A few days ago.
A sharp, stabbing pain at the back of his neck dragged Shen Luolin out of the chaotic darkness.
He opened his eyes. The first thing he saw was not the familiar, dilapidated wooden roof, but an exquisite tent ceiling embroidered with dark silver patterns.
Beneath him was a soft, thick blanket. The air was filled with the scent of expensive soothing incense brought from the Imperial Capital, and an alchemical furnace in the corner kept the entire tent as warm as spring.
Everything here was the polar opposite of the shabby warmth of the Snow-Return Cottage.
Shen Luolin tried to move, but his body was too weak to obey; the effects of that alchemical poison needle had not yet fully faded.
He looked down and found that he had been changed into a clean silk lining. Everything he owned that could be called a weapon had vanished without a trace.
This meticulous “care” was more humiliating than cold iron chains.
The tent’s curtain was silently lifted.
Ayla walked in carrying a silver tray. She had taken off the deep blue Captain’s uniform that symbolized power and coldness, replacing it with a simple, elegant grey dress.
Stripped of the sharpness of her uniform, she looked a little less distant and a little more soft.
Her steps were light, as if she were merely visiting an ill colleague.
However, in Shen Luolin’s eyes, his cold logical system had instinctively begun to analyze: the metal hairpin in her bun, about four inches long, could be used as a stabbing weapon; the silk sash at her waist was tough enough to be used for strangulation…
His brain was operating at high speed, yet his face remained that same mask of indifferent calm.
“While you were unconscious, I had the military doctor treat the burns on your body.”
She placed the tray on the small table by the bed, her voice much gentler than usual.
“The doctor said it’s not serious. You’ll be fine after a few days of rest.”
Shen Luolin had never seen this side of Ayla—this look, this tone—before anyone other than himself.
He didn’t look at the bowl of broth, nor did he look at her.
He simply used a raspy yet incredibly clear voice to ask his first question since waking, and his only question.
“Where is Moyin?”
Those three words instantly shattered all the warm illusions Ayla had painstakingly created.
The hand holding the tray froze slightly in mid-air before she slowly lowered it. She took a deep breath, and the softness on her face was once again covered by a layer of frost.
“The target ‘Key’ has been successfully captured.” Her tone returned to a businesslike coldness. “She is currently being held in the Ice Suppression Chamber. Her vital signs are stable.”
The Ice Suppression Chamber.
That was a cruel prison cell specifically used by the Dragon Slayer Knights to suppress the power of dragonkin. Through an environment of extreme cold, it slowed the blood flow within the dragonkin, stagnating their power, eventually making them weaker than ordinary humans.
Shen Luolin’s pupils suddenly constricted.
He struggled, trying to sit up from the bed, but his weak body betrayed his will. His arms could not exert any strength at all.
His movements completely collapsed the ice-like defensive line on Ayla’s face.
“Luolin!”
She stepped forward quickly, pressing her hands firmly against his shoulders. For the first time, her voice carried an uncontrollable trembling and pleading.
“Stop worrying about her, I beg you.”
She leaned down, looking at him almost subserviently. In those eyes that were always calm, pain and resentment he couldn’t understand were churning.
“Does all the humiliation we’ve endured together for so many years not even compare to the few months you spent with her?”
Her questioning grew more and more out of control, her voice heavy with heartache and anger. “Every old wound on your body—which one did I not treat? Every time you were ostracized—which time did I not pull strings for you?”
Shen Luolin’s fingers resting at his side curled imperceptibly, then slowly relaxed.
“I thought we were looking in the same direction, Luolin! But now, for an irrelevant person, you want to personally destroy the path we paved with blood and endurance!”
“Is it worth it?!”
The last four words were almost roared out. She seemed to have exhausted all her strength, her chest heaving violently.
“Luolin… look at the person beside you more, won’t you?” Her voice went soft again, carrying a heartbreaking plea.
Faced with Ayla’s raw display of emotion, having completely torn away her disguise, Shen Luolin’s reaction was one of total indifference.
He was not moved, he was not angry; there wasn’t even a ripple of emotion.
He stopped arguing because he knew that words no longer served any purpose.
He looked at her. There was no pity in his eyes, only the calm of someone looking at a chess piece.
Yes, Ayla was also a pawn. Like him, they were both gears being crushed by the machine of the Empire.
Only she chose sacrifice, while he chose to smash the machine.
At this moment, he made his final decision.
Since there was no way back, he would flip the path, and the sky itself.
This thought in his mind was not a mad impulse, but a precisely calculated, unique, and most efficient path.
As long as the old Emperor died, the Empire would fall into chaos.
When that happened, his two sons would fight to the death for the throne, and the nobles of the capital would tear at each other for power. Everyone would be in danger, and no one would remember the order to massacre the dragonkin.
Only then would Moyin have a true chance at life.
Only then would Rhyneside’s entrustment be truly fulfilled.
And only then could he himself achieve true redemption.
His silence was not a compromise, but a verdict more resolute than any words.
The last light in Ayla’s eyes was completely extinguished.
Years of unspoken understanding allowed her to read all the meaning behind Shen Luolin’s dead silence almost instantly.
It was not a compromise, not a struggle, but a final verdict.
What he wanted to overturn was not just this tent; it was the entire Empire, the very order to which she had dedicated everything.
Treason…
How she wished she didn’t know this man so well! That she didn’t understand the madness in the depths of his eyes that would never stop until his goal was met, or the stubbornness that made him impossible to turn back once he had set his mind.
If that were the case, her heart wouldn’t ache to the point of suffocation when facing his icy indifference.
That pain was not the anger of betrayal, but a despair born of watching the person she knew best walk toward an abyss while being powerless to stop him.
She once thought she was the one who understood him best, that she could predict all his actions and clear all his obstacles.
But now, he had stepped onto a path that she had to personally cut off.
The heavy air pressing on her chest did not dissipate as Ayla stood up straight.
She released her grip on his shoulders. The lingering warmth on her fingertips reminded her of her previous subservience and futility.
Shen Luolin’s gaze remained fixed on the distance, as if the ridgeline beyond the wind and snow was more worth his attention than the feelings she had poured out.
Ayla felt a hint of bitterness spread across her tongue.
She had once thought that as long as she worked hard enough, was rational enough, and looked out for him enough, those shadows of the past would eventually fade.
The road she had paved for him with her entire career, the future she had planned for him through countless sleepless nights—it now seemed like nothing more than her own wishful illusion.
What he wanted was never something she could give.
She had thought that there was at least the friendship of fighting side by side between them, a silent understanding that transcended everything.
How many times had she suppressed the ripples in her heart for him, pushing back the unease, the worry, and those indescribable flutters deep into her soul?
She had tried her best to play the role of his most loyal and reliable adjutant, just to stand a little closer to him. But now, it had all become a joke.
All her endurance, all her sacrifices, were perhaps nothing more than a negligible distraction in his eyes.
Ayla slowly stood straight. All the vulnerability and pleading on her face were stripped away with this single movement.
She raised her hand, and with near-mechanical precision, tucked a stray strand of hair back behind her ear. Her slightly trembling fingertips stopped completely the moment they touched the cold hairpin, returning to absolute stability.
When she spoke again, she had reverted to the cold, rational Imperial Captain.
“Before His Majesty arrives in the North, please make sure to rest here, Major.”
She spoke those words syllable by syllable, in a tone devoid of emotion.
Then, without another word, she turned and walked toward the tent entrance.
The moment before the curtain fell, two elite guards holding frost halberds appeared at the entrance, one on each side, sealing the exit tight.
Ayla’s figure disappeared behind the curtain.
She walked quickly to a deserted corner. The cold wind blew her long hair into disarray, but she didn’t care.
Since she couldn’t pull him back to the right path, then… she would use the Empire’s thorns to fill the abyss he had chosen.
With that thought, Ayla immediately headed to the command room to increase the personnel assigned to protect the Emperor’s safety.
Stopping him before he could assassinate the Emperor—this was her final, and most cruel, “protection” for the man she loved as an Imperial Captain.