The mad princess forces love upon him, and the aloof imperial advisor trembles every night.

"You know what," he said softly.

"All these years I've been wondering, what were you thinking when you were torturing me?"

"Do you truly enjoy that pain, or... are you just masking your inner emptiness and fear?"

Chu Qingyao could no longer hear what he was saying.

Her consciousness shattered amidst excruciating pain and terror, and hallucinations began to appear before her eyes—

She saw herself seven years ago, dressed in the most magnificent palace attire, looking down at Shen Yue kneeling before her.

She felt great at that moment.

Finally, there was someone she could manipulate and trample on at will.

The Queen Mother said that she was a princess and could have whatever she wanted.

She wanted this man to suffer, to submit to her, to grovel at her feet like a dog.

But she never imagined that one day this dog would turn into a wolf and bite her throat.

"I guess it's the latter," Shen Yue said, answering his own question.

"Because you're too afraid. Afraid of losing favor, afraid of being outshone, afraid of the Ninth Princess who's always more outstanding and more popular than you."

"So you can only prove your strength by tormenting others."

"But that's not power, Chu Qingyao."

He leaned close to her, almost touching her ear, his voice as soft as a feather, yet as heavy as a thousand pounds:

"That's incompetence."

Chu Qingyao's pupils suddenly contracted.

"Like now," Shen Yue continued.

"You're tied up here, at my mercy."

"Not because you're a princess, not because you have any power, but because—you lost."

"You lost to the Ninth Princess, whom you always wanted to trample underfoot; you lost to me, whom you never took seriously; you lost to your own stupidity and malice."

He straightened up and watched her struggle on the chains, like a trapped, dying bird.

"Alright," he said, "warm-up complete. Now let's do... the third thing."

This time, he did not use a dagger.

He took a cloth bag from his waist, opened it, and inside were all sorts of small tools—hammers, hooks, blades, and some strangely shaped implements that Chu Qingyao had never seen before.

"These things," Shen Yue laid out one by one, his movements as gentle as if he were preparing a tea set.

"These are specially prepared for you. Each one corresponds to something you did for me back then."

He picked up the small whistle.

"Remember? On the third day of our marriage, you had someone break my left pinky finger just because I said, 'The tea is cold.'"

Chu Qingyao watched in horror as he raised the hammer.

"I fainted three times from the pain," Shen Yue recalled, his tone as calm as if he were talking about someone else's story.

"When I woke up, my finger was crooked, and it still hurts on rainy days."

The ball fell.

It wasn't a finger. It hit Chu Qingyao's left wrist.

With a crisp crack, the wrist bone shattered.

Chu Qingyao couldn't even scream; she could only open her mouth wide and gasp for breath, tears streaming uncontrollably down her face.

"But later I realized that the pain of a broken bone is nothing."

"The real pain is the kind that is subtle, long, and gradually erodes your dignity."

He lifted Chu Qingyao's chin, forcing her to look at him.

"For example, you let those beggars...do what I did."

Chu Qingyao's pupils suddenly dilated.

"No..." she pleaded hoarsely, "No... Shen Yue... I was wrong... I was really wrong..."

"Wrong?" Shen Yue chuckled.

"Yes, you're wrong."

"But your 'mistake' cannot bring back my father's life, nor can it clear my mother and sister's names."

"It can't bring back my crushed dignity, it can't bring back these seven years... the torment of being awakened by nightmares every day and every night."

He paused, and a slight tremor finally crept into his voice:

"Chu Qingyao, do you know? I don't even dare to close my eyes."

"Because if I close my eyes, I'll see the faces of those beggars, smell their stench, and feel their hands..."

He took a deep breath and forced himself to calm down.

"So," he said, "you have to feel it."

"Experience what real... hell is like."

The hook did not pierce the body.

Instead, it gently hooked the collar of Chu Qingyao's dress.

Shen Yue's hands were very steady, peeling away her outer robe, inner garment, and inner garment layer by layer, little by little.

It's not a rough tearing, but a slow, delicate peeling, like peeling a ripe lychee.

Chu Qingyao trembled all over, and shame and fear almost made her faint.

When the last piece of clothing covering her body hit the ground, she closed her eyes, not daring to look into Shen Yue's eyes—in those eyes, there was no desire, no anger, only a bottomless, cold scrutiny.

Like looking at an object.

A... damaged, dirty item.

"Open your eyes," Shen Yue commanded.

Chu Qingyao opened her eyes, trembling.

Shen Yue was looking at her naked body with a calm gaze, like a doctor examining a patient's lesions.

"Back then," he said softly, "that's the look you gave me."

"They treat me like a toy that they can manipulate and damage at will."

He reached out and gently traced his fingertips across her skin—from her collarbone to her chest and then to her waist.

Those hands that felt so cold they didn't seem alive.

"Now," he said, "the roles have been reversed."

"Let's play a game." He looked into her terrified eyes. "I will leave you with just as many wounds as you left on me back then."

"Exactly thirty-seven places, no more, no less."

"But there's a rule—I won't kill you."

"I will let you live, live with these wounds, just like I did back then."

First dao,

On her left...chest...above...the same spot as the first whip mark on his body years ago.

Chu Qingyao's body convulsed violently.

Right rib area...inner thigh.

Each time, he precisely avoided the vital points, yet his attacks penetrated to the bone.

Each time, it's replicating the scars in his memory.

Shen Yue's hands were steady, and his eyes were focused.

While he was doing this, he exuded an eerie calm—not numbness, but a kind of… morbid tranquility as he finally released the toxicity that had been building up for years.

On the sixteenth fall, Chu Qingyao finally fainted.

Shen Yue stopped what he was doing and quietly looked at her pale face.

He recalled the night of the palace banquet many years ago when he first met Chu Qingyao.

At that time, she was a fourteen or fifteen-year-old girl, wearing a pale yellow palace dress, with delicate eyebrows and eyes, and two shallow dimples when she smiled.

She stood under the apricot tree, extending her hand to him:

"You're Shen Yue? I've heard of you; everyone says you're the most talented young man in Kyoto."

Her hands were clean then, her nails were neatly trimmed, and they were stained with a light balsam juice.

At that time, he had no idea that those hands would later be stained with the blood of his entire family.