In the Qihuan Realm, martial arts flourished. Any martial artist could attach mysterious power to weapons, brushes, ink, paper, or words, giving rise to different schools. Conflict was constant, and countless dynasties, large and small, rose and fell.
Even in this age of flourishing martial arts, tales of immortals never died out, and seekers of the Way were everywhere.
The Crown Prince of the Changwu Dynasty, Yue Jingshi, was one of them. But while others sought immortality or greater martial prowess...
He was simply bored.
*
On a snow-covered road across a rarely visited plain, a carriage rolled along before suddenly coming to a stop.
Someone slowly drew back the richly crafted curtains, embroidered with colorful patterns, revealing a face as radiant as peach blossoms.
Yue Jingshi looked down at the strange figure in the snow. With ink-black hair, skin whiter than snow, and cool, clear features, the person looked like a heap of frost given human form. Yue Jingshi's handsome brows lifted slightly, and his glassy eyes glimmered with a careless smile. “Look at that. Who said I couldn't find an immortal? I've just picked one up...”
He met the gaze of “Frost and Snow” and narrowed his eyes. “An immortal from beyond the heavens.”
An immortal from beyond the heavens, oblivious to worldly matters and poor with words, yet blessed with a face so striking it left anyone who saw it stunned.
Even the moon goddess of Guanghan would pale beside this earthly frost.
*
After traveling together for several months, Yue Jingshi began to think of keeping the immortal from beyond the heavens in the lap of luxury. On a night when candlelight flickered and the moon shone like frost, he casually offered a betrothal gift.
It was all right if the offer was refused. He had his ways of keeping the person there.
Instead, a sharp blade pierced his heart, and his heart was ripped right out.
Yue Jingshi: ?
Only then did he learn that immortals from beyond the heavens truly existed, and this one had come to prove the Way.
The road to heaven was broken. Countless mortals lived in the human realm, and the sincere heart of a person blessed with great fortune could repair the road to heaven, helping so-called cultivators ascend and attain the Way.
He was that person blessed with great fortune. Oh...he couldn't say he was surprised.
In the end, he died surrounded by flickering candlelight.
As his pupils dilated, the last thing he saw was the “immortal from beyond the heavens” flying away on a sword through the false moonlit night.
Hah...an immortal?
When he opened his eyes again, he was not dead, but had become a vengeful ghost.
His chest was hollow where his heart had been, and his eyes were pitch-black.
His fine clothes had become a bloodstained robe. The vengeful ghost gazed up at the sky from the netherworld and drawled, “Since I was lucky enough not to die, I'll have to find a way to make that lofty immortal from beyond the heavens fall down into the mire.”
After all, how could anyone be more arrogant and high above the world than him?
Oh, right. Then he had to remember to demand a sincere heart from his immortal...
And crush it, bit by bit.
The vengeful ghost, who always repaid every slight, thought.
#Yue Jingshi (gong) x Sui Xingshu (shou)
#This is the current blurb. I might tweak it a little. (After a major overhaul on July 26, I think this characterization is still more interesting.)
#The sincere heart Yue Jingshi asks for is a literal heart.
#Anyway, I'm trying for a bittersweet tone. I swear this won't turn into a fluffy romance! (Probably.)
#Xiao Shu isn't a bad person, or it would end in a bad ending.
#Wait, should it end in a bad ending? Thinking about it, that could be pretty compelling too, but in that version Xiao Shu would be purely evil. (Thinking.)
#The cover character is a reference, not a commissioned illustration.
Theme: Feigned affection turns into true love
