousin, the cold and self-possessed crown prince stormed into her bridal sedan and stole her away. His eyes were crazed in a way they had never been before. “Shen Qingli, if you dare marry him, I’ll bathe the prime minister’s residence in blood!”

Later, he repeatedly lowered his voice and bowed his head, pleading for her affection by her ear. “Li’er, use me if you must. Even if you want the whole world, I’ll take it for you. What do you say?”