Blazing Delight

[Blurb] To get her revenge, Chi Huan rescued a slave.

She was arrogant and domineering, using him, toying with him, humiliating and tormenting him. She treated him as a weapon, a dog, and a plaything. She sent him to gather lingzhi mushrooms from sheer cliffs, and he came back with barely half his life left. She made him slaughter every one of her enemies, staining his hands with blood.

She thought no one could be so stupid as to let her use and torment him forever. Besides, he was a prince. Once he gained power, he would surely take revenge and pay her back many times over.

So before that day came, Chi Huan snuffed out the possibility herself.

She was a bad person.

But she had to survive. That probably meant she wasn't all that bad, right?

Standing in a gloomy prison cell, Chi Huan looked at the man on the floor, beaten until he was coughing blood, covered in wounds, and about to be exiled to the frontier. That was what she thought.

The girl's sweet scent mingled with the sharp stench of blood. Her soft skirt brushed against the man's hand, and he trembled uncontrollably. His eyes opened through the blood mist, reaching for the hem of her skirt, but she turned and walked away.

His palm was empty.

In the end, the only thing reflected in his bloodshot eyes was her frail, heartless silhouette as she walked away.

He coughed up another mouthful of blood.

Later, just as Chi Huan was about to forget the man, the empire began to crumble and the land fell apart. The enemy's cavalry thundered across the fields, thousands of soldiers swept forward, and the people fled in every direction.

Chi Huan was carried along by the fleeing crowd. In the panic, an arrow ripped through the air, grazing her cheek before embedding itself in the ground at her feet.

A strand of hair was severed, and her hairpins fell to the ground. She froze and stopped in her tracks.

Then came a thunderous roar, like an arrow piercing the clouds, cutting through everything and striking straight through her heart.

"Su Chihuan!!!"

Chi Huan felt as if she had been struck by an arrow. Her whole body stiffened, and her blood ran cold.

She knew her time had come.

Her retribution had come, too.

When the new emperor took the throne, people said that while he was wandering in another kingdom, a woman had humiliated, used, and tormented him to the extreme. Now that she had fallen into his hands, he would surely torture her until she was no longer recognizable.

Chi Huan was indeed tormented night after night until she was no longer recognizable.

-

To love someone is to wish them life; to hate them is to wish them death. He wanted her alive, and he wanted her dead.

Night after night, he kept her trapped in a dim room. Tears and sweat fell together, dampening their tangled hair.

The man's breath burned against her ear as he whispered over and over, his voice trembling:

"Let's die together, all right...?"

"Your Highness."

He knew she was selfish, wicked, spoiled, arrogant, and a compulsive liar. He knew someone like her could never truly love anyone, but he loved her.

He loved her madly.

He thought that if he couldn't win her heart, he would take her by force.

If she couldn't love him, then at least she could hate him.

Theme: Hold on to yourself and your goodness.