Volume 1, Chapter 34: Bathing Together (2)

Xue Wu almost trembled as she helped Shen Ran remove his clothes.

In truth, Shen Ran’s physique was every bit as worthy of his face. Yet the instant she saw the man’s strong, taut body, her pupils contracted.

His body was covered in countless hideous scars.

And she had never known.

The first time they had been together, the lamps had been extinguished, leaving the room in complete darkness.

Though even if they had not been, it would have made no difference—for Shen Ran had never removed his upper garments.

Xue Wu had thought it was because Shen Ran detested her. But now, it seemed…

At last, she understood why Shen Ran disliked having others attend him so closely. Her fingertips trembling, she touched a scar on his shoulder and knit her brows tightly.

“Your Majesty…”

Knowing what she was thinking, Shen Ran lowered his head and glanced at the scar on his shoulder. Calmly, he said, “When I first entered Rongdi, their Third Prince suddenly decided to test my courage and shot at me with a crossbow. His aim was poor, and the bolt went straight through my shoulder.”

Was his aim truly poor, or had he deliberately meant to humiliate Shen Ran and make him lose face?

Shen Ran spoke of it as lightly as though recounting the weather, but Xue Wu drew in a sharp breath.

Her flustered gaze fell upon another scar at Shen Ran’s waist. It was a large one, and therefore especially conspicuous.

Following her gaze, Shen Ran looked down and gave an indifferent smile.

“The Great General of Rongdi invited me to tea, but his servant was clumsy and spilled an entire pot of freshly boiled water over me.”

Of course, whether that servant had truly been “clumsy” was a question open to interpretation. After all, in all the years since, he had never spilled boiling water on anyone else.

Amid the hazy mist, Xue Wu inexplicably felt her eyes grow moist.

Her fingertips moved lower and accidentally brushed against Shen Ran’s chest. There seemed to be something uneven beneath her touch.

Only when she looked closely did she discover another scar there.

Compared with the countless scars of every size on Shen Ran’s body, this one was not particularly noticeable—only a thin line. Yet it lay dangerously close to his heart. Had the blade veered even slightly, it might have taken his life.

At the thought, Xue Wu’s gaze darkened.

“Was this done by the people of Rongdi too?” she asked softly.

There was a trace of coldness in her voice, one she herself did not notice.

When she had been young, Xue Wu often rode and hunted with her elder brother. A natural air of violence had once clung to her, but as she grew older, she understood that, given her status, she would one day marry into the imperial family. Thus, she had deliberately restrained it. Even so, it would occasionally reveal itself without her realizing.

This time, however, Shen Ran shook his head.

He took her hand.

“During the autumn hunt in the nineteenth year of the late emperor’s reign, he was assassinated in the encampment. I happened to be beside him, so I took the blade meant for him.”

Shen Jianning was incompetent and suspicious by nature. He looked down on sons who accomplished nothing, believing them an embarrassment to him, yet he was secretly wary of sons who were too capable, fearing they might harbor treasonous ambitions and seize his throne.

Everything was a double-edged sword.

After returning, Shen Ran’s brilliance had been too conspicuous. The more authority he gathered into his hands, and the more blood that stained them, the deeper Shen Jianning’s suspicion and fear became.

He thought Shen Ran was a very sharp blade.

And a very useful one.

Yet he was equally afraid that one day this sharp, useful blade would turn against him.

Shen Jianning kept Shen Ran at his side, making him work on his behalf while refusing to grant him any greater power.

That continued until the day of the blade.

The wound had nearly cost Shen Ran his life, yet it was also like a sword striking through ice, dispelling most of the sovereign’s doubts.

At last, it gave wings to the tiger that had lain in wait.

A faint sensation against his chest pulled Shen Ran back to the present.

He froze.

Lowering his eyes, he discovered that Xue Wu had pressed her face against his chest, her cheek gently rubbing against the scar there.

It was truly a first in all the world.

The woman’s voice was faintly choked.

“Your Majesty, you have suffered.”

At that, Shen Ran suddenly laughed.

He lifted her face in his hands and gazed into her eyes.

“A-Wu, do not pity me.”

“What I have told you…”

“It was not so that you would pity me.”

A tear slipped from the corner of her eye, leaving a faintly gleaming curve upon her jade-white cheek.

Xue Wu stared at him blankly, unable to speak.

Shen Ran continued, “Some of these wounds were left by the people of Rongdi, but others were inflicted by the imperial family of Great Zhou—the former Crown Prince, the former Empress, even the late emperor. Every one of them played a part. So did those scholars who kill with brush and ink, and those so-called generals who bow and scrape before their enemies while speaking righteously of how others must sacrifice themselves to preserve the realm.”

“I can tell you plainly…”

“I do want this throne. But from the day I ascended it, I never once imagined that I would become a wise ruler. I had already decided to take this empire and make a game of it.”

Shen Ran smiled, his eyes warm with amusement. His expression and tone were gentle to the extreme.

Tenderness coiled around them, languid and endless as spring.

Yet Xue Wu could not stop herself from shivering.

Instinctively, she tried to avoid his gaze, but Shen Ran held her face and would not allow her to lower her head.

Perhaps the moonlight was too indistinct, casting a thin veil of mist over his glasslike eyes.

His voice was slightly hoarse, so soft it seemed almost a murmur in a dream.

“A-Wu, I know you are afraid of me.”

“I admit it… I admit that there is violence in me.”

“But I swear…”

His thick black lashes trembled in the night like the wings of a butterfly.

Shen Ran lowered his eyes and suddenly drew her into his arms.

“No matter how much violence there is in me, I will never again turn it against you.”

Xue Wu went still.

She had never seen Shen Ran like this. The Shen Ran of her childhood had been quiet. Consort Li, who was determined to see her son become a dragon among men, had driven him relentlessly, and he had consequently grown reluctant to confide his thoughts to anyone. He seemed entirely out of place amid the clamor of worldly life.

After returning from Rongdi, he killed while laughing and talking, played among flowers and amid the pleasures of the world, and watched with cold eyes as human fortunes rose and fell—as though the whole world were merely a play.

He allowed no one into his heart.

But now…

This man rested his chin upon her shoulder.

He brushed his temples against hers.

“A-Wu, from now on, you must not be afraid of me.”

“Everyone else may fear me. They may hate me. But you may not. So long as you are not afraid of me, I will become the wise ruler you wish me to be.”

His words were perfectly calm, yet when their lingering resonance scattered into the wind, they made her feel as though even her breathing no longer belonged to her.

Amid that heart-stirring tremor, their clothes were stripped away before she realized it.

The sensation of bare skin against bare skin was too vivid. It was only when the sound of splashing water reached her ears that Xue Wu belatedly realized Shen Ran had already drawn her down into the pool.

Shen Ran pressed a hand against the back of her head. His damp lips brushed her earlobe.

He murmured, “A-Wu, will you agree?”

Agree to what?

To what he had said before?

Or to…

Sinking with him, here and now?

By then, Xue Wu had grown drowsy beneath a strange sensation unlike anything she had ever known.

Wave after wave of trembling robbed her of nearly all power of speech. The only thing she could do was reach up and cling tightly to Shen Ran’s neck, restraining the shyness that surged over her like a tide.

To Shen Ran, such an action was no different from an invitation disguised as refusal.

As their breathing grew heavier and heavier, he bent down into the curve of her neck and made his most solemn vow.

“A-Wu, I will never betray you.”