Boy, You’re Kidding Me

In Evermont, a woman who enters the Academy is put to death. Chu Wanqing needed money for her mother's treatment, so she cut her hair, put on the uniform and took the place of Xu Wenjin, a magistrate's son with no interest in studying. She reckoned she could play the part for a few years and get out. Then a wounded stranger burst into her room one night: Fu Jingxiu, commander of the Emperor's secret guard, inside the Academy hunting for stolen border defence maps. Soldiers were on his heels, and he forced her to draw them off. He got clear, and afterwards found the maps had slipped out of his coat somewhere in her room. To search it properly he moved in as her roommate. Between night searches and surprise inspections, with the dormitory beginning to gossip about his tastes, he found himself drawn to this quiet boy he was supposed to be watching, and would not admit it to himself. He saw her one day in women's clothes and understood. From then on he set about protecting her from the law, from the plot around the maps, and from the court itself.