Female special forces soldiers in ancient times

The courtyard on East Street in Beijing is bathed in bright sunlight, with dappled shadows cast by the trees.

A gentle breeze blew by, and fallen leaves fluttered down.

In early spring, everything is a new beginning.

The peach grove in the courtyard is already covered with new green leaves, and some branches have even sprouted flower buds.

But He Yalan, inside the house, seemed oblivious to the beautiful scenery before her.

In her eyes, the whole world was gray, even the brightest sun...

It also couldn't bring light to her sky.

That day, after returning home on South Street, He Yalan locked herself in her room.

He remained silent, neither eating nor drinking, yet he was restless and uneasy.

From dawn to dusk, and from dusk to dawn, it was just the occasional short walk.

At this moment, she sat quietly by the window, gazing blankly at the world outside.

His face was expressionless, as if he had lost all hope.

"Mother, ever since you returned from South Street the day before yesterday, you haven't eaten or drunk anything."

How can your body handle this?

The eldest prince suddenly burst in again.

They also thoughtfully brought over some exquisite food and soup.

"go out!"

But He Yalan didn't appreciate it and coldly uttered two words.

Hehe! When it comes to eating, I have to be able to eat it all.

She was the eldest daughter of the prestigious He family in the capital, born with the honor of being a "golden branch and jade leaf".

At the age of 17, she had a chance encounter with the unfavored seventh prince at the royal hunting grounds.

His riding skills were mediocre, but he managed to grab the reins with all his might when she fell off her horse.

The bloodstains on her palms from the reins became the most burning mark in her eyes.

In the ancestral hall, her father and brothers smashed her wedding dress and cursed her for "marrying a son of a concubine and disgracing the family."

She overturned the offering table and threw her phoenix coronet and wedding gown to the ground:

"I, He Yalan, married a husband, not someone with power!"

The next day, she was carried in a blue cloth sedan chair and married into the Seventh Prince's residence.

She only wore half a jade pendant that her mother had secretly given her around her waist.

Three years after her marriage, He Yalan began traveling to various prominent families with the He family's name card.

She knelt before the Prime Minister's mansion in the dead of winter, her skirt frozen to the snow.

In the height of summer, carrying a secret letter, he traversed three thousand miles of his fiefdom.

She wore through three pairs of shoes. She used the He family's century-old reputation as collateral.

She used her dowry to pay military expenses, and even risked her life to force her father to use his private army.

Finally, on her 20th birthday, the Seventh Prince ascended the throne, following the path she had paved.

At the coronation ceremony, he personally adorned her hair with a phoenix hairpin:

"Yalan, you are my only queen in this life."

When the eldest prince was born, he held the swaddled baby and stayed by He Yalan's bedside for three days and three nights.

But even the emperor's promise couldn't withstand loneliness; the beauties of Jiangnan...

The daughters of powerful officials entered the palace one after another.

As she watched the new replace the old, she clutched the phoenix seal tightly and told herself:

"With the Empress in her position, she has someone to rely on."

She thought that her twenty years of forbearance would finally pay off when the eldest prince was made crown prince.

Who would have thought that the change would come without any warning?

Twenty years later, one evening, the eunuch's voice proclaiming an imperial edict pierced the palace walls:

"Empress He and the Crown Prince plotted a rebellion; they are hereby deposed immediately."

They moved to a separate residence on East Street.

The fabricated charges against her were like a blunt knife, severing her twenty-year reign as empress.

As she was driven out of the palace gates, He Yalan looked back at the majestic Forbidden City.

I remember when we first got married, he said, "I promise you a lifetime of peace and security."

Only a cold smile remained on her lips, along with a string of poignant tears.

But she didn't fall; the peach blossoms in the East Street villa bloomed every year.

But she was secretly weaving a web: using the He family's resources and contacting old subordinate families.

They even placed the insignificant and lowly Consort Ping into the harem of the new Emperor Xiahe.

Subsequently, he plotted to kill Prime Minister Wang and frame the Li family.

To sow discord between Emperor Xiahe and Empress Li Tingting.

They had already planned to have Li Tingting assassinated and persecuted on the day she gave birth.

Next, He Yalan joined forces with various powerful families to turn Emperor Xiahe into a puppet ruler.

Just when everything seemed to be going smoothly, unexpectedly, the Consort Ping, whom she had helped to rise to power...

But at the crucial moment, they turned on her and bit her back, infuriating He Yalan.

They lobbied the Li family again, blaming everything on Consort Ping for Li Tingting's ordeal.

As expected, after learning the truth, the Li family used the pretext of "purging the court of corrupt officials" that very night...

They killed Consort Ping directly.

In the days that followed, He Yalan visited the Wu and Wang families time and time again.

After patient persuasion, painstaking efforts, and various inducements, a three-way alliance was finally formed.

Moreover, it seemed that they had successfully forced the Li family to resign on South Street that day.

If the Li family agrees, Emperor Xiahe can be deposed the next day.

Let her son reclaim the throne and regain everything she had lost.

But at this very moment, Li Tingting, whom she had killed,

He unexpectedly came back to life and brought back an army of 100,000 from the border.

His appearance on South Street completely crushed all her plans and schemes.

That day, on South Street, Li Tingting's words were like a fine needle.

It was constantly piercing He Yalan's heart.

"In the face of absolute strength, even the most ingenious opportunism is just a facade."

The voice followed her from South Street all the way back to East Street.

Even the "crack" sound of a peach tree branch breaking in the wind outside the window...

It all sounded like a mocking repetition of Li Tingting's words.

She touched the crack left by the jade seal on the headboard.

Suddenly, I realized that my "painstaking efforts" twenty years ago were now a "coup tactic" twenty years later.

It turns out they were all the same joke about building a tower out of sand.

Now, whenever she comes to her senses, she hears Li Tingting calling her "the late Empress Dowager".

That word "first" felt like a dull knife, repeatedly cutting into her heart.

Until the blood mixed with that "showy facade" was swallowed down,

It was so bitter that I couldn't even shed a tear.

Looking at the ginseng soup that the eldest prince brought over, which had formed a film of oil on the table,

She stared at the shimmering reflection in the bowl.

Suddenly, I noticed the jade hairpin on Wu Xiong'an's hat when he kowtowed on South Street.

It overlapped with the icicles that had frozen in my hair when I knelt in the snow years ago.

It turns out that twenty years of political maneuvering was nothing more than changing from one kneeling posture to another.

My Adam's apple bobbed as I tried to swallow, but the word "showy" made me wince.

She recalled the cold glint of the armor beneath Li Tingting's cloak, a glint colder than the silverware in the imperial kitchen.

She was so cold that she didn't even have the strength to lift her hand to pick up the bowl.

I could only let the stomach acid burn in my empty stomach.

He repeatedly crushed the words "can't eat" into bloody froth.

"Heavens above, why are you treating me like this?"

What did I do wrong? What did I do wrong?

"Woo~ woo~ woo,"

He Yalan could no longer control her emotions and began to completely break down.

"Mother, please don't do this, please don't do this! What if something happens to you?"

What am I to do now, Mother? (Sobbing)

Don't forget, this world has already abandoned us, mother and son.

We've always considered each other our life's purpose, Mother. I'm so afraid of losing you!

Upon seeing this, the eldest prince was so frightened that he burst into tears.

"My son, my child! Why has Heaven treated us, mother and son, so cruelly?"

Why, why is this happening?!

Upon hearing the eldest prince's cries, He Yalan pulled him into her arms.

The mother and son embraced tightly and wept bitterly.