The Sickly Beautiful Prime Minister's Cannon Fodder Scum Wife - Chapter 1

“Shizi? Shizi?”

So tired… so dizzy…

Was that new calming decoction I brewed last night really this effective?

Xie Qingqi forced her eyes open, and in the next instant, she shot awake.

Standing by her side was a girl dressed in ancient maid attire, looking at her with hesitation.

Xie Qingqi sat bolt upright on the bed, the blanket slipping off and falling to the floor.

The maid instantly dropped to her knees, head lowered, panic in her voice.
“Forgive me, Shizi! This servant was wrong. Please don’t be angry!”

“Hey, what are you doing?” Xie Qingqi, too startled to think about anything else, jumped down from the bed to help her up.

The maid instinctively shrank back, but not daring to resist, she stiffly let Xie Qingqi lift her.

Her voice trembled slightly:
“This servant… this servant didn’t mean to disturb Shizi’s rest. But you instructed me this morning to wake you at three quarters past the Hour of Wei, as Young Master Zhou and the others will be visiting this afternoon.”

Servant? Shizi?

Xie Qingqi stared at the girl before her. Without thinking, a name popped into her mind.
“Zhu Yue?”

“This servant is here.”

Xie Qingqi drew in a sharp breath, forcing herself to stay calm as her eyes swept around the room. The furnishings were all antique and elegant. The bed, table, screen and windows—each crafted with exquisite detail. Even the floor beneath her feet was covered with a thick, soft carpet.

Don’t tell me… I’ve transmigrated?!

But wait, wasn’t Shizi a title for a man? She looked down: long boots, robe, belt—definitely men’s attire.

Except her body was still unmistakably female!

She thought back to last night. She’d been in her family’s medical hall, preparing a new calming decoction, adding an herb as a new catalyst. She drank it, then fell asleep at the shop as usual…

Damn it! She had only just inherited her family’s Chinese medicine clinic, and now she’d been thrown into ancient times?!

“Useless wretch! Do you not understand the rule? If you eat, you must work? Write it out, now!”

The angry scolding from outside interrupted her thoughts.

As soon as Xie Qingqi stepped out, a blast of cold air rushed at her. Zhu Yue hurried to follow, offering her a handwarmer and draping a snow-white fox-fur cloak over her shoulders.

“Thank you,” Xie Qingqi muttered absently, too focused on what was happening outside to notice Zhu Yue’s astonished delight at her gratitude.

In the corner of the courtyard, a stout middle-aged woman was berating a young lady.
“Everything you eat and wear comes from the Marquis’ household. You can’t handle hard work, and now you’re too lazy to even copy a few lines?!” In her anger, the woman raised a whip to strike.

“Stop!”

Xie Qingqi strode forward. The woman quickly dropped into a bow at the sight of her, but instead of guilt for being caught, her expression carried smug satisfaction.
“This old servant greets Shizi!”

On the ground, the young woman kept her head lowered. Her black hair spilled like ink around her, papers and brushes scattered across the ground, the white hem of her robe stained with ink.

Her world had been reduced to stark black and white, as if she alone truly belonged to this frozen courtyard.

Xie Qingqi froze for a moment. Then she hurriedly pulled off the cloak and tried to drape it over the woman.

But the woman sidestepped, casting her a cold glance. Her voice was flat and frigid.
“Don’t touch me.”

Xie Qingqi then noticed that her eyes were darker than ink.

That gaze was biting cold, stubborn, and filled with hatred. Under it, Xie Qingqi’s chest clenched for reasons she couldn’t explain.

“Granny Li,” she recalled a name surfacing in her mind, and turned to ask, “What do you think you’re doing?”

Granny Li rushed forward, eager to explain.
“This old servant was merely teaching this ungrateful wretch a lesson. Shizi, you took her in out of kindness, yet she refuses even the simple punishment of copying some lines!”

Xie Qingqi looked back at the young woman. In weather this cold, her clothes were shockingly thin. Though made of fine fabric, they were caked with dirt and mud, smeared with footprints, ripped open in places where streaks of blood showed through, old wounds mixed with new.

“And why exactly did you order her to copy anything?” Xie Qingqi demanded, indignant now, recalling every drama she’d seen where wicked servants bullied others. “What did she do that deserves this beating?”

Before Granny Li could answer, the woman herself spoke first.

“Wasn’t it by your order?”

Xie Qingqi faltered.

“In Qingfeng Courtyard, every servant is allowed to hit me. You made me copy the imperial edict about the Li family’s downfall just to humiliate me.” Slowly, the woman stood up. Her robe hung loosely on her frail frame.

Then her body wavered, nearly collapsing. Xie Qingqi rushed forward, wanting to steady her, but froze under the sharp glare that pinned her in place.

“All because I annulled our engagement.”

The woman straightened her back inch by inch. Her expression was calm, but deep in her eyes burned hatred like hellfire sealed beneath eternal ice. If looks could kill, Xie Qingqi would already be ashes.

Her hands hovered awkwardly in midair, caught between helping and retreating.

“You… you might hate me, but at least put on the cloak, or you’ll catch cold.”

The woman let out a laugh colder than the snow around them.
“Why pretend to be kind now?”

Xie Qingqi had no idea what exactly had happened, but as a healer her instinct was clear: treat the sick, save the suffering.
“I… I don’t want to hurt you.”

The woman only sneered harder, her gaze darkening with even greater loathing.

Xie Qingqi realized how ridiculous her words sounded, but she herself felt wronged. Still, she forced herself to meet that scalding stare and managed a strained, “I…”

“Xie-brother, look who we’ve brought!”

A man’s voice cut her off.

She turned to see three figures approaching. There are two men in front, one woman obscured behind them.

The men wore fine robes and jade hairpieces. The one on the left carried a folding fan, his phoenix eyes glinting with slyness. The one on the right idly rolled two walnuts in his hand, his appearance already less refined, and his grin downright lecherous.

The woman behind them was hidden from view.

Xie Qingqi glanced over, not recognizing any of them, yet names surfaced in her mind unbidden: Li Ye, Zhou Changyu, Liu Liu.

Before she could respond, both men’s attention had shifted to the battered woman standing behind her.

Zhou Changyu was the first to sneer.
“Well, well, isn’t this the famous prodigy Li Huaiyin? Haven’t seen you in months. How did you end up in such a sorry state?”

Li Ye followed suit, turning to Xie Qingqi with mockery.
“Brother Xie, to strike such a talented beauty… don’t you know how to cherish a delicate flower?”

“Her Li family betrayed the empire. She’s the daughter of a traitor. Beating her is lenient. If it were up to me, she’d have been sold off as a slave.” Zhou Changyu snapped his fan shut and tapped it against his palm with disdain. “So what if she was once the talk of the capital? So what if she was the beloved daughter of the great general? Now she’s worse than a dog, living worse than my household’s servants.”

The two burst into laughter.

Xie Qingqi, however, felt her vision go dark.

Li Huaiyin… the Great General’s daughter… Shizi’s wife?

Wasn’t this… the very novel she had just been reading a few days ago, while brewing medicine to pass the time?

That story about the heroine’s rise from princess to empress—where Li Huaiyin, mysterious and brilliant, became her chief strategist and later the Prime Minister. Readers wept bitterly when she died young…

Li Huaiyin was General Li Wang’s only daughter who is stunningly beautiful and blessed with unmatched talent.

She and Xie Qingqi had been betrothed since childhood. To outsiders, the daughter of a great general and the heir of a marquisate seemed the perfect match, a union made in heaven. But Xie Qingqi spent her days mingling with dissolute heirs, drinking, gambling, and even parading courtesans openly into her own home, her infamy echoing through the capital.

Naturally, General Li refused to see his daughter married to such a wastrel. Before he left for the frontlines, he personally broke off the engagement. No one expected that nearly a year into his campaign, the entire army would vanish at the border. Soon after, the Li family was accused of treason and collusion with the enemy. Without any solid evidence, the Emperor confiscated all their property in fury.

With nowhere else to go, Li Huaiyin was left stranded. At that moment, Xie Qingqi seized the chance to plead for her hand and married her, earning herself a month of house arrest. Though she had technically “saved” Li Huaiyin, she treated her cruelly afterwards—insults, humiliation, making her kneel for days in the snow wearing only thin clothes. That was how Li Huaiyin developed her chronic illness, coughing blood until her life burned out far too early.

In the novel, Li Huaiyin had always been calm, brilliant, untouchable. The goddess of countless readers’ hearts. When she died, the chapter was so devastating that it drowned the pages in tears, and every reader cursed the scoundrel heir for not dying a thousand deaths.

Now, Xie Qingqi herself was on the verge of breaking down. She had raged at the scoundrel on the page… only to wake up and discover she was that very scoundrel!

And worse, according to the novel, in just a few months, Li Huaiyin would be secretly rescued by the Princess. From then on, she would bury herself in study, earn first place in the imperial exams, and become the Princess’s greatest support when she ascended the throne. For a time, she would hold power unmatched in the empire.

But once Li Huaiyin died, the Empress’s wrath would fall squarely on Xie Qingqi. She would be thrown into the dungeons, tortured, her kneecaps dug out, and cast onto the streets to beg. In the end, no one knew whether she starved, froze, or bled to death only that her body rotted outside an abandoned temple, left for wild dogs to gnaw.

The thought made Xie Qingqi’s neck stiffen. Even with a handwarmer clutched in her palms, the chill seeped into her bones.

She had clearly remembered that name just now—Li Huaiyin.

But in gawking at the beautiful woman, she had almost forgotten…

The original Xie Qingqi deserved to die. But she didn’t want to!

*******

Li Ye finished laughing, his gaze sweeping greedily over Li Huaiyin. “Brother Xie, don’t just stand there. You promised us that once your confinement was lifted, your esteemed wife would accompany us for drinks and merriment. I’ve waited long enough. We came prepared today.”

As he spoke, he shifted aside, and Zhou Changyu gestured at the woman behind him. “Brother Xie, we brought Lady Liuliu along to keep us company. Afterward, we can even leave her in your courtyard…”

Their lewd grins and darting eyes left no doubt what they meant. Xie Qingqi felt the world spin.

Another step closer to death.

The woman following behind them cradled a folded dress in her arms. With a bashful smile, she curtsied. “Greetings, Young Master.” Then she turned sweetly toward Li Huaiyin. “Greetings, elder sister.”

Zhou Changyu clapped Xie Qingqi on the shoulder and sighed with mock envy. “Brother Xie, see how considerate Lady Liuliu is? Truly, I envy your good fortune with women.”

Xie Qingqi’s temples throbbed. She glanced nervously at Li Huaiyin—only to meet those icy black eyes head-on. Her knees nearly gave way.

These three weren’t mocking Li Huaiyin. They were practically dancing on her grave!

Grinding her teeth, Xie Qingqi snapped, “Since when did I welcome Lady Liuliu into my household?”

She was certain: the original owner had never been with this Liuliu. That “elder sister” was clearly a deliberate humiliation.

Wanting desperately to redeem herself in Li Huaiyin’s eyes, Xie Qingqi blurted out, “In this life, Li Huaiyin is my only wife!”

The words dropped like a stone, and the atmosphere shifted instantly.

Zhou Changyu and Li Ye froze, stunned. Even Li Mama and Zhuyue widened their eyes, baffled at what their young master was playing at.

But Li Huaiyin’s face remained indifferent. With a flick of her lashes, she turned her head away in disdain.

Xie Qingqi knew, with her reputation, such a declaration sounded like mockery—another insult.

Still, she pressed on, forcing the words out: “Li Huaiyin is the wife I formally begged to marry. I will never take another, nor entangle with any other woman. You all must treat her with respect… let her rest and recover. If she’s left with any illness…”

She stopped short.

That illness had been the original owner’s fault. No matter how wronged she felt, she would have to bear it.

To Li Mama and Zhuyue, though, the words landed as a clear threat. They had seen plenty of this heir’s cruelty; what was another twisted game?

Still, Li Mama wasted no time. Whatever her master was plotting, she dared not hesitate. She went forward and bowed properly to Li Huaiyin. “This old servant greets the young madam.”

Li Huaiyin remained silent, so Li Mama held the bow without rising.

Meanwhile, Liuliu’s eyes shimmered with tears. “I never wished to replace elder sister… I only hoped to stay by Young Master’s side.”

Xie Qingqi stared at her coldly until she, too, dropped into a bow, murmuring, “Greetings, young madam.”

Zhou Changyu tried to smooth things over. “It was Lady Liuliu’s mistake. Brother Xie, you’ve just been released from confinement—don’t let such trifles ruin our mood. Come, prepare wine and food. Let the two of them sing and dance for us tonight.”

“She is my wife, not a courtesan.”

The chill in Xie Qingqi’s voice made Zhou Changyu falter. His face darkened. “You told us to come. That we’d watch her make a fool of herself. What’s the meaning of this?” He jabbed a finger at the dress in Liuliu’s hands. “That performance dress was prepared at your order. Surely you haven’t forgotten.”

Li Ye chimed in, eager to please, “Don’t be angry, brothers. No dance, fine. But Brother Xie, you did promise to let me take your wife back with me—”

“Why don’t you send your wife over, then?” Xie Qingqi barked a laugh. How shameless could they be?

Instead of taking offense, Li Ye eagerly replied, “If Brother Xie fancies her, I’ll hand her over with both hands.”

Xie Qingqi was genuinely horrified. What kind of beast had the original owner been, to keep friends like these?

“Out! Get out of here!”

Zhou Changyu flung the dress to the ground with a scoff and stormed off. Li Ye and Liuliu trailed after him, but not before bowing stiffly in farewell.

Once they were gone, Xie Qingqi turned back. Li Huaiyin—the woman destined to one day hold lives in her hands, the one who would condemn her to a fate worse than death—was staring at her with eyes so cold, they carried open contempt.

A fresh wave of dread rolled through her. What if the original Xie Qingqi had already committed the vile act of replacing a wife with a concubine?

“Madam, I…”

At that, Li Huaiyin’s eyes sharpened, her voice dripping frost.

“Get out.”

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