Chapter 337 I Once Loved a Man Like This

Chapter 337: The Man I Once Loved

However, when he realized this was merely the tip of the iceberg of absurd rumors, he took it in stride instead.

By now, there were at least eight or ten versions circulating in the camp about how he and Cui Ji met, got to know each other, and fell in love.

Covering all sorts of wild themes, including but not limited to:

"Snatched by Force: The Stone-Faced General's Runaway Sweetheart"

— A heart-wrenching tale of General Cui falling for him at first sight, forcing a marriage on the second, and getting burned at the stake on the third.

"Married First, Love Later: My Contract Marriage with the General"

— Supposedly they entered a fake marriage to get the court off their backs, only for it to become real.

"The Dead First Love"

— Rumor had it that Cui Ji had a first love who'd passed away, and Cheng Ge happened to resemble her.

"Burning Regrets: The General's Chase After His Pregnant Wife"

— In this version, he not only gave birth but also fled with the child, forcing Cui Ji to chase him for eight hundred li.

The most absurd of all was a version titled "Reborn as the General's Arch-Nemesis."

It claimed that in his previous life, he was a great general of the Northern Di, killed by Cui Ji, and was reborn as his wife...

Cheng Ge listened with a blank face as Zhao Cheng, in a hushed voice, eagerly retold the latest version—"The General's Little Sweetheart." A vein pulsed in his temple.

"So," Zhao Cheng finally asked curiously, "you and the General... what exactly...?"

Cheng Ge raised an eyebrow, saw the gossip gleaming in his eyes, and suddenly shed his earlier annoyance. With a serious face, he lowered his voice.

"Since you asked so sincerely, I guess I'll reluctantly spill the beans."

Zhao Cheng perked up immediately, and even the few soldiers camouflaged as brush piles nearby stirred slightly, clearly eavesdropping.

Cheng Ge kept a deadpan face and began speaking with fake seriousness, his voice tinged with melancholy: "I once loved such a man..."

The crowd: "!!?" What a spicy opening!

The sadness in Cheng Ge's eyes deepened as he continued: "He said I was the most beautiful woman in the world."

The crowd immediately grew wary. Zhao Cheng couldn't help but interject: "Men's mouths are full of lies!"

The melancholy in Cheng Ge's eyes deepened. He nodded in agreement and let out a heavy sigh: "I saved all my innocence for him, shutting the door on anyone else."

Everyone looked at Cheng Ge differently now, thinking the General's Wife was a true romantic at heart.

"And this man I loved so deeply," Cheng Ge's voice trembled slightly, "he turned me into the biggest fool in the world."

Everyone held their breath.

Cheng Ge pursed his lips and took a deep breath: "I believed every word he said. He said he loved my lips best..."

The crowd blushed, and a few young soldiers quickly looked away.

Cheng Ge continued in a mournful tone: "I didn't ask for much. I just wanted him to treat me like he used to. But one day..."

He paused, his voice shaking: "He said the same thing, with someone else in his arms."

"What?!" Zhao Cheng let out a sharp gasp, his tone full of shock—this guy was a total scumbag!

The other soldiers stirred as well, all fired up with outrage.

"Then what?" Zhao Cheng pressed eagerly.

Cheng Ge let out a soft sigh, his eyes even more sorrowful: "One day, I accidentally wore a certain dress, and he got furious, shouting at me. That was when I realized he had always seen me as a replacement for his dead wife."

The crowd: "!!?" What a wild plot!

Zhao Cheng muttered under his breath: "What the hell, he was married before?!"

Cheng Ge nodded, his tone bitter: "He was twenty-eight years older than me, rich and powerful."

The crowd stared at Cheng Ge in disbelief, their eyes clearly saying: What on earth did you see in that old geezer?

Cheng Ge picked up another dried sweet potato slice, chewed it slowly, and continued:

"When I learned he'd always seen me as a stand-in, heartbroken, I confronted him. He actually said..."

Everyone held their breath, even the distant creak of wheels fading from their minds.

Cheng Ge took a deep breath and put on a deep, commanding voice: "You should count yourself lucky to even look a little like her."

He then switched back to a sorrowful tone, his voice trembling: "In that moment, I knew I'd wasted all those years of love and time on the wrong man!"

Zhao Cheng listened, tears welling up in his eyes, and the other soldiers wore sympathetic expressions.

Zhao Cheng said: "And then?"

Cheng Ge wiped at fake tears with his sleeve: "After I was exposed, he got angry and sent me off to a nunnery."

Zhao Cheng couldn't help but quip: "He got angry? What a nerve! And then? How'd you end up with our general?"

A smirk tugged at Cheng Ge's lips as he kept spinning his yarn:

"Well... it was a snowy, windy night..."

As he spoke, out of habit, he kept an eye on the supply road below.

Suddenly, the faint rumble of cart wheels on dirt came from the distance, growing louder.

Cheng Ge instantly cut off mid-sentence, his gaze sharp as an eagle's, and everyone held their breath.

A Northern Di supply convoy slowly appeared in view—about twenty-some grain carts, escorted by over a hundred soldiers.

The wheels creaked on the dirt road, the sound echoing loudly in the quiet valley.

Cheng Ge gave the signal, and all the hidden soldiers held their breath, fingers on their bowstrings.

While Cheng Ge and his men chewed dried sweet potatoes up on the cliff, the Northern Di supply convoy below was taking its sweet time through the valley.

The officer in charge, Wuzhu, smoothed the small braid at his temple and said in the Di language to his deputy beside him:

"This gig is so boring. Those Great Zhou losers are probably too weak to even draw a bow by now—no way they'd dare hit our grain carts."