Transmigrating into a book to save her best friend, her sickly husband vies for her affections every

Meng Family Ancestral Hall.

The night breeze seeping through the cracks made the candlelight on the incense table flicker. Meng**, who was being punished by facing the wall to reflect on his mistakes, stared blankly at the ancestral tablets. His clothes were disheveled, his face was haggard, and his hair was loose. He had no trace of his former vitality and demeanor. He just knelt there quietly, lost in thought.

There was a small desk in front of her, filled with her hastily copied texts from the Book of Rites and the Admonitions for Women. This was her punishment.

A rumbling sound came from her stomach. She lay on her side, clutching her empty belly. She hadn't eaten for two days. She was so hungry. She knew she had made a mistake. Could some dry food fall from the sky?

The creaking sound of the door opening suddenly rang out, and Meng** immediately straightened her back, knelt down, grabbed her calligraphy brush, and pretended to be earnestly repentant. When she saw who had entered, her lips trembled and tears fell in a steady stream.

"Baby, why are you so late? I've suffered so much! Look at how Grandma hit my hands!" She spread her hands, complaining pitifully, "She hits me ten times a day with those two-finger-wide bamboo strips... what a cruel heart..."

Her swollen hand ached terribly when she held a pen, and because she hadn't copied enough, they wouldn't give her food for the next day, leaving her hungry for two days.

Isn't she supposed to be the darling of the group? Shouldn't she always be the one who escapes danger and gets away with things, or have someone willingly back her up?

How could she have ended up like this?

Tingyao closed the door and went inside, opening the small food box she had brought. "I can't stay long. It was only with the help of your mother and Anzhi that I was able to come and see you."

She was also confined by Old Madam Ji, but she sneaked out. "Why did Zhao Siwei and Zhang Zhan both come to the Meng family at the same time?"

The matter was brought to a very fast pace, with all sorts of rumors circulating. One story said that Zhao Siwei and Zhang Zhan were causing trouble by kicking down the Meng family's gate.

The second version says that Zhao Siwei clung to the carriage door and refused to get off, so Zhang Zhan tore his sleeves and dragged him into the Meng family's gate.

The third story says that the Crown Prince came in a hurry and left in a rage.

In short, there are all sorts of rumors.

“It’s all Zhao Siwei’s fault!” Meng shouted. “He made me lose face, my mother collapsed because of this, and my grandmother turned into a wolf in sheep’s clothing.”

"Get to the point!" Tingyao said coldly. "Don't dodge the question!"

"I didn't lose my jade pendant," Meng said in a very low voice.

Tingyao let out a soft "Ah".

Meng** felt guilty, and then raised his voice, filled with anger, "I don't know what Zhao Siwei said to Zhang Zhan, but he brought Zhang Zhan to my house to question me, and in the end, he even alarmed the Crown Prince. Zhao Siwei and the Crown Prince started fighting while they were talking."

Tingyao gasped; every sentence she uttered could instantly generate an entry and trend on Beijing's hot search list.

She asked, "Who struck first, Zhao Siwei or the Crown Prince?"

“Your Highness,” Meng said, “Zhao Siwei is too cunning; he doesn’t hit people in the face.”

Tingyao breathed a sigh of relief. "Alright, self-defense isn't a big problem. At most, it's excessive self-defense." She continued, "Go on."

“When they started fighting, my family tried to break it up, but they told us to get out of the way. Only Zhang Zhan dared to step in, but he ended up pleasing neither side. I didn’t even see clearly before I bumped into someone and broke my head.”

"Stop talking," Tingyao concluded. "It's all because of your lies that these absurd things happened."

Meng** is not lying. Zhao Siwei would not kindly ask her for the jade pendant. Zhang Zhan would not confront Zhao Siwei at the Meng family's residence just to prove that he has nothing to do with the Meng family. The Crown Prince probably rushed here because he was afraid that something would happen to Zhang Zhan, whom he wanted to win over.

Tingyao was furious, unable to understand Meng**'s thought process; he was quite eccentric, and Zhao Siwei was simply caught in the crossfire.

"Tingyao," Meng called to her, "I've wanted to ask you for a long time, do you like Zhao Siwei so you can protect him?"

Tingyao laughed speechlessly, "You put yourself in solitary confinement for ten days, and this is the conclusion you came to? You've become too arrogant. You're the daughter of a high-ranking official, and it's precisely because of this status that you can live a life of comfort and privilege. But at the same time, how many lives are at stake with your every word and action?"

She lowered her voice, but her anger only intensified. "This will cause Zhao Siwei and the Crown Prince to turn against each other prematurely, and Zhang Zhan will also face danger sooner. I don't understand what you mean by 'liking,' but I know it's not what Zhang Zhan wants."

At this stage, what Zhang Zhan needs is Zhao Siwei's absolute trust.

Meng** looked flustered, "I really know I was wrong!"

She knew that her younger siblings could no longer hold their heads high in the capital because of her, her father was being reprimanded and impeached by the Emperor, her mother was so angry that she couldn't get out of bed, and her grandmother was barely holding on.

She sincerely promised, "I will be more careful with my words and actions in the future, and this disaster will never happen again."

Tingyao was afraid that she would swear if she heard a few more words, so she held back and said, "Let's not cause any more trouble."

Meng** stood up. "Baby, don't be angry." She had been kneeling for too long and hadn't eaten for two days. Suddenly standing up caused her to experience a hypoglycemic episode, her vision blurred, and she felt dizzy and fell to the ground.

Tingyao hurriedly went to look, but Meng** tugged at her sleeve and explained, "I just felt so sorry for Zhang Zhan, he's so pitiful..."

"His falling out with Zhao Siwei was actually to protect him. He was forced to restore his identity, not of his own free will, and the timing coincided with when Zhao Siwei lost the emperor's favor."

The book's main theme is torturing the male protagonist, while the soft and adorable Xu Tutu saves the young man's heart.

"Faced with Zhao Siwei, who is always a beat slow on the uptake, and the covetous Crown Prince, all Zhang Zhan could do was act as a human shield for Zhao Siwei. His eventual defeat wasn't due to Zhao Siwei's protagonist halo, but because he had already planned it all out, sacrificing his life to create a way out for Zhao Siwei, allowing him to reach the safest position. I just feel sorry for him..."

"When you see someone you favor, you always want to look at them more. If you see Zhao Fu'er being forced into a political marriage, I don't believe you can sit still. You will definitely do something to stop it."

Tingyao's beautiful eyes narrowed. "What did you say?" Zhao Fu'er is to be married off? To what extent?

Meng** was stunned, then laughed in anger, and shoved her on the shoulder, "I told you not to fucking watch pirated versions, is the version you watched where Zhao Fu'er suddenly turns against you?"

Tingyao let out a soft "Ah".

Meng** was both angry and hungry. "Dog, I told you to support the original, but you always ignored me. Luckily we found out now, otherwise who knows what kind of mess would have happened."

"The author said that the system was malfunctioning and did not update in real time for those chapters. It was stuck in the review process for two days before it was finally updated. Many pirate websites did not copy that part."

Now it was Tingyao's turn to panic slightly, "What were the chapters I didn't read about?"

"Zhao Fu'er stopped the emperor from bestowing the title of Imperial Noble Consort upon Zhao Siwei's mother, fearing that his mother's lack of virtue would bring disaster upon her and would also implicate the unambitious Zhao Siwei, who would be killed!"

"As a result, Zhao Siwei's mother whispered in the emperor's ear, suggesting that Zhao Fu'er go for a political marriage! The emperor did not refuse, and Zhao Fu'er panicked. Zhao Siwei had been busy with romance in the early stages, and after Zhao Fu'er told him, he only said that the emperor would not agree."

The author only briefly touched on this foreshadowing in a few words, or something like that.

"Zhao Fu'er can only tell Zhang Zhan that Zhang Zhan turned the tide of the tragedy. If you were Zhao Fu'er, who would you believe!"

Just then, the old woman on guard in the courtyard called out to Miss Ji, urging her to leave.

Meng pushed her, "Alright, let's go. The plot is the same everywhere except here. You're amazing, you can still watch even when you can't connect."

On her way out, Tingyao began to recall her past life. There was so little of it. Zhao Fu'er didn't like her, and after Zhao Siwei married her, they had much less contact.

But she remembered that Zhao Siwei later made a deal with Zhang Zhan to quell the rebellion.

Wouldn't Zhao Siwei be a major victim of injustice? It was clearly him who told the enemy to get lost, but Zhao Fu'er only believes that Zhang Zhan helped him.

She paused, looking towards the palace. She knew Zhao Siwei would think of this too, and he would surely find out.