After the Emperor Appeared in His Dreams Night After Night, the Shadow Guard Ran Away

When he was first picked up, he was filthy from head to toe and didn't even have a name.

The tiny child stood outside the hall. Though he was clearly terrified, he stared boldly at the person who had taken him in, his dark eyes glistening.

He heard the other person say clearly,

"Then I'll call you Yuanzhen: utmost goodness and beauty, flawless and without blemish."

From then on, Yuanzhen had a name.

But he was nothing like it.

Of those eight characters, the only one that could possibly describe him was beauty.

Yuanzhen knew himself well.

On his first day serving at the emperor's side after slogging his way out of the gloomy Records Office, he received an honor most people could only dream of.

The emperor personally selected him and gave him permission to walk openly at his side.

Who wouldn't say his ancestors' graves were glowing, or that he'd hit the jackpot?

Under the envious gazes of the other shadow guards, Yuanzhen eagerly went to serve at the emperor's side.

But nobody had told him the emperor would be so difficult to please!!!

The tea couldn't be too hot, but it couldn't be cold either. The emperor either complained that the ink Yuanzhen ground was too pale or pointed out that he was breathing too loudly.

Nonsense! His breath control was clearly the best among all the shadow guards!

Yuanzhen smiled sweetly at His Majesty, looking utterly obedient, while thinking up ways to cause trouble. But he picked the wrong target, and the emperor discovered his secret in an instant.

He was face-blind.

That night, Yuanzhen sat on a roof beam, fretting, and drifted into a hazy dream. It was filled with the emperor's inescapable face.

The emperor had bullied him outside the dream, but Yuanzhen never expected him to bully him from head to toe in the dream, too.

The next morning, Yuanzhen climbed down from the roof beam with a flushed face and weak knees, only to meet the emperor's meaningful gaze. Remembering all those intimate scenes in his mind, he fled in terror.

Luckily, it was only a dream.

But when the emperor pinned him to the dragon bed with an irresistible air, Yuanzhen finally understood.

The emperor lusted after his body!

Yuanzhen suddenly understood where all those inexplicable marks on his body had come from.

The emperor was terrifying. He had to run.

But less than two days after escaping, he was caught by the emperor.

The emperor looked down at him from above, his gaze as deep as an abyss.

"How can you not even know how to run away?"

Yuanzhen had forgotten that he was not only face-blind, but also directionally challenged.

He was done for.

A gorgeous shadow guard bottom with maxed-out combat skills vs. an emperor top who takes his wife but never loses out

An obedient little rascal who knows he's beautiful vs. an all-powerful husband who keeps every part of his wife's life under his control

A sweet-talking cutie x an old flame finally catching fire

Bonus scene:

The emperor had an unusually strong desire to control the people around him. He had to approve everything Yuanzhen wore and ate.

Knowing Yuanzhen liked beautiful clothes, he gave him every lovely outfit in the palace.

And so Yuanzhen went off to fight someone, dragging along long ribbons from his clothes and jangling jade ornaments.

After the fight, he looked at his tattered clothes and couldn't help complaining about how no shadow guard dressed like this. Even the emperor changed clothes less often than he did.

Yuanzhen thought this to himself, but the corners of his mouth lifted without him realizing it. He looked up, his pretty little face now smudged with dirt.

Oh, well. Who could blame him for spoiling His Majesty?

He sat obediently where he was, waiting for the emperor to come take him home.

[Both leads are each other's only partners. I don't have any particular squicks, so that's that.]

[This is a sweet little story with loose logic, not a strictly historical novel.]

[If you want to drop the story, just hit the X. No need to tell me. (╥╯^╰╥) The author is fragile.]

Blurb completed on April 22, revised June 19, and refined again on December 21.

Theme: Strive to become a good person.