Chapter 1: She Must Go to Southern Chen for a Political Marriage
In the bitter cold of midwinter, frost coated the ground of the Tile Market, crunching into shards of ice under the wheels of an oxcart.
"Watch your step, clear the way—"
Amid the market's clamor, the slaver's crack of his whip and loud shout drew many onlookers, who pointed and whispered at the several women confined within the wooden cage of the cart.
"Is Chen Lai Zi sending more girls to the Drunken Red Chamber?"
"This cartload of girls looks quite fresh and delicate—probably refugees from Luodu again…"
"Such is fate when dynasties change. Even Hanyang Princess, renowned as the greatest beauty of Great Liang, who would have become a princess of Great Liang if her father Changlian Wang had ascended the throne, now lives at the mercy of warring nobles."
Some shook their heads and sighed; others gazed with greedy eyes.
Hearing these remarks, the girls in the cart began to sob quietly.
Only Wen Yu remained motionless, leaning against the wooden bars. Her entire face was hidden beneath disheveled hair and a worn felt scarf, shielding her from the scrutinizing eyes outside.
Beneath the tangled locks, her half-lowered eyes held a near-numb tranquility, cold as the clear moon.
Her slender back, visible through the thin hemp clothes, arched slightly like a lotus stem on the verge of withering yet still unbroken.
On her flight, she had heard too many such comments.
The Wen imperial clan was now the prey hunted by rebels on all sides!
The empire had fallen into chaos during the previous dynasty, with nobles warring against one another for nearly a century, until Wen Shi'an, later known as Liang Chengzhu, unified the north and south, ended the civil strife, and established the Great Liang.
After Wen Shi'an's death, the Empress Dowager installed the Shaojing Emperor on the throne and began to rule from behind the curtain. From then on, her maternal relatives monopolized power at court, framing countless loyal ministers and capable generals to eliminate dissent, plunging the newly founded Great Liang, only decades old, into deep-seated corruption and decline.
The weak Shaojing Emperor was controlled by the Empress Dowager and, plagued by illness, struggled to produce an heir. Loyal courtiers thus pinned their hopes on the next monarch, selecting her father from among the Wen clan's collateral branches as crown prince.
Her father, at odds politically with the Empress Dowager and her faction, faced repeated suppression. Before the Shaojing Emperor's death, the Empress Dowager and her relatives even staged a palace coup, attempting to depose her father as crown prince and install a puppet ruler instead.
But no one had anticipated that Pei Song, the watchdog raised by the Empress Dowager and her Party of Ao, would turn traitor when ordered to mobilize troops with the military tally to assist the coup.
In a single night, the imperial city of Luodu was bathed in blood, and the five great aristocratic families led by the Party of Ao were exterminated to the ninth degree.
Her father and brother, along with their ministers, hastily relocated to their ancestral county of Fengyang, issuing a summons for nobles to bring troops to their aid.
However, the Northern Border was under invasion by barbarians and could spare no forces, while the Southern Border, relying on the natural defense of Hundred Blades Pass, had stationed few troops and could not send reinforcements.
As a last resort, her father ordered trusted followers to disguise themselves as a merchant caravan, evade rebel spies across the provinces, and secretly escort her to Southern Chen.
Years ago, during the succession struggle of the Southern Chen heir, he had borrowed troops from her father, and the two had arranged a marriage alliance.
Now, she was traveling thousands of miles to Southern Chen to fulfill this marriage pact and secure military aid for Fengyang.
Unexpectedly, they were ambushed along the way. Separated from her escort, she was captured by slavers and brought here.
The cold wind grew sharper. Enduring the increasing itch and pain on her face, Wen Yu silently buried her nose and mouth deeper into the worn felt scarf.
Since childhood, she had broken out in hives at the slightest whiff of animal fur.The trafficker seemed intent on selling them into the brothels. After several failed escape attempts, today was her last chance.
The ox-cart passed through the tile market and turned twice before arriving at a long street adorned with hanging lanterns.
The trafficker halted the cart before the most imposing pleasure house and shouted at an old woman sweeping the entrance: "Quick, fetch your Mama Wu!"
Moments later, the madam emerged with a large red flower pinned in her hair, swaying with each step as she yawned: "What's all this shouting so early in the morning?"
Two burly enforcers followed behind her, projecting an intimidating presence.
The trafficker immediately put on an ingratiating smile: "Just bringing you a money tree, Mama Wu!"
The madam shot him a glance, "Such bold claims?"
The trafficker patted the wooden cage on the cart, browning teeth showing in his grin: "See for yourself!"
The madam's gaze swept over the cage. Having selected girls for years, her eyes were sharp enough to rank the entire cartload just by their silhouettes, even without seeing their faces. Spotting Wen Yu in the corner, her face broke into a wide grin: "That one at the back really has the figure of a future courtesan! Bring her out for a closer look!"
The trafficker fawned: "Your eye is as sharp as ever!"
Unlocking the chain, he dragged Wen Yu from the cart: "This one's proud - tried escaping several times. Didn't dare damage your money tree, so I just skipped her meals twice as punishment."
Understanding his implication, the madam lifted Wen Yu's chin to examine her features: "Well, if her face matches her figure, we can discuss the price."
The trafficker eagerly continued: "In all my years as Chen Lao Liu, I've never seen a prettier girl. Surely even you couldn't claim she's plain-faced..."
Before he finished, the madam shrieked as if seeing a monster, stumbling backward while cursing: "Damn you, Chen Lai Zi! Who are you trying to pawn this diseased girl on?"
Her plump face trembling with fear, she frantically wiped the hand that had touched Wen Yu with a handkerchief.
Baffled by the outburst, the trafficker pushed aside the hair obscuring Wen Yu's face and recoiled in horror—
The faint red spots from their departure had now become a dense covering of rashes and red bumps!
The sight was horrifying.
Perhaps from exposure to wind, the girl with tightly bound hands coughed violently, barely able to stand, clearly gravely ill.
The trafficker stared dumbfounded: "How... how did this happen? She was fine before we left!"
Using a cloth to grip Wen Yu's arm, he pushed up her sleeve to reveal pale blue-tinged skin covered in dense red spots.
Now the trafficker too scrambled backward, while the madam cursed with lingering fear: "Heaven strike you, Chen Lai Zi! Get your plague cart out of here! I heard there's pestilence among the Luodu refugees - she's breaking out in rashes and you bring her to me? Trying to kill me?"
The commotion drew curious looks from neighboring brothels.
The trafficker hastily checked the other girls' arms and sighed in relief finding no rashes, urgently offering the madam to inspect the remaining girls.The madam dared not take any more risks. Yongcheng had experienced several epidemics before, where a perfectly healthy person one day would suddenly break out in rashes and die the next. She pointed at the slave trader’s nose and unleashed a torrent of scolding, even threatening to report him to the authorities if he didn’t take the girls away immediately.
Furious but resigned to his bad luck, the slave trader spat angrily on the ground.
It was still unclear whether the girl was truly infected with the plague, but he didn’t dare call a physician. Not only would the medical fees be substantial, but if the physician diagnosed it as plague, they would be legally required to report it to the authorities.
Once the matter reached the officials, all plague-stricken girls would be taken over by the government. Not only would he lose all his investment, but he would also face legal charges for human trafficking, endure a beating, and have to pay a hefty bribe.
After weighing the consequences, the slave trader decided to sell the girls without rashes at a discount to at least recoup his costs. However, the madam from the Drunken Red Chamber had already spread the word that his cart of girls was diseased. News traveled fast in the nearby pleasure districts, and now no one would dare take them.
Left with no choice, the slave trader turned his cart around and headed back to the market. But he no longer dared to keep Wen Yu with the other girls. Instead, he tied an extra rope to her bound hands and fastened it to the cart shaft, forcing her to walk behind the ox-cart. He snarled, "Keep your face hidden, or I’ll beat you to death right here!"
He wanted to whip her to vent his anger, but he was afraid of catching the disease himself. Swallowing his rage, he climbed back onto the cart and growled at the other girls in the cage, "I’m taking you to the market to find buyers. Keep your mouths shut about this. If you’re infected, you’ll only die here with me. If you’re lucky enough to find a kind-hearted buyer, you might just survive."
The girls, terrified of being sold into brothels or dying from the plague, nodded fearfully.
With a sharp crack of his whip, the slave trader urged the ox-cart forward, its wheels crunching over the frost-covered ground. Wen Yu, dragged by the rope, stumbled along behind.
Her feet, frozen for too long, felt as if pierced by needles with every step. Yet she made no sound. Her clear eyes held a ruthless, forbidding intensity, as sharp and unyielding as the bitter northern wind.
Plague was a scourge among the common people, capable of spreading from one to ten, ten to a hundred, and turning a city into a ghost town overnight. Everyone feared it.
When Wen Yu was first captured by the slave trader, she had tried to disguise her appearance by inducing rashes. She had only taken a small sniff of horsehair, resulting in a few sparse red spots on her face.
But before being transported to the brothel, she had gone all out. As she boarded the cart, she deliberately rubbed a felt cloth against the horsehair to gather loose hairs and held it over her nose and mouth the entire journey. The resulting rash was more severe than ever before.
However, local authorities often dealt with plague outbreaks with extreme cruelty. Those suspected of carrying the disease were sometimes taken away without even a medical examination. Officially, they were placed under government control, but in reality, all plague victims were gathered together and burned alive to eliminate the threat.
This was why Wen Yu had not openly declared her "plague" condition among the crowds. For one, she was uncertain how the local authorities would handle plague victims. For another, many regional governments had already pledged allegiance to the rebels, and the stance of the Yongzhou authorities remained unclear.If she revealed her identity, whether the authorities would believe her words was uncertain. But if they did and decided to use her to curry favor with the rebels, her action would be like walking into a trap.
However, as her hives symptoms worsened, she now felt her entire body burning with pain and had difficulty breathing.
Had she really miscalculated the exposure? Had she inhaled those bristles for too long?
Wen Yu dug her nails into her palm, warning herself not to faint. The trafficker hadn't abandoned her yet, likely still hoping to deceive an unsuspecting buyer into taking her.
If she were fortunate enough to be bought by a kind family, gaining temporary shelter and a chance to contact her trusted allies, that would be ideal.
But if the trafficker couldn't sell her and refused to abandon her to her fate, she would need to devise another plan.
Wen Yu breathed in the cold air and struggled to lift her eyelids.
At the market, the trafficker shouted offers at low prices and quickly sold all the girls in the cart.
Only Wen Yu remained tied beside the oxcart. The trafficker sat at the front counting copper coins while loudly hawking to passersby: "Buy a maid! Madam, want a servant to attend to you?"
A passing woman waved him off and walked away. A local herbalist wearing straw sandals in the cold weather approached, carrying a basket full of medicinal herbs. He had been scrutinizing Wen Yu.
Seeing him, the trafficker called out as usual: "Buy a servant? Just five hundred coins to take her home!"
Wen Yu struggled to look up and saw the sparsely-bearded herbalist still staring at her. Finally, he turned to the trafficker and said: "Buy two packs of herbal medicine. Her hives were caused by inhaling some odor or eating something unsuitable. A few dozen copper coins will fix it."
Wen Yu stiffened completely.
The trafficker was first stunned, then thought of the girls he'd sold at discounted prices. Furious, he gnashed his teeth: "Buy her medicine? She made me lose money! I'll beat her to death!"
He actually jumped down from the oxcart wielding a whip.
Wen Yu gritted her teeth, wanting to run, but the rope binding her hands was securely tied to the cart.
The glossy whip cut through the cold wind with a whooshing sound. She curled up as much as possible, but when the lash landed on her back, it still felt like a venomous snake bite. Blood immediately seeped through the coarse linen clothes, and a burning pain spread from the wound throughout her body.
Wen Yu groaned and collapsed to her knees. Her wrists were already raw from struggling against the ropes.
The hatred in her eyes almost solidified in that moment.
"You little bitch, you did this on purpose, didn't you?" The trafficker approached to whip her again but was startled by Wen Yu's gaze. His second strike slowed just enough for a bony, prominent hand to intercept it.
"Who dares interfere with Master Chen's business..."
The trafficker, still enraged, recovered from his shock and began cursing. But when he turned and saw the newcomer, he fell silent as if struck dumb.
The sun was dazzling, snow was melting, and dripping water echoed from eaves along the street.
Wen Yu fluttered her long lashes and lifted her sweat-beaded eyelids. She found the person standing before her extremely tall, completely blocking the sky from her view.
Her still-ferocious gaze directly met the other's wolf-like eyes.
It was the first time she had seen such an intensely predatory gaze, like the breath of a wild beast.His mere gaze made her feel as though she couldn't move.
Yet the man possessed a face that could make "sleeves blush from every tower"—handsome eyes, elegant brows, and refined features. Tilting his head slightly, his lips curved into a roguish smile. The hand that had intercepted the slave trader's whip was bent at the elbow, and even through the coarse cloth, the outline of his muscles was faintly visible.
His gaze swept indifferently past Wen Yu and settled on the slave trader. Releasing his grip, he kicked the man, sending him stumbling into the muddy snow.
His tone, however, was as casual as if he were greeting an old acquaintance: "Well, well, Master Chen! We've been looking all over for you!"
Roguish and ruthless.
Two burly men approached from the other side of the market, crossing their arms and standing firm, completely surrounding the slave trader.
So, it was a vendetta.
Wen Yu lay on the ground, slowly calming her breathing. Cold sweat from the pain had already dampened her temples, and her disheveled black hair fell messily across her cheeks. Her skirt was stained with mud, and she resembled a white camellia withering in the mire.
At the sight of the young man, the slave trader's face turned pale. Propping himself up on the muddy snow, he scrambled backward, attempting to force a smile that looked more like a grimace. "Xiao... Second Brother Xiao..."
Author's Note:
To reassure the dear readers who've clicked in: the female lead's lowest point is right here at the beginning. From here on, it's her journey to rise to power~
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