Chapter 1: A Bride the Moment She Arrives

The air under the red veil was damp and suffocating, thick with a cloying, fishy sweetness, as if she’d been sealed inside a closed porcelain jar for months, left to ferment in the dark. Su Wan’s eyes snapped open. Her fingertips brushed against rough silk, a texture that cut through her skin and jolted her mind with a flood of alien memories. The original body’s owner was a poor country girl, coerced into signing a marriage contract and shipped off to the Lu Family mansion as a "jinx-breaking" bride. Right now, she was sitting inside a rattling bridal sedan.

Outside, a bizarre mix of celebratory music and mournful wailing leaked in, the sounds scraping against each other like metal on glass. Su Wan’s lip twitched. She’d just transmigrated and she was supposed to look after a "vegetable" husband who’d been lying in a coma for three years? She took a deep breath, pushing down the nausea churning in her stomach, and quickly sifted through the scraps of information the original owner had left behind. Lu Family’s third son, Lu Shiyuan, had suffered a severe injury three years ago and fallen into a coma; ever since, he’d been a liability no one in the family could shake off. Su Wan touched the hidden bundle of silver needles in her sleeve. The cold metal grounded her, sharpening her gaze. Well, since she was here, she might as well stay. The rotting stench of that house was the perfect chance to test whether the "Divine Doctor" title she’d been promised was worth a damn.

The sedan lowered, the dust barely settling before the door curtain was roughly yanked aside. Blinding sunlight flooded in, stinging her eyes until she squinted to adjust. Once her vision cleared, she stepped out. Her feet hit the hard blue stone slabs, radiating a damp, chilling cold, but she didn’t slow down.

Under the eaves of the Lu Family’s back courtyard, a circle of servants had gathered. Standing in the middle was Wang Fu, the head butler of the second household, a man whose face was a map of flesh. He smiled with his mouth but not his eyes as he blocked Su Wan’s path, his cloudy gaze raking over her from head to toe, his tone dripping with the contempt one might reserve for a stray dog. Su Wan didn’t stop. Her eyes flicked to the black-lacquered medicine bowl he was holding out, the thick walls of the vessel releasing a potent, bitter herbal smell, then to the tightly shut doors of the inner room. In an instant, she mapped out the second household’s trap in her mind. They’d placed the medicine in the most visible spot and blocked the path, all to humiliate her the moment she entered, cementing her reputation as an ill-mannered provincial girl. Su Wan let out a cold laugh in her head. It was an old trick, but it played right into her hands. She had no desire to waste breath on Wang Fu; she simply sidestepped him and walked straight toward the inner room.

Wang Fu’s face darkened. He lunged, his hand reaching for Su Wan’s arm, his knuckles just brushing the edge of her sleeve. She shifted her body, light as a swallow, and easily dodged him. Humiliated and enraged, he bellowed, his voice sharp enough to slice the air: "Kneel! Third Young Mistress, you haven’t even entered the main gate and you’re already forgetting the rules? The Third Young Master is lying in there. You are a jinx-breaking wife; the first thing you do is feed him his medicine!" The servants in the corridor tittered along, their laughter harsh, some even deliberately clinking porcelain to stir up the chaos.

Su Wan stopped, but she did not kneel. Instead, she pulled a plain handkerchief from her sleeve and meticulously wiped her fingertips, then looked up at Wang Fu. Her gaze was cold, the kind of detached emptiness that came from witnessing too many deaths. Wang Fu’s swagger faltered, his confidence suddenly shaken.

Feeling his ground slipping under her stare, Wang Fu steeled his spine and shouted, "If you can’t feed the medicine, don’t expect your monthly stipend! I’m warning you, the Third Young Master is a cripple. You kneeling and putting on a show would be the least you can do for the Lu Family. Do it, or get out of this house!" Su Wan let out a soft chuckle, the smile never reaching her eyes, radiating careless indifference. "Butler Wang, you can feed the medicine, but you’d better check on the patient first." She stepped around Wang Fu, walking toward the inner room with steady, deliberate strides. Every step seemed calculated to strike his nerves, the click of her shoes on the floor echoing crisp and firm.

The inner room was dim, the air heavy with the nauseating stench of medicine mixed with the decay of chronic illness. Su Wan pushed the door open, her gaze falling on the bed. Lu Shiyuan lay on his side, his face pale as paper, his breathing so faint it was barely visible. He looked like a man who had spent years in bed. Yet, his features were delicate, and even in his unconscious state, his bone structure held a cool, detached elegance. He did not look like a true waste. Su Wan’s heart skipped a beat, but she pushed the suspicion down and stepped forward, pressing three fingers to Lu Shiyuan’s wrist.

For a split second, the world went silent. A strange resonance exploded in her mind. Her vision blacked out, followed by a sharp, piercing pain, as if someone were chiseling her temples with an iron bar. It wasn’t sight; it was sound—the echo of her internal organs. She "heard" the rhythm of her heart. It was heavy and sluggish, struggling like an old, wounded ox in a mud pit. Su Wan frowned tightly. Within three breaths, she clearly detected a massive, pitch-black blockage deep in the heart meridian. It was slowly expanding, pressing against the surrounding channels. This was a critical warning sign; if the blockage wasn’t broken, an acute crisis was inevitable.

Su Wan yanked her hand back, her fingertips trembling. Tinnitus rushed in like a tide, gray mist blurring the edges of her vision. She forced the discomfort down, opened her eyes, and said in a cold voice: "Blockage in the heart meridian, reversed flow of qi and blood. If this continues for another day, he will have an acute seizure." She turned to the maid standing by the bed and ordered, "Send word to prepare the needles. I need to open the acupoints and guide the qi."

The maid looked at Wang Fu in shock. Wang Fu, however, laughed loudly, as if hearing a joke. "Third Young Mistress, what kind of witchcraft are you pulling? The Lu Family has kept a dozen doctors, and none of them could cure the Third Young Master. And you? A wild girl from the countryside? You take two pulses and dare speak such nonsense?" The noblewomen who had rushed to the room covered their mouths in laughter. Their usually sweet, high-pitched voices now cut like knives, laced with disdain for Su Wan’s lowly status.

Su Wan ignored their mockery. Her gaze swept over the smirking faces, her voice clear and firm. "Butler Wang changed the prescription on his own. He added deer antler to boost qi, but he forgot that the Third Young Master’s heart meridian is fundamentally weak. The conflicting properties of the medicine caused the blockage to worsen. You can mock me if you like, but if the Third Young Master dies, your lives will be used to pay for it." The room fell silent. Even the noblewomen who had been laughing moments before changed color. The residue of deer antler on the rim of the medicine bowl suddenly seemed deeply ironic.

Wang Fu’s face was the color of iron, his knuckles cracking as he gripped the bowl, but he didn’t dare to argue back. Su Wan turned and left, her clothes trailing a chill in the air, leaving the words "an acute seizure within three days" hanging in the room like the Sword of Damocles over everyone’s head. She walked out into the courtyard and looked up. The night was falling, thick clouds pressing down on the sky, and a storm was brewing. She knew the game had begun.

On the third night, a downpour lashed the city. Rain lashed the window frames like whips. Suddenly, a violent crash came from Lu Shiyuan’s room, followed by a stifled, pained moan. The man, who had been sleeping, was now convulsing violently. His face had turned purple-black, and his throat was racking with gasps like a broken bellows. The doctors in the room were in a panic; one was cutting his clothes open, another was trying to force water down his throat, but no one could steady the man’s chaotic breathing. Lu Shiyuan’s pupils were dilating, his vital signs on the brink of collapse. Just as the doctors stood helpless and despair spread through the room, a sharp, urgent knock sounded on the door. The door swung open. Su Wan stood there, wearing a soaked outer robe, water dripping from her hair. Her eyes were sharp as blades, and the silver needles in her hand gleamed with a cold light.

"Move." Su Wan spat out the two words, coldly, and walked straight to the bed. The doctors tried to block her, but the oppressive pressure she exuded forced them to recoil a half-step. She didn’t say another word. Her fingers moved like lightning, driving three needles in rapid succession to seal the major acupoints on Lu Shiyuan’s body, forcefully stabilizing his collapsing qi. The rain still fell, but it couldn’t mask the deathly, tense silence in the room. Su Wan stared at the faint rise and fall of Lu Shiyuan’s chest, her mind resolute. If she could hold out through tonight, this manipulative, grudge-holding man would never be able to play dead again.

As the rain began to ease, Lu Shiyuan’s convulsions finally slowed.

A fine sheen of sweat broke out on Su Wan’s forehead. Her fingers gently rotated the silver needle, drawing the stagnating, turbid qi from his chest downward, little by little. Her left hand pressed on his wrist, her three fingers sinking in, but her frown deepened.

Something was wrong.

Beneath the blockage, there was something else. Sticky, sluggish, like a tiny worm crawling slowly along the heart meridian. It wasn’t an illness. It was poison.

"Bring the dregs from the medicine just now." She said without turning her head.

No one moved. After a long pause, an old doctor snorted. "Miss, the patient isn’t saved yet, and you’re already inspecting the prescription?"

Su Wan didn’t answer. Instead, she reached behind the pillow and retrieved the silver spoon used for feeding medicine. She held it up to the lamp light and examined the bottom—there was a faint layer of blue-gray residue.

The room went silent instantly.

"Something else was mixed into that medicine," she said, her voice low but every word landing with impact. "It didn’t strike during the day, but specifically at the hour of Zi. It didn’t happen before meals, but specifically after the medicine. You’re all experts, so you should know what kind of substance can rot the heart meridian inch by inch."

The old doctor’s face went pale. He snatched the silver spoon and examined it closely, his hands shaking so badly he nearly dropped it. His lips trembled: "Blue... blue-gray... this is..."

"You know what it is," Su Wan finished for him. "Someone in this house doesn’t want him to live."

She ignored the sharp gasps that filled the room and bent down to insert the final needle into the acupoint half an inch from Lu Shiyuan’s heart. The tail of the needle vibrated lightly, humming with a faint resonance. Moments later, the purple-black color on his face receded slightly, and the bellows-like gasping in his throat eased.

As she withdrew the needles, her fingertips inadvertently brushed the inside of his wrist.

The pulse was strong and deep.

A man who had taken poison into his heart meridian and been in a coma for three days should not have such a quick heartbeat. A flash of coldness swept through Su Wan’s eyes, though her face gave away nothing. She simply tucked the blanket neatly around him.

"His life is saved," she stood up straight. "But until the poison is cleared, he will have another attack within three days. And this time, I won’t be here."

Her words fell on the room, and not a single person dared to answer.

She turned to leave, but suddenly, a cold hand clamped around her wrist.

Su Wan froze.

On the bed, the man who should have been in a coma slowly opened his eyes. His irises were deep, reflecting the flickering candlelight, startlingly clear for someone who had just crawled back from the gates of death.

He stared at her, his voice raspy from the burn of poison, but each word was articulated with chilling precision:

"You know I’ve been poisoned..."

His grip tightened, the pressure making her wristbone ache.

"—you should know that the one who poisoned me is standing right behind you."

Su Wan did not turn around.

Because she had heard it. The door behind them had just been gently pushed open from the outside.