Morning in the inner study smelled of fresh ink, damp stone, and the faint, bitter lingering scent of medicinal tea that Rulan refused to drink.
She sat at her desk, reviewing the notes Lian’er had gathered regarding the White Cloud Temple.
The monastery was built into the craggy hills two miles north of the capital walls—close enough for a half-day carriage ride, yet officially outside the jurisdiction of the palace’s guards.
“Read it back to me,” Rulan said, resting her chin on her hand.
Lian’er stood beside the desk, holding a freshly drafted petition on fine yellow silk paper, her voice clear and careful:
“To His Imperial Majesty, the Emperor: Your younger sister, Rulan, having miraculously survived a perilous fever through imperial favor, humbly requests permission to travel to the White Cloud Temple on the upcoming auspicious day. She wishes to offer incense, recite prayers of gratitude for her recovery, and seek divine blessings for lasting health.”
Lian’er paused, looking up nervously.
“Is… is that all, Your Highness? Should we not mention your continued physical weakness, or request an imperial physician to accompany the carriage?”
“No,” Rulan said firmly.
“We do not mention physicians. We do not mention weakness, and we certainly do not mention medicine.”
If she included medical details, it would give the Imperial Medical Bureau an immediate excuse to attach Physician Zhao—or one of his colleagues—to her entourage.
The entire point of this trip was to bypass the compromised palace apparatus entirely.
To the court, this had to look like nothing more than the pious, somewhat dramatic whim of a spoiled princess who believed a few sticks of burning incense would fix her health.
Lian’er tilted her head, her face full of earnest confusion.
“Do you… truly believe the temple incense will cure you, Your Highness?”
Rulan looked at her maid with a completely flat expression.
“If incense can cure chronic organ toxicity, Lian’er, we should burn down the Imperial Medical Bureau and replace it with a spice shop.”
Lian’er gasped, clutching her chest.
“Your Highness!”
“If incense works, wonderful,” Rulan continued smoothly, picking up her sable brush to sign the bottom of the petition.
“If it cannot, at least it gives me a legitimate excuse to leave this stone cage. Until permission is granted, do not breathe a word of this to anyone—not even the other manor maids.”
“I understand,” Lian’er whispered, taking the signed petition with utmost care.
“I will submit it to the Household Bureau’s dispatch office immediately.”
Just as Lian’er turned toward the door, two junior servants pushed open the outer screen, carrying the mid-morning tea service and a small wooden food box.
Rulan, who had been maintaining a sharp, cold expression suddenly paused.
Her nose twitched.
A rich, buttery, warm aroma drifted across the room—sweet, nut-like, and deeply comforting.
Her focus shattered instantly.
“What is that?” Rulan asked, her eyes locking onto the wooden box as if it contained top-secret intelligence.
The junior maid bowed low, setting the tray on the side table.
“Reporting to Your Highness, the royal kitchens prepared seasonal chestnut cakes this morning. They are made from the first autumn harvest, steamed with brown sugar and wild honey.”
Rulan slowly set her sable brush down on the porcelain rest.
She leaned forward, staring intently at the warm, golden-brown pastries arranged neatly on a celadon plate.
“Why didn’t you tell me about this sooner?” she asked, her voice dropping into a tone of deadly seriousness.
Lian’er blinked, caught off guard by the abrupt shift.
“Y-Your Highness? We were drafting an official imperial petition—”
“Imperial petitions can wait five minutes,” Rulan declared, already reaching across the table.
She picked up a chestnut cake and took a generous bite.
The outer pastry was soft and light, yielding instantly to a rich, sweet, velvety chestnut paste that melted across her tongue.
A tiny, involuntary sigh of pure satisfaction escaped her lips.
For thirty seconds, the poisoned wine, the secret masterminds, the palace factions, and her failing physical organs ceased to exist.
There was only chestnut cake.
Lian’er watched her princess eat with a mixture of relief and absolute bafflement.
For days, Rulan had been acting like a cold, calculating military officer trapped in a princess’s body.
But in moments like this, she reverted to someone genuinely, almost childishly thrilled by good food. Follow the newest chapters on g.com.
Rulan swallowed, wiped a tiny crumb from the corner of her mouth with her thumb, and pointed a commanding finger at the plate.
“Save the rest of these for this afternoon.”
“Yes, Your Highness,” Lian’er said, stifling a smile.
“I will take the petition to the dispatch office now.”
Once the petition was sent into the labyrinthine bureaucracy of the Imperial Household Bureau, Rulan settled in for a long wait.
By palace standards, administrative requests usually moved like cold molasses.
A petition from a princess to leave the capital would normally take three to five days—first passing through lower clerks, then the cabinet archives, then the Ministry of Rites, before finally landing on the Emperor’s desk for a brush stroke of approval.
Rulan spent the afternoon pacing her study, casually drafting a list of street foods with Lian’er that she could buy once they reached the capital’s outer markets.
She was halfway through a mental debate on whether fried turnip cakes were worth trying when the heavy courtyard doors banged open.
A senior eunuch from the Emperor’s personal palace stepped into the courtyard, flanked by four attendants carrying a crimson-lacquered scroll case.
Lian’er rushed into the study, her face pale with shock.
“Your Highness! The Emperor’s decree has arrived!”
Rulan frowned, stepping out into the main hall.
Already?
It’s barely been four hours.
She assumed there was a problem—perhaps a rejection or a demand for further justification.
She knelt casually as the eunuch unrolled the gold-bordered silk scroll and read the imperial mandate in a high pitched voice.
The decree was brief, elegant, and absurdly permissive.
His Imperial Majesty, deeply touched by his younger sister’s devotion and longing for recovery, not only granted full permission for her to visit the White Cloud Temple, but insisted she take a five-day retreat in the mountain compound to properly rest.
The eunuch bowed low, handing the scroll to Lian’er before departing with his retinue.
Rulan stood up, holding the warm silk scroll, genuinely bewildered.
“That was… ridiculously fast.”
Lian’er smiled brightly, clapping her hands together.
“His Majesty truly adores Your Highness! A health petition following a near-fatal illness is impossible for him to refuse. He always gives you whatever you want!”
Rulan looked down at the gold thread embroidered along the scroll’s border, a quiet sense of unease creeping into her mind.
Either her imperial brother was truly the most indulgent, doting older brother in history…
or he simply didn’t view her as enough of a threat to care where she went.
In court politics, being loved was useful, but being completely dismissed as harmless was dangerous.
“Regardless,” Rulan murmured, rolling the scroll closed.
“We leave tomorrow morning.”
Late that afternoon, as the manor servants began packing travel trunks and preparing ceremonial robes, Rulan took a brief walk through the connecting covered gallery to stretch her aching legs.
As she turned the corner near the central garden pavilion, a small procession passed through the adjacent stone corridor.
A young man sat in a wheeled wooden chair, propelled smoothly by two quiet palace attendants.
He was dressed in dark navy silk, a thick wool blanket covering his lap.
Beside him walked a noble lady in heavy, elaborate magenta robes.
Rulan stopped on the raised gallery platform, looking down at them.
She searched her mind, but just like before, her stolen memories offered absolute silence.
She didn’t recognize the boy’s face at all.
Lian’er, stepping up beside her, lowered her head and whispered quickly: “Your Highness… that is the seventh Prince, Xie Yuchen, and his mother, Consort Ning.”
Rulan observed them quietly.
The Seventh Prince sat perfectly still in his chair.
His profile was sharp, his posture rigid, and his hands rested flat against the armrests.
He didn’t look up as he passed beneath the gallery. Read this novel at g.com for the best experience.
He didn’t offer a glance toward the Fourth Princess, nor did his mother look her way.
They moved with a quiet, isolated stillness that felt out of place in the bustling palace.
Rulan recalled the vague pieces of gossip Lian’er had mentioned days ago—that the original princess had once thrown cruel taunts at this disabled prince and his disgraced maternal family.
‘So that’s him’, Rulan thought, watching the dark navy robes disappear down the stone corridor.
She felt no emotional resonance, no lingering guilt, and no sudden dramatic realization.
He was simply another piece on this massive, overcrowded chessboard—a boy who had been pushed to the quiet margins of the imperial court.
She turned around without a word and headed back to her chambers to check her packing.
The next morning, the sky was a clear, pale blue.
Rulan woke early, dressed in a simple, comfortable set of dark green traveling silks, and drank a cup of warm boiled water.
She felt quietly triumphant.
Her plan had executed flawlessly: draft petition, secure approval, leave palace, find outside doctor, inspect damaged organs.
“Lian’er,” Rulan called out, stepping into the main reception hall.
“Is the carriage ready?”
“Yes, Your Highness!” Lian’er said, stepping inside with a slightly nervous smile.
“Everything is prepared at the main gate.”
Rulan nodded approvingly.
“Good. Let’s keep a brisk pace. I want to pass through the city gates before noon.”
She swept her sleeves back and walked out of the manor doors, stepping down the grand stone staircase toward the front courtyard.
Then, she stopped dead in her tracks.
Her jaw didn’t drop—she had too much training for that—but her grey eyes dilated in absolute, unadulterated disbelief.
The main courtyard didn’t contain a single, discreet carriage with two guards.
It contained a military parade.
Standing in neat, terrifyingly organized rows were fifty heavily armored Imperial Guards on horseback, their black iron breastplates gleaming in the morning sun.
Behind them sat three massive, gilded royal carriages, each drawn by four matching white horses.
Behind the carriages stood thirty palace attendants in matching formal robes, twenty eunuchs holding ceremonial banners, a dedicated team of imperial cooks, four baggage wagons loaded with chest after chest, and a physician’s cart complete with two assistant apothecaries.
At the front of the entire assembly sat an intimidating man on a massive black warhorse, clad in silver officer’s armor, holding the banner of the Northern Army.
Rulan stood on the top step, frozen.
She slowly turned her head toward Lian’er.
She looked at the fifty armored cavalrymen.
She looked back at Lian’er.
“Lian’er,” Rulan said, her voice completely flat.
“Y-Yes, Your Highness?”
“I am going to a mountain temple to burn incense.”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
“I am not invading a neighboring kingdom.”
Lian’er winced, wringing her hands frantically.
“Your Highness, please understand! You are His Majesty’s beloved younger sister! After your severe illness, His Majesty ordered the Northern Guard to ensure absolute security! This is… this is standard imperial protocol for a royal pilgrimage!”
Rulan stared at the mini-army waiting in her front yard.
She had planned a quiet, low-profile excursion to slip into the capital’s back alleys and find an off-the-grid physician.
Instead, she was being escorted by enough heavy cavalry to lay siege to a small fortress.
She closed her eyes, letting out a long, slow, exhausted breath.
‘So much for sneaking out discreetly.’