Second Chance To Happiness

"Rest in peace,Xiao Ying."(1)

Chapter 1: "Rest in peace, Xiao Ying."(1)

The thirty-seventh year of Fangrong¹.

In a prison cell of the Royal Prison² ,there was a young woman clad in tattered clothes stained with blood. Her arms were suspended from above by an iron chain hanging. Her eyes were bloodshot from not having enough sleep but mainly due to the pain from all the whiplashes she got.

But her black orbs which once used to shine like pearls lost their luster. Her body and face which once glowed like snow became dirty and covered with scars.

Who is this unfortunate girl,you might ask. She was none other than the unfavoured daughter of the main wife³ of the Duke Ning Manor⁴ - Zhu Xiuying who once used to be the fiancee of Prince Shang⁵.

Her birth mother died giving birth to her brother who was born sickly and became a medicine jar⁶. Her maternal family gradually declined and perished. To top it all off, the prince broke off their engagement and married another woman, her brother died and her closest confidants were all executed.

Such a person would usually arise pity from the masses. But Zhu Xiuying in the end got nothing but scorn and mocking. She was framed for something she did not commit - leaking national secrets and she was labeled a traitor by the officials.

The Holy One⁷ let her ex-fiance be in charge of her case and it was a very lamentable fact. They hated each other. He mocked her for not knowing how high the sky was⁸ while she scorned him for being with another woman when they were still engaged.

Yet no one criticized that woman - Lu Meilin. After all, even if her father was the Left Chancellor⁹, he abandoned Zhu Xiuying and her brother as if he never had any affection for this daughter and son and this further reduced her chance of being pardoned.

And Lu Meilin was a woman of great talents; she was skilled in martial arts and medical skills and it was said that her skills were even greater than Prince Jun Shizi¹⁰, who was renowned for his medical skills.

Furthermore,even if Lu Meilin was shu-born¹¹, she was still a daughter of the Right Chancellor¹² and her father was a first-ranked Marquis.

Even if her father was the descendant of one of the founding dukes of the country, the power he currently had at hand is still inferior compared to Marquis Heng¹³. Most of Duke Ning's power came from marrying Zhu Xiuying's mother, the only daughter of the Warrior General¹⁴.

After her mother died, her father used her as a pawn because of her engagement to Prince Shang and now that the prince abandoned her, he immediately burned the bridge after crossing the river.

Prince Shang, who carried out the investigation, found out that all the evidence pointed out to her. Her end was inevitable; she was to be whipped till she confessed.

Every morning,she would be taken to the public execution area and whipped a hundred times. When she returns to the prison, she would be fed medicine which would automatically heal her injuries but they would leave scars. Those scars were like the biggest joke of her life. She, who was once the first beauty of Jing¹⁵ ended up in such a state. And she even dragged her maternal relatives down who were publicly executed.

One cold night, about one month after the start of the whiplashes, two uninvited people approached her prison cell. Her lifeless eyes opened wide for once as she stared unceasingly at the duo who caused her death twice. Twice.

Yes she had been reborn back to before the prince broke off their engagement. She was 15 again. This time she investigated Lu Meilin and found out that she was only a timid shu daughter who was scared of her legal mother.