Yan State, Winter Month. The cold wind howled.
Inside a small room within the Eastern Palace lay a man and a woman.
The woman had delicate, picturesque features, lips like red lotus petals. Her long black hair was loosely spread across the bed, making her skin appear even fairer. She wore only a thin dudou, faintly revealing the alluring curves beneath.
The man had a handsome face, with sharp brows that slanted into his temples. When his phoenix eyes were open, they carried an innate nobility and authority; when closed, they softened with a hint of gentleness. His nose was well-defined, and his thin lips were slightly pursed.
His upper garment hung loosely open, revealing faintly visible, well-built muscles beneath. His handsome face was buried against her neck, his heated breath brushing against her skin.
“……” Gu Ningning, who had wanted to sleep a little longer, felt completely numb.
She had originally planned to keep pretending to sleep to avoid disaster, but the man directly flipped her over and leaned in to kiss her lips.
Gu Ningning grew dizzy from the kiss. Her soft, boneless hands pushed weakly against him as she murmured, “No…”
Shen Que, however, took the opportunity to grasp her hands, playing with them in his palm. Only when Gu Ningning suddenly opened her eyes did he kiss her again. “Be good. I will be attending court soon.”
After that, there came a series of rustling sounds.
As the Crown Prince, Shen Que had been noble since childhood. He had always only considered himself. Serving or taking care of others was never something he would do.
Gu Ningning could only rely on herself.
When it was over, Shen Que dressed energetically and prepared to attend court. Before leaving, he pinched her cheek and told her, “I will come again tonight.”
Gu Ningning knew exactly what that meant—what he had gotten in the morning was not enough, and he intended to continue at night.
Damn it. Being treated like this by the male lead every day… was that also part of a cannon fodder’s job?
Her body felt unbearably sore. Gu Ningning rolled over and lay flat on the bed like a salted fish as memories continuously flooded her mind—
Her true identity was a professional cannon fodder.
In this line of work, the pay was low, the labor was exhausting, there was no future, it was high-risk, and there were no benefits. It was thankless work.
As more and more cannon fodder characters became self-aware and went on strike, the Tomato Novel Management Bureau established a Cannon Fodder Division, specifically hiring a group of professional employees to fill the cannon fodder roles in various novels.
Gu Ningning was one of the employees of the Cannon Fodder Bureau. Because she was too lazy and often slacked off at work, her performance had been below standard for years.
Originally, she had managed to get by through connections, but at the end of this year, a new leader took office and implemented an elimination system for the lowest performers.
Frightened, she hastily tried to make up for it at the last minute and deliberately chose the easiest novel—one where she only needed to idle through each day. Who would have thought that just three days after transmigrating into it, the male lead’s character setting would collapse?
Gu Ningning immediately reported the issue to her superior, but for seven whole days, there was no response.
Only then did she remember that her previous supervisor had already retired and gone on vacation. And in her rush to improve her performance, she had transmigrated in a hurry and forgotten to get the new leader’s contact information…
Now, she could only grit her teeth and continue idling through the story, waiting until the plot ended, after which she would die and return.
The only fortunate thing was that her role in the book was minimal, and her death came relatively quickly.
This book was a female-protagonist revenge story titled Legend of Qingcheng.
The female lead was named Gu Qingcheng, the legitimate daughter of the Prime Minister’s Residence. She had been noble since childhood, extraordinarily talented, and unmatched in the capital. She had been betrothed to Crown Prince Shen Que and was supposed to smoothly become the Crown Prince’s consort and later the Empress who ruled the world.
With such a perfect life, Gu Qingcheng, however, had a love-struck brain. She abandoned the Crown Prince—who was as ethereal as an immortal, exceptionally intelligent, and profoundly learned—and, on the eve of her wedding, eloped with her younger half-sister’s fiancé, Lu Mowei.
With no other choice, the Prime Minister sent the younger half-sister—who had originally been meant to marry Lu Mowei—to Shen Que as a concubine to make amends.
Unexpectedly, Lu Mowei held a grudge against the Prime Minister. His elopement with Gu Qingcheng had merely been a scheme to secretly deal with the Prime Minister’s Residence. He fabricated evidence of the Prime Minister colluding with enemies and committing treason and submitted it to the Emperor.
The Prime Minister’s Residence fell into grave danger. To protect her family, Gu Qingcheng had no choice but to seek help from Shen Que. Still resentful over her previous elopement, Shen Que agreed only to humiliate her.
After arriving at the Eastern Palace, Gu Qingcheng completely let go of her past and began to please Shen Que. Since Shen Que still had lingering feelings for her, Gu Qingcheng transformed into a rising female lead, advancing step by step from a lowly concubine to a favored beauty, and eventually to Secondary Consort.
Her younger half-sister, jealous of her favor, constantly schemed against her. Out of guilt, Gu Qingcheng tolerated her time and again, until one incident—her younger half-sister attempted to poison Gu Qingcheng but mistakenly poisoned Shen Que’s tea instead.
Enraged, Shen Que ordered the younger half-sister to be beaten to death.
Afterward, Shen Que ascended the throne. Gu Qingcheng continued her rise within the harem, eventually becoming Empress. Later, she even outlived Shen Que, becoming Empress Dowager and ruling from behind the curtain.
And Gu Ningning had transmigrated into that very younger half-sister.
No status, no position, no intelligence, little screen time, and a quick death. In the early stage, she only needed to wait in the Eastern Palace for the female lead to return. Later, she would speak ill of the female lead, then poison someone and await her own death.
However, on the third day after she transmigrated, Shen Que was drugged by a certain maid-concubine.
And the plot collapsed right there—
In the original story, Shen Que had executed the maid-concubine and then soaked in ice water for an entire night.
But that night, Gu Ningning had happened to go out for a walk after overeating. After executing the maid-concubine, Shen Que turned around and saw her.
And just like that, she became the unlucky one.
From then on, whenever Shen Que was in a good mood, he would come to her. When he was in a bad mood, he would also come to her. When he was under pressure, he would seek her out to relieve it; when he was relaxed, he would come to pass the time.
In the original book, as the official partner of the female lead, Shen Que had been set as someone who, despite having a harem of thousands, had only ever touched Gu Qingcheng.
Because of this, all the women in the Eastern Palace had been maddened with jealousy toward Gu Qingcheng, each one wanting to kill her.
Now, Gu Ningning discovered miserably that the target of those women’s murderous intentions had become her instead…
What a sinful situation!
Living the treatment of cannon fodder, yet bearing the concerns of the female lead.
What kind of miserable life was this!