The Ancient Dian of that year was at its absolute zenith, and I had just turned twenty.
I was born in the Golden Age, raised in the Golden Age, and I sat at the very heart of its splendor.
Ten miles of flower-strewn streets, lanterns as bright as day.
Colorful banners unfurled from the city gates all the way to the Royal Road, and every eave was hung with golden bells.
When the wind brushed past, ten thousand bells chimed in unison, as if someone were scattering crushed gold from the heavens.
The entire city had emptied out; thousands thronged the streets just to catch a single glimpse of me on parade—Luo Su, the Princess of Ancient Dian.
At twenty, I already held half the world's power in my palm.
Some of it was granted by my father, the King; the rest, I had built myself. Those who swore their lives to me said I was born to be looked up to.
I sat within the high palanquin, the gauze curtains drifting softly, gold-threaded patterns shimmering like fractured light under the sun.
I knew how many eyes were following this carriage—some kneeling, some bowing in silent reverence.
As the palanquin turned the corner of the main street, I flicked a corner of the curtain aside, casting a casual glance toward a side alley. It should have been cleared for the procession, yet it was teeming with people. A street performer stood at the mouth of the alley, having pitched a crude cloth tent that blocked half the path.
His movements were exaggerated, drawing a crowd whose laughter rose and fell in waves—a strange, jarring dissonance against the solemnity of the main street.
I wanted to call for the guards, but in that heartbeat, I couldn't find my voice. Beneath that swaying curtain, I felt a pair of eyes! Those weren't the eyes of a spectator. They were the eyes... of a predator watching its prey.
For a fleeting second, my chest tightened with an imperceptible chill. A sudden gale erupted, and the hair on my neck stood on end.
"Yu Yan!" I called out.
Before I could look closer, the crowd surged, and the cloth tent was swept away, cutting off my line of sight. When I looked again, there was only the churning sea of commoners and the rising tide of laughter, as if that single glance had been nothing more than a trick of light and shadow.
"Princess, be at peace."
A low voice spoke from behind me.
It was so faint that no one but I could have heard it.
I finally steadied my spirit. I didn't turn back, nor did I respond. I knew it was him.
Yu Yan was the deadliest shadow guard my father had handpicked for me from a thousand death-sworn warriors. His martial prowess was peerless, but he existed only in the dark, never manifesting before the world. Even my closest old servants were unaware of his existence.
I let the curtain fall, my fingertip tapping once against my knee. A prearranged signal.
The palanquin moved forward. At that exact moment, the firecrackers exploded in unison.
BOOM!!—Flames licked the sky, smoke swirled in heavy coils, and the entire street shuddered from the force.
The crowd erupted in gasps and cheers; colorful confetti fell like rain, and the air was thick with the scent of gunpowder and cloyingly sweet flowers.
And then, right after that thunderous roar—The sky turned abruptly dark. It was as if the clouds had been violently torn open to crush the Royal City.
A wind howled from the depths of the alleys, whipping the curtains and banners into a frenzy.
The golden bells rang chaotically, a sharp, jarring sound that made the heart race with unease.
I didn't move. I just simply straightened my back, slowly.
For a split second, the wind caught the gauze curtain, and the people outside caught a glimpse—I had frozen. Like a jade statue that had suddenly lost its soul.
Someone screamed. Someone fell to their knees. Someone began to retreat. The once-orderly procession dissolved into chaos in an instant. Guards drew their blades, horns blared, and panic spread like wildfire.
"Assassin—!"
I don't know who shouted first.
After that, sharp cries rose one after another, and the entire Flower Street exploded.
The crowd began to spiral out of control, the stampeding masses held back only by the guards surrounding me.
And I remained in the palanquin, motionless. Until the wind died down. Until the curtains fell. Until every gaze was pinned to that moment of "anomaly."
"Someone tried to assassinate the Princess!"
Later, the entire Royal City was abuzz with rumors. Some said the Princess had encountered an assassin during the parade and narrowly escaped death. Some said someone had infiltrated the crowd and was only a step away from succeeding. Others said the heavens had sent a warning through the sudden change in the weather.
But no one knew that all of it was a rumor I had released myself. The assassination was real, but it wasn't meant for me.
It was the bait I had cast to lure out the prey.I reached up and gently unfastened an earring. The woman in the bronze mirror remained poised as ever, her gaze as calm as if nothing had happened.
"And him?" I asked.
The room was empty.
A moment later, a raspy response drifted through the air.
"As the Princess commanded, he has been lured out."
I let out a soft laugh.
"Excellent."
What I needed was never just him as a shadow guard.
It was the entire network of shadow guards that had stood behind him all these years.
As for that glance at the street corner today...
My fingertips paused.
Those eyes... they didn't feel like a first meeting.
"Did you see them?" I asked suddenly.
This time, he was silent for a heartbeat.It was a very brief silence, so short that if I hadn't been so familiar with him, I wouldn't have noticed.
"...I saw them," he replied, his voice raspy and tinged with a hint of exhaustion.
But his tone remained steady, as it always was—devoid of emotion, like a piece of wood.
I didn't press further. I had long grown used to his dull, wooden nature. Boring.
And naturally, I wouldn't notice—That those eyes of his, which had always guarded my back, were colder than anyone else's in that very moment...