After Mistaking the Paranoid Eunuch for My Older Brother

The Ninth Thousand-Year-Old held power as regent. In just three years, five emperors had died of sudden illnesses in the palace.

When a party went to fetch the Fifth Prince, who had been sent to the mountains to live in seclusion years earlier, the prince accidentally fell into the water and lost all his memories, becoming a simple-minded fool.

A fool would be even easier to manage. The only problem was that he was a little too foolish. On the day he met the Ninth Thousand-Year-Old, he ignored the palace servants cowering on the ground all around them and happily reached for the hand of the handsome man with cold, terrifying eyes. Then he called him, “Big brother~”

The man had always hated being touched. He narrowed his eyes, yet, to everyone's astonishment, neither killed anyone nor pulled his hand away.

The foolish little emperor grew bolder, clinging to him all day, demanding hugs and cuddles, as annoying as a piece of sticky candy.

As everyone speculated how many days the little emperor would survive under the Ninth Thousand-Year-Old, He Jinchen, who was notorious for his erratic temper and countless killings, seemed to become a different person. He let the other man get away with all those outrageous antics, and even held the little emperor in his arms and gently soothed him on stormy nights.

Yan Huan had a secret: he was not the real Fifth Prince.

The Fifth Prince was dead. Yan Huan was a nightmare spirit who had taken on his appearance and impersonated him, all to find the older brother he had lost by accident many years ago.

Yan Huan had a hunch that He Jinchen was his brother, but he needed to make sure.

Nightmare spirits could devour dreams, under two conditions:

1. The target had to be fast asleep.

2. The target had to let down his guard around Yan Huan.

He kept clinging to the other man and getting close to him. At last, one night, He Jinchen fell into a deep sleep with Yan Huan in his arms. The walls of wariness he had built up in his dreams had silently crumbled after their long time together.

But this man was not his brother.

After moping for a while, Yan Huan turned his attention to the young general at court.

Overnight, He Jinchen noticed that Yan Huan had changed. He no longer clung to him and called him “Big Brother,” and he even made excuses to avoid him.

At the same time, he became remarkably warm toward the general, who had always been at odds with He Jinchen. He even tried several times to invite the man to spend the night in the palace, hatching plans to bring He Jinchen down.

From a hidden passageway separated by a single wall, the words Yan Huan and the general exchanged carried clearly to He Jinchen's ears. Half his face remained hidden in shadow, flickering in the candlelight.

Hah.

After a soft laugh, half mockery and half scorn, He Jinchen turned and left.

On the day of the palace coup, Yan Huan finally realized he had never mistaken the man. The He Jinchen he had been searching for from the start was indeed his brother.

But when he rushed out of the palace in a panic to save him, he saw He Jinchen standing calmly outside the hall. A headless corpse knelt beside him, and a bloodied head rolled to Yan Huan's feet, revealing the general's face.

“Huanhuan, come to your big brother.”

He Jinchen called to him softly, as kindly as ever. But when Yan Huan looked up, beneath the blazing light of the soldiers' torches, he saw a face smiling and spattered with blood, both bewitching and terrifying.

[Early draft of the blurb. The gong may not necessarily be a eunuch; I haven't decided. He could also be a powerful minister. If he is a eunuch, he will recover later. The nonhuman character can do anything.]

[They are brothers of the same clan, not direct blood relatives, so it is acceptable under the rites of Jin.]

Theme: Honesty and kindness