At long last, the heavens showed rcy, or maybe they just got bored watching the world’s most chaotic bridal entrance.
As the palace gates creaked open at a pace only slightly faster than a funeral procession, four swamp-drenched cultivators exhaled in perfect, miserable harmony. It wasn’t noble. It wasn’t dignified. It was the kind of sigh that ca from the soul, from the deepest corners of dignity that had been so thoroughly trampled by swamp muck.
Finally. A roof. A room. A chance to erase the sha of being mistaken for seaweed monsters.
Shu Mingye, still silent, still blood-drenched, still staring vaguely at the candy in his palm like it held answers to the universe, said nothing. With one smooth flick of his wrist—cool, commanding, still questionably sticky—he gave a signal.
Two palace maidservants appeared as if summoned by dramatic tension. They wore identical expressions: the perfectly neutral look of soone who had seen too much and would be processing it later over strong tea and gossip. They gave the four a slow, deliberate once-over—up, down, pausing slightly at Song iyu’s algae hair accessory—then wordlessly turned and began to walk.
No questions. No towels. Definitely no warm welco.
And so, Linyue and her companions followed, trailing soggy footprints across pristine palace tiles.
They were led deep into the palace grounds, farther and farther from anything resembling grandeur. The air grew quieter. Less polished. More… suspiciously budget-friendly.
Eventually, they reached a secluded courtyard tucked far behind anything remotely important. It was peaceful, but in the way abandoned shrines are peaceful. One strong breeze, and half the surrounding trees looked ready to collapse dramatically. The bushes were brown. The grass was crunchy. The ground might’ve been cursed. Who could say?
It was clear.
Deliberate.
A polite way of saying: “You may live, but preferably where no one can see you.”
Still, beggars could not be princesses. And compared to the swamp? This was luxury.
The courtyard was large enough. Quiet. Definitely private. Definitely flammable.
The chamber inside had all the basics: a bed (mostly level), a table (a little scarred, possibly used for sword polishing or ritual sacrifices), mismatched chairs (charmingly individualistic), and a water basin big enough to rinse off two buckets of sha and maybe one regret.
Shen Zhenyu, still dripping and clinging to the last shreds of his dignity, ran a hand through his hair and muttered, “At least the roof doesn’t leak. Yet.”
He Yuying examined a wooden pillar with mild suspicion, his tone mild but grim. “If soone lights a candle, this place is going up faster than a festival lantern.”
Song iyu wrung out the corner of her sleeve, green water dripping like tears, “I miss the swamp. It was more welcoming.”
Linyue, already making her way toward the wash basin, rely said, “Well, at least there’s no candy tax this ti.”
And for one precious mont, all was quiet in the flammable little courtyard of exile.
As the door shut behind her with a soft and slightly judgntal thud, Linyue was finally alone. Just her, a basin of clean water, a suspiciously stiff rag and sothing she hadn’t seen in what felt like a lifeti: a mirror.
She leaned forward and froze.
A silence fell over the room.
Then ca a soft, long-suffering, “... ah.”
There, in the polished surface of the mirror, was not the artfully disguised face of Princess Fu Yuxin, Second Daughter of the Emperor, but the very recognizable, very real face of Linyue of Xuanyi Pavilion—complete with streaks of green, so mysterious moss still clinging to her brow, and no sign of the expensive jade dust powder that had once cloaked her identity in soft pale shimr.
Gone. All of it. Washed away sowhere between being tail-flicked by a mythical spirit beast and dunked into what could only be described as a swamp's evil cousin.
She blinked at her reflection, then sighed. "At least the seaweed was doing its part.”
Yes, sohow, nature had conspired to protect her secret. She owed her thanks to a tangle of soggy forest weeds for keeping her true face hidden from the Demon of Shulin. A miracle. A humiliating, squelchy miracle.
The jade dust powder had cost a fortune. Well, for anyone else. Living under the eccentric generosity of Master Yin Xue, she got free access to rare dicines, luxury costics, at least one hundred different kind of tea leaves, and an alarming number of useless scrolls titled “How to Negotiate with Demons (Without Dying Imdiately).”
She had offered the disguise to her companions on the way here, just in case.
“Want to cover up?” she had asked.
“Waste of money,” Shen Zhenyu had grunted, barely looking up.
“I’m too lazy,” He Yuying said, lying on his back.
“I'm already beautiful,” Song iyu declared, cheerfully patting her cheeks. “Let them marvel.”
Linyue hadn’t pushed. It wasn’t like anyone in Shulin knew what they looked like. They weren’t famous. Or so she thought until the swamp decided to stage a full-body identity reveal.
She scrubbed her face clean and dried off, thinking briefly about how close she had co to being revealed to one of the most dangerous n in the realm while slling like pond soup. She dried her face with what might have once been a towel but now resembled damp regret. Then, wrapping herself in a slightly scratchy blanket, she listened to the sounds from the other room.
A thud. A groan. A noise that might have been soone collapsing face-first onto a mattress and giving up on living.
Her companions—chaotic, proud fools, and honorary swamp survivors—had officially entered the final stage of post-disaster recovery: the loud, graceless flop.
No more talk, no more swamp, no more anything.
Tonight, they would sleep. Sleep not as cultivators. Not as fake princesses or sword-wielding guards. And definitely not as respected visitors of the Shulin Palace. But as exhausted ex-seaweed monsters with identity crises and sore feet.
And honestly? That was enough for one day.
Early morning, in the distant courtyard of the Demon of Shulin’s palace, before the sun could even stretch its golden arms across the roof tiles, Song iyu was already fully awake and brimming with unearned energy.
The door to Linyue’s chamber exploded open with a bang, courtesy of Song iyu’s foot and zero self-restraint. She burst in energetically, bright-eyed and practically vibrating.
“Good morning, Sis—Oh! I an, Princess!” she corrected herself with exaggerated grace, clapping her hands together. “Let dress you up!”
Linyue, still clinging to her cocoon of blankets like a determined caterpillar refusing tamorphosis, let out a muffled groan. Her eyelids fluttered open just enough to give Song iyu a narrowed glare that said, Is the sun even up yet?
It didn’t matter. Song iyu had already yanked the blankets away and was dragging her toward the dressing table.
Linyue slumped into the chair, her limbs surrendering one by one. Head rolling to the side, eyes half-lidded, she looked less like a royal and more like soone recovering from a spiritual hangover. She hadn't even reapplied the jade dust powder, the magical powder that usually turned her from dangerously beautiful into moderately ignorable.
And that’s when Song iyu froze.
Not because sothing was wrong.
But because sothing was dangerously, terrifyingly right.
Song iyu leaned in, squinting at Linyue’s freshly scrubbed face, completely bare of makeup. No jade dust. No careful disguise to dull her edges. Just... her actual face.
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