Cloud and Crane Handkerchief

In her previous life, Shen Lingyi died on her wedding night. Outside the door, she heard her husband and half-sister say, "Now that she's dead, her dowry is ours."

She opened her eyes and found herself back on the night before her coming-of-age ceremony. Her half-sister brought her a bowl of "restorative soup." Its sweet, metallic smell was just like the one from her previous life. Smiling, she accepted it and drank it all in one gulp. In exchange, a doctor outside the manor gave her written proof that she had been slowly poisoned for years.

Hidden in the cloud-and-crane handkerchief her mother left behind were words written in blood: "The ginseng soup has slowly withered me away. It's no illness, but poison. The culprit is the one beside me in bed."

Clutching half a scented sachet, she smiled as she unraveled the scheme, following the trail to a pawnshop ledger connected to the palace walls.

The regent, Gu Heng, asked whether she was afraid. She replied, "I am. That's why we have to move faster."

Letting three routes go isn't defeat. This time, she was going to win.