"Was it all... true...?"
Zhao Linchuan murmured.
He looked at Gu Yuena's flushed face, deeply complicated emotions churning in his eyes.
When Gu Yuena saw that he remained silent, she tilted her head slightly. Her long silver-white hair slipped off her shoulder and fell over her chest.
She seemed unconcerned by Zhao Linchuan's reaction and simply began explaining in a calm, candid tone:
"It all began in Holy Soul Village..."
Gu Yuena slowly unfolded the past that Zhao Linchuan knew nothing about.
From the day of his martial soul awakening in Holy Soul Village, she had noticed this boy with his unusual martial soul.
She had begun following him.
From Holy Soul Village to Ox-Horse Town, from Ox-Horse Town to Sunset Forest, from Sunset Forest to Shrek...
Those dying ten-thousand-year soul beasts he had thought he encountered through "good luck"...
His third, fourth, and fifth soul rings—she had prepared them beforehand by...
And that Phoenix he had happened to encounter while it was undergoing its tribulation had also been...
Gu Yuena spoke as though she had every right to do so, making no attempt to avoid the details of those "intimate encounters."
Everything she said stressed one thing: she had been Zhao Linchuan's first woman.
Her eyes never left Zhao Linchuan's face, her gaze filled with undisguised anticipation. She all but asked him to accept her on the spot.
Standing nearby, Qian Renxue listened to Gu Yuena's account in utter bewilderment, practically steaming at the head.
She had always assumed Zhao Linchuan was the young heir of some secluded clan.
He had connections, resources, and an impressive background, which was how he could produce things that defied all common sense.
And what was the truth?
He was a "pretty boy" being kept by an "empress"?
And this pretty boy didn't