Chapter 3

Chapter 3

I grabbed my glasses and turned to leave.

Xiao Xu caught my arm.

“Lan Ting.”

“Lan what?” I snapped, making no effort to hide my impatience. “You’ve been Lan Ting this, Lan Ting that since just now. If you like Preface to the Orchid Pavilion so much, go home and copy it out.”

“Your eyes look a lot like Lan Ting’s.”

“What the hell? I have no idea what you’re talking about.” I rolled my eyes. “Senior, your girlfriend is waiting for you. I don’t want to get cursed out as the other woman, so have some self-respect!”

“Shen Yuan isn’t my girlfriend.”

“What does that have to do with me?”

I kept walking.

As if he still refused to give up, Xiao Xu reached out and grabbed me again.

I flung him off hard.

“Don’t touch me!!!”

Xiao Xu froze.

He clearly hadn’t expected me to recoil so violently.

“Psycho. Who do you think you are? You think every girl has to like you? If you keep pestering me, I’ll call the police and report you for harassment!”

After unleashing that whole tirade, I turned and ran.

By the time I made it back to the dorm, I nearly collapsed onto the floor.

That had been close. So close. I had almost given myself away.

The moment Xiao Xu grabbed me, my whole body started trembling.

I remembered our first meeting in my previous life.

Xiao Xu had been lying in the snow, barely alive, using the last of his strength to clutch my hand.

“Please… save me.”

When I saw him, his entire face was as pale as snow. Only the red mole beneath his eye was dazzlingly beautiful.

I had never seen a boy so good-looking.

My heart softened.

That year, I was fourteen.

I was the only princess of Daxu, raised in pampered seclusion within the deep palace, sheltered from the world.

At fourteen,

I brought that boy back to my princess residence.

He said his name was Ah Xu. He had no surname.

In Daxu, slaves did not have surnames.

The slave brand on the back of his neck had turned red from the cold. I found him a high-collared garment to cover it.

From that day on, Ah Xu became my guard.

When I climbed trees, he stood below to catch me.

When I teased dogs, he had to guard against me getting bitten.

When my imperial brother bullied me, he would wear that solemn expression like he was ready to draw his blade on him at any moment.

Because of his slave status, Ah Xu never fit in.

Because of his slave status, whenever he went out, the young masters of noble families would throw rotten vegetable leaves at him.

I took revenge on every single one of them for him.

When Father Emperor found out, he punished me by making me kneel in the ancestral hall.

Ah Xu did not sleep. He knelt outside the door with me for the entire night.

The next day, limping, I went to see him.

“Ah Xu! Guess what I brought you!”

With an air of great mystery, I pulled a half-broken pastry from inside my robes.

“Peach blossom pastry! On my birthday, I absolutely have to eat peach blossom pastry. I’ll give you half.”

“That’s right. Today is my birthday. Father Emperor never remembers.”

At fifteen,

my birthday happened to fall on Gu Yu.

I had gone to a temple to pray for blessings, only to run into an assassination attempt.

The guards escorted me away to safety, while Ah Xu stayed behind to cover our retreat.

He was wounded, and he was the last one to return to the residence.

When I saw him, he was in a terrible state, rainwater and blood mingling all over him.

But he seemed unaware of it. He only carefully took a bundle from inside his robes.

Inside was peach blossom pastry.

“Your Highness, I am late.”

At sixteen,

I vaguely began to realize that Father Emperor… was a tyrant.

He had killed many people and made countless enemies.

The number of assassination attempts against me grew more and more frequent.

Once, Ah Xu was gravely injured. The imperial physician said that if he did not wake up, we could begin preparing for his funeral.

I threw myself over him and sobbed at the top of my lungs.

Somehow, I cried him awake.

Flustered, he wiped away my tears, his movements panicked and clumsy.

“Your Highness, don’t cry. Please don’t cry… When you cry, my heart hurts.”

That day, I kissed him.

The young man froze for a long while, his long lashes lowering to hide the emotions churning in his eyes.

I was still young then, and I failed to see the restraint and struggle in his gaze.

That day, Ah Xu swore an oath to the moon.

“Your Highness, I am willing to protect you for the rest of my life, until death and beyond.”

“Only you.”

It was many years later before I understood the deeper meaning of those last two words.

At seventeen,

Ah Xu became my prince consort.

Father Emperor bestowed the surname Xiao upon him.

On our wedding night, Xiao Xu drank wine.

Red candles burned warm beyond the bed curtains as he held me. “Lan Ting, you have no idea how much I love you…”

My heart was filled with joy.

The red mole beneath his eye looked more and more like a teardrop.

“If only you weren’t a princess.”

“What?”

Lost in happiness, I had not heard him clearly, and I did not think to ask further.

A year later, I gave birth to a daughter. We named her Little Jade Peach.

Little Jade Peach was frail, and Xiao Xu and I protected her with all the care we had.

Back then, I never doubted that my daughter would grow up healthy.

Just as I believed Ah Xu and I would be together forever.

But beautiful dreams always come to an end.

The year Xiao Xu launched his palace coup, my Little Jade Peach died of illness.