So hungry.
Song Yunfei was jolted awake by the intense hunger gnawing at her stomach.
Her stomach felt hollow, burning painfully, and it seemed as though something was ceaselessly chewing at her bones.
She expended all her strength just to force her eyes open.
The first thing she saw was a roof plastered with thatch and mud. A few shafts of daylight leaked through holes in it, illuminating the dust motes drifting through the air.
The wooden bed beneath her was hard enough to hurt. The thin, old mattress spread over it gave off a damp, moldy smell.
Where was this?
Frowning, Song Yunfei struggled to sit up, only to discover that she was so hungry she could not summon even the slightest bit of strength.
She managed to turn her head and saw a wooden door creak open.
A tall, slender man wearing coarse hemp clothing walked in.
Though his clothes had faded from repeated washing, he showed no trace of embarrassment or hardship .
He was carrying an ax, its blade still dusted with fresh wood chips.
Song Yunfei narrowed her eyes and studied him carefully.
His ink-black hair was tied simply at the back of his head with a strip of cloth. A few loose strands hung over his forehead, swaying gently as he walked.
Even in such plain attire, his extraordinary looks were impossible to conceal.
He had a face so handsome it was almost unreal. Sword-shaped brows, star-bright eyes, a high, straight nose—his deep eyes, dark as a frozen pool, held not the slightest trace of a country villager’s rustic simplicity.
When he looked toward Song Yunfei, there was no discernible emotion in his eyes, yet his gaze inexplicably tightened her chest. Along with the fresh scent of wood chips, he carried a faint fragrance of soapberry.
Who was this man…?
Song Yunfei had not yet figured out what was going on, so all she could do was remain silent.
But when the faint aroma of rice porridge from the courtyard drifted into the room with the man, her instinct for survival overwhelmed all her questions. Her throat bobbed involuntarily, and she swallowed.
“Awake?” the man asked gently, his clear voice like snowmelt flowing down a mountain.
“There’s porridge in the pot. Get up and serve yourself a bowl. Remember to wash the bowl when you’re finished.”
His tone was matter-of-fact, as though Song Yunfei had always been expected to do these things.
After speaking, he leaned the ax against the corner of the wall, then calmly ladled out a dipper of cold water and began washing up.
Following the scent of the rice porridge, Song Yunfei finally managed to gather a little strength. Bracing herself against the edge of the bed, she slowly lowered herself to the floor.
The moment her feet touched the cold packed earth, she shuddered. The hunger in her stomach grew even more intense.
Who cared where this was, or who he was? Filling her stomach came first.
Song Yunfei followed the scent of the rice porridge to the little earthen stove in the courtyard and lifted the lid from the pot.
The rice porridge was so thin she could almost see her reflection in it. A few wilted yellow leaves floated on top, it was impossible to tell what kind of vegetable they had come from.
Even so, to her in that moment, this pot of rice porridge was already a rare delicacy.
Song Yunfei took the chipped ceramic bowl beside the iron pot and, without the slightest hesitation, filled it to the brim.
Just as she was about to bring it to her mouth, a sharp pain suddenly stabbed through her temples. Countless memories that did not belong to her surged into her mind.
“…Afei, what are you throwing another tantrum about? If it weren’t to treat your illness, why would I ever…”
“Cousin, don’t blame me. If you must blame someone, blame this miserable world. Once you place first in the palace examination, we’ll have good days ahead of us.”
“…Mm. As long as you behave, I’ll let you touch me…”
Chaotic images and a jumble of voices exploded in Song Yunfei’s mind. The ceramic bowl in her hand fell to the ground with a clatter and shattered into several pieces.
Song Yunfei had transmigrated into a book.
She had become the vicious supporting female character in an old-fashioned romance novel, a character who shared her exact name and whose ending was utterly tragic.
The original owner had been a palace maid assigned to sweep and clean at an imperial retreat. After making a mistake, she was punished by the matron in charge with three days without food. Driven by intense hunger, she secretly left the palace at night, hoping to find some fruit in the wild to fill her stomach.
Unexpectedly, she encountered the Crown Prince of Daxia, Chu Jinhan, in the rear mountains. He had been the victim of an assassination attempt and lost his memory.
To escape punishment, the original owner had boldly claimed that Chu Jinhan was her Cousin Li Han—the cousin she had been betrothed to since childhood, before his family fell into poverty.
Not only had she taken all the gold, silver, and other valuables Chu Jinhan carried, she had also fled with him in the middle of the night. Song Yunfei had no idea what extraordinary means the original owner had used to spirit a living man out of the heavily guarded capital without making a sound, then hide him in this run-down side courtyard in Nanshan Village on the outskirts of the capital.
She had originally planned to rely on the so-called debt of saving his life and her own beautiful face to coax Chu Jinhan into sleeping with her.
As long as she gave birth to a royal heir, she would transform from a crow into a phoenix overnight and fly to the highest branch in all of Daxia.
Who could have imagined that Chu Jinhan had not only lost his memory, but also suffered from a hidden ailment? No matter how hard she tried to seduce him, he was unable to consummate their relationship.
Unwilling to give up, she had used the gold and silver she had taken from Chu Jinhan to buy medicine to treat his condition.
Now, with all the money spent, his condition showed no sign of improving.
In a fit of anger, the original owner had tormented the amnesiac Chu Jinhan in every possible way, ordering him around as though he were her servant. She had turned a scion of the imperial family into a country villager who chopped wood, carried water, washed clothes, and cooked for her.
A few days earlier, the household’s grain had run out. Chu Jinhan had gone out to perform hard labor to supplement the family income, telling her to cook herself some thin porridge to fill her stomach.
She had been too lazy to do it, and so she had simply gone hungry while waiting for Chu Jinhan to return….
Hah!
She deserved to starve to death!
Song Yunfei could not help but spit under her breath, but then she suddenly remembered the original story’s ending.
A year later, the Eastern Palace’s hidden guards would find them in Nanshan Village and bring them back to the Eastern Palace.
After returning to the palace, Chu Jinhan would quickly recover his memory under the Imperial Physicians’ treatment. Once he learned that he had been deceived, he would grant the original owner death by three feet of white silk.
It was over!
Song Yunfei’s entire body turned cold, as though she had fallen into an icy pit.
Ignoring the rice porridge spilled across the ground, she turned toward Chu Jinhan in the courtyard, where he was hanging clothes out to dry.
He had just finished washing his hands and was skillfully draping a freshly laundered plain-colored ruqun over the clothesline, then smoothing out its wrinkles.
Chu Jinhan worked with utmost seriousness, as though he were handling some momentous affair.
Song Yunfei’s eyes widened.
That was… that was her clothing.
Heavens.
He was the future emperor of Daxia.
And he was actually washing her clothes for her.
Song Yunfei felt a chill run repeatedly along her neck. The phantom of that three-foot length of white silk kept swaying before her eyes.
As a modern corporate wage slave who had been repeatedly worn down by the complexities of human relationships, how could she possibly let desire cloud her judgment?
Deceiving the ruler, acting above her station, abducting the Crown Prince, enslaving the heir to the throne… Any one of those crimes would have been enough to have her entire clan exterminated to the ninth degree of kinship.
No.
She absolutely could not repeat the original owner’s mistakes.
“How could you be so careless?”
After hanging up the clothes, Chu Jinhan walked toward Song Yunfei and immediately spotted the ceramic bowl overturned on the ground.
“I’ll serve you another bowl.”
Song Yunfei had no time to worry about her stomach rumbling like a drum. She hurriedly waved her hands. “No… no… Oh, no, don’t, Cousin. I… I’ll do it myself.”
Chu Jinhan’s gaze paused on her.
What was she so flustered about?
The cousin before him, Song Yunfei, had a pale face and cracked lips. Her beautiful, wide eyes shimmered with frightened tears.
“Yunfei, I’m unwilling to share a bed with you, but it isn’t because there’s anything wrong with you. It’s just that…”
Chu Jinhan seemed to find the subject difficult to discuss, leaving his sentence unfinished.
Only then did Song Yunfei remember that the original owner had been using starvation to force him to consummate their marriage.
“Cousin… Cousin, I know.” She lowered her head, an appropriate blush spreading across her face. “You should go on with what you were doing. I… I need to change my clothes…”
Chu Jinhan looked deeply at her. In the end, he let out a soft sigh. “All right, then. Serve yourself some more thin porridge.”
With that, he turned and walked out of the room.
Song Yunfei watched his figure disappear behind the wooden door before she dared to breathe heavily.
She quickly cleaned up the shards on the ground, then ladled herself half a bowl of rice broth. After filling her stomach just enough to feel half-full, she hurriedly lay down on the bed and began making plans.
Run. She had to run!
While he still had not recovered his memory, and before the people from the Eastern Palace came looking for them, she had to save enough money to flee!
Night deepened. Moonlight spilled across the ground like liquid silver, shining through the hole in the roof and falling before the bed.
Through the door curtain, Song Yunfei could see that the straw pallet where Chu Jinhan usually slept in the outer room was empty.
Where had he gone?
As she wondered, familiar footsteps approached from a distance. Rustling sounds came from the outer room.
Song Yunfei quickly closed her eyes and pretended to be asleep.
Huh?
Why was there a scent of soapberry?
Oh no.
Song Yunfei remembered that, in the original novel, tonight was the night Chu Jinhan would take a potent virility drug and allow the original owner to get what she wanted.
What was she supposed to do?
Submit? No. That would be seeking death!
Refuse? But she had been clamoring to consummate their marriage during the day. If she suddenly insisted on remaining chaste tonight, only a fool would believe her!
The footsteps stopped beside her bed.
Song Yunfei kept her eyes squeezed tightly shut, even deliberately making her breathing softer.
That tall figure loomed over her. Even through her eyelids, she could feel the oppressive aura he exuded.
“Afei, stop pretending.”
“You… are you afraid of me?”