Chapter 1

Chapter 1

The moment I saw the blood-red words appear, I hadn’t even had time to process the fact that I had transmigrated.

A chaotic flood of memories surged into my mind, and I realized who I was now.

A Cairen casually granted the title by the new emperor after he ascended the throne. Unfavored.

I had no desire to die a second time, so my first instinct was to run.

After hastily gathering some gold, silver, and valuables, I took advantage of the deep night and slipped out the door.

The palace map was etched in my mind.

But the moment I stepped outside, I ran straight into an old nanny. She was sneaking around too.

The instant our eyes met, we both jumped out of our skins.

The old nanny blurted out, “Holy crap!”

That catchphrase?

I froze for a second, then calmed down a little and tested the waters.

“You are the most beautiful cloud on my horizon, let me keep you here with all my heart?”

“Keep you here!” The old nanny finished the next line before realizing what she had done.

The next second, she clamped her mouth shut.

I stepped forward first and grabbed both her hands, tears welling in my eyes. “Comrade from home!”

In a strange dynasty, how lucky was it to meet someone from the same era?

The old nanny said she had seen the bullet comments in the sky too and fled because of them.

She seemed to have arrived earlier than I had, and as we headed out, she told me a few things.

The palace in the dead of night was especially eerie. Soon, the only sounds in my ears were our breathing.

But around the corner, footsteps grew clearer and clearer.

A eunuch was also heading outward, muttering as he walked, “Oh my God, cross-dressing as a man or a fake eunuch, I do not want to be Louis XVI…”

The moment our eyes met, I asked warily, “Odd changes, even stays?”

“Signs depend on the quadrant!”

Another comrade from home running for his life?

When comrades meet, tears fill their eyes.

But now was not the time to chat. The three of us reached a consensus: take advantage of the night and get out of the palace.

Unfortunately, fate loved playing tricks on people.

As we passed through another palace gate, we ran headlong into two sword-bearing guards, and my heart sank halfway.

Then one of them looked at us suspiciously and spoke first. “How are you?”

All three of our eyes lit up at once.

If things still counted as normal up to this point, then when our group of five reached the next palace gate and ran into several more people traveling together, we all fell silent.

Those people were dressed just like us, in all sorts of outfits.

Palace maids, imperial physicians, guards, even other imperial consorts.

The two groups faced each other. In the end, everyone cautiously opened their mouths.

“Imperial jade wine?”

“One hundred eighty a cup!”

More transmigrators!

No, wait. Was this even right?

Seeing the escape team grow from five people to over a dozen, the risk of being discovered shot straight up.

Someone suggested, “Why don’t we split up? We’re too big a target. There’s a good chance we’ll all get wipe-”

Before they could finish, another dozen or so people emerged from the corner.

Hold on-

“Don’t tell me you’re transmigrators too?”

“Too?”

I muttered to myself, “Just how many transmigrators are there in this palace?”

After matching code phrases again, everyone was clearly numb to varying degrees.

“What’s the first word you memorize for vocabulary?”

“Abandon!”

“Arise! Ye who refuse to be slaves…”

“With our flesh and blood, let us build our new Great Wall…”

“Wait, no. We’re running for our lives. Why are you getting fired up?”

“…”

All the novels I had read over the years had not lied to me.

Every corner of the palace seemed to have transmigrators. Like cockroaches, once startled, they all came crawling out one by one.

I looked at the scattered transmigrators pouring out from every direction, all in the middle of fleeing for their lives, and fell silent.

Even novels never described anything this ridiculous!

One or two transmigrators might have been able to sneak out, but with things like this, sneaking was impossible.

We could only make a desperate push.

I charged ahead at the front, passing through palace gate after palace gate, not even bothering to pay attention to the people we ran into afterward.

There were too many.

I failed to notice that aside from us, the palace was excessively quiet.

There was not a single guard either.

But that was not too strange, considering there were quite a few guard transmigrators in the escape team.

Finally, panting hard, we arrived at the last palace gate.

This palace was way too huge.

Beyond this gate lay the outside world.

Vague. Uncertain.

But at least I had to stay alive first.

However, just as we worked together to open the palace gate, I was about to step out and impatiently crane my neck to see what the world outside the palace looked like.

The instant the doors opened, firelight lit up my face.

I instinctively narrowed my eyes and saw row after row of people facing us under the dim yellow glow.

At the very center, a young man sat astride a tall horse, looking down at us from above.

He wore a bright yellow robe. On the satin, golden dragons coiled.

His identity was self-evident.

I stopped dead in my tracks.

The people behind me were confused at first, then panicked.

Because before us stood the emperor of this dynasty, leading soldiers to surround us.

Amid my shock, my eyes met the young man’s.

Suddenly, the corner of his mouth tugged upward, and he let out a cold laugh. “Su Cairen, are you planning to rebel?”

Su Cairen?

Me?

Baffled, I turned to look behind me-

Dear God, the crowd behind me had practically grown into an army!