Higher Level Wife

Chapter 1: First Encounter with this Noble Land

Sponsored Content

Translated by Pill Bug

Edited by Gumihou

Gumihou: Actually, rather than a strict Translator/Editor relationship, we have a more collaborative arrangement

Pill Bug: From what I have skimmed earlier, the whole thing looked like it has been rewritten, lol

Gumihou: Gumi could explain! This is in keeping with the later tone in the novel.
Trust Gumi, this version is more correct!

Pill Bug: Your writing tone is more playful compared to the original arrangement.

Gumihou: Gumi could explain! It’s because the original exposition text is very boring.
(Psst, Gumi skipped a lot of exposition stuff when reading the raw).
It is also in keeping with the tone of the opening and ending paragraphs! This version is correct!

Pill Bug: So, basically, you’ve rewritten-

Gumihou: Onwards to the story!

So, the god of transmigration exists after all.[1]

The god of transmigration exists after all

The god of transmigration exists…

This same line repeated itself over and over again in Fang Chuyu’s mind from the moment she opened her eyes and realised where she was.
By this point, the number of countless repeated words were enough to circle the earth twice or three times.

“Madam [2], please say something.
Say something, ah… wuwuwuwu, don’t frighten this maid, ah.
This maid knows you are very sad, but… but madam, you should not seek death, ah, ah, ah…”

This noisy person next to her has incredible endurance.
The words that spilt out of her mouth was probably enough to twirl around the earth eight or ten times after half a day of wailing.
Was this her maid? Should she compliment this girl on her endurance?

Ignoring the background noise, Fang Chuyu slowly chewed over the memories left in her head.
Once she deemed herself properly informed of this strange new world, she let out a long shuddering breath.

“Madam… madam…”

“Enough with your wailing,” Fang Chuyu sat up effortlessly.
“Can’t your eyes see that I am not dead?”

The soul within this body must have yielded her mortal coils quite willingly.
Not only did the original graciously left her memories for the next occupant, Fang Chuyu also found herself fitting very nicely into this mortal container.
In fact, she felt so comfortable that she could probably pull off some of the more difficult yoga poses with no problem.

“No, I am no longer Fang Chuyu,” she whispered to herself.
“I am Fu Qiuning.
I must remember this.”

Sponsored Content

The wailing girl, her maid, stared at Fang Chuyu, no, Fu Qiuning with frightened eyes.
Fu Qiuning smiled, “What is it? Since you do not want me to die, I have woken up.
Have you changed your mind? Was the crying and wailing just a show?”

Fu Qiuning paused.
Her words sounded oddly formal, dignified and fitting with her current surroundings.
Was this a blessing left by the previous owner? Or was her adaptability just that good? Fu Qiuning’s smile widened, good, very good. Personally, she had never liked <> much and would be hard-pressed to try and speak like an ancient Chinese noble lady.

“N, no…” the maid, Yu Jie, hastily wiped her tears.
Her mouth stretched into a smile, Madam, would madam like something to eat? This maid will make it for you, is that alright?”

“Hmm, I am a little hungry,” Fu Qiuning nodded to herself.
“Go make some noodles.”

Yu Jie leapt to her feet and ran off happily.

As she stared at the disappearing figure, a bitter smile graced Fu Qiuning’s lips.

Then, she shook her head and stared into the space.
The original Fu Qiuning was seventeen years old.
This girl’s character could be described with three words, cowardly, self-abasing and, oddly enough, talented.
If one had to describe this girl with just one word it would be ‘wimpy’.
Taking her character into consideration as well as the situation she found herself in, this girl’s condition could be described as ‘miserable’.
Tied all of this with her identity as a [4] shu-born daughter, her situation could well be described as ‘doomed’.

The newly assigned Fu Qiuning glanced around the very spacious room.
It did not look like the room of a doomed person, at first.
A second glance revealed the very simple, almost austere architectural designs did not match a woman of her status.
Moreover, although the shelves were made of beautiful antique wood, there was almost nothing on them.

It was… very empty.

It looked nothing like the room of an official wife.
If she was forced to guess from appearance alone, she would have thought she had transmigrated into the body of a concubine at best.

This doomed girl’s story was very complicated.
In fact, if one looked at her story through written text alone, one would have thought that this Fu Qiuning was quite fortunate.
After all, though she was a shu-born daughter, how many could compete with the shu-born daughter of the Eldest Prince of Zhenjiang Kingdom?

Moreover, she was the official wife, the main wife of the Young Marquis of Jinxiang Marquisate.

One could only blame politics for her fate.
Ah yes, that dirty thing called politics was to be blamed.

The reason why it took Fu Qiuning a long time to parse out her inherited memories was because of how very complicated it was.
Let’s split it into four parts:

Part 1: Fu Qiuning is a shu-born daughter of the Eldest Prince Zhenjiang.
She and her mother were bullied and driven out of the royal palace when Fu Qiuning was three years old to live in some random village.
When little Fu Qiuning grew a little older, she was presented to dear old dad, who finally took notice of her talent and assigned a female tutor to train her up.
Don’t see this as a kindness, she was really being groomed to become a concubine candidate for the Marquisate of Jinxiang.
Oh, that was when she was summoned to live in the royal palace too.
How nice.

Part 2: Who were the Marquisate of Jinxiang?

Nobody ordinary, that’s for sure.

Old man Marquis of Jinxiang died before he was 50 years old.
Boo hoo.

Luckily, he left two sons behind him, Jin Yu and Jin Shi.
Both were pretty decent men with their own official positions.
Elder son Jin Yu inherited the title of Marquis and had one daughter, Jin Yanqiu, who married Prince Rong as a succeeding wife.
Prince Rong was the sixth son of the current emperor and was known to be witty and benevolent.
More importantly, he was highly favoured by the emperor and was a popular candidate for the Crown Prince position.

Good daughter Jin Yanqiu also worked hard and gave birth to a son, which pleased Prince Rong so much that he installed her as the Crown Princess last year.
Thus, the status of the Marquis of Jinxing rose with the tide.

Sponsored Content

So, how did Eldest Prince Zhenjiang manage to get the Young Marquis to marry his shu-born daughter as the official wife?

This brings us to Part 3: of this long and involved story.

It’s all Prince Rong’s fault.
This young prince was coddled by the emperor since he was young and developed an arrogant behaviour.
One day, this arrogant prince openly offended the emperor and was harshly reprimanded.
He even nearly lost his ‘Prince Rong’ title and was placed under house arrest for a year to reflect upon his wrongdoing.

Because of this unfortunate event, Prince Rong’s reputation within the court plummeted.
Before this, both Prince Rong and Prince Hong’s influences had been at par.
However, with Prince Rong locked away, Prince Hong now had the upper hand.
He showed his capability as prince and became the new apple of the emperor’s eye.
With the emperor’s favour upon him, courtiers and princes who had once supported Prince Rong turned around to support this new rising star.

Part 4: What did this have to do with Fu Qiuning?

Well, [3] jumping ship to shift support from one prince to another was easy except for the House of the Marquis of Jinxiang.
They were bound by marriage to Prince Rong via Jin Yanqiu, who had been elevated to Crown Princess status thanks to her smart womb.
The Marquis of Jinxiang could do nothing but cautiously guard his back and grit his teeth while others bullied them.

Again, this should have nothing to do with Fu Qining.
In the end, it was all Prince Hong’s fault.
The prince was petty and narrow-minded and enjoyed kicking people when they were down.
Now that Prince Rong was put under house arrest, he could not lay his hands on that brother of his.
Therefore, Prince Hong decided to make trouble for the Marquisate of Jinxiang instead.

What was supposed to be a good year for the House of the Marquis of Jinxiang turned into something very disastrous indeed.
That year, the second son of the marquis, Jin Fengju, had just reached marriageable age and was supposed to welcome his cousin into the family in marriage when he was forced to marry the shu-born daughter of Prince Zhenjiang [5]!

This was basically slapping the Marquisate of Jinxiang in the face! This second son was a rising star in the scholarly world.
Even the emperor once praised his talent and grace, naming him ‘A peerless talent with no equal’.
The emperor even bestowed the title of ‘Young Marquis’ to him, making him the heir to the Marquisate which would have gone to his elder brother, Jin Pengzhan.

To see this peerless Young Marquis forced into the terrible situation of marrying a lowly shu-born… So what if she’s a prince’s daughter? A shu-born concubine’s daughter was practically a nobody! Such atrocity! Such shame!

The Marquis of Jinxiang ended up bedridden for several months, feverish and ill, barely clinging to life.
Luckily, he was able to recover, but how could he look fondly upon this terrible shame forced into his household?!

Thus began the miserable life of one Fu Qiuning.

Young Marquis Jin Fengjiu wanted to marry his childhood sweetheart, his cousin and granddaughter of the Duke of Lu.
They had grown up together until the age of ten before they separated, each waiting for the moment when they would reunite in marriage as a heaven matched couple, the envy of all around.
But now… An obstacle had been thrust between their happiness.
Who was this lowly plain-faced woman to dare force herself in as his main wife?! How could he stomach it?!

Due to the tragedy of having to take a shu-born as a wife, the Marquis of Jinxiang allowed Jin Fengju to take in a second wife immediately.
In anger, Jin Fengju took in Jiang Wanying, the sweetheart cousin and granddaughter of the Duke of Lu as his secondary wife.
Still not quite appeased, he also took in Jiang Wanying’s two dowry maids as his concubin