She wore the same bridal gown, yet the guards dragged her out. The man in splendid robes was utterly cold, saying her thoughts were devious and she was no suitable match.
The Empress Dowager rebuked her: the demoness had brought disaster upon the kingdom and deserved execution.
The final image froze on her rolling head. Those wide, staring eyes were filled with the despair of betrayal, the fury of having everything denied, and the towering hatred born from promises and acknowledgment being utterly shattered!
The mirror surface returned to calm. Chu Jiang's heart trembled slightly, and he gained a measure of understanding.
The core of the Ghost Bride's obsession was not a single trait. What she longed for was to be seen, understood, accepted, and acknowledged.
She possessed many talents—crafting, perfumes, knowledge, and more. She gave her sincere heart and promises, yet in the end, those talents made others wary of her, her sincerity was trampled upon, her promises betrayed. Even her head was severed, and everything about her was utterly denied.
Those eighteen phantom items symbolized her different facets.
Choosing any one of them meant choosing to acknowledge the value of that side of her.
Combining what he had seen in the mirror, Chu Jiang swept his gaze over the eighteen phantoms. "What hurt her most was having everything about her denied. So could we choose... to acknowledge all of her?"
"All of her?" Everyone was stunned.
"Eighteen phantoms, eighteen facets. But one phantom may perhaps bear the meaning of them all."
Chu Jiang fixed his eyes on an inconspicuous phantom floating above a tray held by one of the spinning palace maids—it was a blank, unfurled scroll.
The other phantoms represented specific things or events. Only this blank scroll seemed to contain nothing at all.
"Blank... represents the