Today was the seventh day. According to ancient custom, the soul returns home on the seventh day, so Wanwan would surely come back too, wouldn’t she?

There were too many people—would it frighten her and make her afraid to enter? She had always been gentle and shy, coming and going with pure cleanliness. Though she had drifted in the worldly cesspool for twenty-three years, she had never wavered in her sincere heart. Now she was gone, but hopefully her soul hadn’t traveled far. He feared she would be timid, so he had everyone withdraw, leaving only Tonghuan. He had some questions for her.

Outside was dark chaos, but inside Yin’an Hall it grew quiet. Night had fallen, and only the long, resonant sound of chimes could be heard drifting in the wind and rain. Tonghuan knelt before the altar burning paper offerings while he remained by the coffin. Even though she was just an empty shell now, he couldn’t bear to abandon her.

The person in the coffin looked peaceful, as if death was liberation. He gazed at her again and again, unable to control his tears. Only now did he understand what it meant to have a heart like dead ashes. His girl—he knew every detail of her growth. He had once looked forward to her growing up, to marrying her, but when she truly condescended to rest by his side, he hadn’t protected her well.

This kind of farewell would be the death of him. She was gone—what was he still seeking? Regret came too late. Why had he rebelled in the first place? Even if his feudal lands were reduced, what of it? As long as husband and wife were together, even plain tea and simple food would be sweet.

Facing that beloved face, he had so much to say but didn’t know where to begin. Choking and sobbing, every word was extraordinarily difficult to utter.

“All the fault is mine. I couldn’t suppress my inner demons and insisted on achieving great deeds. My ambitions were too great—I didn’t deserve to reach so high for you. This past year abroad, not a day passed that I didn’t think of you. I thought of returning to see you, but I was afraid—afraid you would resent me. I had no face to confront you. How I regret it now! Had I known it would end like this, what empire would I have sought! You were sixteen when you married down to me, following me for a full seven years. But the days we spent together weren’t even half that time. How did these years get wasted like this? I thought I had plenty of time to make it up to you. Who knew there wouldn’t be time—you wouldn’t give me that chance…”

He wept sorrowfully, tears of blood like rain. People always feel regret only after losing something. “I thought”—how often this becomes the root of missed opportunities. How many beautiful unions has “I thought” ruined? By the time one understands, it’s too late. The beloved has departed, never to be seen again in heaven or earth. Perhaps until death, she never forgave him.

He stroked her cheek—she had always feared winter, yet now she was this cold. He took her hand, wanting to warm her, but she stubbornly clenched her fists tight, stiff now, never to open again.

He knelt with his forehead against the coffin, muttering distractedly like a lost soul: “Come back and take me with you. I couldn’t take your place in suffering, but at least let me accompany you…”

Tonghuan, who had been silent for a long time, finally couldn’t bear it anymore after hearing his words. “Does Your Lordship think Her Highness passed from illness and pain? Do you really believe she died of sickness?”

He raised his vacant eyes, staring at her fixedly, his lips trembling slightly before falling speechless.

Tonghuan didn’t care whether his grief was real or fake—nothing could shake her determination to stab at his heart.

She smiled bitterly: “Your Lordship has been wise all your life, yet now you play dumb? Those who die of illness don’t have such good complexions—they should be gaunt and withered. Her Highness couldn’t bear the humiliation and took her own life. She had three sets of red gold turtle-knob seals, and she took the set from the Mingzhi Dynasty with her—even in death, she didn’t forget she was a descendant of the Murong clan. Your Lordship loved and cherished her so much, yet didn’t know her character? She was noble and self-respecting—how could she willingly submit to her enemies? From the day you raised your rebel banner, you should have anticipated this outcome. You just kept harboring false hopes. You drove her step by step to the cliff’s edge. Not only that, you deliberately had her make that false rubbing, using her to mislead the Emperor. Someone with such concern for the world, yet you forced her to become Daye’s sinner. For her, this was torment worse than death—didn’t you foresee this? She was just a young woman, alone and helpless in Nanyuan. Aside from us servants, she had no one she could really talk to. When the princely mansion rebelled, even the Dowager Consort ignored her completely. How strong a heart could she have to withstand such pressure? When she was alive, you didn’t consider her situation. Now that she’s gone, what use is this wailing and lamenting? I advise Your Lordship to save your tears—Her Highness may not need your false mercy. Speaking this way, Your Lordship probably wants to kill me. No matter—even if I risk this life, I must cry out for my mistress’s injustice. When we master and servant meet again in the underworld, I’ll keep her company so she won’t have to travel that lonely road alone.”

Tonghuan’s words were undoubtedly another torture of a thousand cuts. Not illness—suicide… Death by swallowing gold. No wonder her fists were clenched tight—it must have been terribly painful. What exactly had he done to drive her to this state! What he owed her could never be repaid in this life. Only death remained.

“That rubbing did indeed come from my selfish motives. I knew you couldn’t let go of Daye. Only by completely breaking with the court could you truly abandon responsibility and return to my side.” He gripped the coffin, murmuring weakly as gossamer: “So I was wrong again… wrong again…”

“I’m afraid Your Lordship’s motives weren’t just to keep Her Highness, but also to punish her.” The mourning clothes made Tonghuan’s face look like a vengeful ghost in the lamplight as she peeled away the bloody scars word by word. “Your Lordship resented Her Highness for deceiving you with a false pregnancy. In your extreme disappointment, you wanted to teach her a lesson. But Your Lordship didn’t know—Her Highness truly was pregnant. Due to successive blows, the child died in her womb… Your Lordship, this stratagem of yours destroyed not only Her Highness, but also the little prince who had finally been conceived. Do you regret it? Does your heart ache?”

His mind sank into confusion, feeling he was already mostly dead. Wave after wave of blows had left his chest a bloody mess long ago. After a long while, he laboriously lifted his hand: “Go now. After the funeral is complete, leave the mansion with the others. I know Wanwan couldn’t bear to kill you all, and I cannot create more bad karma…”

Before, he had been such an imperious person—how could he have tolerated a servant pointing at his nose and lecturing him? But now, living without spirit or energy, he wished her people would vent for her. The more incisively they cursed, the better he felt inside.

The final days of her life had been such misery. If he simply drew his sword in atonement and died too cleanly, he must torture himself with tenfold pain to relieve his hatred. Tonghuan wiped her tears and left. He struggled to rest his face on the edge of the coffin, as if this way he could be closer to her.

“Wanwan, I remember everything I said before. I promised you we’d never be separated again in this life, and I’ll keep my word. Just wait a little longer for me. I’ll die immediately, but I’m afraid they won’t properly send you off.” He choked out: “I’ve had them build a tomb. I’ll personally inspect it later. During your lying-in-state, I’ll make offerings to you. We husband and wife were together so little, apart so much—from today on, we truly won’t be separated.”

He bent down and kissed her forehead once. The cold went straight to his heart. In the past, she would probably have smiled shyly. Not anymore. Her expression was frozen forever, without joy, anger, sorrow, or happiness. His heartbreak was his just deserts. From now on, she would never be hurt again—perhaps this was for the best.

He waited all night until the wind stopped and rain ceased. She didn’t return. The yin-yang master said some people don’t go far because their hearts still have attachments. Others never look back because they have no lingering affection for what they leave behind. The wood ash spread before the door was smooth—laid out to wait for her footprints. It came to nothing. It seemed she had truly gone far away.

The time for sealing the coffin had long been set—he was powerless to stop it. Those seven-inch nails, accompanying the iron hammers wielded by the eunuchs, drove down inch by inch. All he could do was mutter constantly from the side: “Wanwan, dodge the nails, dodge the nails…”

All his love and concern sank into endless darkness with those muffled sounds. Through the heavy coffin and complex embroidered coverlets, he couldn’t see Wanwan’s face, but her every frown and smile were imprinted in his mind, never to be erased.

The Dowager Consort’s intention was to place the coffin in the hall of worship east of the ancestral shrine until the tomb was completed—this was how generations of princes and their wives had been handled. He looked at her numbly: “She is the Grand Princess. This is her residence. Why send her to such a gloomy place? She’ll be frightened.”

His mind was no longer quite normal. The Dowager Consort wept sorrowfully: “You must remember the burden on your shoulders. How can you have the luxury to act up now? There’s fighting going on up front. Your son, your brothers—they’re all risking their lives for your great cause. Do you have the leisure to go mad here?”

The Dowager Consort tried to rekindle his ambition, but hearing this, he remained completely unmoved: “To hell with the great cause! It cost me my wife and child—whoever wants it can take it! I just want to stay with Wanwan, attend to her daily needs, and not let her go hungry…”

He had traveled thousands of miles, his body stained with blood and mud, utterly filthy. The once high-spirited feudal prince had always been a bright presence like the moon. And now? Dirty and wretched, barely human anymore.

Lady Tala stepped forward with a curtsy, saying carefully: “Master, this servant has prepared hot water for you. Please wash and eat something. The dead are gone, but don’t the living still need to live? If Her Highness saw you like this, how heartbroken she would be.”

He acted as if he hadn’t heard, going to the altar to light incense. After making a deep bow, he inserted it into the incense burner.

Everyone was at a loss with him. The Dowager Consort could only order the tomb construction hastened. His soul was currently bewitched. After the Grand Princess was buried, he should gradually improve. But until then, no one could separate him from that coffin. He took up residence in the side hall, spending each day making offerings and burning incense, using the remaining time for companionship. He didn’t care whether the dead would rot and smell—in his heart, Wanwan was still the same as when alive.

He was surrounded by endless longing, missing her more and more, yet she seemed determined to cut all connections, refusing even to enter his dreams. He pleaded before her altar: “Let me see you tonight. Can we just say a few words?”

Each time full of hope, each time disappointed. She used to be so tender-hearted, but now she must hate him completely. He lowered his head and murmured: “If you won’t see me, I’ll have to find you myself.”

Half a month after she passed away, he finally thought to look at her former bedroom. Standing in the courtyard and looking around, those carved beams and painted rafters were still as he remembered. In a trance, he seemed to see her sitting by the railing with a charming smile. He wanted to chase after her, but in a blink she was gone again, leaving only overwhelming loss and desolation.

He sat at her writing desk, stroking each piece of her writing materials one by one. The brushes and inkstones were smooth and warm, as if they still held her scent. After wandering about for a while, he went to the eastern side hall. The furnishings were unchanged—the color of the curtains was something she had chosen with him, and the pattern on the screen, whether peonies or butterflies, she had deliberated over for quite some time back then.

His body was much worse now. The dull pain in his chest had become more severe since her death, sometimes suddenly attacking and leaving him unable to breathe. Moreover, walking just a few steps tired him, because his daily food intake was only enough to sustain life—he couldn’t swallow even one bite more.

He sat on the couch to rest, and when he had recovered his strength, went to the dressing table. The mirror reflected a stranger—no longer distinguished, just skin and bones. He even pondered for a long time who this person might be. When he finally recognized himself, he realized: “So ugly—no wonder you won’t come find me…” He smiled and picked up her comb, holding it reverently in his palm. “Wanwan, where have you traveled to now? Wait for me before crossing the Bridge of Helplessness—don’t forget me.”

What he feared most was not being able to catch up, but the tomb wasn’t finished yet, and he wasn’t at ease. In this world, who else could be trusted? Before departing for war, he thought she wouldn’t be lonely. Only at the end did he understand—the only person she could ever rely on was him alone. If he weren’t there, she would probably be left with no one to care about her again.

The boundless loneliness she had endured, he finally tasted in full. The coldness of human relationships—he talked constantly of loving her, yet in truth had done nothing for her. Unfortunately, this awakening came too late. No matter how much he regretted, there was no longer a Murong Jun in this world. She had let go of everything—she no longer valued him.

He sighed, hiding the comb in his sleeve, and turned to leave. Passing the treasure shelf, his sleeve caught on something. With a crash, a redwood box fell to the ground. Looking down, he saw pouches and sachets scattered everywhere—all in men’s styles.

His head buzzed. He stared for a long time, finally covering his face and collapsing.

The weather in May—how could it be bone-piercingly cold…