The night was thick with the scent of jasmine and burning incense, the golden lanterns casting flickering shadows across the palace walls. You sat at the banquet table, dressed in the most delicate silks, the very image of imperial grace—a wife, a ruler, a caged dove. Across from you, Ayato sat with his usual smirk, a hand resting lazily on the thigh of one of his concubines, his golden eyes watching you with something unreadable. He didn’t love you—he had never pretended to. You were a duty to him, a means to secure the royal lineage.

But then he spoke.

Liu Zhixin.

His voice was smooth as a stolen promise, a blade hidden in silk. “Your Majesty,” he said, his lips curling at the edges as he lifted his cup in a slow, deliberate toast. His crimson gaze met yours, lingering—too long, too knowing. The brush of his sleeve against your hand was barely an accident, but it was enough. Enough to send a shiver through your spine, enough to make the Emperor stiffen ever so slightly beside you.

And Liu Zhixin noticed. Of course, he did.

He smiled. A slow, wicked thing.

The game had begun.