After I Tore Off the Hostage's Disguise, the Buddha-like Crown Prince Went Mad

[Beautiful, powerful, ill-fated hostage princess + mad Buddhist crown prince, sworn enemies, love and hate, domineering possessive romance]

Dugu Chisui: “Run away once, and I'll slaughter an entire city.”

What Xie Yanzhao regrets most in this life is using a debt of gratitude as leverage when she was fifteen and abducting a beautiful young man from the Northern Border.

She taught him the classics, gave him bows and crossbows, and let him defy her. But on the night he knelt to present her with a fragrant orchid, she threw a money pouch at his bloodstained collarbone. “I, Xie Sanlang, can have any beauty I want. What makes you think you're special?”

Four years later, after the Western Rong army is defeated, Xie Yanzhao takes the crown prince's place as a hostage in an enemy nation. She fakes her death and slips away, only to encounter the newly appointed crown prince of the Northern Border trampling on her charred fake corpse atop the city wall.

As the officials bow before him, Dugu Chisui takes the Buddhist beads from his wrist and turns around with a smile. “Brother Xie, long time no see.”

…

Xie Yanzhao is cornered in the Eastern Palace and retreats again and again. “Your Highness, would you really defy the world and take a man?”

Dugu Chisui curls his lips and advances. His large hand tears her clothes to shreds, while the nine-turn Buddhist beads on his wrist snap one by one with every breath. “So, Zhaozhao wants to be taken as a man? I'll grant your wish.”

…

Later, all four nations know that the crown prince of the Northern Border has gone on a rampage over a “man.”

He cuts off every path of escape, yet at the highest point of the city wall, he covers her hand as she grips a dagger.

“Use the dagger you taught me to wield when you made me kill my master. Stab me with it. Isn't that how you tamed me back then?”