Chapter 1

During the Lantern Festival, a light snow fell, and the thirteen Heavenly Streets facing the Vermilion Bird Gate blazed with lantern light.

Anyone standing atop the Reaching Heaven Tower within the imperial city could have looked down and seen the city's surging human energy mingling with the brilliant lanterns, forming an intricate totem that illuminated the sky and awed the Nine Provinces. Beneath its fading glow, the ghosts and monsters lurking in the darkness scattered in terror.

Some monsters fought desperately to flee the city, while others would rather die than stay out.

The city gates, which should have closed at the start of Xushi, still stood wide open. The guards kept glancing distractedly toward the thirteen Heavenly Streets, wondering if they would have enough time after their shift to join their families at the lantern fair.

While they were daydreaming, a shadow flashed past. The Nine Dragon Lanterns hanging from the city gate flickered, and when they lit up again, not a single shadow remained within their glow.

Only a few drops of dark blood were left in the shadow of the gate.

At the same time, a slender girl in a thin, plain white jacket and skirt stood alone at a side gate of Jinyang Marquis Manor. Fine snowflakes drifted down, dusting her eyelashes with a light coating of snow that veiled the anxiety and unease in her eyes.

The gatekeeper hurried back about half a Shichen later, followed by a stern-faced, middle-aged woman.

When the woman saw Ji Chan, her brows knitted together. She stepped forward and asked in a cold voice, "Eldest Miss, what brings you here?"

"Mama Qian, today is Father's birthday. I wanted to..."

Before she could finish, Mama Qian cut her off, her voice edged with obvious impatience. "Eldest Miss, you know perfectly well that today is the Marquis's birthday. Why have you come to disturb him? Are you trying to ruin his birthday banquet?"

Ji Chan faltered, then said softly, "I only wanted to see Father and speak with him."

"There's no need. You'd best remember your place. You have not the slightest connection to our manor, and the Marquis will never see you." She turned to leave, but just then a round-faced maid approached from the opposite side.

Ji Chan recognized her. She was a personal maid brought along by the step-madam, Madam Xue. Her name seemed to be Chun He.

Chun He stopped in front of them and looked Ji Chan up and down before turning to Mama Qian. "Mama Qian, what are you doing?"

Mama Qian put on a fawning smile. "It's the Eldest Miss. She insists on seeing the Marquis, but he has no time for her now."

"I see." Chun He glanced sidelong at Ji Chan before speaking. "The Marquis is indeed very busy today, but I can take you into the manor and report your arrival. If he refuses to see you, then you can only look at him from afar and kowtow. That way, at least, the father-daughter bond you've shared for so many years will be honored. How does that sound?"

Ji Chan bit her lower lip, though she felt no pain. She heard herself answer, "All right."

Chun He smiled. As she turned around, her tone abruptly sharpened as she said to Mama Qian, "The Eldest Miss of this manor is our young lady, not some outsider. Mama Qian, you'd best be more careful from now on."

"Yes, yes. This old servant's head must be failing her. I really am no use anymore." Mama Qian bowed repeatedly with a fawning smile, not daring to say another word.

Ji Chan watched in silence. Even now, she still could not understand how she had ended up like this.

Just over ten days ago, she had still been the legitimate eldest daughter of the Marquis of Jinyang. Then, out of the blue, a woman appeared claiming to have been her mother's personal maid eighteen years ago. She said Ji Chan was not the Marquis's blood, but a bastard child born years ago from an affair between the late marchioness and another man.

At first, her father did not believe it. He simply had the supposed maid thrown out. It was only after Madam Xue spoke up and urged him to uncover the truth, lest the late madam's reputation be sullied, that he relented.

First they had someone verify the maid's identity. Then, guided by her, they found the midwife who had delivered Ji Chan's mother. The midwife insisted that Ji Chan had been born prematurely, but showed none of the signs of a premature birth.

Just a few slanderous words from these people of unknown origins had been enough to change her father's expression completely.

Yet he never considered that her mother had given birth prematurely because she had heard he'd been ambushed while away on campaign and had gone into labor from the shock.

Later, they somehow found several more servants who had worked in her maternal grandfather's household before its decline. Those people swore they had seen her mother secretly meeting other men before she was married.

One after another, they had taken the stage like actors in a play, each adding a line, until they had thoroughly ruined her mother's good name.

And she, the Marquis's legitimate daughter, had become proof that her mother had betrayed the Marquis.

Five days ago, she had been thrown out of the manor. Before she left, Madam Xue looked down at her and said that her father, mindful of the years he had raised her, was unwilling to pursue the matter further, and that she must remember the manor's kindness.

Ji Chan could not bring herself to accept such a grave accusation against her mother. Since today was her father's birthday, and her mother had spent so many birthdays by his side, she thought perhaps he might remember his affection for her and investigate the matter again.

Qing He took her to wait by a covered walkway in the garden, then headed straight for the brightly lit part of the grounds.

Looking at the lights in the distance, Ji Chan suddenly remembered last year, when the garden had also been hung with lanterns. At her pleading, her mother had joined her in guessing the lantern riddles.

In just a year, her maternal family had been exiled, her mother had died of illness, and now she had to wait at the manor for someone to announce her arrival.

After hesitating only a moment, Ji Chan started toward the lights. The closer she came, the clearer the women's laughter grew.

She stopped beside a rockery and saw her father nearby, helping Madam Xue and the pair of children she had brought with her guess lantern riddles.

Xue Zhao stood to her father's left, holding a lantern.

Xue Ying stood to her father's right, even going so far as to cling affectionately to his arm.

The four of them stood before the lanterns, laughing and talking. Xue Ying called him "Father" again and again, as if they really were a family.

A family?

Ji Chan's heart suddenly clenched. She stared fixedly at Xue Zhao and Xue Ying standing beside her father.

In the past, she had rarely seen Madam Xue's children, so she had never paid them much attention. Now, she suddenly realized just how much their profiles resembled her father's—especially Xue Zhao's.

And Madam Xue allowed Xue Ying to be so intimate with her father. Aside from them being father and daughter, what other explanation could there be?

At last, she understood why Madam Xue had been able to enter the manor just three months after her mother's death, bringing her own son and daughter with her when she married into the family.

Perhaps she should also understand why she had ended up in this state. She even began to wonder: after her maternal grandfather's entire family was exiled, her mother had suddenly fallen gravely ill and died. Had she truly been sick?

Ji Chan felt colder and colder. She realized she might never have understood her father at all.

When she was little, she would ask him to play with her, and he always said he was busy. It turned out he had not been short of time; the daughter he cherished simply wasn't her.

Ji Chan did not watch any longer. She quietly left by the way she had come.

The words she had spent so long preparing in her heart on the way here all scattered. What was there left to say? Those accusations pinned on her mother might well have been fabricated by her father himself for Madam Xue's sake.

About a quarter of an hour after Ji Chan left, Qing He went to look for her by the covered walkway, only to find that she was gone.

She asked at the gatehouse and learned that Ji Chan had left long ago.

She quietly relayed the news to Madam Xue, who was sitting in a stone pavilion watching her daughter guess lantern riddles. Madam Xue's gaze shifted slightly. She leaned toward her eldest son, Xue Zhao, and murmured a few words. Xue Zhao then rose and left.

Ji Chan walked out of Jinyang Marquis Manor and looked back at its tightly shut vermilion gate. At last, her shoulders slumped.

She asked herself, even if she had guessed the so-called truth, what good would it do? What could she do?

Her maternal grandfather and uncle, the only ones who could have stood up for her, had been exiled. Her mother was gone. She had no one left.

Even if she told everyone in Shangjing the truth, would anyone believe her? No one would. She did not even have proof.

The snow fell heavier and heavier that night.

Ji Chan walked through the bustling crowds like a walking corpse. Her clothes were too thin, and her hands and feet had gone numb with cold, but she seemed not to notice as she headed toward Changping Quarter.

After being driven out of the manor, she had been living in a small shop in Changping Quarter. Her mother had given it to her the year before.

When she left the manor, they had not let her take a single one of her mother's belongings. If the shop had not gone through the authorities and been formally registered in her name, she would not even have had a place to stay.

Changping Quarter was more than half an hour's walk from the manor, but fortunately, there was no curfew on the Lantern Festival.

Ji Chan crossed the brightly lit, clamorous Heavenly Street, then passed through Yongping Quarter. At last, the noisy voices gradually faded, until all she could hear was the crunch of her shoes on the snow.

At some point, the snow had covered the ground. Along the long road, only her footprints remained.

The farther she went toward Changping Quarter, the sparser the lights became. Fortunately, the snow illuminated the road beneath her feet.

Once she crossed Anping Quarter, she would reach Changping Quarter. Ji Chan stopped to rest, cupping her hands around her mouth and breathing into them a few times to warm her fingers, which were nearly numb with cold.

After a brief rest, she continued toward Changping Quarter. As she passed a narrow alley, she suddenly heard heavy breathing. It wasn't far away, seemingly coming from inside the alley, like a wild beast panting.

Before she could think about it, a piercing shriek tore through the night. A horrifying cry suddenly rang out from a nearby residence, followed by several figures leaping into the sky, their blades flashing.

Ji Chan heard someone shout, "That Evil Spirit went east!"

The residence's east side lay directly toward where Ji Chan was now. Her heart was in turmoil, and before she could figure out what to do, a foul wind swept toward her from behind.

A flurry of arrows followed, streaking like meteors. Before she could react, one pierced straight through her chest from behind.

The next moment, the Evil Spirit changed direction and headed south. The people pursuing it in the distance also turned and followed.

As she fell to the ground, Ji Chan vaguely saw a figure with a bow pause on a rooftop, seeming to look in her direction.

She heard someone say, "Lord Xue, that creature seems to have escaped..."

The figure vanished in an instant.

Ji Chan lay facedown on the ground. The agonizing pain nearly drove her to the brink of collapse, leaving her almost desperate. The Xue family... So they had never wanted her alive. But she didn't want to die.

Her hands dug into the ground as she dragged herself forward inch by inch. Ji Chan's mind was blank. She did not know what good it would do, but she did not want to give up.

She did not know how long she had crawled. The pain seemed to fade, but she was too weak to keep breathing.

At last, as the darkness of the alley closed around her, she struggled to raise her head—and met a pair of blood-red beast eyes.