Zetian wakes in an infirmary after the Wall breach battle, tormented by guilt over the destroyed village and the orphaned girl she rescued. She finds Yuhuan in the next bed, traumatized after unintentionally killing her co-pilot upon disconnecting from the Plum Blossom Deer. Zetian comforts her with the same hollow platitudes she once despised, realizing why such lies persist, and resolves to shield Yuhuan from the brutal truths of being a pilot.

By morning, Han engineers blame the siren malfunction on the typhoon, but the breach news leaks and public blame falls on Zetian, then on women, then on the revolution itself. Returning to Chang'an in a wheelchair, Zetian confronts Qin Zheng, who agrees reactionary engineers sabotaged the sirens and pledges an independent review. He surprises her by producing their unsigned marriage certificate and demanding her signature for legal recordkeeping.

Qin Zheng then presents her with a qì-replenishing congee made from his shīfu Mi Xuan's recipe, which he cooked himself in a private pantry he installed to avoid waiting for poison testing. Zetian teases him sexually while eating; he flusters but stays composed. They acknowledge that only one announcement can salvage her reputation: pregnancy.

In a stitched-together broadcast, Qin Zheng announces "their" pregnancy, knowing it's a bluff shared only with Zetian, Yizhi, Sima Yi, and Doctor Hua. Public sentiment shifts dramatically—Zetian becomes a sympathetic pregnant heroine. The independent inspection confirms siren tampering, implicating many Han frontier personnel whom Zetian feels no urge to spare.

During her extended one-month "pregnancy" recuperation, Zetian tours devastated southern villages distributing aid with a production crew, winning over peasants. New propaganda posters declare her "Iron by Birth, Made Steel by Motherhood." Privately, she chafes under the cautious treatment from Wan'er, Taiping, and Qieluo, viewing the ruse as a humiliating defeat she must endure until the Gewei Bu crushes Zhuge Liang and Kong Zhuxi's reactionaries.