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Marrying the Short-Lived Villain
Type
Web Novel (CN)
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Rating(4.4 / 5.0, 70 votes)
5    76% (53 votes)
4    7% (5 votes)
3    1% (1 votes)
2    13% (9 votes)
1    3% (2 votes)
Language
Support Book (#ad)
Author(s)
One entry per line
Artist(s)
One entry per line
N/A
Year
Example: 2012
2024
Status in COO
Status in Country of Origin. One entry per line
194 Main Chapters + 17 Extras (Completed)
Licensed
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Completely Translated
No
Original Publisher
One entry per line
English Publisher
One entry per line
N/A
Release Frequency
Every 2.9 Day(s)
Activity Stats
[Graph]
Weekly Rank: #432
Monthly Rank: #323
All Time Rank: #4947
Reading List
[Graph]
On 1435 Reading Lists
Monthly Rank: #619
All Time Rank: #6715

Description

Links are NOT allowed. Format your description nicely so people can easily read them. Please use proper spacing and paragraphs.

After the heiress Mu Wan suddenly died from overworking, she thought it thorough and came to terms with her situation—let’s fully enjoy her second chance at life by indulging in food, drink, and leisure. To hell with work, scheming, and power struggles!

Then, because of her new carefree attitude, excessive indulgence, and idleness, her engagement was broken off.

Mu Wan: …

Then, out of the blue, an imperial edict came, arranging her marriage to the powerful but intimidating Marquis of Zhenbei—clearly intended as an insult to him.

Mu Wan: ???

Her reborn half-sister arrived, gloating: “So what if he’s tall, elegant, and handsome? Marquis Zhenbei is cold towards women, ruthless, and bloodthirsty. He killed the Empress Dowager and the puppet emperor to put his nephew’s on the throne, but he died on the battlefield later. Even if you don’t die, you’ll soon be widowed, my dear eldest sister.”

What Mu Wan heard amidst the unintelligent noises: Marquis of Zhenbei, put his nephew on the throne, and then died…

So, in a few years, she would inherit both an emperor nephew and all the Marquis’ wealth?

What a stroke of luck! She’s in!

***

Zhenbei Marquis Manor indeed needed a figurehead mistress, so Xie Heng made a strategical decision to marry the easily controlled daughter of a lowly merchant family. It was nothing more than a political move; he treated her as a convenient pet, like a house cat.

But to his surprise, this delicate little cat wasn’t one to be bullied. He couldn’t hit her, nor could he outsmart her in arguments.

Xie Heng began to suspect that she was out to annoy him to death.

One day, Mu Wan sighed: “The Chi Ling Tribe may be barbaric, but their gemstones are truly beautiful.”

Xie Heng, with a cold voice: “So you really wish for my death, don’t you?”

Mu Wan: ???

Later, Xie Heng led his troops to conquer the Chi Ling tribe and threw their royal family’s treasures at Mu Wan, sneering: “Sorry to disappoint you, but this Marquis will live a long life.”

Mu Wan: ???

That same day, Xie Heng lay in bed, flushed and gritting his teeth: “This Marquis will die at your hands sooner or later!”

Mu Wan: …

It was just a simple wound stitching. There’s no need to make it sound so suggestive—her medical skills are great, okay?

Everyone said Marquis Zhenbei Xie Heng was ruthless and cold, and the people he despised the most were those cowards who indulged in pleasures. Yet, when death loomed over him, his first thought was: If he died, who would bring home the tribute fruits for that house cat? Would she be bullied? Who would take good care of her?

He realized then that he must survive, so he could protect her, ensuring she would live a long life, filled with prosperity.

[Cold-hearted, aloof cat-like beauty female lead vs. Crazed, ruthless but secretly tsundere male lead who only softens for her]

Associated Names
One entry per line
MSLV
嫁给注定早死的反派
被迫嫁給短命權臣後
被迫嫁给短命权臣后
Related Series
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Recommendations
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Recommendation Lists
  1. Keeping them cause they might get read one day
  2. Quality? Check. Female Lead? Double Check.
  3. Recent favorites
  4. cnovels obsession who ?? (#2)
  5. Entertaining novels with FL. Part 8

Latest Release

Date Group Release
07/23/25 aerialrain c44 part1
07/20/25 aerialrain c43 part2
07/19/25 aerialrain c43 part1
07/16/25 aerialrain c42 part2
07/12/25 aerialrain c42 part1
07/09/25 aerialrain c41 part2
07/05/25 aerialrain c41 part1
07/02/25 aerialrain c40
06/27/25 aerialrain c39 part2
06/24/25 aerialrain c39 part1
06/22/25 aerialrain c38 part2
06/21/25 aerialrain c38 part1
06/18/25 aerialrain c37
06/14/25 aerialrain c36 part2
06/11/25 aerialrain c36 part1
123…6
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Review
6 Reviews


theliongirl
theliongirl
Oct 29, 2024
Status: c105
This story was actually quite great, with a fantastic translation and good writing. Unfortunately, I could only find the MTL to chapter 105. If you want to try to finish the story, you'll probably have to figure out a way to buy from jjwxc.

Mu Wan, the female lead, is a charming salted fish who only does things that end up benefiting her- a merchant through and through. This isn't to say she's a bad person. In fact I consider both her and the male lead good people. Though because of... more>> past events human selfishness has chilled their hearts, they still end up helping people where they can.

Mu Wan always manages to turn the tables in an astounding way, making her enemies into friends and those that should be opposed to her sympathetic. Those that try to hurt her usually end up on her side, but if you really push her she'll make sure you regret it. She's really wild in some ways hahaha.

Mu Wan is so funny. In her point of view, if marrying her husband brings her a lot of troubles, then it's his responsibility to clean it all up. Xie Heng always has a headache when thinking of what she might do, so he can only go solve things himself. If he doesn't want to be pushed into a pit then he can only jump down himself.

Before marriage, the male lead Xie Heng is a cold, calculating, and terrifying man. After marriage, he can only helplessly hope that his wife remembers him once in a while!

Some of the headache-inducing things she's done:

Spoiler

Imply that her new husband is impotent so that her mother-in-law feels sorry for her. Say that he's heartless so her love rivals protect her. And more...

[collapse]

I think Xie Heng starts to like her pretty quickly. He has his reasons for not pursuing her but he's always a bit angry and helpless when she isn't interested in him. He always indulges and protects her though, very cute!

The female lead just likes the lifestyle he provides haha. I think being a modern woman, she's very hesitant to put her life and heart in the hands of an ancient man, so she always reminds herself not to cross the line. Unfortunately from where I read their relationship hadn't yet progressed further, but I can probably guess how their relationship developed.

They're very cute together! I like their banter. The plot is good and the side characters are very vivid. This novel is pretty entertaining and I do recommend it. I'll try to finish it in the future.

And kudos to the translator, they're only on chapter 3 but they've done a fantastic job. <<less
23 Likes · Like Permalink | Report
decemy
decemy
Jan 25, 2025
Status: Completed
Wow.... Uwwuuu this is actually great!! Im not good at writing lengthy review, but I'm telling you to read this! The story is engaging! Haha I've ran out of translated chapters so I searched for the raws, but then the raws also have few chapters so I really made a JJWXC account and bought the chapters just to read this gem!!!

10 starsssssss!
11 Likes · Like Permalink | Report
flsimp
flsimp
Dec 26, 2024
Status: c104
Like the previous commenter, I only managed to find raws up to chapter 104, but I'm honestly considering figuring out how to buy from jjwxc to keep reading because it is that good. The writing is smooth and compelling, the humour is witty and not overbearing, the dialogue is fun, and aerialrain's translation, though at time of writing is only at chapter 16, is absolutely amazing.

The protagonist, Mu Wan, is kinda really op in that she knows how to deal with people and situations really well as someone with a... more>> high EQ and IQ. The funny part is that she uses all her knowledge to find the smoothest path forward for herself, as she is serious about being a salted fish. That doesn't mean that she's a pushover or a silly person, she is undoubtedly always the smartest person in the room, but she only shows people what she wants them to see. She is also a relatively kind person. She has a mantra of making friends when she can, in some of the most bafflingly hilarious ways, and only makes enemies when she senses they're not worth the time or they've wronged her first. She usually tries to help or at the very least not hurt people who don't hurt her, and very clearly has a bottom line that she sticks to.

For the first little arc of her getting married, the main antagonists are her half-sister Mu Rou and her step-mother. They're the classic greedy pair who want to steal her engagement, the one that Mu Wan's mother prepared for her before her death, and while they're rude, they're not cartoonishly evil but just serve as a little fun for Mu Wan to flex her skills on. The issue with the pair is that they're greedy for more but aren't smart enough to back it up, so Mu Wan runs circles around them. When Mu Rou is reborn (not a spoiler, mentioned in the description), Mu Wan picks up on it immediately and then provokes her sister to give her information, such as who the male lead married in her last life and also how long it lasted.

Her sister uses the information from her previous life to try and gain advantages over Mu Wan, but she never fully succeeds because all the things she tries to rob are what Mu Wan did in a previous life, and she doesn't do it as smartly as Mu Wan did. She also (so far as I read) never considers that all that Mu Wan got was because Mu Wan is smart enough to pull it off, and that she simply doesn't have the background and benefits of Mu Wan to be able to pull it off.

What's truly interesting is the main overarching background plot that shapes the country and involves both Mu Wan and male lead's past and future.

(Not tagging for spoilers because this is revealed within the first few chapters.) Mu Wan's mother was a very capable and brilliant businesswoman who divorced Mu Wan's father when he got his first concubine, and she left a flourishing business to Mu Wan when she died 3 years prior to the beginning of the story. She was clearly a very strong woman in a time when not many women were able to stand on their own, and was able to give Mu Wan an early foundation and a lot of good cards to hold.
Spoiler

Her death is tied to the deaths of male lead's father and two older brothers, who we know to have died fighting for the country, but is also tied to the plot the male lead is investigating of rumours of a previous dynasty's treasure house and the rebellion that ties into it. The previous dynasty's treasure house rumours were built off her in her childhood revealling modern day technologies (including the rubix cube), but the plot that lies underneath those rumours is what she is investigating, to understand her mother's death.

[collapse]

Her husband is also very much a tsundere whose subordinates can see through faster than maybe he himself realises. He cares about Mu Wan's opinion and her attention very soon from the get go, and while part of it may be that he is actually a good man who will not let his wife lose face and be dishonored, he very quickly starts putting up with her shenanigans and following her lead. He also wants to avenge his family and is working on his plan to damn the court to hell in retaliation for how they let his family die brutally, but there are still signs that he still cares about the common people and those around despite his "everyone who dies in the crossfire die anyways" attitude he puts up.
Spoiler

While he's said to hold a girl in his heart as the reason why he doesn't want to marry anyone, I think that it was always a rumour spread so he doesn't have to have anyone beside him while he embarks on his revenge, especially considering his illness that will kill him within a few years. The girl just showed up to try and ingrate herself with him and she's clearly only scheming for her family's own benefit, so he doesn't care about her and compares her silently to his own wife, who he finds better.

[collapse]

I also love the whole Xie family (ML is Xie Heng), who is much better than her mostly sucky family.
Spoiler

I'm writing this for my own benefit, because it was a little hard to understand at first in the mtl, but the translation should have no confusion. ML's mother is a princess of the previous emperor (or maybe previous previous emperor), so he is of the royal family. ML is the youngest of 4, 1 older sister and 2 older brothers. The older sister was the previous crown princess, wife of the crown prince (or maybe she was the empress for a little bit but I'm pretty sure her husband hadn't ascended yet). The ninth prince that everyone is talking about is the older sister's son, so legitimate grandson of the emperor, and should've been the new crown prince if not for the turmoil in court, which is how ML becomes uncle to the emperor. Due to ML's mother taking charge, the ninth prince gets raised as ML and Mu Wan's son, and I absolutely adore how she takes care of him and their little family as a whole. ML's oldest brother and his wife have two daughters, and ML's second brother and his wife have an older daughter and a younger son. Both sisters-in-law of the ML are referred to as Madam Xie, but the first wife is in charge of the household and the daughter of a duke, while the second wife is a quiet person who is from a very renowned scholarly family.

[collapse]
Mu Wan and her mother-in-law have such a sweet relationship, and while there's a tiny bit of tension between her and her older sister-in-law, both sister-in-laws are kind to her. She also is very kind and encouraging of the children, and the whole family dynamic is just overall very sweet.

I really can't wait to read more of this story to see how the relationship between Mu Wan and Xie Heng develops, as well as see how Mu Wan twists the future of the country to her own benefit. This is one of the few novels during historical times that has no writing that irritates me (hopefully author continues doing a good job), and you can really see how much detail and thought has been put into each and every single line. From the foreshadowing of the big plot to all the little side characters, everything has been written amazingly, and it is a story I truly want to be able to read to the end. <<less
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Sleep-deprived
Sleep-depriv
Jan 09, 2025
Status: c181
What I love about the novel is that our MC is hyper-competent and independent woman, who also has a heart for the world. Love to see it!

The author loves OP MC. In different novels it's mitigated by different factors, which makes it still interesting to read. Here, it's suspense in a good 60-70% of the book, then it's more steamy.

Don't get me wrong, it's romance since the get-go, with meet-ugly (still cute!), marriage first, then love, but in a dozen or so chapters after the suspence resolved, it really picks... more>> up steam (but R, not NC-17).

My biggest grip is that the female cannon fodder, MC's sister, is too miserable. She never learns. It would have been nicer if it wasn't the case. And I wish her husband - our MC's husband in the previous life - wasn't such an irresponsible scum. Would be nice if it ended with them growing as people, too.

Well, I'm temporarily stopping at ch181 with plans to come back and finish it later, when it's completed - so we will see. <<less
6 Likes · Like Permalink | Report
kyrez
kyrez
Jun 14, 2025
Status: c194
A very thrilling, heart-rending yet motivating novel. The writing is superb and the plot is impressive.

... more>>
Spoiler

FL seems mary-sue but her backstory and her attitude in life makes her shine especially at the end. She was low-key throughout the story but she steps out at the critical moment for her dream and aspiration.

ML is the heart-rending part of the story. He was a turned villain after being betrayed by his country. He had a grand plan of revenge where he finally died and everything burnt... but he changed the plan accordingly to create a better future for the FL.

[collapse]

Spoiler

FL & ML is all about love. Love for themselves, for their land, their family... and for each other~

This pair of lover had a bittersweet (or was there sweetness? I wouldn't know since I don't have acces to the extras! *cried*) story in their past lives.

FL's sister & ex-fiance had memories of their past lives. Ironically, their schemes seem to help the ML & FL get together in this life.

[collapse]

Spoiler

FL is truly broad-minded and mischievous. She's a transmigrator who was successful in her modern life. In this ancient life, she likes to dab in different fields of study (such as business, medicine, agronomy & weaponeering) and create new technologies to increase life quality.

ML was once playful and powerful. His playfulness changed to ruthlessness as he plot for his revenge.

There was "sacrifing their feelings for the good of the other" plot, but it was written in a heartbreakingly beautiful way.

[collapse]

I immensely enjoyed reading this but now am so upset that I couldn't fine the raw of the extra chapters to MTL *cried*

Because the future and the past life is all in the extras so I deeply feel that the story is only half-finished!

I would like to recommend the story, but beware that you won't be able to finish it (unless you can find the raw or subscribe to jjwc).

Mood: Happy but sad

Translation is ace! Hopefully translator will translate the extras too *wish and wish and wish*

Btw, I've read the author's translated stories in NU and I love them all. So yes, recommended author and story here~ <<less
5 Likes · Like Permalink | Report
sinisterspringroll
sinisterspri
Jan 28, 2025
Status: c21 part1
Both protagonists are fun and interesting and their sparse interactions so far brim with delicious tension. The translation on Aerial Rain is extremely good as well. It's far too rare to find a good romantic story that is also well translated; Marrying the Short-Lived Villain is a real gem in the webnovel mines.

I have high hopes for the rest of this novel and wish I could binge-read it right now!
5 Likes · Like Permalink | Report
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