The towering imperial palace, with its purple pillars and golden beams, vermilion lacquered gates, and glazed tiles, was adorned with painted rafters and carved beams, exuding unparalleled splendor.
In the imperial garden, a refined and gentle middle-aged man, clad in bright yellow robes, was affectionately coaxing a tearful little girl in his arms.
Bai Roushuang, having emerged from the realm of her inner demons, had regained some clarity of mind. Still shaken and fearful, she seemed somewhat dazed. "That... is your younger self?"
"Yes, that’s me and my father," Xu Shulou smiled as she gazed at the man. "When I was little, he personally taught me to read, often holding me on his lap to recite poetry. He even bandaged the wounds of my pet rabbit with his own hands."
Bai Roushuang was puzzled. "This is your inner demon?"
"Don’t rush. Keep watching."
Bai Roushuang had no choice but to suppress her impatience and accompany Xu Shulou in witnessing the chronicle of a princess’s upbringing. The opulence of silver screens, golden chambers, pearl palaces, and jade towers nearly made her suspect that Xu Shulou was deliberately flaunting her privileged life before her.
As Bai Roushuang had guessed, Xu Shulou was indeed the kind of girl coddled in honeyed comfort—cherished by her parents and elder brother, revered by all as the imperial princess, with emerald feathers, precious pearls, and delicacies laid out for her indulgence. When it came time to choose a husband, the Top Scholar, renowned throughout the capital and initially reluctant to become a royal consort, had blushed faintly the moment he laid eyes on her at the palace banquet. The greatest sorrow in her life was likely the death of her pet rabbit, which had reduced her to inconsolable tears.
Bai Roushuang admitted she was envious. Who wouldn’t be?
The sole treasured jewel of the Son of Heaven, the beloved and charming imperial princess. For Bai Roushuang, who had never known her own father, witnessing the emperor’s doting indulgence toward Xu Shulou filled her with bitter envy.
Xu Shulou stared at the figure in bright yellow robes, lost in thought. "My father was truly a good man—honorable, trustworthy, and true to his word. He promised my mother ‘one heart, one life,’ and never took concubines. He taught my brother and me to be upright and kind. His heart was soft, his nature benevolent—he never once struck or scolded a servant. Even when his childhood study companion committed a grave crime, he couldn’t bring himself to order his execution."
"..." Bai Roushuang nodded at first, finding the man’s scholarly demeanor fitting of a noble gentleman. But the last sentence sent a chill down her spine.
Sure enough, Xu Shulou’s tone shifted, and she sighed softly. "It’s just a shame... a good man does not always make a good emperor."
With her sigh, the peaceful scene before them twisted into one of slaughter.
The city was breached by rebel forces, blood flowing like rivers.
A dreadful realization struck Bai Roushuang. "Senior Sister... which princess of the fallen dynasty were you?"
"Fang Yi," Xu Shulou replied flatly.
Bai Roushuang gasped. "You’re—" the lost princess of a ruined kingdom.
The only daughter of the last emperor of the fallen dynasty, given but a fleeting and dismissive mention in the annals of history.
Legends spoke of Princess Fang Yi’s breathtaking beauty, her allure unmatched, with countless suitors vying for her favor. Her mysterious disappearance following the dynasty’s collapse only added to her mystique, inspiring countless romantic tales speculating about her fate.
Bai Roushuang had read one such salacious story—claiming that Princess Fang Yi had never vanished, but was instead imprisoned by a powerful minister of the new regime, forced into nightly debauchery.
Now, learning that her senior sister was the protagonist of one of those scandalous tales left Bai Roushuang reeling—shocked, appalled, and utterly at a loss for words.
She had known that Xu Shulou hailed from the fallen Xu imperial family, but given her carefree and generous nature, Bai Roushuang had assumed she was a princess of peaceful times—one who had lived in luxury, untouched by hardship, and transcended worldly concerns by joining the Dustless Island sect before the dynasty’s fall.
She had never imagined Xu Shulou had endured the war.
Xu Shulou’s gaze fixed on the imperial throne hall, as if she knew exactly what scene would unfold next.
Bai Roushuang followed her line of sight.
Inside the palace, before the grand hall.
The emperor listened to the distant clang of weapons and calmly instructed the eunuch beside him, "Tell them to surrender. The battle is lost—there’s no sense in more lives being wasted."
The eunuch wiped away his tears, kowtowed, and hurried off to deliver the command.
The emperor dismissed the palace attendants, urging them to flee, then took Xu Shulou’s hand. "I’ve arranged silver and escorts for you. Go now—live well."
Xu Shulou wept, begging him to come with her.
The emperor’s eyes were filled with sorrow—and deeper still, with worry for her. "I’ve lost the empire of our ancestors. I cannot face the world any longer. It is my duty to die with my kingdom."
Xu Shulou turned to her mother, but the ever-gentle empress shook her head firmly. "I will stay with your father. Forgive me, Shulou. I cannot go with you."
She clutched at her elder brother’s sleeve, but he merely embraced her. "Silly girl, as a son of the Xu imperial family, the new emperor will never let me live. You must escape alone—only then will you have a chance."
"No! I won’t!" The once-spoiled princess fell to her knees before them, but for the first time in her life, they all refused her.
The maidservants assigned by the emperor dragged Xu Shulou away. The empress, who had remained composed, smiling through her farewell, finally broke—chasing after her daughter with a desperate cry: "Shulou! When it’s cold, remember to dress warmly! Don’t be stubborn like before, refusing thick clothes for vanity’s sake!"
"Remember to dress warmly..." Such simple, maternal words—hardly befitting an empress’s last utterance to her princess. In that moment, she was just a mother, pleading with a daughter she would never see again.
Then, Xu Shulou’s parents and brother took their own lives in the Hall of Supreme Harmony.
Bai Roushuang watched as Xu Shulou was dragged away by the maidservants, her wails of anguish echoing, her struggles sending a delicate jade hairpin crashing to the ground, shattering into pieces. The scene left her with a tumult of emotions.
Yet the Xu Shulou beside her remained eerily calm. She took Bai Roushuang’s hand and led her past the rebel armies, through the bloodshed, out of the imperial city.
Bai Roushuang couldn’t help but pause, glancing back at the younger Xu Shulou. The grief and hatred in those eyes sent a shudder through her.
The contrast between the two Xu Shulous—one shattered, one serene—left her with an unsettling sense of dissonance.
She couldn’t fathom how the once-naive, pampered little princess had, over time, become the composed and nurturing senior sister before her.
Xu Shulou remained silent, so Bai Roushuang quietly stood by her side, watching as the man Xu Shulou had once affectionately called "Uncle Xiao" ascended the throne, proclaiming a new dynasty under the name "Xiao." They watched the Top Scholar, who had once fallen for Xu Shulou at first sight, take office under the new regime.
Bai Roushuang wondered if the young princess had ever returned his feelings. If not, that might have been the only mercy in this tragedy.
The horrors before her were so overwhelming that Bai Roushuang, for a moment, forgot her own hatred, consumed instead by outrage on Xu Shulou’s behalf.
"You... don’t hate them?"
"How could I not hate him?" Xu Shulou gazed at the Top Scholar, her voice icy. "At my worst, I wanted to carve every last one of them into pieces—flay their skin and snap their bones."
"But Senior Sister, how are you unaffected by the illusion?" Bai Roushuang, having witnessed the fall of their kingdom and the ruin of their home once more, couldn’t fathom her calm composure.
"I’ve entered the Heart-Demon Mirror more than once," Xu Shulou explained. "Every time the Yuankong Secret Realm opened, I would go in—just to see my parents and elder brother again. I feared the day I might forget their faces... and worse, the day I’d forget the faces of those who took them from me."
"How did you resist raising your sword in the illusion?" Bai Roushuang had clearly grasped the mirror’s trick by now. She herself had struck out three times in the vision, merging with her illusionary self and nearly losing her way.
Xu Shulou paused, weighing her words. "The reason is... complicated."
Bai Roushuang braced for some profound insight into inner cultivation—perhaps a tale of bitter struggle and hard-won discipline. But then Xu Shulou continued, utterly matter-of-fact:
"Back then, I wanted to hunt them down in the real world. So inside the mirror... I held back."
"..."
