In the eyes of ambitious nobles, she was less a woman than the greatest political prize in the eastern kingdoms. Because whoever married Gin Xuexin would not simply gain a wife.
He would gain the loyalty of half a million cavalry. For that reason, Gin Wenyuan protected his granddaughter with almost obsessive care.
She lived in an isolated residence within the military camp, guarded day and night. Contact with outsiders was heavily restricted. The camp itself was home to hundreds of thousands of soldiers.
Almost all of them men, and Gin Xuexin was the only woman so Gin Wenyuan had no intention of allowing rumors, scandals, or political schemes to reach the only heir of his bloodline.
The isolation had somewhat negative consequences however. Growing up with almost no interaction with men outside her own family, Gin Xuexin developed an unusually simple view of affection.
She longed to be loved, to be noticed, to be cherished, not because she sought power or status, but because she had spent most of her life alone. As a result, she formed emotional attachments far more easily than most women.
A man who treated her with genuine warmth, listened to her, or simply made her feel seen could quickly earn a place in her heart.
It was not foolishness so much as innocence born from years of isolation.
Gin Wenyuan understood this better than anyoneelse, which was precisely why he guarded her so very fiercely.
Long before the current war began, her hand had already been promised to the Second Prince of the Yue Kingdom. From Gin Wenyuan's perspective, it was the perfect alliance.
Supporting the prince's claim to the throne would place his granddaughter beside the future emperor of Yue while strengthening his own political influence within the Yue kingdom.
The Second Prince, however, viewed this simple arrangement differently. To him, Gin Xuexin was not a woman he wished to love. She was an alliance. A path to five hundred thousand cavalry.
A path to power. He visited her only once after their betrothal. That single meeting was enough for Gin Xuexin to begin dreaming of him.
Having known so few men in her life, she mistook courtesy for affection and convinced herself that the prince would one day return for her. He never did.
Years passed without another visit, another letter, or even a message asking about her well-being. The loneliness she had always carried only deepened.
By the time Luo He learned of her existence through information provided by one of his highly trusted intelligence networks.
Gin Xuexin remained little more than a beautiful bird confined within a gilded cage. An heir desired by countless men, yet truly known by none.
It was that loneliness, more than her inheritance or beauty, that first caught Luo He's attention. He was as lonely as she was maybe a little bit less so.
He was the Crown Prince and soul heir to the most powerful empire. So he was never allowed to interact much with the public, as it gave people the opportunity to approach him.
This might seem good for a young ruler but being approached is being recognised. The more this happened the more chance people had to control him.
And the more threatened the current emperor felt. So Luo He was also isolated for his own protection and the protection of the empire.
But he at least had his mother and sister while Xuexin didn't so she had it even worse than he actually had. But Luo He understood her loneliness better than most other people.
Long before Luo He arrived at the Jin mansion, he had already built many great things despite his young age.
One such something that very few people on the continent have ever even realized, existed was the intelligence network of the great Yang empire.
When he was still the Crown Prince of the Yang kingdom, Luo He understood something his father's ministers failed to grasp. Wars were rarely won by stronger armies.
They were won by better information.
Instead of merely expanding the imperial spy organization, Luo He completely redesigned it.
Every kingdom gradually received agents planted under ordinary identities. Ministers, merchants, caravan leaders, scholars, servants, dockworkers, innkeepers.
Even insignificant clerks inside many government offices. Individually, they knew almost nothing. Together, they formed a web that stretched across the continent.
No single spy possessed the whole picture. Only the man at the very top did.
That man was Luo He's closest sworn brother. The two had grown up together.
Despite Luo He's heavily restricted childhood, his father occasionally allowed him to leave the palace perfectly disguised as an ordinary wealthy noble.
He was accompanied only by a handful of trusted guards from the Flame Shadow Guard. Those rare outings became treasured memories.
Luo He and his sworn brother wandered the capital like ordinary young men, visiting markets, teahouses, festivals, and famous districts simply to observe people together.
His brother often laughed whenever beautiful women walked by. Luo He merely admired them from afar without ever actually approaching them.
To him, beauty resembled a magnificent painting or an elegant sculpture. He appreciated it intellectually, never emotionally. Women simply never stirred anything inside him.
His interests lay elsewhere. Books on: History. Engineering. Mathematics. Military strategy. Architecture. Science Economics. Human behaviour.
He spent almost every waking hour inside the imperial libraries, consuming knowledge with frightening speed. His isolation left him with few companions.
Besides his mother, his younger sister, and the sworn brother who would later command the empire's intelligence network he didn't have much friends. It also gave him something else. Time.
While other children played outside, Luo He quietly mastered subjects most of the flame kingdom's scholars spent their entire lives dedicated to studying.
By the extremely young age of eight, his understanding of warfare had already surpassed nearly every general serving the Flame Emperor.
The incident that revealed his genius became almost legendary within the imperial family.
One afternoon, while reading reports from the front lines, Luo He noticed a fatal mistake hidden within the army's deployment.
Certain the current strategy would lead the army into an ambush, he quietly drafted an entirely new set of military orders. Unable to issue commands himself, he treated the whole thing like one of his usual "games."
He asked his mother to place the imperial seal on the document. Believing her lonely son was simply amusing himself, as he often did, she smiled and obliged without reading it carefully.
The sealed orders reached the battlefield. The generals followed them without question, believing they came directly from the Empress.
The army unexpectedly changed its route, avoided the hidden ambush entirely, and achieved a decisive victory.
Meanwhile, the Flame Emperor was searching for whoever had dared alter his campaign. Before he could uncover the culprit, messengers arrived announcing the victory.
Only afterward did the investigation reveal the truth. The orders had never come from the Empress. They had come from an eight-year-old boy.
Rather than punishing his son, the Flame Emperor laughed. For the first time, he realized his heir possessed a military mind unlike anything the empire had ever produced.
From that day onward, almost every major campaign undertaken by the Flame Kingdom was planned by Luo He. And his father personally guided him to study military strategy.
He never attended councils. He never sat among the generals. He simply wrote detailed strategic reports inside the palace and handed them to his father, who presented them as imperial strategy.
Over time, the world came to believe the Flame Emperor himself was one of the greatest military minds of the age. Only a handful of people knew the truth.
The true architect had always been the quiet Crown Prince hidden inside the imperial library.
Years later, after arriving at the Jin Mansion, Luo He quietly repeated the process of creating a spy network.
Using the experience he had gained in the Yang Kingdom, he established another intelligence network centered around the Jin family.
It was naturally much smaller than the continental network his sworn brother commanded, but it was organized using the same principles.
The two networks exchanged critical information whenever necessary. His sworn brother never forgot who had entrusted him with his high position.
Whenever intelligence gathered in the Flame Kingdom concerned Luo He, copies were sent across the continent without fail.
It was through one such report that Luo He first learned of Gin Xuexin. To almost everyone else, she was the heir to five hundred thousand cavalry.
To Luo He, she was simply another lonely soul hidden behind walls built by people who loved her enough to protect her from the world.