The clang of the stool connecting with Shen Haoran's skull echoed deafeningly in the small, oppressive chamber. Haoran howled, a raw, animalistic scream of pain and disbelief, stumbling backward, his hands flying to his head. The stool, having done its work, clattered to the floor. Zhiyu, spent all energy, collapsed against the wall, breathing heavily, his small chest heaving. He had done it. A flicker of triumph, fleeting and desperate, surged through him, quickly overshadowed by the chilling knowledge of the consequences.
Haoran's scream, loud and desperate, instantly drew attention. Heavy footsteps thudded down the corridor, and within moments, the door burst open again. Shen Weisheng, Zhiyu's uncle, the usurper, stood framed in the doorway, his face contorted in a mixture of rage and alarm. Beside him, Xie Wanqing, his aunt, peered over his shoulder, her initial expression of curious expectation curdling into fury at the sight of her bleeding son.
"Haoran! What in the seven hells happened?!" Weisheng roared, rushing to his son's side, ignoring Zhiyu completely. Haoran, clutching his head, groaned, "The little viper! He hit me! That fucking Omega struck me!"
Weisheng's eyes, cold and calculating, swiveled to Zhiyu, now blazing with incandescent rage. "You insolent whelp! You dare lay a hand on the Crown Prince?!" He lunged forward, his massive hand raised, poised to strike. Zhiyu flinched, bracing for the inevitable blow, his body still weak and bruised from his two days of imprisonment. He had no strength left to fight, no energy to even dodge. He was a defeated, starved boy, facing the full, brutal force of a man who had murdered his own brother.
His mind flashed back to the last two days. Thrown into the damp, lightless cell, he had initially screamed, pleaded, banged on the heavy door until his knuckles bled. But no one came. The silence was absolute, broken only by the rats scuttling in the corners. Hunger gnawed at his stomach, a relentless, burning pain. Thirst became an agony, his throat raw and parched. He had tried to conserve his energy, curling into a tight ball, shivering in the cold, trying to block out the reality of his situation.
He was a prince. He had always been told his blood was noble, his destiny grand. He had been taught diplomacy, the art of command, the weight of responsibility. His father, Emperor Wenzhao, despite his initial concerns about an Omega heir in a patriarchal world, had nurtured Zhiyu's intellect, his strategic mind, showing him how a ruler's wisdom could be far more powerful than physical might. "A true leader," his father would say, "commands respect through honor, not brute force. Your mind, my son, is your greatest weapon." His mother, Empress Ji Lianhua, had instilled in him resilience, a quiet strength, and an unyielding pride in his lineage.
But now, all of that felt like a distant dream. He was just an Omega, captured, stripped of his dignity, awaiting forced submission. The humiliation was a deeper pain than the physical hunger or the ache in his joints. He was supposed to be the future of Shen, not a concubine for a despised cousin. Every fiber of his being screamed in protest. He would rather die. He truly believed it. He had spent hours imagining ways to escape, to fight, to simply vanish, but his weakened body and the iron bars had proven insurmountable. His defiance was all he had left.
And now, as Weisheng's hand descended, that defiance was about to be crushed. Zhiyu squeezed his eyes shut, bracing for the impact, a bitter taste filling his mouth.
But the blow never landed.
Instead, there was another deafening crash, louder than the stool, a splintering sound of heavy wood. Zhiyu's eyes flew open. The large, sturdy door to the chamber, which Haoran had just closed, now lay in shattered pieces on the floor, ripped from its hinges. Standing silhouetted against the dim corridor light was a figure, shorter and younger than Weisheng, but with an aura of cold, controlled fury that made the air itself crackle.
It was a boy. A boy he remembered. The features were sharper, harder now, but unmistakable. His father had shown him a painting, a scroll of alliances and future pacts, long ago, when Zhiyu was perhaps five or six. "This, my son," Emperor Wenzhao had said, pointing to a solemn-faced boy with piercing eyes, "is Crown Prince Min Yulin, the heir to the Min Empire. One day, you will meet him when you are announced as Crown Prince."
The boy, Min Yulin, the Crown Heir of the other half of the Imperial Dynasty of Xuanwu, the Min Empire, stood there, perfectly still, his eyes locked onto Weisheng's raised hand. Zhiyu, stunned, could only stare. This was Min Yulin? The boy from the scroll, the son of the powerful Emperor Min? But why was he here? How?
His thoughts raced, bewildered. And what did he have in his hand? As Zhiyu's mind struggled to comprehend, Min Yulin had already moved. It was a blur of motion, too fast for the eye to follow. The gleam of steel. A sharp, wet thwack. A guttural scream from Weisheng that far outstripped Haoran's.
Zhiyu watched, horrified and mesmerized, as Weisheng staggered back, clutching his wrist, blood gushing between his fingers. His hand – the hand that had been poised to strike Zhiyu, the hand that had ordered his parents' murders – lay severed on the floor, a gruesome, twitching testament to Yulin's brutal efficiency.
Haoran, his face ashen, stared at his bleeding father, then at the severed hand, then at Yulin, his earlier smugness replaced by utter terror. Xie Wanqing let out a strangled shriek, falling to her knees, pointing a trembling finger at Yulin. "You! You barbarian! What have you done?!"
Yulin didn't spare her a glance. His eyes, cold as winter ice, swept over the chaos, resting briefly on Haoran's stunned, bleeding face, then finally settling on Zhiyu. There was no emotion there, no pity, no kindness, just a stark, unreadable intensity. Yet, in that unreadable gaze, Zhiyu felt something he hadn't felt in days – a strange, unexpected sensation of safety. This boy, this brutal, terrifying boy, had just saved him.