On the night Chang’an fell, I pulled the dying female general Shen Zhiwei from a mountain of corpses.
Through her fading consciousness, she saw my cold profile as I moved the pieces on the board: me, the “biggest wastrel in Chang’an.”
“Give the order. Wangyou Pavilion… enters the game.”
In her eyes, I am the useless only son of the chancellor, drinking and dreaming my life away and sleeping through court sessions.
She despises me, scolds me, and even punches me out of my carriage in the middle of the street.
That is, until the moonlit assassination attempt, when I “luckily” escape death right before her eyes.
At last, she points her sword at my throat, each word icy cold:
“Li Wenyan, how long are you going to keep up this act?”
I smile faintly, rolling between my fingertips the bronze maple leaf that will decide the fate of the realm.
In this game of strategy, all living beings are pieces, and the empire is the board.
Shen Zhiwei, now that you’re in the game, why not… play alongside me?
