Moonlight in Chains

A cup of warm water on a rainy night made art student Jiang Rou the "personal collectible" of Qi Mo, a newly risen business tycoon.

A listening device was hidden in her hair, and medical bills became chains.

Red lights flickered on the villa's surveillance screens. He had carefully built a "cage of love," determined to make her submit completely.

When resisting him brought threats that her friends and family would have their futures ruined, Jiang Rou put on a mask of obedience. In her sketchbook, she recorded evidence of his crimes with invisible ink, and responded with compassion to the scars from his self-inflicted wounds on his chest.

"The price of running away is blood." On the night Qi Mo held a knife to her throat, three opposing forces broke into the prison.

But Jiang Rou raised the bloodstained suicide note written by his birth mother and turned the blade toward her own wrist. "Let my blood bring you to your senses, and let me go."

Two years later, the art exhibition "Cage and Light" caused a sensation throughout the city.

As Jiang Rou turned to face the applause, a gaunt figure in the corner paid a million for A Glimmer on a Rainy Night. Beneath the brim of his hat, his gaze licked its wounds one last time, like a trapped beast.

One of them walked toward the sunlight, while the other drowned in ashes.

And the echoes of every abyss would eventually be revealed in the light.