笑面虎 (xiào miàn hǔ) – a tiger with a smiling face; a wicked person with hypocritical smile.

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"Gū pó, you came back," Chūn Yīlì said. Her smile was full of knives.

A week later, Zéyì stood before the throne, drooping like a wilted flower. The court officials muttered to each other, the sound a seething hiss in Zéyì's dulled ears.

"How... how did you find me, zhí sūn... nǚ?" The last word was spoken practically under her breath.

"Get out," the regent ordered the officials. They filed out quickly, but not without casting prying looks behind them. Once the room was empty, Chūn Yīlì leaned back and sighed. "I would much rather you call me zhí sūn, gū pó."

"If that is how it is, I will absolutely respect your wishes."

"It's not like that." Her grandniece yawned. "Things are just easier this way."

Zéyì had no energy to argue. She merely stared dumbly at the floor.

"Well, you seem more obedient than last time. You were really annoying before."

"How... did you find me?"

"... It really wasn't that difficult. Did you think that no one would notice a cultivator flying around with a giant lotus? And making such a huge scene in Yùhǎi?"

Zéyì's eyes rose, although she kept her head lowered. The effect was somewhat scary. "Did you have someone there at the auction?"

"Why not? I heard there were some interesting things for sale. Pity I couldn't get hold of anything. Who would have thought there were still loong left in the world?" Chūn Yīlì laughed viciously. "I guess Sir Lí certainly didn't expect so."

"... You know that man who ran the auction?"

"Who doesn't? Sir Li is a smart man. This will just be a setback for him. Still..." She suddenly looked wistful. "I would have dearly loved that loong skin. It would have made a wonderful rug for this throne room."

Zéyì almost threw up blood. She shook her head and rolled her neck weirdly.

Chūn Yīlì raised an eyebrow. "What's wrong with you?"

"Are you really asking after my health here or are you up to something else?" Zéyì asked in a very different tone of voice from her usual. For once, she was aware of it too. It was the voice that the imaginary Fàn Bì'ān spoke in. She let it take her over and spit from her mouth. "Have you got something against loong? Did a loong eat one of your pet demons or something?"

Chūn Yīlì laughed again, without a trace of amusement. "Ah, Zéyì, A Lián, Princess. You have no idea... You have no idea." As she repeated the last phrase, her eyes grew dark, her voice falling ominously. But then she dismissed it and returned to her usual arrogant self.

"The Crown Prince of Zhàng is on his way here. He will arrive in a week's time, and you will get married to him. We will join hands with Zhàng and increase our influence. That's all. Now go to the Lily Palace and stay there until your wedding day. And get rid of those ugly scars all over you, that should be easy enough at your cultivation level."

So many things should be easy. Zéyì stared without blinking at her grandniece until two guards came to escort her away.

It was night time by now. Once back within the walls of the Lily Palace, the gates were locked behind her. A waning crescent moon hung above her head, reflecting in her staring eyes.

A few nervous servant girls approached her, beckoning for her to enter her rooms to be bathed and prepared for bed. She ignored them.

Fàn Bì'ān was whispering in her ear.

"Where's the best place to start a fire?"

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The kitchens exploded satisfyingly.

Like a demon, Zéyì had crept unnoticed through the night and destroyed several large bags of flour, casting the contents into the air and lighting it all up with a lantern she had picked up on the way.

The guards found her half a li away, where the blast had blown her. She floated face up in one of the water gardens, laughing, half the skin on her body gone.

The Regent put a call out for the best exorcists, brought in doctors to heal Zéyì's injuries, and locked Lily Palace down with a twelve-shí guard, raised the palace walls, and slapped talismans on every door.

Later, she came to visit Zéyì.

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"Where is that loong you were with, back in Yùhǎi? Who were they?"

It seemed that the informant had escaped with everyone else during Gong Lau Yan's rampage. Zéyì blew a raspberry. She would have stuck a finger up if her body were not bound down by heavy demon-suppressing chains. "The loong is your mother."

Chūn Yīlì brought her face very close to Zéyì's. "Do you understand how I could hurt you? I don't think you realise-"

"I don't. I really don't. I can't think of anything worse than what has already happened." Zéyì smiled sweetly. "Please teach me, zhí sūn nǚ."

Chūn Yīlì's face pinched, and she stood abruptly. "We'll see."

"See? Hey, zhí sūn nǚ."

"... What?"

"You realise I'm infertile, right? How could I not be, after being cursed the way I was? What do you think Crown Prince Zhàng will say if I told him...?"

Chūn Yīlì left Zéyì alone in the dark.

This was nothing new. Hadn't she been alone in the dark for a hundred years?

Only this time, she wasn't alone. She and the hallucination of Fàn Bì'ān talked continuously, flipping from amicable to outright murderous in an instant.

"Fuck off, Fake Bì'ān."

"I'll leave if you let me. You're the one that created me after all."

"GO AWAY GO AWAY GO AWAY -"

The doctors advised the Regent that this was one of the worst cases of demonic possession that they had seen.

"Your Majesty," said the most senior, bowing, "we have tried all sorts of things to repair the Lady's body. We thought we had succeeded last time, but the demon within her was toying with us. The skin on her face appeared to have grown back, but when the Lady laughed, it all sloughed off again."

The doctors shivered as a group. The sight of the pretty young woman's face turning to the consistency of tofu sheets and slipping off her face, revealing muscle and blood vessels beneath, was too horrifying to witness. Add that she was sat in the dark and laughed the whole time, some doctors had run away and not returned.

"Have you run out of ideas?" Chūn Yīlì asked coldly, tapping a finger on the throne.

"We have another option," the senior doctor said hastily. "We've heard that there is a certain medicine that has been developed, that can temporarily render someone docile and obedient. We are searching for a doctor who can create this medicine as we speak."

"The Crown Prince of Zhàng arrives in four days," Chūn Yīlì remarked darkly. "Need I say what will happen if the Lady is not presentable by that time?"

The doctor wasn't sure what was scarier, the tone of the Regent's voice, or seeing Zéyì's face slide off. He bowed fearfully. Investigations into the medicine sped up.

Exorcists from across the kingdom, and further, had begun to arrive. One by one, they entered the Lily Palace. One by one, they ran out, pursued by a roiling wave of conflicting demonic and spiritual energies.

On the second day of attempts, someone suggested that intense sunlight might assist in the exorcism. Zéyì was staked out in the courtyard of the Lily Palace to prevent her escaping.

She no longer laughed, but lay blank-eyed, staring directly at the sun without apparent discomfort.

The exorcists rang bells, and threw holy water from the west, and swung peach wood swords over her. Zéyì was pricked with silver needles, prayed over in a dozen different languages, and forcibly fed the extract of a strange plant root until she was near vomiting (1).

She continued to stare at the sun.

"From there to there," said Chūn Yīlì, who had come to watch, shaded from the sun by a giant parasol. She pointed at one exorcist and swept her arm across to point at another. "Kill them all."

Her soldiers murdered them before they could run.

The Regent of Chūn stared at the survivors with contempt. She had been informed that the Crown Prince had crossed the border that morning. He was two days away. "Is there no one with any ability here?"

No one spoke. Those who had not been targeted watched with narrowed eyes. There were many con artists, desperate people, and delusional people who had come to try their hand at exorcism. There were some who were a bit talented, and they had mostly been among those who survived, but no one here had the skill to deal with this situation. Those who did would probably be smart enough to avoid this place altogether.

Then another exorcist arrived, and those who had just thought the previous thought slapped their mouths. What was this famous person doing here?

The newest participant stepped slowly in, eyes fixed upon the staked-out, staring and shivering figure of Zéyì.

"Are you not going to greet me, the sovereign of this kingdom, first?" Chūn Yīlì remarked. The exorcist had completely ignored her, despite the clear symbols of her office - rich robes of gold, the Regent's headdress, the servants around her. Instead -

"Who is this lady with demonic possession?"

"A lesser member of the Chūn royal family," an official supplied. Chūn Yīlì gestured, and his head was separated from his shoulders by a swift sword, to teach him a lesson for speaking when the Regent had unfinished words.

The exorcist remained unconcerned. "She needs to be released."

"Impossible." Chūn Yīlì's lip curled. "Now do your job, or join them." 'Them' being the dozen corpses now strewn across the courtyard.

The exorcist moved. Before anyone could react, the chains binding Zéyì were broken, and Miss Fén, Demon Hunter, lifted the suffering woman into her arms.

Swords flashed. Chūn Yīlì barked orders, "Surround them! Retrieve the Lady alive!"

Gong Lau Jan's response was to take something from a pouch on her belt and slip it between Zéyì's pale, mostly intact lips. The woman's staring eyes flickered, and she began to chew slowly.

"Strawberry... how.... it's not even the right season..."

Gong Lau Jan gently squeezed her. "I'm sorry I'm late, Meí Guī. Can I take you away from here?"

"... yes..."

"Then let's go." Completely unfazed by the menacing soldiers, Gong Lau Jan turned for the palace gate.

"She is a member of the royal family, Demon Hunter Fén. Do you know the penalty for kidnapping a royal?" Chūn Yīlì stood tall, a finger pointing directly at Gong Lau Jan. "You-"

"She has given up the name of Chūn," Gong Lau Jan interrupted coldly.

"She cannot. She belongs to me."

"She belong to no one," Gong Lau Jan refuted. "And she has chosen to leave with me. I will not ask for your permission." She frowned slightly as she looked at the Regent of Chūn. "Have we met before?"

Those watching winced. Demon Hunter Fén had not only not greeted the Regent of Chūn, she had interrupted her, and asked such an impertinent question! Never mind kidnapping a royal, she had signed her death sentence with these three actions alone!

As if this would concern either the Demon Hunter, Miss Fén, or the loong princess, Gong Lau Jan. She kicked off from the ground, bounding through the air away from the Lily Palace at lightning speed. How could anyone stop her?

Chūn Yīlì ground her teeth with helpless rage as the two figures disappeared into the blue sky, ineffectually pursued by her soldiers.

"Put a bounty on Miss Fén's head. Alive or dead."