So this is the path you chose—the merciless road woven from power and desire, the very road I exhausted myself trying to escape because I refused to be bound and imprisoned, while you sharpened yourself to a point and fought with everything you had to put down roots in it. Nalan Xuan did not want to doubt him, yet he could not stop himself from questioning it. When had everything between them begun to change? When had Han Ruifeng stopped being who he once was, and when had Nalan Xuan himself stopped being who he once was? Han Ruifeng had become skilled at calculating and scheming, while Nalan Xuan had guarded against everyone around him only to discover that the hardest thief to guard against was the one already inside his own home.
Han Ruifeng jolted violently at those words. The deliberately anxious concern on his face seemed to freeze beneath the summer wind. He had believed everything he did was flawless and could not understand when Nalan Xuan had managed to seize hold of a weakness, much less why Nalan Xuan, having found one, had tolerated him again and again without taking action. He forced down the sudden unrest surging through him and repeatedly told himself that Nalan Xuan only suspected him. There was no evidence, so nothing could be proven and nothing counted. Empty accusations meant nothing. As long as he made it through tonight, tomorrow he could devise a perfectly secure countermeasure.
The stiffness vanished in an instant, replaced by anxiety and concern even more intense than before. Nalan Xuan no longer wished to look at him, and Han Ruifeng did not particularly care whether Nalan Xuan believed him or not. It was enough for Feng Xuanyi to believe that the two of them shared a deep brotherly bond. “I know what I’m doing, and I know what I want…” The answer responded cleverly to Nalan Xuan’s question while successfully diverting the subject. “Young Master, please come back. If you keep making trouble like this, none of us will be able to end matters gracefully… As long as you’re willing to come back, His Majesty will certainly pardon you!”
Nalan Xuan found it laughable. “Pardon me? Why would I need his pardon? Does he think that because he is ruler of all under heaven, he can decide everything about my life however he pleases?”
He raised a hand and toyed with the snow-white strands beside his cheek. A trace of stiffness flashed across his face. His voice sounded almost like a murmur, almost like remembrance, yet the curve of his lips was filled with bitterness. Again and again, he had told himself not to give anything more for Feng Xuanyi, never again to sacrifice himself for him because Feng Xuanyi was not worth it. Yet Heaven never seemed willing to grant what people wished. Nalan Xuan had abandoned everything for him, had even allowed his pride and self-respect to be trampled underfoot, sharing Feng Xuanyi’s nonexistent love with countless others and allowing himself to be toyed with at will. And now, because of a single sentence from him, his hair had turned white.
Nalan Xuan raised his head. His unfocused gaze fell upon Feng Xuanyi as though looking through the man before him toward a distant past, or perhaps toward a future too far away and hopeless ever to reach.
Ever since Nalan Xuan had miscarried only to be elevated to the position of empress, rumors had spread endlessly through the palace. Xiao Dezi had done everything possible to suppress them and keep even the slightest whisper from reaching him, yet they had become so widespread that it was impossible for Nalan Xuan not to hear. The most outrageous among them was the so-called “truth” behind the loss of his child.
“…Using the opportunity to make your move—you even had a perfectly respectable pretext. What methods! What a scheme! A trap meticulously arranged from the very beginning, with everyone else stepping into it one by one at exactly the right time and place without realizing a thing, while you stood off to the side issuing orders over who would remain and who would not… This subject is in awe!” Nalan Xuan smiled beautifully. If the rumors were true, if the loss had merely been collateral damage in a chain of traps that required him to walk into them one step at a time, then Feng Xuanyi did not need to admit anything aloud. One look would be enough. Even now, at the very end, Nalan Xuan was still willing to gamble on a single look from him. “I can put righteousness above family. I can be disloyal and unfilial. I can let the whole world point at my face and curse me. I can lie low for years for your sake and hurt someone who had never harmed me in any way, even willingly lowering myself beneath others to please and serve them! All because of one sentence from you, all because of something you could never actually give me!…”
In the blink of an eye, fury overwhelmed him, yet this was only the smallest tip of the iceberg. The grief and desolation inside him were ten thousand times greater. Even with such a twisted expression of rage, that exquisitely sculpted, unparalleled face remained dazzlingly beautiful, as though anything belonging to Nalan Xuan could only ever be beautiful, regardless of how wretched the circumstances.
He had spoken directly into his own deepest wound and torn it open himself. He was devastated beyond measure, yet there was not a single tear in his eyes. Instead they became increasingly dry, as though this were a reward for his strength, or perhaps a punishment for every compromise he had ever made, depriving him even of the final right to vent and scream. “But you didn’t trust me…”
Feng Xuanyi’s gaze flickered. It was as though something he had restrained for far too long suddenly surged violently beneath the surface, like a wild beast struggling to break free of its chains. Yet no matter how violently it churned, every struggle ultimately proved futile. His expression and voice returned to complete calm, cold and indifferent. “…Come back. That is an order.”
Nalan Xuan’s final sliver of hope shattered, breaking apart piece by piece until nothing remained. There was no smoke without fire; the ancients had not lied. His heart, which had been suspended all this time, plummeted instantly into the abyss. He did not need to understand anything further and no longer wanted to know. Whether the rumors were truly accurate had ceased to matter. Feng Xuanyi’s expression had already explained everything. Hearing him say it aloud would only fill in the details; the outcome had already been decided.
People could be so wretched. The more deeply they were hurt, the harder it became to let go. Nalan Xuan kept searching for the point at which everything would finally collapse, hoping that if one final thing shattered, it would destroy every last trace of feeling he still carried for Feng Xuanyi. And so he spoke again, asking about something he had already decided in his heart. “Do you trust me, or don’t you?”
It was a question with no meaning and an answer that had nothing to do with right or wrong. The moment the words left his mouth, Nalan Xuan could not help thinking, What am I still doing this for? Am I still clinging to him? Am I still refusing to give up? How many more times do I intend to deceive and humiliate myself before I’m finally satisfied?
Unexpectedly, this time Feng Xuanyi said nothing. A drifting cloud shyly covered half the moon, casting his strong, handsome features into deep shadow. When the cloud passed and the moon emerged again, the face revealed before everyone was still the same cold, unchanging face of the ruler they had always known.
“As expected of an emperor…” The words carried melancholy and a sigh, containing all the sorrow Nalan Xuan had buried in his heart again and again. “Your Majesty…” He smiled bleakly, and all creation seemed to pale. “What’s the point anymore? What meaning is there? At this point whether you trust me or not is already perfectly clear. Asking was unnecessary. I only humiliated myself… An emperor… heh. Now I finally understand. From this day onward, I will remember it for life after life.”
As though an enormous burden had finally been lifted, Nalan Xuan raised a hand and brushed at his sleeve, then straightened the collar the night wind had disturbed. There was no more grief, no more obsession, and no more resentment. His black hair had turned to snow, swaying in the wind like frost filling the sky. His white robes drifted like gauze, hazy and ethereal beneath the silver moon. Every old dream of the past was carried away with the current, nothing more than flowers in a mirror and the moon upon water.
What he could not let go of, he finally let go—or perhaps he had been forced to let go. What he had been unwilling to surrender, he finally surrendered—or perhaps he simply had no choice. What he had refused to accept, he finally accepted—or perhaps it no longer mattered whether he accepted it willingly. All his former retreats, all his humiliating compromises, all the joy and sweetness they had once shared, whether real or false, voluntary or forced—at this point, if there was one thing Nalan Xuan regretted, it was falling in love with Feng Xuanyi. Yet now that everything had already reached this point, even if he could begin again, there was no guarantee he would not repeat the same mistakes. Fortunately, the curtain was finally ready to fall.
On that night as cool as water, the moon-white figure seemed impossibly distant and impossible to grasp. Nalan Xuan had not moved at all, yet for some inexplicable reason everyone’s heart had risen into his throat.
He looked back, his face filled with longing yet complete release. He raised his brows, brilliant yet drained of life, and his thin lips parted as he offered a solemn blessing. “In this life, I wish you an everlasting reign and an imperial throne that will stand forever—”
It was both a blessing and a wound of love, both finality and a curse. “In the next life, may you and I meet—and never know each other.”
He leapt. And the song ended in sorrow.