“Your Highness… Your Highness… I beg you… please don’t break off our engagement! Please…” The young girl’s faint, anguished pleas echoed through the resplendent Golden Throne Hall…
Yet her pitiful appearance won no sympathy. The palace servants went about their duties, attending to their masters, while the few masters present all turned as one to look at the man she was begging…
“Prince Chen, what do you think…” Emperor Yuqian, seated on the Dragon Throne, glanced at Prime Minister Yun below, then turned to Prince Chen, standing in the middle of the hall, looking troubled…
Seeing the Emperor’s troubled expression, a glimmer of hope flashed in the girl’s tear-filled eyes. She gazed imploringly at Prince Chen, standing beside her, hoping he would change his mind!
“My mind is made up. I beg Your Majesty to grant my request!” But Prince Chen rejected her without the slightest hesitation!
“No… no…” Unable to bear his repeated refusals, the girl shook her head violently. Tears spilled from the corners of her eyes, and her soft pink lips trembled with agitation. Prince Chen’s expression was cold and cruel, and though resentment surged in her heart, she didn’t dare show it. She could only stand there in a daze, murmuring to herself…
Everyone in the hall held their breath at Prince Chen’s answer…
Her face as pale as snow, the girl looked around the hall with pleading eyes. Then she bit her lower lip hard and dropped to her knees before Prince Chen…
“Your Highness… Meng’er begs you… please, don’t break off our engagement… I beg you…” Her pleas came in broken bursts. Ignoring the disdainful looks around her, she began bowing her head repeatedly before Prince Chen…
A soft gasp rippled through the hall. One after another, contemptuous glances fell on the girl as she kept bowing her head…
At the sound of her head striking the floor again and again, Prince Chen, who had been gazing straight ahead, furrowed his brow. He looked down at the girl beside him with disgust. Seeing her timid, cowardly, tearful state, his expression darkened further. His voice icy, he said, “I will never take a weak and cowardly woman like you as my princess consort!”
With that, Prince Chen turned away and said no more…
At his merciless answer, the girl’s shoulders sagged. Her legs gave way, and she slumped to the floor, despair in her eyes. Blood seeped from the lower lip she had bitten between her teeth…
Now that Prince Chen had publicly rejected her, even though Yun Qianmeng was still an unmarried young lady, she feared she would never have the chance to marry anyone in this life!
The disdainful looks around her only made Yun Qianmeng feel worse. Suddenly, she began to laugh as if she had lost her mind…
“Heh… heh…” Tears pooled in her eyes and streamed down her cheeks. Her body, sprawled on the floor, shook violently as she laughed, nearly frenzied…
Slowly lifting her delicate, elegant face, Yun Qianmeng gazed at Prince Chen, so close to her, with the same infatuation as before. In her heart, she traced the lines of his cold profile and the proud breadth of his frame…
“If Your Highness doesn’t want me, what face do I have left to go on living?” she murmured. Yun Qianmeng staggered to her feet, her gaze never leaving Prince Chen. Her pitiful appearance was enough to break anyone’s heart!
But her wretched expression couldn’t win even a shred of pity from Prince Chen…
Yun Qianmeng’s misty eyes slowly turned toward the red pillar carved with dragons inside the hall. A look of resolve appeared in them…
“Quick! Stop her!” Emperor Yuqian cried out when he realized something was wrong with Yun Qianmeng. Everyone’s heart jolted, but no one reacted in time to what was happening before them…
Thud! The sound of impact rang through the solemn, magnificent Golden Throne Hall…