The Wicked Offspring of Wei Family Becomes Chief Grand Secretary; The Whole Clan Kneels for Me to Acknowledge My Roots
[Power Struggle] [Single Female Lead] [Group Ensemble] [Wei Faction] Born into the world with guilt already attached, I was given the name Ni Sheng, "reverse-born." On the day I was born, my mother died in childbirth and my grandfather grieved before the ancestral hall. The whole household looked at me askance, all saying I was a jinx who had traded lives with someone else. My biological father hated me like a sworn enemy, my legitimate elder brother treated me like bad luck, and my stepmother smiled with a knife hidden in it. For ten years I lived in the side courtyard, with dim lamps, cold charcoal, winters without warmth, and clothes too thin for the season. I was not born to a military family, did not know martial arts, had no system, and no golden finger. My only reliance was the brush in my hand and the rules in my heart. Use propriety as a blade, law as a shield, imperial favor as my body, and ministerial integrity as my name. The blades of the court are all essays; the winds and sands of the frontier are all a chessboard. I seek not fame or fortune, only to be worthy of my own conscience. A reverse-born one is one born in adversity. If Heaven will not give me a road, then I will walk one myself. ... In the past, Duke Zhou spat out his food and rose three times for every meal, fearing to lose a worthy man under heaven, and thus won the hearts of the realm. Today, Duke Wei holds his brush, with the lonely lamp shining long into the night, never betraying the trust of ruler and father, and thus brings peace to the world for four generations. Duke Zhou opened the Zhou with rites and music; Duke Wei supported Zhou with rites and law. One saint, one minister, gazing across the generations. In life, he was called Ni Sheng, because he lived in adversity. After death, he was called Duke Wei... Across the ages of the imperial court, the two dukes share the same name.
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