“Someone come — my stomach is in terrible pain! The pain is killing me!”

On the huanghua pear canopied bed, a shape bundled up like a silkworm chrysalis was rolling back and forth.

A’Xue patted the chrysalis with a look of deep distress. A pert little head popped out from within, round almond eyes wide open.

A’Xue shook her head.

Shen Zhuxi was so furious she nearly broke into the stream of curses she’d learned from Li Wu: “Your Highness” this and “Your Highness” that, and then when Your Highness has a stomachache they don’t even care — what kind of people are these?!

She threw off her covers, stuffed her feet into her embroidered shoes, and stood up with her heels still uncollapsed.

She opened the window — four guards outside stared at her.

She pushed open the door — two rows of guards outside stared back at her.

Fuming, Shen Zhuxi said without patience: “I said my stomach hurts — didn’t any of you hear me?!”

“In reply to Your Highness — tonight’s situation is unusual, and His Majesty expressly ordered that you may not go out or move around. Please remain calm, Your Highness. Come tomorrow morning, this subordinate will —”

“By tomorrow morning I’ll be dead from the pain!” Shen Zhuxi cut him off, bluffing with borrowed authority: “If anything happens to me, will Fu Xuanmiao let any of you off the hook?!”

The supervising squad leader dropped to his knees in consternation, tiny beads of sweat breaking out on his forehead.

“Your Highness, this subordinate truly cannot let you go out — please do not make things difficult for this subordinate…”

Shen Zhuxi was just about to speak again when a cool, composed voice rang out:

“All of you, stand down.”

Shen Zhuxi lifted her head abruptly. Fu Xuanmiao stood tall and straight in the archway of the courtyard, a few deferential-looking attendants behind him.

The two rows of guards at the door, relieved as condemned men who had just been pardoned, each bowed and withdrew with their heads lowered.

Fu Xuanmiao walked toward Shen Zhuxi, his unfathomable gaze fixed on her the entire time. Under this wordless pressure, Shen Zhuxi turned and fled back into the room, spinning around to slam the door shut behind her.

A sharp, fleshy sound rang out. The two door panels came down hard on a lean wrist, and the three cinnabar-like scars on that pale hand back were jarringly vivid.

Shen Zhuxi was startled by those three red marks and involuntarily released her grip.

The door that could not be fully shut naturally swung open, and Fu Xuanmiao’s calm, impassive face appeared behind it.

A’Xue instinctively stepped forward, then hesitated for a moment midway — and in the next instant, she rushed in front of Shen Zhuxi and pulled her behind her with one arm, like a mother hen shielding her chick, then dropped to her knees with a thud and began knocking her head repeatedly against Fu Xuanmiao’s boots, which were embroidered with flying dragons.

She could not say a single word, yet each knock of her head seemed to say: “Please spare the Princess —”

Shen Zhuxi’s tears surged up at once.

“Get up! You don’t need to beg him!” She fought desperately to pull A’Xue to her feet, but A’Xue’s knees remained firmly pressed to the cold floor.

Before long, A’Xue’s forehead had turned a frightening shade of red.

In the moment A’Xue knocked her head against the ground, Shen Zhuxi covered it with her own hand. The full force of the blow landed instead on the back of her hand. A’Xue let out a hoarse cry, finally stopped kowtowing, and hurriedly grabbed Shen Zhuxi’s hand to examine it, her face full of distress and guilty worry.

“What good does begging him do?! Even if you bashed your head to pieces, he wouldn’t care in the slightest!” Shen Zhuxi wept.

A’Xue made a series of sounds, shaking her head and pointing at Shen Zhuxi, as though trying to explain something.

“…But I care about her.” Fu Xuanmiao said.

He bent down to help Shen Zhuxi to her feet. She slapped away the supporting hand. The hand paused in mid-air for a moment, then, as it had done countless times before, withdrew in silence and calm.

Shen Zhuxi supported A’Xue and stood up on her own.

“You, go outside.” Fu Xuanmiao said to A’Xue, but his gaze was fixed on Shen Zhuxi.

A’Xue shook her head repeatedly, but in the next moment Yan Hui walked in, and without giving A’Xue any choice, “escorted” her out of the bedchamber.

“What do you want?” Shen Zhuxi took a step back, wiping away her tears with one hand while watching him with full wariness.

“Didn’t you say your stomach was in unbearable pain?” Fu Xuanmiao walked one step closer, his expression perfectly calm. “Let me take a look.”

“Don’t even think about it!” Shen Zhuxi said. “Men and women must observe propriety — how could I possibly let you ‘take a look’?”

“Men and women observe propriety, but degree of familiarity differs. You and I are betrothed, and once we return to Jianzhou, we will choose a date and wed. How can we be compared to ordinary men and women?”

“You can give up that dream — I am already a married woman. Even if you kill me, I would never marry you!” Shen Zhuxi said furiously.

“Xi’er…” Fu Xuanmiao said.

“Don’t call me that!” Shen Zhuxi recoiled as though she had been licked by something repulsive, retreating another step in full-body revulsion.

“…Do you despise me that much?”

Fu Xuanmiao halted in the moonlight.

The long, slanted band of light fell over his tall, slender silhouette. The moonlit reflection, bright as rippling water, left the faint, fleeting vulnerability in his eyes with nowhere to hide.

“Why would you rather give yourself to a man of lowly common birth and not spare me a single glance?”

“What does birth matter?” Shen Zhuxi glared at him with a sharp gaze. “Character matters a hundred times more than birth. If a person is born of noble origins yet has vile character, then he is more contemptible than the lowly person born of base origins — because baseness did not choose him. He chose baseness.”

“…You don’t mind that he is of common, even base birth?” Fu Xuanmiao watched her, his voice dropping to something barely above a murmur.

“In your eyes, perhaps I am nothing more than a sheltered, pampered princess you can mold as you please — ignorant of the world, easy to reshape according to your desires, your disregard for my own will as you try to make me into whatever form you wish… But no matter how ignorant I may be, I know well enough that a true hero is not judged by his origins.”

Shen Zhuxi’s gaze was resolute as she said once more:

“Character is a hundred times more important than background… You were raised in a family of ministers and generals, well-read in the classics — and what of it? You have your fine clothes and rich food, your fine carriages and treasure horses, free from the daily worry of earning a livelihood. The strength your origins spared you — not a shred of it has been spent on those close to you or on the welfare of the nation. Instead you have spent it entirely on self-pity and resentment —”

“Silence!” Fu Xuanmiao’s expression darkened.

“Silence?” Seeing his face change, Shen Zhuxi actually laughed. “…You call yourself a loyal subject of Great Yan, yet you speak disrespectfully to Great Yan’s own princess. So you’re not performing the role of the realm’s greatest gentleman anymore?”

“…”

“Aren’t you exhausted, wearing that mask of yours all the time?” Shen Zhuxi said with mockery.

“…Xi’er, do not anger me any further.” Fu Xuanmiao said.

Knowing she had stepped on Fu Xuanmiao’s absolute limit, Shen Zhuxi sensibly held her tongue at once. Taunting someone into recklessness — that was something she had always known better than to do.

After a moment of silence, Fu Xuanmiao walked toward her. Shen Zhuxi retreated warily, step by step, until once again she was backed into a corner.

Having learned her lesson from last time, Shen Zhuxi now found herself not only unable to escape — every object within sight that could conceivably serve as a weapon had been removed without exception. Never mind blades and swords, she could not find so much as a shard of porcelain, and even the hairpins on her head had all been replaced with ivory and sandalwood.

“I know.” Fu Xuanmiao stopped before her, his dark eyes looking deep into hers.

“…”

Shen Zhuxi said nothing, on absolute guard against his every movement.

“…I have known for a long time,” he said in a low voice. “In my eyes, you are not merely an ignorant, pampered princess. What I feel for you…”

Fu Xuanmiao stopped. Something hard seemed to be blocking the words he wanted to lay bare.

After a brief pause, he seemed to make up his mind. He raised his eyes to meet Shen Zhuxi’s gaze and opened his mouth —

“Urgent report! Your Majesty! Urgent dispatches from Xiangzhou and Jianzhou!”

A frantic, panicked cry cut off Fu Xuanmiao’s words.

His expression shifted. What he had been about to say was pressed back down once more.

“What is it?” Fu Xuanmiao turned and walked out. Yan Hui and a figure who appeared to be a courier both knelt down together.

“A military rebellion has broken out in Xiangzhou — Military Governor of Zhenshan Li Ping has died by his own hand. The rebel forces of Xiangzhou and Jinzhou have joined together and surrounded Jianzhou in a single stroke!”

Fu Xuanmiao asked: “What is the situation inside Jianzhou?”

“Opportunistic merchants have seized the moment to hoard goods and drive up prices — grain prices within the city have skyrocketed and the people are in a panic —”

The enemy’s misfortune was Shen Zhuxi’s joy. The news burst before her eyes like a firework, and she could not suppress the delight breaking across her face.

“Urgent report! Urgent dispatch from the front lines!” Yet another courier came sprinting in. At some distance from Fu Xuanmiao, he dropped to his knees with a thud and said in a trembling voice: “The enemy forces outside the city are beating war drums and demanding that His Majesty enter negotiations — otherwise… otherwise…”

“Speak.” Fu Xuanmiao’s voice was dark.

“Otherwise… once the city falls, all family members of officials of the fifth rank and above within Jianzhou will be… put to death to the last person…”

Fu Xuanmiao’s expression changed entirely.

From outside Northern Spring Garden came the faint sound of a clamoring crowd. Shen Zhuxi strained to listen, and could make out only a repeated, rising tide of “Your Majesty.”

Fu Xuanmiao looked toward Yan Hui, who lowered her head and said with an uneasy expression: “Those are the court officials from Jianzhou currently in Jinhua City… after hearing the news from Jianzhou, they have all rushed here to seek an audience with Your Majesty…”

Silence fell over the courtyard.

In a flash of sudden clarity, Shen Zhuxi connected the pieces of the Qingfeng Army’s entire strategy. Their siege was real — but what they were truly besieging was not Fu Xuanmiao and Jinhua City. It was the undefended Jianzhou.

It was abundantly clear that the coalition army had already gained the upper hand. Not wanting to draw attention at this moment, Shen Zhuxi quietly began retreating toward the room — but Fu Xuanmiao’s sharp, penetrating gaze swept toward her. In a cold voice he said: “Bring Her Highness along. Come with me to the city wall.”

Shen Zhuxi was forcibly “escorted” out of Northern Spring Garden. The moment the red lacquered gates swung open, the officials outside all dropped to their knees in a sweeping wave, and with one voice implored Fu Xuanmiao to enter negotiations with the Qingfeng Army.

Fu Xuanmiao paid them no heed. He took Shen Zhuxi and got into the carriage. On the road toward the city gate, he said not a single word, his expression icy cold.

Terrified of provoking him and walking into trouble, Shen Zhuxi likewise said nothing, but her thoughts were racing anxiously over whether Li Wu’s plan would go smoothly.

The carriage halted behind the city gate. Fu Xuanmiao stepped out first. This time, he made no move to offer his hand. As Shen Zhuxi descended, she could only see his figure, surrounded by the press of people, walking up toward the battlements.

Ten or so guards with threatening stares stood in a ring around her with hands on their sword handles. Shen Zhuxi dragged her feet, reluctant and unwilling, and followed them up onto the city wall.

The clear autumn moon hung high in the desolate night sky, its pale, dim band of light cast over every head.

After Fu Xuanmiao appeared on the battlements, a familiar, tall figure stepped out from the coalition army below. Shen Zhuxi could not help but press close to the half-man-high stone parapet, gripping the edge tightly with both hands, watching as Li Kun summoned his breath from deep within his core and bellowed out, in a voice like a great bell, the words the person beside him had given him:

“Fu Xuanmiao! Your family home is done for — for — for —”

The many officials on the battlements wore unpleasant expressions and all lowered their heads, studying their own noses.

“Fu Xuanmiao! Give back this old man’s— ow!” Li Kun received a kick from behind. The person next to him, in a manner Shen Zhuxi recognized well, grumbled and cursed a few words. Li Kun rubbed his backside, then shouted again: “Give back my little piggy— ow! Give back my sister-in-law, and come back here!”

“Otherwise, all family members of officials of the fifth rank and above inside Jianzhou City, men and women, old and young, will all lose their lives! Your Empress Dowager mother — this old man is going to invite her to Yangzhou for a cup of tea too!”

Shen Zhuxi, who had been holding back tears, could no longer help but laugh.

Through the glimmer of her tears, she looked at the man she had pledged her life to. His radiant, glowing face was like a brilliant ray of golden sunlight — cutting through the pale, frantic lunar shadows, illuminating her world.

Then suddenly, her smile froze.

A hand closed around her throat from behind.

Fu Xuanmiao’s slender fingers gripped her neck firmly, pressing down on her windpipe beneath her skin. Shen Zhuxi’s breathing became labored. She struggled with all her might but could not free herself from that iron-clamping hand.

Fu Xuanmiao did not look at her.

He still stood tall and straight, refined as a jade tree. The night wind gently stirred his robes, like wind through an empty valley, sending up a sound like a mournful sigh.

He gazed at Li Wu below the city wall and said:

“Do you still feel, right now, that victory is within your grasp?”