His consciousness scattered. In the instant climax arrived, Nalan Xuan vaguely heard someone by his ear repeating, again and again, in a low voice that seemed both desperately suppressed and roaring like a shout: “Love.” The figure grew blurred—or rather, lost all meaning—yet those bright, profound eyes, deep enough to steal one’s breath, remained extraordinarily clear, sharp as if they would be branded into the depths of his soul. They stared at him unblinkingly, unwilling to look away.
For one bewildering moment, Nalan Xuan found himself wondering who this man was—the man who gave him pleasure and betrayal in equal measure. How absurd that the word “love” should come from his mouth.
He remembered a female friend from the modern world who, after a breakup, had once gotten hopelessly drunk and clung to his hand while declaring that men were the coldest and most heartless creatures in existence, natural-born liars. Never believe what a man tells you in bed, she had said. If you believe him, then you are finished. Women were doomed to lose twice over because, unlike men, they supposedly could not cleanly separate love from lust. Once a man got into bed, she claimed, he could say “I love you” as many times as you wanted to hear it. And perhaps he really did love something—just not the romantic love the woman imagined. He loved the pleasure itself.
At the time, Nalan Xuan had found the argument ridiculous and had wanted to refute such an extreme condemnation of an entire sex from a man’s point of view. In the end, however, he had given up. What normal person argued endlessly with someone who was completely drunk?
He had never imagined that his friend’s gloomy drunken nonsense would one day seem to strike straight through the heart of the matter. Just look at him now: a cold-blooded emperor who seemed to love nothing but power could speak of love, while Nalan Xuan, who resisted him in his heart, could still lose himself in physical closeness with him. Perhaps his friend had been right about at least one thing. In bed, love and desire could become two entirely different things. At this moment, perhaps what they both loved was nothing more than the satisfaction desire gave them.
Nalan Xuan did not know whether he merely thought of laughing or actually laughed aloud. Feng Xuanyi’s expression darkened, and the intensity of their encounter increased until Nalan Xuan felt like a tiny boat caught in towering waves, able only to be carried wherever the current took him.
“Have you truly thought this through?” A low voice sounded, weighted with concern and gravity.
Incense burned in the room. A heavy, oppressive atmosphere hung over everything, as though something might erupt at any moment. Slow, deep breaths rose and fell, pulling taut at the nerves, each one echoing beside Nalan Xuan’s ears with inexplicable force.
That voice was so familiar. He had heard it before—perhaps for a very long time, or perhaps only recently.
Curious, Nalan Xuan turned around. Sitting upright in the seat of honor, one hand gripping the armrest so tightly it seemed ready to crush the wood, was none other than Marquis Dingbei, Nalan Jian!
But why was a man who ought to be dead sitting there perfectly alive? Nalan Xuan should have been inside the imperial palace, living in Moon-Embracing Palace. So what was this place, scented with sandalwood and furnished simply yet elegantly? Why did surroundings he had never seen before somehow feel strangely familiar?!
Was this a dream? But which place was the dream?! Everything here felt so real. When his fingers touched the table, he could even feel the grain of the wood beneath them. If this was reality, then what had everything before it been? What was the imperial decree Feng Xuanyi had issued half a month ago ordering the executions?
He tried to step forward and ask, only to discover that he could not control his own body at all.
“Yes.” The answer came in his own voice, yet Nalan Xuan had never intended to say it. What in the world is happening?! Where is this? What am I?
“Nonsense!” Nalan Jian erupted in fury and slammed one palm against the table beside him. Even the finest, strongest timber could not withstand a blow from a seasoned martial man who had spent years on battlefields. A thin crack immediately spread from beneath his palm toward the nearest table leg, branching into countless fine, irregular fractures as it traveled downward.
The body Nalan Xuan occupied remained perfectly composed, its breathing neither interrupted nor disordered, as though everything Marquis Dingbei did had already been accounted for. Yet Nalan Xuan himself had no idea what was happening. He seemed to be nothing more than a strand of consciousness inhabiting his own former shape, utterly unable to control a single word or movement, capable only of watching events unfold.
“Father, I am telling you my decision. I did not come here to discuss whether it is feasible.” Nalan Xuan heard himself say the words.
Father…? It was true that Feng Xuanyi’s inexplicable imperial decree had transformed him into Marquis Dingbei’s long-lost second son and formally returned him to the Nalan clan. But whether in public or private, Nalan Xuan had never once called Marquis Dingbei “Father.” Nalan Jian had never demanded it either and had seemed entirely unconcerned. So why did the word come so naturally now, as though it had always belonged there?
Any father confronted with such openly disrespectful defiance from his son would have been furious. Yet Nalan Jian—the head of his household, a decorated military hero, a veteran of three reigns whose name struck fear even among tribes beyond the borders—only sighed deeply in the face of his son’s blatant disobedience and yielded far more than Nalan Xuan would ever have expected. “Whatever you want and whatever you choose to do, I will do everything I can to satisfy you. But not this. This alone is impossible.”
With a teacup in hand and fragrance rising from the tea, Nalan Xuan’s body leisurely used the lid to brush aside the leaves floating on the surface and took a shallow sip before answering coolly, “I have already said everything I need to say. I came only because you are my father and I thought I should inform you. If you agree with me and help me, naturally that would be best. My chances of success would improve. If you disagree and refuse to help, then so be it. Nothing is ever absolute. There is risk, but I intend to succeed. If you choose to obstruct me, then there is nothing I can do about that either.”
What was being planned in secret? What was Marquis Dingbei so desperately opposed to while I insisted on doing it anyway?
“You are trying to pull a tooth from a tiger’s jaws! Do you understand what will happen to you if this is exposed? Fine—even if you actually succeed, what are you doing it for? You are gambling with your entire fate!” Nalan Jian seemed so anxious he could barely keep still, yet there was nowhere for him to advance or retreat, leaving him pacing endlessly through the room.
“For what?” Nalan Xuan’s body gave a cold laugh. Although his observing consciousness remained separate, he could nevertheless feel anger rising within the body he inhabited. It was not merely hatred or resentment, but something deeper, suppressed, and impossibly complicated—something almost like love, yet not quite; hatred, yet not entirely. “If even Father does not know, how could I possibly know?”
“…He would not want you to risk yourself.” Nalan Jian sighed, suddenly appearing to age many years, helplessness settling heavily over him.
“How do you know what he thinks? How do you know what he wants or does not want?” Disdain and bitterness threaded through the words, while Nalan Xuan could feel unwillingness and countless unanswered questions churning violently in his chest. “If you truly cared, if you truly understood what he wanted, then you would never have—”
“Enough!” Nalan Jian, who had not even reddened with anger when his own son openly defied him, suddenly roared. His eyes turned bloodshot like those of a wounded beast. “What happened between the two of us is not something a junior like you has any right to interfere in!”
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