After my father was sent to marry into the princess's household, I became the darling of the en

The next day, Shen Jingque entered the school as usual and immediately saw Xu Wanying sitting by the window with her arms propped up.

His cheeks were puffed out, like a sulking pufferfish.

Shen Jingque took out a flower cake from her purse and waved it in front of her.

Xu Wanying lifted her eyelids slightly, twitched her nose, and then buried her face back down.

Why do you look so wilted today?

This isn't right.

Xu Wanying's love for food is roughly equivalent to a worker's obsession with getting paid.

Even if the sky falls, she'll still have to take a bite first.

Xu Wanying buried her face in her arms and muttered, "Don't mention it."

He Lanqing peeked out from behind the book, hesitatingly asking, "Miss Xu... did your stepmother... did she scold you again?"

Xu Wanying shook her head and said sullenly, "My mother... that Zeng Shi, took me to see some kind of wandering master yesterday."

"Oh?" Shen Jingque raised an eyebrow.

"The master said that I have a noble destiny and will surely marry into a high-ranking family in the future. However, I should be gentle rather than strong, and quiet rather than active."

"My stepmother was overjoyed when she heard this. When she returned home, she had my wooden knife taken away and said that from this day forward, I was not allowed to eat much, run or jump, and had to practice my manners and learn to manage the household."

She said I was uncouth and that if I continued to cause trouble, no noble family would be willing to marry me.

She slammed her fist on the table with a thud, and the pen holder jumped up.

"I don't want to be some high-society lady, so why should I change it!"

Shen Jingque's temples throbbed as she listened.

What kind of high-society lady?

Xu Wanying will one day be a heroine capable of leading troops on horseback. To restrict her like this is like putting a wild horse into an embroidered cage.

Xu Wanying looked down at her hands; her palms had calluses and thin marks from practicing with a sword.

For her, this is a testament to her hard work.

"My mother used to be a江湖人 (jianghu person, a person who travels the martial arts world). I heard from the old people in the manor that when she was young, she rode the fastest horse and wielded a short spear, accompanying my father to fight on the battlefield and watching the sunset over the desert."

"But after she married into the capital, people said she was unruly. Her father was away fighting a war, so she had to endure it all alone in the inner quarters."

"Later she fell ill, and the royal physician said it was due to depression."

"I didn't understand when I was a child, but now that I think about it, she was probably trapped and killed little by little by these rules."

He Lanqing froze, the tip of his pen hovering over the paper, ink dripping down and spreading into a black blot.

Shen Jingque also fell silent, which was rare for her.

It's as if you can see a bird soaring in the sky being forced into a golden cage, gradually losing its vitality.

Xu Wanying looked up, her eyes red, and asked, "Little Sparrow, do you think I'll become like that too?"

Shen Jingque looked into her eyes and shook her head.

"You won't, that master's prediction is inaccurate."

Xu Wanying was taken aback.

Shen Jingque said seriously, "His third-rate rhetoric is only good for fooling women in the inner quarters. Don't believe him."

"How...how did you know?"

Shen Jingque rested her chin on her hands, leaned closer, and lowered her voice: "Because... coincidentally, I can also tell fortunes."

"And it's a hundred times more accurate than his."

"However—" she smiled mysteriously, "my method is a bit special; it only works if the person seeking divination cooperates in answering the question."

"I'll bring the ritual implements tomorrow and do a divination for you."

Xu Wanying looked at her with some skepticism, but the slight dejection in her eyes had been largely washed away by curiosity.

"Really?"

"It's a million times better than that fake Taoist priest your stepmother hired. If it doesn't work, you don't have to pay."

He Lanqing, standing beside him, looked up, seemingly wanting to say something but then stopping herself.

"Shen... Shen Jingque, when did you learn fortune telling?"

"I was born with this talent, oh dear... you'll find out tomorrow."

Shen Jingque was talking nonsense with a straight face.

……

That evening, upon returning to Mingcui Pavilion, Shen Jingque locked herself in her room, spread out paper and pen, and began to write furiously.

She is compiling a simplified version of the MBTI personality test.

There are sixteen questions, covering four dimensions, with two options for each question.

After she finished writing down the questions from memory, she drew a simple scoring table next to them.

Finally, he solemnly wrote four large characters at the very top—

"Divination of Heavenly Secrets"

The system popped up at just the right time.

[Dear host, what are you doing?]

"Promoting feudal superstition."

[Please note that this system does not support the development of metaphysical or mystical features.]

"Who asked for your support?" Shen Jingque continued copying without looking up.

"This is called science. Do you understand psychology? It's a legitimate modern discipline, but I've just packaged it as fortune-telling."

She certainly wasn't just doing this for fun on a whim for Xu Wanying.

Xu Wanying's stepmother, Zeng, disciplined her according to the standards of a traditional noblewoman, and her father, who was away from home for many years, had no time to care for her.

Therefore, she is easily won over by people who understand her aspirations.

In the original book, Xiao Jingchen discovered her extraordinary martial arts skills, bestowed small favors upon her, and generously praised her military talent, which made this naive girl feel a deep affection for him, as if they had met too late.

Xiao Jingchen, that scumbag who only knows how to make empty promises, can easily win over a future female general with just a few cheap words.

Why can't she draw this cake?

Not only Xu Wanying, but also He Lanqing.

One possesses superhuman strength, the other has a photographic memory.

One is a promising female general who will one day suppress the northern border, and the other is an iron-willed censor who will one day overturn the case against the Shen family.

Right now, they are just teenagers who are bullied and trapped in confusion in the academy.

Since Shen Jingque doesn't intend to follow the disgusting old path of the original female lead, the Princess's Mansion will one day have to confront the imperial power and Xiao Jingchen.

So she had to dig up those two good seedlings first.

Being just friends isn't enough.

She wanted to offer them understanding, support, and encouragement, and to give them tangible benefits upfront.

When Xiao Jingchen finally reaches out to pluck the peach...

I'm sorry, she dug up the peach tree, roots and all.

Shen Jingque folded the thick stack of divination slips and put them into her sleeve, the curve of her lips cool and clear-headed.

"Then I'll take all the knives that Xiao Jingchen might possess in the future, one by one, and collect them all."

Of course, it was also because she genuinely liked these two friends.

……

The following day, at Qishan Academy.

In the tea room after school, Shen Jingque occupied a corner table, on which lay her "divination slips of destiny," and next to it she solemnly lit a stick of sandalwood incense that she had swiped from Ji Qianshang.

Xu Wanying and He Lanqing sat opposite her, with seven or eight classmates crowding behind them to join in the fun.

"Let me explain the rules." Shen Jingque cleared his throat, his expression as serious as an old Taoist priest who could tell fortunes by counting fingers.

"Today, the diviner will open his altar. Each person is limited to asking one question, and must sincerely answer the sixteen questions about the secrets of heaven."

"After you answer, the fortune teller will interpret your destiny, temperament, and future."

"If you don't allow it, you don't get paid, but if you do—"

She squinted.

You have to promise me one thing.

"That's it?" Xu Wanying's eyes widened.

"That's it."

"Then I'll go first!" Xu Wanying slammed her hand on the table and stood up, her momentum unstoppable.

Shen Jingque handed over the test paper, along with a charcoal pencil.

"Use this checkbox; it's convenient. Don't overthink it; just choose based on your intuition."

Xu Wanying took it and started marking it up quickly, like filling out a military order. She finished writing it in less than half a cup of tea's time.

He Lanqing observed silently from the side and found that the questions were all about choosing from very common situations, such as "Do you prefer to take the initiative to chat or stay quietly at a party?" or "When faced with a problem, do you consider other people's feelings first or analyze the pros and cons?"

It doesn't look like a divination... it looks more like some kind of strange strategy question.

Shen Jingque took Xu Wanying's answer sheet, mentally calculated for a moment while looking at the score sheet, and then looked up.

"They're out."

The entire room fell silent.

"Yingying..." Shen Jingque's voice suddenly became solemn.

"You are naturally fiery, with an innate drive to act, live in the moment, and have a very keen sense of perception."

"On the battlefield, you can judge the direction of arrows by intuition, but if you were asked to memorize something for half an hour—"

"She'll fall asleep," Xu Wanying blurted out.

Then he slapped himself in the mouth.

There was a burst of laughter all around.

Shen Jingque continued, "You're not good at expressing your tender feelings, so you hide all your concerns in your actions. You say you 'don't care,' but your body is already standing in front of others."

Xu Wanying's smile froze on her face, and her eyes suddenly stung.

"Your greatest pain is not that others don't approve of you, but that you are never sure whether the people you care about have truly accepted you."

The tea room fell silent for a moment.

Xu Wanying lowered her eyes, and after a long while, she said in a muffled voice, "...How did you know?"

Shen Jingque smiled and softened her voice.

"Your destiny is not to 'marry into a wealthy family,' but to 'ride across the plains.'"

"The fortune teller your stepmother hired didn't predict your fate, but rather your stepmother's wishes."

"Because only in this way can he obtain a generous sum of money for divination."

"And I, Yingying..."

Shen Jingque held her hand: "I hope you can be yourself."

Xu Wanying took a deep sniff, forcing back her tears, and nodded vigorously.

"So... what do you think I should do?"

"Tell your father," Shen Jingque said seriously. "Explain to him face to face your desire to learn martial arts and military strategy."

"I believe General Dingyuan does care about you, he just doesn't know what you truly want."

"If you don't speak up, he'll have no choice but to follow your stepmother's arrangements."

Xu Wanying clenched her fist, and the light in her eyes gradually brightened.

The classmates watching from the sidelines were dumbfounded.

Someone muttered quietly, "Is it really that accurate...?"

"Who's next? Who's next?"

"Me! Me! Me!"

Shen Jingque raised her hand: "Line up, one at a time."

She was like a seasoned traditional Chinese medicine doctor, meticulously analyzing, scoring, and interpreting each paper.

Some people were so touched that they burst into tears on the spot, while others were so ashamed that they crawled under the table.

After listening, the usually most stubborn boy remained silent for a long time before finally blurting out, "Miss Shen, did you make a hole in my wall?"

The positive word-of-mouth effect was so strong that the queue stretched all the way to the door.

Shen Jingque continued outputting her message without changing her expression, but inside she was overjoyed.

Hey hey hey.

It wasn't a waste of time to learn this skill specifically to earn pocket money.

In modern times, MBTI bloggers would charge 200 yuan per consultation.

This can be considered a charitable medical consultation.

Finally, it was Helan Qing's turn.

He hesitated for a long time before handing over the answer sheet, his ears already slightly red.

Shen Jingque glanced at the score and understood the situation.

She looked up at Helan Qing's slightly nervous face and said:

"Qingqing, you...!"

She drew out the word, and Helan Qing's eyes flickered as he stared at her with tense posture.

Shen Jingque lifted her eyelids, her eyes full of smiles.

"He's such a romantic!"