The Mountain Lord’s Daughter

In the winter of the 14th year of Shengping, Yue Zhiheng, a criminal of the dynasty, was sentenced to the most severe punishment: having his flesh cut off and bones scraped. Outside the iron prison cart, countless commoners gathered to watch the fall of this young, once-powerful minister. Zhan Yunwei was among them. She had traveled thousands of miles to witness his final journey, but it was only to save another person. At the time, she didn’t realize that coldly watching this sinful ex-husband go to his death would become one of her deepest regrets—the regret that would haunt her every sleepless night, long before the spring day when her own bones would be buried. In her past life, she had the misfortune of becoming the wife of this “dynasty hound,” and Yunwei had thought those days were sheer torment. Knowing she didn’t wish to share a bed with him, he sent her a letter in the middle of summer, its words distant and cold: “Miss Zhan, The evil spirits of the dynasty are rampant, and the court is overwhelmed. From now on, I will not return home at night. Do as you please.” Once, behind her back, they had walked together under the endless moonlit sky of the dynasty, and he had softly said, “I won’t live much longer. You’ll just have to bear with it a little longer.” But it wasn’t until Yue Zhiheng was truly dead that she realized how peaceful and precious those days had been. Only then did she begin to understand, however faintly, the bloody and vulnerable heart he had hidden beneath his harsh and ruthless exterior. So, when Zhan Yunwei found herself once again back on that rainy and windy night from ten years ago—when Yue Zhiheng had rushed to her side, raising his sword to defy the dynasty, only to collapse in a pool of blood—this time, she didn’t walk away with Pei Yujing like before. Instead, she cradled his scarred body and told him, “Yue Zhiheng, let’s go home.”