Shadows Sent to the Vermilion Wall

In the cold, secluded palace, a strange shadow always drifts across the window paper of the Fragmented Jade Pavilion.

The shadow belongs to Consort Wan, Shen Weiwan, yet it is not entirely hers. When the candle flame flickers, it sketches the outline of the old cherry tree in the He family manor. When she lifts her brush, it writes the long-buried character for "abyss." And in the shadows of the palace walls, it retraces the old route she once took while climbing over the wall in search of sweet cakes.

Once a wife of the He family, now a concubine of the imperial house, Shen Weiwan thought the vermilion walls had long since cut her off from the past. Then the shadow began to haunt her. Carrying the bitter fragrance of pine soot ink and wrapped in the sweetness of rice cakes, it draws out, bit by bit, the promise made in Jiangnan three years ago and the whispers shared on a snowy night.

When the shadow in the bronze mirror takes the shape of another person, and ink on the desk spreads by itself into the cherry blossoms of years past, she finally realizes that some bonds cannot be confined by palace walls. But this shadow that crosses the boundaries: is it the obsession of a restless spirit, an illusion born of a troubled heart, or... proof that he has never let go?

The vermilion walls tower high, the moonlight is cold. Only that wavering shadow, within the walls and beyond them, continues their unfinished entanglement.