The moon was swollen and red, hanging low in the sky like a silent on. It cast no warmth, only a cold silver light that stretched across the cracked stone path as Hua Jing sprinted eastward, her breath short, her heart louder than her footsteps.
The vial of poison clinked softly inside the sash at her waist. Every ti she heard it, she felt like she might scream.
Gu Wei.
That was the na Zhao Ling Xu had whispered. A reclusive healer in the Third Province, east of the palace. East. East.
She didn’t know what distance it ant in this world. This world, where carriages were rare luxuries and horses were bound to the military. This world, where narrow paths wound like veins between sleeping villages and ghost-quiet forests. This world she was still learning how to survive in.
She gripped the fabric of her robes tighter and kept moving.
The streets were nearly empty. The capital was in mourning.
Every step forward seed to echo through an empire holding its breath.
There were no laughing rchants. No gossiping won sweeping their storefronts. No children chasing chickens through the dust. The silence wasn’t peace—it was fear.
And guilt.
The emperor—dead.
The crown prince—presud dead.
And the throne—already poisoned by ambition.
Hua Jing didn’t need to hear the drums of war or the clash of steel to know sothing terrible was coming. The quiet told her enough.
She passed an alleyway, dimly lit by the orange flicker of a dying lantern. Five figures stood huddled beside a stack of overturned crates and broken baskets. One man clutched a broom like it was a spear.
"...he was the last good one," the broom-holder whispered, voice trembling.
A second man, his clothes patched and hands dirt-stained, nodded. "He used to walk among us, rember? Said the market radishes were too sour and laughed with Madam He about her burnt buns."
"He didn’t just rule," said a third, an older woman, her back bent with age, "he listened. Even to us."
A fourth one, a boy no older than sixteen, kicked a pebble into the darkness. "And now? Now they say Prince Zhao Yan’s gone too. He was supposed to be like him. Better, even."
A fifth leaned in close, eyes darting up and down the alley. "Don’t say that too loudly. The new ones? They’ve got ears like snakes."
"But it’s true," the first man muttered, looking around. "What kind of gods take both the emperor and the crown prince in the sa season? And leave... that thing in their place."
They all went silent. One of them spat on the ground.
Then ca a softer voice—maybe the woman again. "We’re dood. If Zhao Yan’s really dead, we’re finished. Pei Rong’s not a ruler, he’s a butcher with a crown."
They paused again. Then the boy added, "The coronation’s in two days. We won’t see another new year."
The broom-holder looked up, squinting into the shadows. "Keep your heads low. Don’t talk about this again."
And then, just like that, the group scattered, slipping into the dark like frightened mice.
Hua Jing didn’t move until they were gone.
She had pressed herself into the shadows, just inches away. Every word had landed like a stone in her gut. She had never known the forr emperor. Never seen what kind of man Zhao Yan had been to the people before they transmigrated into this cursed world. But now—
Now she understood.
He had been more than a prince. He had been their hope.
And now that hope was bleeding out sowhere beyond the palace gates.
If she failed... they would not only lose a crown. They would lose their last chance at peace.
Her feet moved again, faster now. No more hesitation. No more second guessing.
Zhao Yan had always been calm, stubbornly composed—even when he woke up in this world, dazed and confused like her. He had adjusted faster than her. Carried himself with a quiet strength, even when he didn’t yet know the customs or the ancient titles, or the crushing weight of seven wives and a scheming court.
He had joked once, in a hushed whisper beneath silk covers, that transmigrating as a prince was better than waking up a beggar.
But now, he wasn’t a prince.
He was a hunted ghost, and if she didn’t reach Gu Wei before midday tomorrow, he’d be a real one.
She clutched the fabric of her sleeve, trembling. "You idiot," she whispered to herself, "why did you get yourself poisoned? Why did you go alone?"
But she already knew why.
Zhao Yan had gone to investigate the Cold Palace. To find answers about the emperor’s death. To challenge Pei Rong. And he had paid the price.
Her legs burned. Her lungs scraped. Still, she didn’t stop.
The road forked ahead—left, toward the rchant quarter, now dark and locked up, and right, toward the outer gates. She took the right, ducking past a silent shrine where incense sticks were still burning low in the offering bowl. Soone had been praying recently.
Maybe for safety.
Maybe for revenge.
She prayed too—but not with words.
She prayed with movent. With action.
With the promise that she would not let Zhao Yan die in this world, no matter what fate had planned for them.
They hadn’t co all this way—through death, through another world, through seven twisted palace wives—for nothing.
Hua Jing vanished into the fog of the eastern road, where the city ended and the unknown began.
Sowhere beyond the hills was Gu Wei.
Sowhere beyond that was her prince.
And she would find them both.
Even if it ant tearing through heaven and earth with her bare hands!
anwhile, back at the palace...
The chamber reeked of mildew, rust, and sothing worse—blood long dried into the cracks of the stone floor.
Water dripped steadily from sowhere above, the sound maddening in its rhythm. One... two... three...
Then ca the splash.
Xia Lin’s body was hauled upward again—soaked to the bone, lips purple, eyes fluttering sowhere between life and death. Her wrists were tied tight with cords that had long since rubbed her skin raw. The weight of her drenched robes clung to her like chains, heavy and suffocating.
She coughed—weakly. Then went still.
"Start talking," a hoarse voice snarled.
Five n stood around her, each one uglier than the last—scarred, scowling, shadows painted across their faces from the single flickering lantern overhead. Their armor was mismatched, their eyes cold. rcenaries. The kind Pei Rong paid handsoly to do his dirty work.
"She was here," growled the tallest one. "Her courtyard slled of perfu and poison. But the bird flew. You—" he stepped forward and jabbed a finger at Xia Lin’s face, "you know where she went."
Xia Lin didn’t respond.
Her lips were split. Her breathing shallow. But her eyes—those eyes still burned.
"She’s just a maid," one of them muttered. "Barely more than a girl. She’ll break."
Another splash. They dropped her again.
The water closed over her with a gurgling rush.
Ten seconds.
Fifteen.
Twenty.
They hauled her back up.
She choked, coughing up water, hair plastered to her face, arms trembling from exhaustion. Still, she didn’t speak.
"Stupid girl," soone hissed.
"She’s loyal," said another, with a smirk that didn’t reach his eyes. "Loyal little dog."
He stepped closer, sneering.
"You think we won’t kill you? You think your silence is so grand act of bravery?"
Still nothing.
Xia Lin lifted her head, just barely, and rasped, "Even if you kill ... I will never say where my lady is."
Her voice was a whisper, but it echoed in the chamber like a scream.
"You can break my bones, drown , burn ," she said through gritted teeth, "but I won’t betray her. Never."
The smirk twisted into a snarl.
"You little—!"
He surged forward, hand outstretched, ready to strike, to tear, to make her regret every word.
But then—
BOOM.
The doors to the chamber burst open with a force that slamd them into the walls.
The flas of the lanterns flared wildly in the sudden gust of air.
The n turned, startled, drawing blades from their belts.
A figure stood in the doorway, cloaked in black from head to toe.
Tall. Silent.
His face was hidden behind a carved mask the color of ash.
No insignia. No na. No allegiance.
Just presence.
Heavy. Ominous.
The masked figure didn’t speak. He didn’t have to.
The temperature in the room seed to drop. Even the rcenaries—hardened killers—froze, instinct telling them what their mouths couldn’t say:
They were in danger.
Real danger.
The figure moved, his presence ominous among these cold walls.
His footsteps seed heavy yet he had already reached where they were in just a few steps.
One of the bandits stood up and walked towards him, he raised his fingers and pointed accusingly,
"You, what do you think you are doing here? Do you think k this is just a place for soone like you to be in? Who left you in?"
The black figure did not speak which made the bandit angry. He took out his sickle and held it in the air while shouting,
"You arrogant jerk—"
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