When Cen Zhaoye was five, her heart ailment left her on the brink of death.
Her father sought help from a Daoist priest, who captured a scarlet fox cub, the son of the Fox King. He was born with Nirvana Flame, and legend said the blood from his heart could bring the dead back to life.
She personally fed him a bowl of sweet water laced with a spirit-binding drug. For the next two years, she took bowl after bowl of blood from his heart, keeping herself alive by sheer force.
Ten years later, he returned in red, now the fearsome Prince Liao, the most untouchable man in all of Shangjing. He pinned her against a wall, smiling both cruelly and tenderly. "Cen Zhaoye, my blood still runs through your veins. How are you going to repay this debt?"
Every noblewoman in Shangjing wanted him, yet he fixated on her, the very person who owed him a debt.
Only later did she understand: He claimed to want repayment, but what he had always wanted was her.
When you were five, you took a bowl of my heart's blood. I'll spend my whole life coming back to collect from you.
