[A fan novel based on Thousand Fragrances]
Baili Gelin was born knowing how to smile. The quick wits she had developed performing on the street let her wear a sweet, obedient smile in front of anyone. She entered the Young Phoenix Academy with her older sister Chang Yue and her cousin Ye Ye. On the surface, she flitted among her admirers, playing at being carefree. In her heart, though, she carried an old wound: years ago, in a muddy alley, Ye Ye had protected Chang Yue and left without looking back at her once. She had hated him for years and lied to herself for just as long, disguising her resentment as a crush and using frivolity as armor.
Lu Li was an orphan of the fox demon clan, cold-faced and taciturn, never one to explain himself. He had seen too much blood spilled beneath the blades of demon hunters and was long accustomed to walking alone. In the sea breeze at the Young Phoenix Academy, at first he could only complain that Gelin’s perfume was overpowering. Later, though, he kept that bottle of jasmine hair oil tucked in his sleeve and never let it leave his side.
Both were people carrying heavy burdens. They went from disliking each other to fighting side by side, from testing one another to entrusting each other with their lives during the East Sea trial. Lu Li forced a necklace bearing the fox clan’s crest around Gelin’s neck and swore on the blood of his three tails, “I’ve chosen you for this life. I’ll never abandon you.” Yet on the day of her eldest sister’s wedding, Gelin hid a poisoned dagger in her sleeve, intent on ending a decade-old grudge at the happiest moment of Ye Ye’s life. Lu Li stopped her blade, and Gelin broke down sobbing in his arms.
The Sea Calamity struck, and heaven and earth were overturned. Gelin broke a rib and fell unconscious saving Lu Li, while he kept vigil for three days and three nights. After surviving the catastrophe, the two lived in seclusion in a mountain valley, planting flowers and chopping wood, but old nightmares still haunted Gelin every night. She made a decision: she would ask the fox clan elders to erase the most painful scenes from her memories, leaving only the knowledge of what happened, without the pain. From then on, amid lofty mountains and flowing waters, by flower fields and streams, as the silver fox’s fluffy tail curled around her wrist, she looked at him with a smile in her eyes
