The Delicate Empress and the Ninth Prince Who Takes Her by Force

[Forced love + taking by force + a dangerously obsessive, compelling male lead + a delicate, seemingly helpless heroine + a clever heroine]

She never expected that saving someone out of kindness would make her a target. He took her by force. He was a prince, younger than her in both rank and age.

She was an empress caught in a game of chess, powerless amid the whirlpool of political intrigue, yet bound by an inescapable connection to the unruly prince, Lin Xunqing. She fled, but he pursued her at every turn, until there was nowhere left to hide.

“Even now, you think we're square?” Lin Xunqing's Adam's apple bobbed slowly. He breathed in the fragrance of Chu Qingyou's hair, fighting the urge to devour her whole. “It's not that easy...” Before he had even finished speaking, he suddenly swept Chu Qingyou into his arms, his movements decisive and strong.

“Let go of me!” Chu Qingyou cried out. Her voice echoed through the silent Kunning Palace, sounding especially desperate.

He carried Chu Qingyou straight to the chaise longue and gently laid her down, then leaned over her. He lightly traced her lips with his index finger.

“Shh... Keep your voice down. What if someone hears us...”

“I am the empress. You will not dare behave so outrageously!” Her voice rang through the silent palace, though an unmistakable tremor betrayed her.

He savored the words “the empress,” his expression growing ever more inscrutable, like a fathomless pool. “The empress... In name, at least, is still mine...”

Turn the pages and see how power and passion collide amid royal struggles, how a pawn breaks free of the game, and how true feelings find their light beneath layer upon layer of disguise.