Xie Heng is the head of the prestigious Langtai Xie clan and the youngest Left Vice Director of the Secretariat in the Southern Dynasty. Power and beauty define him, yet he is haunted by the weight of his family’s survival, a burden he has carried alone since his parents’ early deaths. Behind his peerless grace lies a mind consumed by the duty of preserving his lineage.
Xiao Jue is a commoner military officer who carved a path through the rigid aristocratic hierarchy with nothing but raw courage and military merit. He is a sharp blade that trusts only his spear. Their paths cross in a secluded bamboo grove where Xiao Jue encounters the elegant scholar playing the zither. That single glance binds his fate forever.
Despite Xiao Jue’s clumsy attempts to offer his heart—a captured northern dagger for protection or a hand warmer heated by his own body—Xie Heng remains distant, maintaining the cold decorum of his station. To the world, Xie Heng is Xiao Jue’s greatest obstacle. He suppresses the officer’s promotions, watches silently as he is attacked by the nobility, and even publicly insults him as nothing more than a dog at the Xie family gate.
No one knows that Xie Heng spends his nights burning secret letters meant to frame Xiao Jue. He suppresses the military reports only because the Emperor’s suspicion has already turned lethal; to advance further would be a death sentence. The insults he hurls are wounds he inflicts upon himself to keep the man he loves safe from the court’s lethal gaze.
When the Northern Dynasty invades, political enemies conspire to bury Xiao Jue and his army at the border. While the court assumes the general is doomed, the ever-composed Xie Heng finally breaks his silence. Before the imperial throne, he stakes his entire clan’s life to protect Xiao Jue, threatening the Emperor with the judgment of history and the weight of his own influence.
Once a man bound by family duty and ancient rites, Xie Heng finds his shackles burned away by Xiao Jue’s fiery spirit. If the old order cannot bring peace to the world, he will tear down the throne and build a new era with his own hands.
Raw Novel Name: 謝公為何偏憐我
