Chapter Summaries

Zhaoling used her knowledge from a previous life and newly acquired martial skills to pursue Guanyin's Tear in the First-Rank Tomb, while also intending to make Li Lianhua her prince consort. At Wei Manor, she joined Li Lianhua and Fang Duobing under the alias Feng Qingtang, claiming to be Li Lianhua's fiancée and warning that anyone who obstructed her would die.

• After Zhaoling pleaded for Chancellor Zongzheng, the emperor spared most of his relatives from execution but exiled them, while Chancellor Zongzheng, his son, and grandson were sentenced to be cut in half at the waist.
• Zhaoling recalled her previous life as the Ethereal Immortal Maiden, when she had saved Li Lianhua and learned about his later movements from his stories.
• Zhaoling practiced the Void Thought Art, drained several martial scoundrels of their internal force, and used her swordsmanship to defeat Yang Yunchun.
• Seeking Guanyin's Tear, Zhaoling traveled alone to Wei Manor to join Li Lianhua's case-solving team and claim the treasure, while planning to win Li Lianhua's favor.
• After Li Lianhua rescued Fang Duobing, Zhaoling arrived, took Li Lianhua's arm, and introduced herself as Feng Qingtang, his fiancée.
• Zhaoling told Li Lianhua and Fang Duobing that she wanted Guanyin's Tear and would kill anyone who stood in her way, leaving Li Lianhua wondering whether she knew his identity.

At Wei Manor’s banquet, Zhaoling killed Zhang Qingshi and later entered the First-Rank Tomb with Li Lianhua, Fang Duobing, and Di Feisheng. In the main burial chamber, she fought Di Feisheng to stop him from taking Guanyin’s Tear while Li Lianhua began to wake.

• Zhaoling killed Zhang Qingshi after he leered at her, and Zhang Qinghu abandoned his attempt to attack her.
• Zhaoling left Wei Manor with her companions and entered the First-Rank Tomb, where the grave robbers suffered heavy losses finding the main burial chamber.
• Zhaoling tried to knock Li Lianhua unconscious, but he resisted until she used knockout drug to put him down; Di Feisheng knocked Fang Duobing unconscious.
• When Di Feisheng approached Consort Xuan’s coffin for Guanyin’s Tear, Zhaoling attacked him with Ethereal Swordsmanship.
• Zhaoling and Di Feisheng fought evenly in the chamber as Li Lianhua began to wake.

Zhaoling took Guanyin's Tear, subdued Di Feisheng and Ding Yuanzi, and warned Yang Yunchun as she prepared to move against the Hundred Rivers Courtyard. Li Lianhua and Di Feisheng reached an agreement to keep Li Lianhua's identity secret and search for his senior brother's remains.

• Zhaoling poisoned Di Feisheng, took Guanyin's Tear, and forced him to swallow a pill mixed with Asura Grass seeds.
• Zhaoling offered to cure Li Lianhua's Bicha poison if he married her, then let him leave with Di Feisheng.
• Zhaoling forced Ding Yuanzi to swallow a pill, gave him a fake Luomo Ding, and ordered him to report back to Jiao Liqiao without revealing what he had heard.
• Zhaoling told Yang Yunchun to arrest Ge Pan and warned him to choose between serving her and remaining entangled with Shi Shui and the Hundred Rivers Courtyard.
• Di Feisheng recognized Li Lianhua from his lightness skill, and Li Lianhua promised to teach him the Essence-Cleansing and Marrow-Tempering Instruction.
• Di Feisheng agreed to keep Li Lianhua's identity secret and help him search for his senior brother's remains.

Zhaoling reported to the emperor, strengthened her martial arts with Guanyin's Tear, and then confronted Qiao Wanmian at the Hundred Rivers Courtyard's sword-viewing gathering. She accused Qiao of contradicting her long-standing search for Li Xiangyi by speaking like his widow while leaning on Xiao Zijin.

• Zhaoling told the emperor about the First-Rank Tomb while concealing the Luomo Ding, and he praised her work and assigned her to the Court of Judicial Review after she handled the Hundred Rivers Courtyard.
• Zhaoling swallowed Guanyin's Tear and, after a day and a night in seclusion, greatly improved her martial arts.
• At Pudu Temple, Li Lianhua learned that the Hundred Rivers Courtyard was holding a sword-viewing gathering for the Shaoshi Sword, and he and Di Feisheng, using the name A Fei, entered with Fang Duobing's help.
• Before Qiao Wanmian could begin the gathering, Zhaoling's attendants defeated and slapped Xiao Zijin for disrespecting the princess.
• Zhaoling appeared at the gathering and challenged Qiao Wanmian over claiming to have searched for Li Xiangyi while now speaking as his widow and leaning in Xiao Zijin's arms.

Princess Zhaoling exposed Yun Biqiu and the Hundred Rivers Courtyard for conspiring against Li Xiangyi, leaking secrets, and neglecting cases, then placed the Courtyard under the Inspection Bureau’s supervision. As the four courtyard masters were taken into custody, Qiao Wanmian confessed that she had wronged Li Xiangyi and left.

• Zhaoling accused the Hundred Rivers Courtyard of plotting against Li Xiangyi and failing to report the desecration of Prince Fangji’s tomb, while Fang Duobing challenged her authority.
• Yang Yunchun charged Yun Biqiu with poisoning Li Xiangyi, betraying the Sigu Sect to the Golden Mandarin Duck Alliance, and leaking a map of the One Hundred and Eighty-Eight Prisons.
• Yang Yunchun also accused the other courtyard masters of covering up Yun Biqiu’s crimes and the Courtyard of neglecting cases, including dozens of missing women.
• Inspection Bureau guards surrounded the Courtyard, Zhaoling’s maids crippled Yun Biqiu and arrested him, and Yang Yunchun announced the Bureau would supervise the Courtyard and review its cases.
• Zhaoling shattered the Shaoshi Sword, revealed it was fake, and departed after warning Yang Yunchun to prove himself.
• Qiao Wanmian admitted that she had wronged Li Xiangyi, waved Xiao Zijin away, and left in tears.

Zhaoling strengthened her authority at court while Li Lianhua and Fang Duobing uncovered Shan Gudao’s plot and retrieved the Mother Worm from the Tower of Ultimate Bliss. After the emperor’s men seized it, they escaped the palace with help from Zhaoling’s subordinates and wondered why she had not appeared.

• Yang Yunchun reopened the Cailian Manor bride murder case, helping Zhaoling justify the Inspection Bureau’s presence in the Hundred Rivers Courtyard.
• Zhaoling became vice minister of the Court of Judicial Review, studied its operations, and sent old cases with mistaken or lenient judgments for retrial.
• Zhaoling gained control of several major offices and support from more than half the court while preparing to confront Shan Gudao.
• Li Lianhua and Fang Duobing entered the Tower of Ultimate Bliss, obtained the Mother Worm before Shan Gudao, and noticed that someone had recently erased markings from a wall.
• The emperor’s men seized the Mother Worm from Li Lianhua, but he and Fang Duobing escaped the palace with help from Zhaoling’s subordinates.
• Li Lianhua asked the maid who helped them escape why Princess Zhaoling had not appeared during the palace crisis.

Li Lianhua and Princess Zhaoling joined forces with the martial world to defeat Shan Gudao’s rebellion and restore the imperial court. After Zhaoling was named crown princess, she sought the Lethe Flower to save the emperor and hinted that a secret about their bloodline explained her actions.

• Li Lianhua left the palace, learned that Princess Zhaoling had gone to destroy the Golden Mandarin Duck Alliance, and resumed his identity as Li Xiangyi to summon the martial world.
• Li Xiangyi, Fang Duobing, and the assembled heroes met Zhaoling at the alliance’s headquarters after she executed Jiao Liqiao and other Nanyin remnants.
• Zhaoling’s forces returned to the palace, where Qin Po destroyed Shan Gudao’s Mother Worm with Li Lianhua’s blood and revealed the truth about their ancestry; Feng Qing killed Shan Gudao and then himself.
• The emperor named Zhaoling crown princess, and she spared Xuanyuan Xiao while appointing Feng Xiaoduo to command the palace guards.
• The imperial physicians found that the Lethe Flower could cure the emperor’s poison, and Zhaoling asked to seize it from Li Lianhua while promising to find another cure for him.
• Zhaoling told the emperor that she had left the palace to verify a secret about their bloodline and origins by questioning Jiao Liqiao.

Zhaoling revealed the secret of Consort Ying’s affair with the Nanyin sorcerer Feng Alu and explained why she had pursued Li Lianhua. She cured his Bicha poison by forcing their marriage and later told Qin Po she was carrying his child.

• Zhaoling told the emperor that Consort Ying had imprisoned Feng Alu in the Tower of Ultimate Bliss, conceived a son with him, and destroyed the tower with him inside.
• Zhaoling explained that she sought Li Lianhua, a descendant of Prince Fangji, to protect them if the truth about the emperor’s bloodline emerged, and that she had tried to verify the story through Jiao Liqiao.
• The emperor ordered Zhaoling to find Li Lianhua and save him, and Zhaoling offered him palace spirit medicines if he became her prince consort.
• Li Lianhua refused Zhaoling’s offer and gave her the Lethe Flower, but she sealed his acupoints and forced him to marry her.
• Li Lianhua woke with his Bicha poison gone and learned that Zhaoling was carrying his child; Qin Po welcomed them on Mount Yun Yin, scolded Li Lianhua, and agreed to the marriage.

Li Lianhua agreed to marry Zhaoling to protect their unborn child, and she gave birth to twin boys whom he named. Zhaoling later conceived a daughter, inherited the throne from her dying father, and achieved her ambition of ruling as emperor.

• Li Lianhua agreed to marry Zhaoling, bringing relief to Qin Po, Fang Duobing, and Di Feisheng, while Zhaoling became annoyed by his constant efforts to make her take tonics.
• Zhaoling gave birth to twin boys, and she told Li Lianhua to give them his surname and choose their names.
• Zhaoling decided her heir must be a girl and spent five years developing a pill to conceive a daughter.
• As the emperor became terminally ill, he passed the throne to Zhaoling.
• Zhaoling took the imperial throne and smiled as the people hailed her as emperor.

Situ Baye reflected on how her mother’s ruthless rule and her father’s compassion shaped her as she prepared to ascend the throne. After receiving the imperial jade seal, she realized she could never become the solitary sovereign her mother had been.

• Situ Baye described how her mother reformed the examinations and suppressed Confucianism to protect her own power and ambitions.
• Situ Baye recalled how her father, Li Lianhua, divided his time among her and her twin brothers, and comforted her when she feared they resented her.
• On the day of her enthronement, Situ Baye walked toward the throne and saw her family and allies gathered in the palace.
• Situ Baye accepted the imperial jade seal from her mother and concluded that she could never rule as a solitary sovereign.