Chasing Dreams - Chapter 6

Chapter 6

Everyone waited upon Tilan and Ji Chang as they mounted their horses, and the soldiers reorganized their ranks, preparing to hurry back to the Chiran Bay dock before the sky turned completely dark.

Tilan unfastened the ceremonial sash from her shoulder and handed it to Gongye. The sea breeze suddenly rushed into her thin gauze dress, which was sprinkled with gold and red, making it look as though it might catch the wind and fly away like tumbleweed.

Gongye stared blankly at the bright blue frost-mist brocade sash in her hands, then suddenly burst into loud sobbing. She dropped the sash into the dust, grabbed the reins of Tilan's rock-antelope with both hands, and refused to let go, crying, "Your Highness, I will go with you!" Everyone was stunned, having no idea what had happened.

The girl on horseback was paler than Gongye, but she smiled faintly and shook her head, asking, "Gongye, have you ever lied to me?" Gongye choked back a sob and shook her head.

"Then have I ever lied to you?" Tilan asked again.

Gongye said nothing, only shaking her head, her face covered in tear tracks.

"So, what use would it be for you to go? Let go." Tilan gave a bitter smile.

Yet Gongye clung desperately to the horse's reins and refused to release her grip. Tilan reached out, touched Gongye's slender and strong hands, gave them a very gentle squeeze, and suddenly raised the decorative thin golden whip in her hand, lashing it down fiercely across Gongye's hands.

Ji Chang could never have anticipated that Tilan possessed such great strength, and Gongye likely had not expected it either. Struck by a sudden wave of pain, her grip involuntarily loosened. With a backhand motion, Tilan delivered another lash to the horse's rump, and the agile rock-antelope broke free from the crowd, galloping straight ahead into the pine forest behind the temple in the direction of the sea breeze.

Taken completely by surprise, the attendant ministers and soldiers scrambled to give chase, but the rock-antelope left them far behind in no time.

Just as Ji Chang was about to spur his horse after them, Tang Qianzi intercepted him, saying urgently, "I'll go!" Seeing the anxiety in his eyes, Ji Chang had no choice but to dismount and hand his riding crop over to him. Without a word of farewell, Tang Qianzi had already vanished into the distance like a wisp of smoke.

Deep within the dense, dark green forest, red and gold sleeves fluttered in the air. A chilly wind whistled past her ears, reminding Tilan of the fierce rain of arrows on the night of the Panxiao rebellion. Clenching her teeth to endure the pain of slender branches tearing at her skin—along with a blind terror—she simply wound the reins around her hands, lowered her body to hug the horse's neck tightly, and galloped forward. Rock-antelopes were intelligent and faithful creatures; as long as they went deep enough into the forest, the beast would lead her to a water source, to that legendary lake.

She heard the rustling of leaves and the roaring of wild beasts, but the rock-antelope was as swift as the wind, casting those terrifying sounds far behind in the blink of an eye as it leaped over low bushes and kept on running.

"Divine beings, if you still show me pity..." Tilan clutched the dragon-tail deity pendant at her chest, pressed her cheek against the horse's warm neck, and murmured a prayer.

The rock-antelope flashed through the thickets like lightning, broke through the barrier of vines, its hooves kicking up splashes of water at times and sending sparks flying against the flagstones of ancient ruins. Ever since leaving the temple, it had been heading steadily downhill, running onward as if without a moment's hesitation toward a path of destruction. Tilan sensed that the damp, cool air around her was continuing to chill, gradually condensing into dew; perhaps it was already night—or perhaps she was drawing closer to the lake at the heart of the island.

She heard someone calling her name far behind her in the distance.

He had nearly failed to find her.

The deeper they ventured into this forest, the denser and more terrifying the appearance of the trees became. The pine trees had long since vanished, replaced by thick, grotesque plants whose aggressive leaves and branches were inextricably tangled together with moss and creepers, defying identification by species or number like a multitude of struggling, swollen, vengeful ghosts that emitted a rotting stench. Tilan stood motionless at the end of the path, sitting so quietly upon her horse that she resembled a single drop of water, her entire figure buried within the eerie green miasma, her fresh bloodstains and slightly torn formal gown alike stained to a drab, ash-gray hue.

Hearing the sound of hoofbeats approach, she raised her face and smiled brightly. "You're here." With that, she nonchalantly turned the horse's head, gently nudged its flanks, and urged the rock-antelope forward once more.

Tang Qianzi spurred his mount past her, cut her off from the front, and grabbed the reins of her steed, saying, "Your Highness, come back with me." "It's too late, Zhenchu," Tilan smiled softly. "It's getting dark, isn't it? We've been out for a good two hours now. If we turn back, picking our way through the dark will only be slower, right as nocturnal beasts come out to hunt. The only path left is to keep going forward." "Going forward is a dead end as well. By now, they've probably entered the forest to look for us; we'd better turn back." Tilan shook her head. "Not far ahead is the lakeside. Wild beasts wouldn't dare approach the lake water at night." "Why?" He knitted his brows in confusion.

Tilan re-pinned the askew and slipping golden xieluo ornament at her temple. "Do you remember the story Gongye told? Fire-like xieluo flowers bloom along the lake's banks." With a light chuckle, she patted the horse's neck, and the creature trotted forward gracefully.

"What on earth are you trying to do?" he asked, verging on anger. "The lives of thousands of people outside are all tied to you!" But she did not answer him, merely turning back to flash a smile as dazzling as a wild rose blooming all along a spring meadow, radiant even in the gathering twilight. That smile reminded him of that night years ago when he had raised his saber against her, yet had ultimately failed to bring it down. He owed her a debt, even if she remained entirely unaware of it.

He sighed, chased after her once more, and took hold of her reins, saying, "I'll take the lead." The two rock-antelopes followed one after the other, vanishing into the deeper green mist.

The prison-like, gloomy green seemed to have no end, yet at some point, the scenery all around began to shift gradually. It was still green, but with a faint, fluorescent glow hidden within, as though countless tiny lamps had been lit behind the dense foliage. After another half-hour of travel, the very last trace of daylight was swallowed up, yet that cool, ghostly light illuminated their path the entire time.

Tang Qianzi caught sight of a flickering orange-red glow filtering through the distant tree gaps—undoubtedly firelight—only for it to vanish again as they drew halfway closer. He had no idea where he was heading, simply letting the two rock-antelopes take the lead as they descended a steep, sunken terrain. The crisp clatter of hoofbeats on the ground grew increasingly rapid until they were finally galloping side-by-side like a gust of wind. Amid the violent jolting, he gradually reined in his horse with one hand while refusing to let go of Tilan's reins with the other. Just as he was about to press his horse closer to pull Tilan over, he suddenly felt his body grow weightless as a sudden, massive force hurled him straight up into midair.

The two rock-antelopes leaped into the air one after the other, clearing dense bushes taller than a man in a single bound. Suddenly, a vast rush of light burst forth before him in the quiet night wilderness, dazzling his vision into temporary darkness.

Tang Qianzi slammed heavily back down into his saddle before tumbling off to one side and landing in the grass, where sharp blades scratched his face. Proppping himself up, he discovered that Tilan had also been thrown to the ground, with the upper half of her body slumped in the water. He hurried over, and just as he scooped her up by the shoulders, his hands froze in midair, unable to move another inch.

All around was dead silence, with night mists drifting like gauze.

Layer upon layer of dense forest crowded together, and at the lowest depression, a expanse of water suddenly opened up—a giant, pitch-black eye with which the gods gazed upon the starry night, crystal-clear yet profound, and vast enough to chill the heart. Thousands of tiny silver specks rose like steam from the surface of the water, drifting and soaring upward toward the heavens like smoke and down. Beneath the shimmering lake light pooled a thick, inky pool, as if burying unfathomable secrets.

The two rock-antelopes, likely parched from their long journey and unable to bear their thirst any longer, had already plunged straight into the lake before them and buried their heads to drink deeply.

Tilan reached out to cup the water. The surface of the lake was as dark as lacquer, reflecting the vault of heaven, yet the water itself was sparkling and immaculate. It leaked between her fingers with a clear, lonely echo. She laughed with irrepressible joy, like a carefree child. At last, she had found this legendary lake—the one rumored to possess hidden waterways connecting to the deep sea and burying countless treasures.

Across the vast, hazy ripples, a tiny spark of flame suddenly flared up on the opposite shore, its reflection weaving a path across the dark silver water straight to the center of the lake. In the blink of an eye, two or three more flames lit up in succession, shattering the shimmering halo of light.

Tang Qianzi suddenly yanked Tilan upward, dragging her back several paces away from the shore. By the light of those few distant flames, he spotted a faint ripple parting the surface of the water as it headed directly toward them.

It was a person, walking from the depths of the water toward the bank, gradually revealing a head, a neck, and a bare upper body.

"Zhenchu... what is it?" Tilan asked in a daze, sheltered within Tang Qianzi's embrace.

Tang Qianzi gave her no answer.

Blue-purple hair clung wetly to a chiseled cheek, and intricate tattooed patterns on the forehead wound all the way down below the eyes. The figure appeared quite young, with smooth muscles covered by slick skin that gleamed with the grayish-blue hue of a deep-sea fish. The build was slender and upright; with every step forward, it seemed as though the bow-spine of a purple spruce was flexing slightly, brimming with silent power.

Tang Qianzi expended all his strength to suppress the scream about to burst from his throat.

Those desperate sea pirates from the Eastern Land had no respect for the Dragon-Tail Deity; they would break into this dense forest, bite down on fish-bladder air sacs, and leap into the lake to dive toward their dreamed-of treasure vaults. Why some of them never returned; why others drifted to sea ports to live out their days in drunkenness and were soon found dead on the street corner of some early morning; why still others returned to their hometowns but could never again utter a single complete sentence—now he understood it all completely.

The lake bank shelved gently, and the gloomy water parted before that figure. As he drew closer step by step, he revealed the fish-tendon crossbow in his hand and the razor-sharp, steel-armor-like scales below his waist. He had no legs; the human torso gave way to a long, powerful dragon-tail that coiled upright against the ground, resembling the descendant of a dragon god from ancient mythology. Although the Eastern Land had never worshiped the merman race as deities, very few people had ever laid eyes upon their true appearance. Such unearthly beauty—when the ancestors of the Western Land, struggling to survive amidst wind and waves thousands of years ago, first witnessed it—could surely find no other name for it than the "Dragon-Tail Deity."

"What is that?" Tilan frowned, straining to listen to the sound of the water.

That entity, seemingly half-god and half-human, was now a mere twenty paces away from them.

Tang Qianzi calculated in his mind that the fish-tendon crossbow had a long range and immense power; launching a rash attack offered zero chance of success. Even if he managed to entangle the merman before him, Tilan was blind, and escaping on her own would be extremely perilous. For a moment, completely at a loss, he could only hug her and retreat another few paces. One of the rock-antelopes seemed to have quenched its thirst and was now leisurely wandering and grazing, drawing closer to them as if entirely oblivious to danger.

Seeing that Tang Qianzi intended only to retreat, the merman male advanced no further. He raised the crossbow in his hand toward his side, and with a sharp sound of breaking air, the other rock-antelope—still drinking by the lakeside—let out a pained shriek and collapsed dead, the arrowhead evidently poisoned. He then dragged his webbed, blue-green hand in an arc across the ground before him with an indifferent expression, as if drawing an absolute boundary of non-aggression, before twisting his dragon-tail and spinning around to head back into the lake. A moment later, the mirror-like lake was silent once more, the mountain forest drenched in ink; if not for the carcass of the horse lying dead in the water, Tang Qianzi would have almost thought it a dream.

The firelight on the opposite shore gradually died out, but all around, scattered points of light flared up one after the other—perhaps other mermans communicating with one another from afar.

With a soft hiss, the sound of firewood being ignited behind him chilled his heart once more. Tilan was initially startled, but a moment later, understanding dawned; overwhelmed with joy, she broke free from his arms and ran toward the sound.

A bright, dazzling flower of flame swayed in the wind, every petal and stamen vividly distinct, illuminating the iron-withered branches nearby. The tree was leafless, its branches straight and pointing toward the sky, sparsely dotted with fist-sized, pearly white buds that gleamed coldly in the firelight—upon closer inspection, they were coated in a layer of exceptionally thin ice shells.

Tilan let out a low gasp of wonder and reached out toward the melting warmth of the flame, only to instantly singe her fingers. With a sharp intake of breath, she pulled her hand back and gently blew on them.

"Tilan!" Tang Qianzi caught her hand, preventing her from getting any closer.

"Zhenchu, what does it look like?" Tilan asked without anger, turning her head back toward him with a radiant expression on her face.

Just as he was about to answer, she stood on tiptoe and childishly blocked his mouth with both hands, laughing, "No, don't tell me after all." Right at that moment, that flower of flame burned more fiercely than ever, growing too brilliant to look at directly. A sudden mountain gust swept past, and with a puff, the flame was extinguished. Within the scattering white smoke, its true form was revealed: a massive, pale-cyan flower whose overlapping petals formed the shape of a bowl, from which fine, moth-whisker-like stamens protruded.

Tang Qianzi caught a glimpse of the solid-gold makeup flower ornament at Tilan's temple and understood in an instant—that was xieluo, a strange flower whose petals, when dried and brewed into wine, could grant a single dream per blossom. What could not be obtained still could not be obtained, and what could not be kept could not be retained. This flower granted people a brief span of three hours, allowing them to relive within dreams those flashes of happiness and those faces too difficult to see ever again in this lifetime. Yet so many people were willing to pay an exorbitant price for it. This addictive, poison-like flower, paired with strong wine, day and night filled the bottomless voids within countless people's chests.

"Zhenchu, you said you would take me away." Tilan raised her deep, unseeing eyes as if looking right at him, or perhaps as if her gaze pierced right through him. The night wind carried the sound of distant flames crackling and leaping.

"I said it. One day, I will take you away." He gripped her shoulder reassuringly.

Her smile deepened, though her tone turned desolate. "That was something I forced out of you; perhaps you weren't truly willing." "Why say something like that?" he sighed.

She kept smiling. "I never imagined that things between you and me would turn out like this. When you first met me, you must have thought this child was such a nuisance, wanting nothing more than to dump me like unwanted baggage." Tang Qianzi was momentarily at a loss for words, but the river of flood memories had already broken its banks, roaring down from distant years.

Both of them had been so young back then. He was the eldest at sixteen, already bearing the weight of Ji Chang's and five thousand soldiers' lives on his shoulders, with nothing to rely on save the sword at his waist. Rain fell from a scarlet night sky, and fires blazed to the heavens, turning even the raindrops crimson. Fresh flesh and blood splattered across his face, gradually blurring his vision, but he had nowhere to retreat. Right behind him were eleven-year-old Ji Chang and six-year-old Tilan, two children trembling together.

People always said he had saved Tilan back then, but he knew very well that it wasn't him who had spared her life—it was merely his own useless shred of pity. He had never possessed any grand ambition of sacrificing himself to protect others; on that blood-soaked night filled with slaughter and conspiracy, in order to preserve himself and Ji Chang, he would have drawn his sword and struck down a hundred Tilan's without a second thought.

Caught in the violent vortex of a chaotic era, they were merely ants drifting with the current, far too frail to even protect themselves, clinging together simply to survive. He and Ji Chang were bound so tightly by fate's tether that they could not separate; calling it a fulfillment of duty was true, yet they understood with crystal clarity in their hearts that had it not been so, they could never have survived.

"Isn't that right, Zhenchu? You must have thought of me as dead weight back then." Tilan tilted her face up to him, asking with a playful smile.

He snapped out of it and said decisively, "No." Yet Tilan seemed startled by the answer, the smile fading from her face to reveal a look of desolate shock. Just as he reached out to take her hand, she turned around and walked away.

Beside that extinguished xieluo flower, a bud swelled slightly, fine snake-like cracks tracing across the thin ice frozen on its exterior. With a sharp crack, it began to tremble along with the pitch-black branches. After a moment of stalemate, the tip of the pristine white bud suddenly split open, tongues of flame licking out from within. Then the ice chips shattered and burst in all directions, and every single enclosed petal bloomed with dazzling brilliance, burning fiercely to emit intense light and heat.

Tilan reached out, touched the stem of the flower, and—disregarding the searing pain—snapped the blossom off into her hand. "Zhenchu, you know that people who cannot see hate nothing more than being lied to." He felt his entire body suddenly grow chillingly cold.

"I know you were only sixteen back then too, and afraid of death. You didn't know whose child I was, didn't want to be implicated, and were afraid I'd leak your whereabouts." She cradled that flame in her arms, yet kept her back turned to him, refusing to look back. What expression she wore, he could not see.

When Tang Qianzi spoke, managing only a single word, "I"—seeing her shake her head silently, he could go no further.

"I was still very young when I returned to the royal capital from Fengnan. You had your reasons for not daring to tell me. I was arrogant and domineering back then, naturally unable to understand your predicaments, and in my anger, I inevitably made things difficult for you. Later on, we gradually... grew closer. With things from so long ago, there's no need to dredge them up, is there? I've already figured out all the reasons for you, Zhenchu. I understand the logic of it all, but deep down, I still can't reconcile myself to it." There was a sour trace of tears in her voice, yet she could sense an oppressed tremor coming from the chest of the man behind her.

She abruptly spun back around, placed both hands on his cold, dry cheeks, and touched a tear at the corner of his eye that even he had been unaware of. Just a single tear, trembling on her fingertips.

Only then did Tang Qianzi realize that the core of the xieluo flower was actually brimming with crystal-clear night dew. The moment Tilan dipped her tear-stained fingertips into it, the dew transformed into molten silver, its white light intensifying as it pierced through the flames. The fire itself gradually grew dim and weak until it was finally extinguished, leaving behind only a glass-lamp-like blossom gently holding a pool of cold, clear green water.

Tilan suddenly jerked her head back as if about to drain it in a single gulp, but instead hastily poured that cup of night dew right over the center of her forehead. Water splashed in all directions like flying snow and mist, almost blurring her features. Even standing several paces away, Tang Qianzi could feel the bone-chilling cold. Yet Tilan did not flinch in the least, letting the night dew spill like a spring, flowing over her wide-open eyes and freezing into tiny, clear-blue ice beads on her eyelashes and hair before melting away in a flash.

Tang Qianzi vaguely sensed this was a terrifying transformation, yet he clung to a shred of wishful thinking, unable to believe it. He didn't even dare step forward to touch her; that resolute, lonely maidenly form seemed like a reflection in water, ready to shatter at the slightest touch.

She stood proudly upright for a long time, bearing water droplets on her butterfly-wing eyelashes as she blinked several times. Maintaining that stone-like, frozen posture, she simply stood there with her wide-open eyes turned toward the heavens. Tang Qianzi could only watch as she smiled silently, her expression utterly joyous, while tears streamed unchecked down her face.

Tilan lowered her head to survey her surroundings, her gaze lingering and greedy, as if she meant to capture the lake reflections, forest shadows, and fluttering flames before her into her very soul with her eyes.

At last, her gaze shifted back, fixing squarely upon him, unblinking.

For ten years of knowing each other, she had listened in the dark as his clear youthful tone steadily deepened into a warm, mature man's voice, like a hand reaching out from an iron cage to cup a handful of sunlight. She had imagined his appearance countless times, and traced his features countless times with her fingertips. His shoulders and spine were lean, unlike a military commander; he must have resembled a military official in armor, with an inherent heroic spirit naturally restrained between his brows, like the sharp edge hidden within a blade—revealing a flash of intimidating chill only at the moment of drawing.

This very scene, she had guessed and painted over and over again, like an oyster swallowing a grain of sand to polish it into a pearl, filled with deep-seated expectations and sweetness amidst the pain. She had imagined ten thousand scenarios, but never this one.

Her lover, always by her side yet never truly seen—upon laying eyes on him for the very first time in this lifetime, his expression was not his usual steady warmth, but rather guilt and recoil.

When Tilan spoke, her entire body trembled, yet her voice was astonishingly cold and steady.

"When I was eight years old, Gongye told me there was a strange rumor among the pirate villages: washing one's eyes with the night dew accumulated inside the core of a xieluo flower could restore a blind singer's sight and turn them back into an ordinary person. But as long as the xieluo is still burning, the dew cannot be extracted, and by the time it burns out naturally, the dew has long since evaporated. If you use water to extinguish the flame, the night dew washes away with it, and if you bury the xieluo in snow and ice, this proud flower instantly shrivels into a charred lump. There is only one way in the entire world to extinguish the xieluo's flame and preserve the night dew... funny to think, it takes a long-standing lie, coupled with a single tear from the liar." As the words "a lie" left her lips, Tang Qianzi's expression shook. Looking at him, Tilan felt even the ground beneath her feet begin to sway. This man before her—for all these years, whenever he and Ji Chang led her anywhere, no matter where they took her, she never asked and never felt afraid. Even if everyone in the world deceived and humored her, she had always believed that he alone told her the truth—she had always thought so. She reached out to hug her own shoulders, pressing so hard as if failing to do so might cause her body to collapse, as if letting go would scatter her whole being into ashes. Hearing her own voice, she was surprised; it sounded like another person outside herself, detached and calmly continuing her narrative.

"How absurd. True blind singers are exceedingly rare in this world, happening perhaps once a century. Those who achieve great fame and are treated with high honors by the royal court naturally have no desire to return to being ordinary; while those who remain unaware, quietly growing old in the countryside, likely never even heard of such a tale. Even if a blind singer willing to change back were to find the xieluo flower, what liar would ever be willing to accompany them there? From ancient times to the present, this legend has never once been proven true; it's practically absurdly remote. Yet I was someone destined to spend my entire life locked inside a dark room—even for a shred of light, a single thread of hope, I was willing to stake my life on it. By a fluke of heaven's fortune, I actually won my gamble—only I always assumed the liar's tear would be shed from my own eyes, never imagining it would be yours." She had never spoken so many words in one breath, nor had she ever imagined that ripping open an old scar with her own hands could be so bloodily exhilarating.

"For a full ten years, even while plotting against me, your kindness toward me wasn't necessarily all fake. But you never imagined that this little girl, kept completely in the dark, had actually been plotting against you all along. I kept my mouth tightly shut, and aside from Gongye, no one knew the truth, precisely to prevent others from obstructing us. Did you never wonder why, on a matter of life and death like this, I confided everything exclusively to you?" He smiled bitterly and nodded slightly. "Now I understand. Had I known you were a blind singer, I naturally wouldn't have kept it from Ji Chang. Given Ji Chang's temperament and ambition, he would have found every possible means to take you back to the Eastern Land for his own use. During the return journey to the Eastern Land, we would inevitably stop to make offerings to the gods—that was probably the only opportunity in your entire life to legally set foot on Minzhong Island. I always knew your mind was sharp, but I never imagined it had reached this extent." Tilan said word by word, "I will never dream again, Zhenchu. From this day forward, I am no longer a princess, nor am I any blind singer; I am simply myself, alone. Will you still go with me?" He hadn't expected her to suddenly ask this, and after a brief pause, he answered, "I will." The moment the words left his mouth, he knew he was wrong. How sharp a young girl in her teens was! That unconscious hesitation of his had already exposed the pretense of his words. He could only watch as her gaze gradually dimmed, finally turning ice-cold and beyond recovery.

"You had better return to your master's side." She refused to look at him again, her words laden with mockery. "I will never submit to being manipulated by you people." As night deepened, it was the prime hour for the xieluo flowers to bloom. The intertwined, swaying flames bathed the entire lake in a fiery, crystal-clear brilliance. Tilan turned her back and walked alone toward the depths of the gloomy tree shadows. She silently counted her own footsteps; every step she took felt like a bottomless chasm, layer by layer distancing those playful, laughing days far behind her.

Yet she heard him call her name: Tilan.

It was neither an explanation nor a defense, merely a call. In that tender and sorrowful tone, those two words pierced her heart like ten thousand arrows.

Her footsteps faltered, and then she began to run recklessly, as if chased by a ferocious beast. Dense leaves whipped against her body, stinging with every impact.

After a moment, she heard the sound of hoofbeats approaching like the wind, coming up beside her in the blink of an eye. She felt herself stepping into empty air as she was scooped up by the waist and placed in front of the saddle. Unable to break free, she acted swiftly, twisting around to draw Tang Qianzi's waist saber and slashing it wildly toward his throat, nearly shearing off half his jaw. Shocked, he reached out to snatch the blade back. Because the two of them were pressed close together and the blade was long, it violently slipped from their hands amidst the struggle, slashing a long, deep wound across his right knee with a swish. Blood instantly filled the gash and spilled over.

He gritted his teeth and said nothing, but she was frightened by her own actions. Taking advantage of her momentary daze, he retrieved the saber and sheathed it. Without even sparing a hand to control the reins, he simply clamped her tightly in his arms, allowing no room for struggle. Unable to bear the weight of them both, the rock-antelope slowed to a crawl, wandering aimlessly through the forest. Within the boundless, heavy darkness, the eerie green trees emitted a strange, faint glow.

At long last, she heard him say, "Go." She raised her eyes to look at him, her hostility gone, her face filled with alertness and suspicion.

Yet his expression was calm and unreadable as he slowly spoke, "If you go missing, even if they search the forest and fail to find you, they will inevitably seal off the port of Chiran Bay, and you still won't be able to leave. If you are determined to leave, you can only return with me, and we'll figure out a way to escape once the fleet reaches Quanming. Go anywhere you like, but you cannot stay in the Eastern Land. Whether it's King Xu or King Chang, whichever side finds you, you won't be able to leave." "And... what about you?" "I cannot leave Ji Chang at a time like this." "What kind of person Ji Chang is—could you possibly not know? Outwardly, he is so casual and easygoing, but in private, he hides nothing from you. Even a blind person like me can guess his ambitions. Even if I could bear to have Gongye sacrifice her life in my stead, if you return to Quanming and fail to meet me there, what will Ji Chang do to you?" Tilan's voice grew increasingly passionate. "He went through all this trouble simply to want a blind singer to strengthen his faction. Even if he can't have one, he certainly won't let me marry the Emperor—he needs to bide his time and keep a low profile, terrified that I might expose his true foundation." Tang Qianzi said indifferently, "Right now, besides me, he has no other military commander to rely on; he won't do anything to me." Tilan sneered, "Right now, yes. Once we return to the Eastern Land, will those sucking up to him be few? Your privately letting me go this time is an act of disloyalty toward him. Knowing what you do about his behavior over the past decade, he naturally guards against the possibility of you defecting to the new emperor. How can you know he won't resort to cooking the hound once the hare is dead?" He was silent for a moment before saying, "You don't need to worry about that." Tilan laughed out of extreme anger. "What did he promise you to make you disregard your life like this? A title of nobility, or a fifth of the realm? Knowing this, why put on those aloof pretensions during the martial exams back then?" He looked at her with a strange sorrow in his eyes. "I still have a mother in the Eastern Land. If I am branded a criminal, she will be implicated as well." Tilan was left speechless, her heart turning cold inch by inch as she finally understood. Whether for his mother, for Ji Chang, or for himself, Tang Qianzi could no longer be severed from the Eastern Land in this lifetime. He had to walk that path of brutal power struggles to the bitter end, with no end in sight; if he failed to make it out unscathed, everything would be lost.

And she was a crucial wedge in these elaborate schemes. If she pulled away and left, the whole game would be thrown into chaos, and Tang Qianzi would meet only a single end: death. He knew this well. Yet no matter what, she would never sit by and watch him die—this, too, he knew. His attitude of grievance and concession was built entirely on this certainty; no matter how she struggled, she could not escape the palm of his hand. This path was chosen by Ji Chang and him, yet it was meant to be walked with her bound alongside them. Even if she discarded the painful shackles of her innate talent, he still refused to set her free.

Tilan's face turned deathly pale. She almost raised her hand to strike him across the face, but instead clenched her fists at her sides, hissing in a voice near-silent, "Tang Qianzi, you are despicable!"

He turned his head away, unable to bear looking at her any longer. His heart churned with agonizing pain, yet he was as cold and clear-headed as frost. She would ultimately yield after all.

By the afternoon of the next day, the soldiers searching and advancing through the dense forest ran straight into Princess Tilan and General Tang. Only one of the two rock-antelopes remained; the princess rode upon it, the hems and edges of her gown slightly torn, yet still presentable. The young imperial guard general, however, bore a gruesome wound on his right leg. Because he had walked leading the horse for too long, his entire trouser leg and the binding bandages were soaked through with blood. Strangely enough, the eyes that the princess had been born blind with had somehow recovered their sight. The story went that she had fallen from her horse, struck the back of her head, and passed out cold, only to wake up able to see once more. Although the tale was peculiar, it was auspicious nonetheless. The princess's bondmaid, Gongye, had rushed forward, clinging to the princess's knees and sobbing uncontrollably. When the accompanying court ladies and eunuchs heard the news, they too wiped their tears repeatedly, calling it a miracle bestowed by the Dragon-Tail Deity.

That night, the royal fleet hoisted sails and weighed anchor, taking the Yingge Strait and heading northwest. Their lights shone brilliantly like a floating city upon the sea.

On the twenty-third day of the sixth month in the first year of Tianxiang, fifty giant ships sailed in single file into Quanming Port in Zhongzhou.

As the ships neared the shore, banners blotted out the sun near the docks, and magnificent canopies filled the air—it was the two legions of twenty thousand soldiers dispatched by Emperor Xu to welcome them. At the forefront of the crowd stood five hundred female officials, surrounding two sedan chairs.

Ji Chang stood by the ship's rail wearing a seven-treasure golden crown on his head and a crimson brocade court robe, the left shoulder embroidered with a lifelike golden qiu dragon—presenting an aura of supreme nobility. Gazing into the distance at the crimson-based sedan chair with its golden coiled dragons, he couldn't help smiling faintly to Tang Qianzi beside him. "Everything has changed, but this gadget certainly hasn't." Having been away from his homeland for a decade, Tang Qianzi felt a myriad of emotions, yet they were not enough to outweigh the anxiety and trepidation in his heart; he could only manage a strained smile.

The colors and craftsmanship of the sedan chair were supremely noble, second only to the imperial dark-based gold coiling-dragon chairs—identical to the one Ji Chang had ridden upon arriving in Quanming ten years ago. Because Tilan had not yet been formally conferred a title, her chair was merely jade-colored, woven with vibrant emerald peacock patterns.

Palace attendants inside the cabin emerged surrounding the princess. She wore a dress of gold, red, and peacock blue, draped from head to toe in eighteen layers of black gauze that concealed her hair and face down to her ankles to signify purity and tranquility. The edges of the black gauze were densely sewn with obsidian beads the size of beans; though tiny, each bead flashed with a seven-colored, hazy optical ring on both sides under the sunlight, resembling the shifting gaze of a beauty—what was commonly called "double rainbow eyes."

The gangplank was lowered, and court eunuchs rolled out a colorful felt rug trimmed with gold threads. Looking up from below, one could see the first to step down the stairs was a handsome, graceful young prince in red robes, followed by a slender, fragile maiden. Her body was enveloped in layers of dark gauze that fluttered like black clouds in the wind, beneath which peeked the dazzling crimson and emerald hems of her skirt—undoubtedly the Heqin princess of Zunian. At that moment, tens of thousands of people bowed and cheered, their joyous shouts shaking the earth.

Tang Qianzi followed closely behind Ji Chang, yet instinctively turned his head back to look toward the ship. Standing on the deck by the rail was a maid in gray-blue attire, her face shielded by a gauze screen. Seeing him turn back, she spun around and walked away, as if wishing to avoid meeting his gaze.

"Is that Tilan?" Ji Chang also turned to look, asking in a low voice.

Tang Qianzi nodded in silence. He had long held influence among the Eastern Land merchants, and had already entrusted a friendly fleet owner in Quanming to rent a small courtyard for Tilan, planning to take her there to live the moment she disembarked. The attendants arranged within the courtyard were also carefully chosen—every single one of them had a shady background yet was fiercely loyal, connections forged back in Bipolu years ago, quite capable of shielding her from prying eyes. Others would not see Tilan, nor could Tilan see others.

Ji Chang smiled, his gaze sweeping over the gauze-veiled maiden beside him. "And who are you? Gongye?" Across eighteen layers of veils, the maiden's demeanor was as serene as water, her head giving an imperceptible nod.

Female officials stepped forward to support the princess, surrounded by a crowd of attendants in layers of silk robes. In the blink of an eye, she was far away from them. Looking back from horseback, Tang Qianzi saw that Tilan, disguised as a maid, was no longer visible on the deck.

This departure marked the beginning of a journey through the red dust of the world.

The dowry brought by the Zunian princess was lavish and filled with countless rare treasures, now being continuously unloaded from the ships. Among them were twenty boxes each of six precious incense medicines: high-mountain blood amber, aloeswood, jiangzhen, frankresin, suhe, and musk beeswax; twenty boxes each of six varieties of rare jewelry: Yingge sea pearls, chrysoberyl cat's-eye stones, rose crystals, aquamarines, tourmalines, and diamonds—even the boxes were made of century-old ebony, worth more than gold. There were ten red and ten white coral trees, each standing a person's height; a hundred tridacna clam shell cups and dishes; a colorful glazed bed and a dressing table; twenty-four sets of hawksbill turtle shell pieces; one folding screen; twenty jars of refined rosewater; ten Dongling jade cooling mats; ten kingfisher-feather quilts; ten pure white rhinoceros horns; fifty pairs of elephant tusks; not to mention countless jewelry and garments.

The attendant ministers and palace staff tasked with managing the princess's dowry chests alone numbered three hundred, yet not a single one was brought into the inner city. The wedding-sending envoy was provisionally served by Prince Chang, and wet nurses and maidservants were entirely unused—the explanation being that many of the old staff who had served the late Empress Zixin, who passed away the previous year, still lingered in the Eastern Land and could all be summoned for service. The attitude was humble and yielding to the extreme. Only the inventory list, stretching some seven or eight feet long when counted in detail, matched down to the exact gift items of Princess Zixin's arrival ten years prior, carrying once again the rank of an empress.

Along the dozens of days of travel from Quanming to Tianqi, the newlywed bride observed fasting and silence, seeing no one else save for the nearly one hundred palace attendants and eunuchs who had originally served Zixin, along with a few female court officials from the Eastern Land.

On the nineteenth day of the seventh month in the first year of Tianxiang, in the Zichen Hall of the Tianqi Inner City, Prince Chang and the Zunian princess had their audience at court.

It was the height of summer, and outside the hall, the earth was bathed in a blinding, searing white glare. Ji Chang lowered his gaze to look at the imperial steps beneath his feet—that color, a red so vivid it bordered on the grotesque, seemed to swirl and writhe amidst the rising heat waves, preparing to devour anyone who approached. A scorching, fiery wind suddenly rushed forward, lifting the crimson court robes on his shoulders—robes embroidered with golden dragon patterns—causing his collar and sleeves to flutter violently.

The wide doors of Zichen Hall were deeply recessed within the blinding daylight, forming a square of unfathomable, pitch-black shadow. That was where the imperial throne of his ancestors and forebears lay—the seat from which they ruled the world. Buried within that spacious hall were his impoverished, lightless years of childhood, unspeakable. Ji Chang curled his lips into a detached half-smile, gave his robes a light shake, and stepped into that darkness without a trace of hesitation.

For a moment, his vision was shrouded in dim darkness, as if someone had clapped a hand over his eyes. Gradually, his sight adjusted, and countless faces emerged one by one from the deep shadows—some familiar, others unfamiliar, each drawing closer. Only then did he clearly see the civil and military officials lining both sides, and a red felt runner woven with gold-and-silver thunder patterns and wan symbols stretching all the way to the very end of the great hall.

Ji Chang strode forward, while Tang Qianzi stood at the very end of the military official ranks to await the proclamation.

At first, the court robes of the officials nearby were a slightly lower-ranked purple, ranging from deep to light across dozens of ranks, before finally giving way to the higher-ranked blue. Further ahead, the procession abruptly cut off. Up front ought to have been the imperial clan members and princes clad in red robes; there had easily been over a dozen residing in the capital region in former years, but now the area stood empty, without a single soul in sight, leaving only the scarlet felt stretching onward. Milled by the turbulent currents of history, after eight years of warfare, the once-thriving imperial family seemed to have barely any survivors left.

At the head of the blue-robed ranks stood two distinct parties: on one side were five unfamiliar military generals of noble attire, all in the prime of their youth, among whom was even a woman; on the other side stood a solitary figure. Initially blocked from view by the civil ministers behind him, the person turned slightly sideways to offer Ji Chang a gentle bow, revealing a full set of five layers of light silk robes.

Ji Chang's heart tightened, though he maintained a lazy, smiling expression and nodded in return.

The outer four layers of that person's robe were an extremely pale, light azure, while the innermost layer of pale azure-colored woven brocade was luxurious to the extreme. The lower hem was densely embroidered with qilin patterns, their fierce, blood-red horns vaguely revealing an alarming dark-red hue through the outer robe—that was the emblem of the Duke of Qinghai. The House of Fang, Dukes of Qinghai, had been hereditary for fifty-three generations. Their ancestor Fang Jingfeng had risen from the grassroots alongside Emperor Chu Jing, the founder of the Dawei Dynasty, making them the only non-imperial noble house in the history of the Wei Dynasty. The eldest sons of successive Dukes of Qinghai were all sent into the palace to be raised alongside the crown prince, granting them immense power and lofty status.

In the summer of the thirty-second year of Lintai, Fang Zhiyi, the former Duke of Qinghai, had surrounded and annihilated the rebel army in Tulin Commandery, Zhongzhou, Eastern Land. The eldest son, Fang Jianming, had attended upon King Xu of the Frost-Mist City in the Northern Land when he was twenty years old, performing peerless feats as one of the most heavily relied-upon figures among the Six Winged Generals. In July, Fang Zhiyi died in battle, and the commanderies of Liuliu and He'an fell successively, leaving the Fang clan's lineage all but extinct. Fang Jianming inherited his father's peerage on the battlefield, becoming the fifty-third Duke of Qinghai and Lord of Liuliu Commandery of the current dynasty.

Ji Chang remembered that Fang Jianming was roughly of the same age as himself. His face retained the upright elegance of his youth, save for an old knife scar at the corner of his lips that curved upward by half an inch, as if wearing a perpetual, ambiguous smile that inexplicably deterred anyone from meeting his gaze. Looking closer, his eyes appeared gentle on the surface, but deep within they were calm and vigilant—the gaze of a veteran hardened by countless battlefields.

Following protocol, Ji Chang walked a few more steps, stepped out of the officials' ranks, and finally stopped to bow low and prostrate himself.

"Little Qi, you've returned." The figure seated at the highest point at the end of the grand hall spoke, calling out Ji Chang's childhood nickname. Separated by a decade, the voice was somewhat deeper, yet remained cool, crisp, and resonant like a bell or chime. His facial features were entirely invisible, swallowed by the deep shadows beyond recognition. He wore a pitch-black imperial robe, with only the pearls upon the imperial throne beneath him and the pure gold coiling-dragon patterns on his garments periodically refracting a chilling, blindingly painful cold light.

"Thanks to Your Imperial Majesty's boundless grace." Ji Chang raised his head and smiled slightly.

Everything went precisely as Ji Chang had anticipated. Emperor Xu bestowed upon him the Prince Ning Manor in the west of the city, along with an annual stipend of three million bushels and seven hundred servants. The lists for all manner of furnishings and utensils had long since been drawn up by the treasury bureau and delivered.

Tang Qianzi was promoted to the position of Vice Commander of the Huangquan Pass in recognition of his meritorious service as a guard. Throughout the eight years of quelling rebellions, the Six Winged Generals had displayed dazzling military achievements. Aside from Fang Jianming, who retained his status as a duke, the other five had been appointed as commanders of the four major garrisons—Huangquan, Chengcheng, Moge, and the Capital Region—alongside the Imperial Guards, all serving as key heavy-duty officials guarding critical strategic points; their deputy commanders naturally also hailed from exceptional military talent.

Tang Qianzi expressed his gratitude before the throne, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Ji Chang, and the two exchanged a glance. Both had expected Tang Qianzi to be transferred out of the Imperial Guards and assigned to a post far from the capital region, but neither anticipated such a high-ranking position. Tang Qianzi's late father had once been a garrison major at Huangquan Pass; with this appointment, his widowed mother back in Qiuye would likely find great comfort.

At that moment, a court eunuch came forward to report to the throne that the Zunian princess had finished dressing and requested an audience. Many among the civil and military officials wore looks of mild astonishment.

Ji Chang smiled indifferently. "The custom of the Western Land folk when a bride marries is just like this. Upon arriving at the groom's family, the bride allows the groom to catch the first glimpse of her face, after which the black gauze is discarded to showcase the bride's beauty to the guests." Emperor Xu nodded. "When the Empress and I had our grand wedding, it was also thus." Hearing this, all civil and military officials held their breath, watching a butterfly-like figure walk slowly forward beneath the imperial steps. The scorching wind raged like fire, and withered pomegranate blossoms of a searing red swept horizontally through the air, striking against the eighteen layers of black gauze veils shielding her face with a crisp rustle.

The seven years that Chu Zhongxu and the Zunian princess Zixin spent bound together in marriage were precisely his most difficult seven years.

The day after their grand wedding, he had led his troops out on campaign, and from then on spent his years embroiled in military hardships. Zixin had once teased him, saying, "The assassins come to visit you far more often than you do." Yet it was merely a jest, not a complaint. Prior to that, frightened by assassins, she had suffered a miscarriage and sustained several injuries. She could never become an extraordinary woman capable of commanding three armies, yet she possessed a steadfast and magnanimous courage—everyone placed high hopes on Chu Zhongxu, calling him the Restoration King, and she refused to weigh him down.

As the decisive battle approached, Zixin was poisoned with a slow-acting toxin within the royal residence. When it took effect, she endured two days and three nights of agonizing torture, passing away before she turned twenty-four, while carrying a six-month-old child in her womb. By the day before her death, she no longer recognized the attendants serving her, muttering deliriously in her high fever. When a female official bent down to listen, she realized she was calling out Zhongxu's name, weak and faint until the moment she died.

When the news arrived, Zhongxu was in the far northern wilderness, where leaden clouds surged silently across the sky like ten thousand battle horses galloping with bits in their mouths. Beyond the boundless snow and sand before him lay the battlefield of Hongya Yuan, where history recorded blood flowing high enough to float pestles. The finale of the eight-year chaotic era was close at hand, yet Zixin had not lived long enough to see it. His tears would not fall; instead, they drained backward into his chest. For years, he had turned the tide of the times, sweeping away all before him, crushing countless flesh, blood, and ambitions beneath his horses' hooves. People everywhere hailed him as the darling of the heavens, yet facing capricious fate, he was merely an insignificant speck of dust. What he hated was constantly thrust upon him, while what he cherished could never be retained.

He ascended the throne, transforming from King Xu into Emperor Xu. On the side of the imperial throne, that empty space belonging to the empress was marked merely by a spirit tablet wrapped in phoenix-patterned ceremonial robes, surrounded on all sides by every variety of gold, jade, and brocade.

All the suffering a woman ought to endure for his sake, Zixin had swallowed to the last drop, ultimately failing to preserve even her own life and that of their child. All he could offer her was a set of forever-unused empress seals, a lengthy posthumous title, and hundreds of iron-cold characters in the historical records. Late at night, when he perused memorials and military reports, someone would still tiptoe forward to drape a warm garment over his shoulders, but it could never be her.

Emperor Xu watched as the maiden entered Zichen Hall, walking step by step. Though her face remained hidden behind layers of black gauze, her posture was so light she seemed ready to take flight. The identical black gauze and luxurious robes gave the illusion that a seventeen-year-old Zixin was newly wed, walking toward him through the vast expanses of time, a soft, warm smile still lingering on her red lips beneath the veil, just as it had back then.

The maiden neither looked aside nor showed any hesitation, walking straight toward the end of the red felt. Her steps were light and silent, save for the black gauze fluttering like clouds.

Ji Chang suppressed a quiet smile in his eyes, refusing to let it show on his face.

Gongye was of the same age as Tilan, with a nearly identical stature and fair features; stepping into royal attire made the substitution truly seamless.

His second oldest brother had been wise, clever, and illustrious since childhood, and ascending the throne as emperor was the general expectation of the populace. Zhongxu could never have guessed that his brother—who had played the fool and acted spineless for so many years—was wearing a mask of submissive obedience right under his nose, substituting a female maid for his newlywed bride. All of this was merely the opening act.

In the eyes of commoners amidst the marketplace and rivers of the realm, Prince Chang was dashing, self-appreciative, and precious in his youth; surely nothing in the world could ever go wrong for him. Yet standing among the ranks of the four imperial brothers he had once matched, Ji Chang appeared so insignificant as to be not worth mentioning. He was merely twenty-one years old, yet he had known since childhood that the most desolate and agonizing situation in the world was neither having nowhere to turn nor facing the betrayal of all one's allies, but rather the feeling of "everyone else has it, while I alone do not."

He had never been willing to reach out and demand anything from others, knowing full well he would likely get nothing, and even if he did, it would invariably be barren and broken. A cruel, vengeful joy welled up within him—a richness and exhilaration he had never known before. This joy spoiled him utterly; from this day forward, nothing else could ever fill the chasm in his heart.

Ji Chang watched the maiden walking gracefully toward them, as if watching all his wishes turn into reality, resting upon her slender shoulders, radiant and bright.

The hands that the maiden had originally held tightly together at her chest to gather the black gauze now slowly loosened. Those dark ink-colored gauze fabrics floated like smoke, stripped away by the air currents one layer after another, falling one by one onto the ground in succession like countless translucent cicada molts left behind in the center of the silent hall. And her face, too, grew clear step by step.

She was not Gongye.

Ji Chang suddenly felt as if he had just stepped inside from outside Zichen Hall, his vision plunged into darkness, unable to make out the true state of anything. So great was his shock that his face remained calm and unruffled.

At that exact moment, the maiden passed by his side. She slowed her pace, her skirt rippling like the swirling floral currents on the Papar River during the day of the Papar Festival. The soft tone he had grown so familiar with over the years grazed past his ear in a gentle breeze. She spoke once more in the Zunian tongue, extremely quietly: "For Solan... I made a promise to my uncle." She passed him, continuing onward until she nearly reached the foot of the imperial throne, where she herself lifted the final two layers of black gauze.

Emperor Xu stared at the maiden's face, the expression on his chiseled brows shaking so violently he almost blurted out the name "Zixin."

The pupils were equally bright and heavy like gemstones, the curly hair dark and alluring, and hanging around her neck was the merman crest of the Zunian royal family—how astonishingly similar her appearance and bearing were.

Yet after a brief moment of daze, he realized for himself: Zixin was already dead.

The child before him possessed a beauty that bordered on murderous, and in her gaze there was none of Zixin's gentle harmony. Whatever similarities existed were merely those of blood. She was extremely beautiful as well, yet no one in the world could ever match Zixin, who was utterly devoid of worldly taint.

The maiden turned her head back slightly, as if searching for something—faintly resembling the expression of the little girl on the shoulders of the giant Father Kraft years ago.

Tang Qianzi finally felt a blazing red blade slice straight through his chest. The blood pulsing through his heart boiled entirely, burning dry down to the last drop, searing out an empty hollow piercing straight through his lungs and vitals. As the wind blew, the ashes within collapsed with a dry rustle, igniting agony.

He opened his mouth in vain, yet could not call out her name. Her name was that very same crimson blade piercing his heart, obstructing the flow of blood; every single heartbeat was a heavy, dull ache.

Tilan.

She was always stubborn, proud, and willful; he had simply treated her as a child. When she hated him, he assumed it was merely a childish annoyance.

Yet he never imagined that her heart had already become a wasteland, silent and cracking like a thousand acres of scorched earth, dying inch by inch beyond all redemption. She refused to remain his dependent any longer or submit to being manipulated. The tragic part was that, even while hating him to the bone, she could not bear to simply walk away and leave him trapped in mortal danger. And so she had lied to Ji Chang, shifting all the blame onto Grand Monarch Yingjia while preserving his life. She preferred to stand right before him, trampling and destroying her entire life just to make him see: Look, it was all for you.

She was only fifteen years old.

It was he who had bound the wings of a flying bird with thorns; it was he who had forced her onto this path of mutual destruction—it was he who had handed her over to someone else with his own hands.

The maiden bowed to Emperor Xu, then spun around with effortless grace. Shocks of astonishment rippled through the gathered officials.

Like a weary traveler sitting atop a mast, reminiscing about a lover he had brushed past in his youth, whose bone-deep features had already blurred in his mind, yet whenever he recalled her, he still proclaimed her the most beautiful woman in the world. Such was her peerless beauty.

She looked toward him and Ji Chang, her eyes as deep and lonely as a well, with only he able to understand the cold amusement hidden within.

In the seventh month of the first year, taking Korortier, royal daughter of Zunian, she was conferred the title of Noble Consort Shurong. The consort's name was Tilan; post-mortem title Korortier's niece. Fond of luxury and splendor, she daily cut gold leaf into double-petaled makeup flowers, falling like blown snow. Court attendants vied to serve her by sweeping the floors, to the extent that some even resorted to bribery.

—The Records of Wei: Imperial Consorts: Noble Consort Shurong of the Korortier Clan