In the cold night of late autumn, in the silent courtyard, there was only the rustling sound of wind blowing through the leaves, desolate as if he were the only one left in this world.

Though he could no longer feel the cold, Hu Hai still tightened the fox fur cloak around himself, because he felt that even the inside of his body had frozen stiff.

Look, even his hands and feet wouldn’t obey him. He clearly wanted to go inside to rest, yet he still sat under the corridor without moving.

Hu Hai didn’t know how long he had been confined in this courtyard. The rising and setting of the sun and moon were nothing unusual to him, and he couldn’t feel the warmth or cold brought by changing seasons.

He had grown accustomed to obeying Zhao Gao’s arrangements since he was still the most favored young prince of the Qin Dynasty. He had long since lost the courage to resist, which now left him unable to dare take even half a step away from here.

In the long years, Hu Hai had long since learned how to dispel loneliness. Unknowingly, he had emptied his thoughts and begun to daydream, until a bewitching crimson butterfly appeared in his field of vision.

Hu Hai immediately snapped back to attention, staring in shock at the crimson butterfly dancing gracefully in the night sky.

What shocked him wasn’t seeing a butterfly in late autumn, but that Zhao Gao had imprisoned him in this courtyard with a special barrier. Not only could he not leave freely, but even creatures from outside couldn’t approach.

He had never seen such a beautiful butterfly in the courtyard, let alone one that, under the reflection of the corridor wind lantern, seemed to glow with magnificent fluorescence all around its body, like a flame burning in the night sky, so dreamlike it almost seemed like his hallucination.

Hu Hai stared blankly at this fire butterfly. This crimson fire color reminded him of Minghong, whom he hadn’t seen for so long. He unconsciously reached out his hand, trying to let the fire butterfly land on it, but the fire butterfly gracefully turned and flew toward the corridor.

Unwilling to give up, Hu Hai clumsily climbed to his feet. His legs, already stiff from the cold, could barely bend, and he staggered two steps before slowly recovering. He noticed the fire butterfly was flying toward the interior of the house, and remembering that Sun Shuo was still there, he suddenly felt something was amiss.

Where was Sun Shuo? Only now did Hu Hai realize something was wrong. He had stayed outside too long tonight, yet Sun Shuo hadn’t come to find him and persuade him to go rest.

He felt both relaxed and fearful. Heaven knew how ridiculous this was—Sun Shuo was clearly his attendant, yet he was the one who had to fear the other. Though Sun Shuo had never been disrespectful to him, those chilling gazes and smiles always made him shudder whenever he encountered them.

The red little figure of the fire butterfly suddenly turned a corner at the end of the corridor and immediately disappeared.

Hu Hai had no time to think further and stumbled after it. The courtyard where he was imprisoned actually had some scale to it, and to avoid Sun Shuo, he had chosen a secluded place to daydream. Hu Hai walked along the corridor for quite a distance, intermittently catching glimpses of the fire butterfly’s figure, until he finally saw it flash into the main house where lights were still burning.

The main house’s door was opened just a crack, and he could vaguely see someone kneeling in front of a screen inside. With their head lowered, their face couldn’t be seen clearly.

Hu Hai looked left and right through the door crack and discovered that in the vast hall, besides this intruder, Sun Shuo was standing in a corner where the lamplight couldn’t reach, motionless like a true human puppet.

“Since you’ve returned, come in,” the man said without raising his head, yet still sensing Hu Hai’s presence.

The moment Hu Hai heard the other’s voice, he froze in place.

It was actually Zhao Gao.

His mind went blank for an instant. When Hu Hai came to his senses, his body had already acted before his reason, obeying Zhao Gao’s command and automatically pushing open the door to enter.

Due to fear, his hands were trembling unconsciously. Hu Hai had imagined countless times how he should face Zhao Gao when they met again. He couldn’t help but touch the dagger hidden at his right waist, but felt that even if this sharp blade pierced Zhao Gao’s chest, it might not successfully kill him.

After all, to some degree, they could no longer be considered normal humans.

“Chancellor, what is the meaning of imprisoning me here?” Hu Hai took a deep breath, trying to make his tone sound firm, but the effect wasn’t good.

Zhao Gao, sitting in front of the screen, raised his head. When Hu Hai saw his appearance, he involuntarily stepped back. In the dim lamplight, Zhao Gao’s bewitching eyes were like a demon crawling out from the abyss—the sudden sight was truly heart-stopping.

“Just now, I went to see your imperial brother,” Zhao Gao didn’t answer Hu Hai’s question, but instead brought up another topic as if casually. “Well, your imperial brother didn’t ask a single word about you. He should be able to guess that you’re in my hands, right? Truly worthy of being the Great Qin’s eldest prince—such composure.”

“What are you planning to do to my imperial brother?!” Hu Hai immediately stepped forward two paces, demanding with false bravado.

The fire butterfly flew around the hall once before finally landing on Zhao Gao’s fingertip, intimately caressing with its antennae. A glimmer of light flashed in Zhao Gao’s cold gaze, but his voice remained flat and calm: “What could I do to the eldest prince? I merely gave him a pair of Candle Dragon’s Eyes. Such wonderful things—you wouldn’t have forgotten them, would you?”

Upon hearing this, Hu Hai’s mind was severely shaken.

Candle Dragon’s Eyes—of course he knew what those were!

A pair of jade spheres that could see the past and future!

Those weren’t treasures! They were evil objects that could drive people to despair!

The culprits behind all tragedies!

Hu Hai painfully covered his head, curling up powerlessly on the ground. He hated his helpless self but was powerless to change it.

Back then, after obtaining that pair of Candle Dragon’s Eyes, he was overjoyed, feeling that the entire empire was in his hands.

Through the black Candle Dragon’s Eye, he could see others’ pasts that he wanted to see, grasping all their weaknesses one by one.

Through the yellow Candle Dragon’s Eye, he saw a future where he would ascend the throne and become ruler of all under heaven.

Later, he did indeed sit upon that dragon throne, just as he had seen through the Candle Dragon’s Eyes.

However, the Candle Dragon’s Eyes couldn’t reveal all futures. He hadn’t seen that his imperial brother would die because of this, nor that the Great Qin Empire would be destroyed in his hands within just a few years.

Initially, he hadn’t wanted to inherit the throne and had tried to resist, to prevent the future shown by the Candle Dragon’s Eyes from coming true. But no matter how hard he tried, the future always appeared before him exactly as the Candle Dragon’s Eyes predicted, without exception.

Gradually, he gave up struggling. Regardless of whether he acted or not, the future would be the same anyway.

His life hadn’t been lived under his own consciousness. He was like a marionette, covered in strings, controlled by so-called “fate,” like prey bound in a spider’s web, unable to struggle or escape.

“That kind of… that kind of evil object that bewitches hearts… how can you give it to my imperial brother…” Hu Hai said through gritted teeth. He raised his head to stare at Zhao Gao, his crimson pupils almost ready to drip blood.

Zhao Gao picked up the fire butterfly from his fingertip and directly threw it into the oil lamp beside him.

With a sizzling sound, the flame on the oil lamp shot up more than a foot high, quickly devouring the fire butterfly completely.

Hu Hai’s breathing stopped. How could he have forgotten that the man before him had always viewed all things in the world as mere straw dogs, killing and discarding at will.

Zhao Gao didn’t feel there was anything shocking about what he had done, asking in a tone without any fluctuation: “Since you say those are evil objects that bewitch hearts, were you bewitched by them?”

Hu Hai lowered his eyelids. His silver-white eyelashes trembled a few times as he silently acquiesced.

“Back then, I was very curious whether someone as pure and noble as the eldest prince would also be bewitched by the Candle Dragon’s Eyes.” Beside the dancing flames, Zhao Gao’s smile was reflected in shadows and light, appearing extremely eerie. “Now I finally have the chance.”

Hu Hai collapsed on the ground, once again hating his own powerlessness.

Minghong held a blue-green point of light in its beak, occasionally spitting it out, then swallowing it again when the other tried to escape, playing with great delight. The blue-green light was toyed with until its glow dimmed, looking as if it would truly dissipate into the air soon.

Nearby, Fu Su sat motionless at the edge of the high-rise rooftop with his eyes closed. Minghong had long grown accustomed to Fu Su’s appearance—throughout this night, Fu Su had been continuously opening and closing his eyes, his expressions changing unpredictably.

However, this time when Fu Su opened his eyes again, the expression on his face was indescribably complex.

Minghong immediately lost interest in toying with the blue-green light. Holding the spirit of the green stone tablet, it hopped onto Fu Su’s shoulder seeking comfort.

This time, however, Fu Su didn’t reach out to comfort it, but instead fell into deep thought.

The scene he had just witnessed through the Candle Dragon’s Eyes truly shocked Fu Su immensely.

The futures predicted by the Candle Dragon’s Eyes became clearer and more complete the closer they were in time. But if one wanted to see more distant futures, the images became blurry and intermittent.

The last scene he saw should have been the same kind of night as now, or perhaps a room without much lighting. Only brief fragments, but enough for Fu Su to see clearly what happened.

He had actually seen Bi holding a sharp blade, expressionlessly stabbing it into the doctor’s chest.

…

This should be the reason why Zhao Gao had given him the Candle Dragon’s Eyes to see.

…

Fu Su sighed deeply and looked up at the night sky.

Stars shifted and seas changed.

More than two thousand years had passed, yet the stars overhead still twinkled as before. Even if there were slight changes, they weren’t very obvious. Fu Su quickly confirmed the current time through the positions of the constellations.

It wasn’t too late yet. Though he had looked at many future scenes through the Candle Dragon’s Eyes, in reality, only a very short time had passed.

Fu Su picked up the Candle Dragon’s Eyes again, but this time, it wasn’t the yellow one.

“Is the future truly unchangeable? I don’t quite believe that…” Fu Su’s murmur finally dissipated in the bitter night wind.

The doctor was very irritated. This kid Tang Yuan had actually let a stranger into their home without any wariness! No matter how eloquently Tang Yuan spoke, the doctor had made up his mind not to believe him anymore! Tomorrow! Tomorrow he would send this kid to school! Let the teachers properly discipline him!

The doctor lectured Tang Yuan for over an hour, finally nagging him into nodding and admitting his mistakes before letting him go rest. Just as he was about to wash up and sleep himself, he heard the doorbell ring.

Looking at the clock on the wall, it was almost 2 AM.

Could it be that fellow who left earlier had returned? Earlier, before he could react, the man had left in a hurry, and he hadn’t had time to interrogate his identity!

Thinking this was possible, the doctor didn’t even look through the peephole and eagerly opened the door.

There was no one outside the door, but the doorbell was still ringing.

Only a black jade sphere lay alone on the ground.

The doctor stepped back, his first thought being whether this might be a bomb.

But then he laughed at himself for being so jumpy—bombs didn’t look like this anymore.

How strange. Who exactly had placed this black sphere at his door?

Speaking of which, that person who came to his house earlier seemed somehow familiar, as if he’d seen him somewhere…

The doctor went out and looked left and right, confirming the hallway was empty, before bending down with a puzzled expression to pick up the jade sphere.

The moment his finger touched the black jade sphere, it emitted a blinding light. A vertical pupil suddenly appeared in the center of the black sphere, like a monster opening one eye.

Holy crap! Could this really be a bomb?!

The doctor instinctively closed his eyes.