Great Yong Dynasty, Shengjing.
The ancestral hall of the Marquis of Kangping’s residence.
A sharp slap cracked through the room.
“You unfilial wretch! Your younger sister merely slapped you, and you pushed her into the water? Were you trying to kill her?”
The woman beside him was even more furious. She stormed forward and slapped the girl again.
“I gave birth to you and raised you, and this is how you repay me? You actually tried to kill my Yue’er!”
The young girl kneeling on the floor gave a bitter smile.
“Father, Mother… My sister and I are twins. Why are we treated so differently?”
The moment Xiao Qingqing heard those words, she bent down, grabbed the girl’s hair, and struck her hard across the face again.
Half of the girl’s face immediately swelled, and the corner of her mouth split open.
“You still dare compare yourself to my Yue’er? You disaster! Why don’t you just die? What gives you the right to compete with her? Every good thing in this world belongs to Yue’er. If you take even one thing away from her, you don’t deserve to be alive!”
The girl let out a quiet, bitter laugh.
Blood and tears streamed down her face.
She suddenly broke free and, using every ounce of strength she had left, hurled herself toward the corner of the table.
Bang!
Her body collapsed onto the floor.
Under the dim candlelight, her deathly pale face looked even more horrifying.
Xiao Qingqing was so frightened that she couldn’t make a sound. She hurriedly grabbed her husband’s sleeve and pointed at the bloodied girl on the floor, panic filling her voice.
“M-Marquis… Did that girl actually die? What are we going to do?”
Xiao Zhaoning felt as though her head were splitting apart. The pain was so intense it felt like her skull might explode.
Her face burned as if it had been set on fire.
Is this what it feels like to be blown to pieces?
That hurts way too much.
She was the young mistress of the Yuhun Sect in the modern world.
In order to uncover the truth behind the mysterious disappearance of her entire sect overnight, she had risked opening a forbidden book and using a forbidden technique. She had summoned countless ghosts and attempted to refine a Soul Banner.
Instead, she had blown herself sky-high.
Wait.
Didn’t I get blown to ashes? How can I still feel pain?
Can ghosts feel pain too?
Just as she was wondering about this, she heard an irritating buzzing around her, like a swarm of flies.
The noise was driving her crazy.
She suddenly opened her eyes.
The first thing she saw was a gentle-looking woman crying in a man’s arms. Everyone standing around them had sorrowful expressions on their faces.
Xiao Zhaoning almost laughed.
Are they mourning me?
She was just about to tell them to stop crying because the noise was making her head hurt when the movement tugged at the corner of her mouth.
Pain shot through her.
A small sound escaped her lips.
The crying in the room stopped instantly.
Xiao Qingqing stared wide-eyed at the girl on the floor who had supposedly been dead, her face filled with shock.
Xiao Zhaoning struggled to push herself halfway upright.
Then she raised a hand and casually waved.
“Hi?”
Only then did she get a proper look at the woman.
The woman’s brows were shaped like distant mountains, naturally dark without needing makeup. The corners of her eyes drooped slightly. Though faint lines of age had appeared around them, they did not make her look haggard. Instead, they gave her a gentle elegance born of maturity.
At first glance, she looked refined and soft-spoken.
But on closer inspection, there was a hint of sharpness hidden in the corners of her eyes and brows.
What surprised Xiao Zhaoning even more was the faint aura of auspiciousness surrounding the woman’s features, as though she had been born with extraordinary fortune.
How strange.
With a face this sharp and mean, how could she possibly possess such tremendous luck?
Xiao Qingqing’s pupils widened.
Panic flashed across her face as she hurriedly hid behind the man and ordered the servants behind her,
“Quick! She’s come back from the dead! Get her out! Throw her out! Hurry! Don’t let her frighten my precious girl!”
Xiao Zhaoning looked around.
Everything here was completely unfamiliar.
And she was wearing nothing more than a thin undergarment.
It was the dead of winter, and this was all she had on?
She reached up and rubbed the swelling on her head.
A wave of dizziness suddenly washed over her.
Then a flood of memories that did not belong to her came rushing into her mind.
The girl had also been named Xiao Zhaoning.
She was the eldest legitimate daughter of the Marquis of Kangping’s residence in the Great Yong Dynasty.
She should have been born into wealth and privilege, destined to be loved and cherished all her life.
Instead, because her twin sister had been born frail and sickly, Xiao Zhaoning had become the family’s scapegoat—the lowliest person in the entire Marquis’s household, someone everyone felt entitled to bully.
Whenever Xiao Zhaoyue fell ill, the entire household blamed Xiao Zhaoning.
Some even believed that the fortunes of twins were naturally balanced against each other.
The more lowly and miserable Xiao Zhaoning became, the more glorious Xiao Zhaoyue’s life would be.
Thus, the two sisters lived completely different lives.
One was treated like a precious jewel from the heavens, carefully held in everyone’s hands.
The other was like mud at the bottom of a river, struggling simply to survive.
And that was how fifteen years passed.
Yesterday had been the coming-of-age ceremony for the two sisters.
It was the first time Xiao Zhaoning had ever appeared before everyone dressed in luxurious clothing.
She had thought that after all these years, perhaps the people of the Marquis’s household would finally forgive her.
Yes.
For all those years, she had genuinely believed everything was her fault—that somehow she was responsible for Xiao Zhaoyue being born weak and sickly.
But Xiao Zhaoyue considered Xiao Zhaoning’s mere presence at the coming-of-age banquet an ill omen.
Before the guests had even left, her father had found an excuse to take Xiao Zhaoning away.
She could only watch helplessly as Xiao Zhaoyue was surrounded by everyone while her mother personally dressed and styled her.
As for Xiao Zhaoning, the servants had forcibly dragged her into the ancestral hall.
They claimed she was being made to kneel and pray for Xiao Zhaoyue’s blessings.
After kneeling there for three hours, Xiao Zhaoning finally dragged her exhausted body back toward her courtyard.
On the way, she happened to run into Xiao Zhaoyue.
Her younger sister, who had always treated her reasonably well—or so Xiao Zhaoning had believed—immediately raised her hand and slapped her.
“You bitch! Why were you even born? The Marquis’s residence was supposed to have only one legitimate daughter, but your existence stole my position as the eldest legitimate daughter! What gives you the right?
“If it weren’t for you, I could have married the Crown Prince. I would have become Empress someday!
“But now the Crown Prince says he can’t marry me, and it’s all because of you! Because you exist, he can’t marry me!
“Why don’t you just die? Everything would be better if you had never existed!”
“Little Sister? I didn’t… We are sisters, aren’t we? I…”
Xiao Zhaoyue seemed to have lost control of herself.
Completely abandoning her usual graceful demeanor, she grabbed Xiao Zhaoning by the hair and beat her like a woman gone mad.
Only then did Xiao Zhaoning understand.
It turned out that her status as the eldest legitimate daughter had been standing in everyone’s way.
While she was still trying to process what was happening, Xiao Zhaoyue lost her footing during the struggle and accidentally fell into the water.
By the time the servants came running, all they saw was Xiao Zhaoyue drowning.
The moment her father and mother arrived, they immediately decided Xiao Zhaoning was guilty.
They stripped away all her clothes, leaving her in nothing but a thin garment, then threw her into the ancestral hall to wait for Xiao Zhaoyue to wake up.
Overwhelmed by despair and suffering, Xiao Zhaoning eventually chose to end her own life.
She had given up everything.
And, in doing so, she had given everyone exactly what they wanted.
But she had never expected her body to be taken over by a wandering soul from another world.
After the modern-day Xiao Zhaoning absorbed the original owner’s memories, wave after wave of pain surged through her chest.
She knew exactly what it was.
The original Xiao Zhaoning’s lingering emotions.
She raised a hand and gently pressed it against her heart, trying to soothe the pain inside her.
Don’t worry.
Since I’ve taken over your body, I owe you this much.
I’ll make every single one of them pay you back.
Xiao Zhaoning slowly exhaled.
Once the dizziness finally subsided, she grabbed the corner of the nearby table and forced herself to stand.
Her body was still unsteady, and she nearly collapsed again.
She closed her eyes and shook her head.
Then, ruthlessly, she bit down on the tip of her tongue.
The metallic taste of blood spread across her mouth.
From nearby came an impatient voice:
“Since you didn’t die, stop pretending to be some kind of ghost! Look at the state you’re in!”