NU Link: https://www.novelupdates.com/series/the-devious-first-daughter/ Any spoilers would be helpful. Who is the ML? Why was she killed? Fate of step-mother and half-sister?
The only thing make me feel like vomiting blood about this story is the tenacity of the villains. Like, the villain ruined good character's reputation, then good chara dead/exiled for life/poisoned. But when MC ruined those villains reputations, they somehow still can act like nothing happened. But I have to say the story is somehow good (if you can stomach the insidious plots and risking yourself angered by reading those villains behaviors)
Spoiler: ML He is Ao Chen Yi, aka Yi Wang, brother of current emperor. Very ruthless, and hate the current emperor so much because the emperor robbed ML's supposedly throne and trying to kill him so many times. He was son of the favorite concubine of 1st emperor, but his mom killed by empress at that time (in the novel everyone called her empress dowager) . Then empress dowager killed some daughters of courtiers and put the crime to ML. The current emperor (at that time still prince) then tortured him, but the 1st emperor (who was out to war at that time) returned and saved him. When 1st emperor died, he passed imperial edict the throne supposed to be ML's. But empress dowager (with her clan's (An Guo hou) help) set the current emperor as the emperor because ML too young. However the 1st emperor passed his most important army and secret guard to ML, so ML could grow up safely. After the current emperor boarded the throne, he killed the empress dowager because she is too controlling (she is not his blood mom). And secretly suppressed An Guo hou after that. Spoiler: Very spoiler about MC - read at your own risk MC as Ning Zi Ying was adopted daughter of Ning family in Jiangnan. But in reality, she is previous kingdom's eldest princess. When ML's dad overthrow MC's dad, she is only 2yo. Her mom brings MC to her friend in Jiangnan so she can safely grow up. When her mom runaway, she was pregnant with 2nd daughter which later the mom gaveaway to her friend, Ming-shi. Ming-shi knowing her friend is pregnant, she faked her own pregnancy and put MC (Ning Xue Yan) as her own daughter. So NZY and NXY is sister and both died at the same time, by the same hand. The butterfly mark on MC body is royal family proof. The prev queen never mention again after giving birth to MC and gone. The queen and princess become fugitives because when the kingdom overthrown, the treasure and former emperor's secret army is gone, so many people suspect it's gone with them. In reality, the treasure already taken by 1st emperor then passed to ML (current emperor didn't know), and there is no secret army exist. Nobody suspect MC as former kingdom's princess tho, coz nobody know the former kingdom's queen is pregnant. Because Ming's pregnancy seems dubious, Ning Zu An as Ming husband got angry thinking Ming cuckolded him. Coupled with Ling flaming behind and trapping Ming to ruined Ming's name, Ling then become legal wife. In reality, Ling is woman raised outside of the house before Ming's marriage. Even her children all born older than MC. NZY was gullible and naive, she believed in Ling, Ning Zi Yan and Xia Yu Hang lies. Ling thinked, NZY is just orphaned anyway, if she is killed nobody missed her. So she ruined her reputation by photoshoped her face in porn pic, then give it to XYH. XYH want to marry NZY because he suspect she is former princess. But after looking the PS'ed pic and knowing there is no butterfly mark, he got angry so he joined to kill NZY. As NXY, MC's goal is to stay alive and revenge. Whenever those villains try to ruin her reputation, she will deflect it back. But those villains somehow still alive, and keep back, to be kicked again by MC. Most of the time, they tried to set MC with man, PS'ed her face to porn pic, poisoned MC, set MC again with other man, then accuse her poisoning other yiniang, sabotage MC's carriage to create accident, or when all those schemes deflected back to the villains, they will scream to MC they being set up by MC. Spoiler: Villains's fate Stepmom - killed by drowning by MC after MC ruined stepmom's name to be tongfang. Stepmom want to pushed MC to a well, but MC's ninja maid pushed stepmom instead. After that, MC's 2nd sister (NYL) accuse MC killing stepmom, everybody want to condemn MC, but ML show up and defend MC (at that time MC already ML's cefei). (note, what make you gonna be angry is this stepmom takes 500chapters to die) Ning Zi Yan - after her marriage, she didn't have good reputation because she married when it's mourning period. Then MC set Chen He Xiang to be XYH's concubine, to make NZYan busy while MC dealing Ling and NYL. Later CHX make NXYan aborted her baby in a party (with MC's help) and make everybody know she is pregnant for 2-3 months already while she just get married last month. CHX also aborted her baby (kicked by angry XYH, coz CHX talk about NZYing in public). After series of bad backfired schemes (she tried to set MC with a man, but the person ruined become her instead), she then degraded as yiniang. Later when she is pregnant again, CHX instigated her again and aborted again. CHX then become fugitive, to save her own neck, she told the officials about NXYing's death (at that time, people already know she is the former kingdom princess). So NZYan as killer then got persecuted. Chen He Xiang - as I mention, she become XYH's concubine, but she lost her baby. She mostly become thorn in NZYan eyes. Later when she was persecuted she told the officials about NZYing because NXY promised to give her money and safe way out. After the trial, she was released and got money, but captured by angry XYH and tortured by him. Xia Yu Hang - his reputation ruined after NZY pregnancy known. So he cannot join the spring examination and need to wait another 3 years. After, when NZYan tried to set MC to be XYH's concubine but it's become NYL instead, his reputation become worse. Then after NZYing's homicide case known, he become accomplished murderer, and lost all his chance to be official for live. Ning Yu Ling - what can i say about this girl? Super stupid and got the worst fate imo. She tried to set MC multiple times, name it, ps'ed pic, pervert man, older more pervert man, poison, another man (her own waste cousin), and more random man. Every time she tried to schemes MC, all got backfired and become hers instead, so you can imagine how stink her reputation? She got herself ps'ed porn pic, ruined name with 1 pervert man to anothers, and later become XYH's concubine, and still has relationships with other man, BUT STILL DREAMING TO BE 3RD PRINCE WANGFEI OR XYH'S LEGAL WIFE. As%uțj#+[k$kt. Her stupidity and evil way make me want to vomit. Later she tried to kill MC with her mom, but got her mom killed instead, ML then ordered her to be blinded (her eyeballs gorge out) then kill her. Ning Qing Shan - NQS will appear after ch 100ish. She is 3rd daughter of the family. Was adopted by NZuAn but she actually Ya guifei's niece, smuggled to Ning family to harness Ning family support when NQS marry 3rd prince as wangfei, and to search the former emperor army symbol secretly. She poisoned Ming because Ming cannot help her. And when she saw how smart MC, she tried to kill MC multiple times (because she must be the most perfect!). After Ling degraded to tongfang, she become daughter of tongfang as well, because she is registered as Ling's daughter. So she tried to kill MC to restored her own position as legal daughter. 1 time, she sabotage MC's carriage and get 2 thugs to kill MC. But MC killed the thugs instead with secret weapon given by ML. ML who later knows about the accident then sabotage NQS's carriage and make sure she break her leg. Because of failed schemes, she degraded from soon-to-be-wangfei to soon-to-be-cefei and later become yiniang instead. She also got delusion she is the former kingdom's princess because some people who secretly trying to find the princess lied to her (they secretly set her as fake princess to lure people, she didn't know). Later she tried to get MC raped, she got raped instead, because she is already 3rd prince's yiniang, the emperor kill her for ruining his fav son's name. Ning ZuAn - after multiple scandals in the family goes out, he has to give up his title and passed it to his 2nd son (from another yiniang, this 2nd son was helped by MC). After MC become queen, he got killed after trying to be 'brave' to get meritorious deed in the war. Ning Lao taitai - she is super 1 sided selfish old woman. In her mind, nothing more important than her son and the family reputation. So every time something happen, she always suppressed MC in the name of family benefit and pretend not to see any evil happening. Well, MC then makes all the schemes goes public (she got poisoned? Meh... The medicine dreg somehow got eaten by beloved civet of certain wangfei, civet got poisoned, so the poisoning case go public. NYL tried to kill MC multiple times? Well MC makes NYL very angry and lead her to hit MC in public. NYL got very fierce woman reputation.) But even tho all those things is not MC's fault, this old woman keeps blaming MC secretly for making things up (uh.... Helloooooooooooo????). Long short story, after multiples scandals, her fav grandson cannot become heir and her son's dead, she got stroke. Ning Huai Yuan - Ling's son, he was the heir of the family, and grandma's favorite. But after some failed schemes and Ling got degraded to be tongfang, he also degraded from legal son to concubine son. Later when Ling's dead, under ML's pressure, NZA has to change back the family genealogy to the original. Because he was born before Ling comes to houfu, he become outside children (lower than concubine son) and permanently lost his chance to be heir. Later he defect to rebel army and tried to kidnap MC for revenge. ML kills him. Bonus villain: Xianyun junzhu - she is daughter of An Guo houfu, and want to restore the former family glory when the empress dowager (her grand aunt) was alive. So she wants to marry ML badly. When the palace invite a lots of lady to be chosen as palace lady, she begs her aunt (current queen) to help her get marry. She has rival (other junzhu) for ML's wangfei position so she instigated that other junzhu to kill ML's favorite qie (unnamed low rank concubine, but MC in disguise) and MC (ML's cefei candidate). The scheme failed to kill qie and MC, that other candidate then rejected by ML. So she become wangfei, MC keep her cefei position. After get married she tried use MC to fight this fav qie. But MC pretend to be stupid. Then she tried to kill the qie and put the blame on MC. But the qie (ML's secret guard) accuse wangfei kill her, not MC. ML pretend to be angry and confront the emperor about his disgusting wife. The emperor then punish xianyun junzhu to be sick and need to recuperate, but since wangfu need host, he raised MC to be Zhengfei (legal wife). After this, xianyun junzhu tried to send her own sister to ML, by make the sister fake just-out-from-secret-meeting-with-ML-in-his-office, in front of party guest. MC pretend not to see her disheveled state and accuse her stealing ML's work in the study. In rage, the sister scream she got secret meeting with ML under her sister order (make everybody amazed with An Guo houfu rules). But ML suddenly show up saying he just back from the palace, and did not have the time to bed her! Don't put your own bad reputation to this prince head! Then ML proceed to palace again to complain, in the end xianyun junzhu degrade to be cefei. Waaaaay later when the emperor sick, the queen try to invite xianyun junzhu to killed the emperor, so the crime of killing the emperor will be in ML's head. MC just refused those invitations with straight NO. After ML board the throne, XYjunzhu then exiled to a temple. A little rant about this novel: The strangest thing is, everybody (the villains) believes as long as they kill MC, they will be fine, and everything will be like it use to be. Like, way later when Ling's name already ruined to be tongfang she still believes as long as MC dead she can become legal wife again. And the children (NHY, NZYan, NYL, NQS) believe as long as Ling become legal wife then their status will be back, the son can become shizi, the daughters no longer degraded as yiniang, etc. Like, hellooooo, everyone know your bad reputation.... How come you think if MC's dead, you can just spouting lies that everything was MC's fault and nothing happened???? Those caught in bed with a man schemes, ps'ed porn pic, poisoning case was seen by public. Even the grandma and dad want to condemn MC as murderer when Ling dead for this reason. As long as MC's ruined/dead their fav son/grandson can become shizi.
Spoiler: ML & MC rls He didn't love anyone before met MC. In the past he always refused to get married because of still mourning his dead old fiancee (he never love the dead fiancee, he just used it as reason). But the current emperor still trying to gift him women (to spy). He cannot blatantly kill them all, only occasionally kill 1 or 2, but every time he kills 1 the emperor will send more. So he then come up with favored unnamed low rank qie (face always covered with white scarf) to detered those gift away women. For ex, he wants to kill some of those women, he makes those women accidentally 'angered' the fav qie. So he then kills those women to 'appease' his qie. With 'dead' example, the rest of the women-spy then will behave for a period of time. In reality, it's MC in disguise. When he wants to marry MC, he knows if he looks too eager it will make MC become target. So he pretend to not interested or dissatisfied with MC in public, including in wangfu when MC still cefei. Sometimes pretend to kick the door, break the porcelains, even ML said to MC to prepare some ugly porcelains near the door for him to break when needed. MC only rolled her eyes looking at her husband's behavior. MC herself chosen to be ML's cefei by the emperor because MC is suspected to be poisoned in the past with infertility drug and her own family is declining with all the scandals happened. The emperor didn't want ML too happy by marry too powerful family or having children. Before marriage, ML make MC to paraded (as qie) in front of Xianyun junzhu to make her angry. XY then beg her aunt to let her and MC marry at the same day (to deal with this qie). MC pretend to be sick at wedding day (fainted twice) and ML then visit MC's room. But the favored qie (ML's secret guard) clamoring in front of MC's yuan. So ML then goes to the qie's yuan. MC herself already waiting in the qie's yuan, and they spend the wedding nite together. It's become huge shame of XY because her wedding nite robbed by qie. ML never touch this XY.
Thank you for the spoiler! I wanted to read this but I dont think I can stomach the frustrations I'll get from the schemes of those villains..
Can anyone give spoilers on lingyun? Shes the sister that was envious of the sister that got the really bad reputation.
More spoilers anyone? We've already reached the marriage being handed down by the emperor, but as they get married at chapter 500 (give or take) what happens in the 100 chapters before that? When does the MC find out her true identity? When does the ML find out?
There are few things from this novel (started a couple of days ago) that I don't quite understand, or find confusing. It is trope heavy, and that's the only fact that helps with some of the confusing things. First subject is, how the hell an outside room ends up stepping into a rightful married wife and, while being co-wives, she still is the one to retain the title of Marchioness? Even if she gave birth to a son, is just too much nonsense and disrespect... I guess this is part of the turnovers later. Also, this Madam Ling just swallowed everyone's dowry... I am just hoping Ning Yuxuan won't drag too much to get Madam Ming's dowry back. Ning Ziyin's dowry is a little hard to regain. Also, Ning Ziying, I take it as she was fully an adopted daughter? Madam Ming openly adopted her, I guess (?), because she was already born and grown a little, so no chance to fake a pregnancy like she did with Ning Yuxuan, right? That is why both girls never knew they were actually blood-related direct sisters, I guess. After some more chapters: I take it as she was adopted by a different branch of the Ning Family and she believes she's a Ning all along, but entered this Protectorate of the Country Manor when both her parents had passed, at the age of 13? It is a good read, but it's also too exaggerated and trope-heavy XD the villains are too typical and cartoonish. I understand that they never get killed by the same schemes they applied to Ning Ziying, because it's in the best interest of Ning Zu'An and the Old Taitai to keep Madam Ling's viciousness hidden. However, is still nonsensical that a nobody became the main co-wive having the upper-hand, even if Madam Ming was unfavored, suspected of having an affair and estrangled from her brother, it's still a little unrealistic. Also, it was mentioned at the beginning of the novel that Madam Ling had been stripped of her title, yet, the author keeps treating her as the Marchionnes. I've noticed a lot of authors keep doing this things, forgetting decisions they did earlier on the plot.
eeeh, as far as i remember about this novel was, all the villains is like cockroach, no matter how u kick, schemes, give bad rep, poison, break their leg (literally and figuratively), they will always come back like terminator. And they somehow share 1 believe, as long as MC is dead/maimed/hv bad rep, they will get what they use to have like thanos's re-snap. Well, an outside room usually will never have any chance to be rightful wife, BUT we have combination of I-REALLY-WANT-GRANDSON-LIKE-CRAZY-Lao taitai, and FUCK-MY-BRAIN-I-BETTER-THINK-WITH-MY-D1CK-husband. Soooo....yeah.... and Ling happens to have eldest son. If im not remember it wrong (pls dont blame if im wrong, i read this last year), Ling didn't start competing rightful wife position at the beginning, she was a woman raised outside (this is lower than concubine, coz her children is not acknowledge), but then, she went crying in public along with her baby children, begging to be recognize in front of houfu. Ming-shi was soft hearted (and laotaitai really want THAT grandson), so she let them in to be recognize as concubine. Later, Ling schemes Ming to get house management right, then after MC's born, Ling giving fake evidence of Ming's infidelity to her husband. After that, Ming was degraded as secondary wife, and Ling got herself promoted to primary wife. But yeah, normal ancient family with many elders and relatives WILL NEVER let this kind of thing happen. At best, they will force Ming to be divorce, and make the Marquis remarry a proper (noble) woman (not a butcher's sister with bad past). Ning ZiYing was adopted by Ning family in Jiangnan, kinda branch family of the marquis family, so by right, she is everybody's cousin. The 1 adopted by Ming was NQS, but she quickly jump out of the ship when Ming got degraded, thus later NQS was adopted daughter of Ling (what she want is legal wife-adopted-daughter status, it doesn't matter who is the legal wife). And NQS also 1 of those poisoned Ming as well.
Thanks! Yes, it is quite unrealistic and when one has read enough of these novels, you can see it's just done so the villain can fall harder and the shitty father/lao taitai can get scolded really good/be demoted to commoners/killed in the name of pampering the concubine and destroying the wife. Because, as much as an eldest son is there, an outer room is an outer room, it's better to hire a different co-wife (it seems is not secondary but sort of "equal wife" system done specially for that dynasty) that you make sure can give birth to a son, while pressuring the master to bed the other rightful wife, in hopes of having a di heir.