Tang Chen feigned a normal expression. "Han Xiao? Who's that? I've never heard of him."

Yan Bingyan tightened her grip on his ear and sneered, "Enough with the lies. What’s this bet you forced him into?" They continued along a secluded path and soon reached a small cabin.

As they approached, the double doors opened, revealing two masked women who greeted them. "Your Highness, please enter. Everything is ready."

Yan Bingyan entered, giving the two female bodyguards a glance. "Hmm, your parents must really treasure you to send these two weirdos here."

Inside, Tang Chen sighed, "We’re inside. Little sister, can you let go of my ear now?"

"Hmpf!" Yan Bingyan snorted, releasing her grip. In a flash, she snatched his black sunglasses.

The room was dimly lit, but the moment the sunglasses were snatched, a pair of cyan lights flickered from Tang Chen’s eyes.

"I knew it. You've defied the Yan Royalty," Yan Bingyan said, her tone triumphant. "I'll keep this a secret, but tell me, how many limiters have you unlocked?"

"Little girl, stop talking about things you don’t understand. Who would punish me for doing something I enjoy? Your royal father? No way. Uncle loves me so much that he placed this Heavenly Suppression on me at my request. You don’t even know the real story behind it." Sensing her curiosity, he added, "Fine, since you are my lovely cousin, I’ll tell you the story. But I suggest you stop talking about this matter to anyone else, okay?"

Yan Bingyan nodded and sat on the cultivation mat made from the hide of a beast.

Tang Chen sat opposite her, elegantly, and asked, “Do you remember that day?”

“What day?”

“Your third birthday, when I came with my mother to celebrate.”

“Yes, how could I forget? You destroyed all my dolls and got beaten silly by my Crown Big Brother because of it.”

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

Tang Chen frowned. “Fine, I was only nine and immature. But one thing is wrong. Your brother never touched me.”

“Hmm, stop lying. Everyone at the party knew you got beaten up, and even Aunt Yan Roulin kneeled before my royal father to spare you. Are you that shy to admit the truth?”

“Truth? Hmm, no one other than me and the Crown Prince knows what really happened that day.” He continued in a serious tone, “Yes, I was beaten silly, but he didn’t lay a single finger on me. He was just thirteen at the time.”

“Beaten without being touched? That doesn’t make any sense at all.”

“You already know my situation. My mother, your father’s younger sister, eloped against everyone’s wishes to marry my father, a young master of the Tang Clan. There was already a deep, generational enmity between the Yan Palace and the Tang Clan, so both families opposed my parents’ marriage. After marrying my mother, my father was ostracized by the clan and demoted. The same happened to me; I was treated poorly and always felt lonely. There was always anger inside me, making me wild and unruly.

That day, my mother and I were received by your royal father with courtesy. I saw you behind your big brother. You were everything I wished for, and I wanted to be friends with you. But you chose to play with your dolls. In anger, I entered your room and tore all your dolls apart. When you cried because of that, things escalated. Later, I was found out, and do you know what the Crown Prince did to me?”

“What did he do?” asked Bingyan.

“He asked me why I did it. I told him the truth: I wanted to be friends with you. He said I was wrong and needed to be punished, but he also told me that we are family. He said if I wanted a friend, he could be my best friend. He explained that being willful and causing trouble is okay, but as a family, making my little sister cry was an unpardonable crime. So, he punished me.”

“Stop beating around the bush. How did he punish you?”

“First, let me ask you again. How many dolls did you have that day?”

“How would I know? I was just three.”

“But I know exactly how many there were: one thousand and fifty-nine!”

“So, how did he punish you?” she asked again.

“His eyes turned dark suddenly, and I felt like I was swallowed into a pitch-black void, endlessly falling while I screamed in terror. Outside, it might have been just a moment, but in that realm, I fell for what felt like a hundred years. The punishment didn’t stop there. He brought me to a hellish place, scorched with blue flames that burned all the time. There, he killed me over and over—matching the exact number of dolls I destroyed. I died one thousand and fifty-nine times, each death mirroring the way I destroyed your dolls. The memory is still vivid.”

“Died one thousand and fifty-nine times?”

“Little Bing Er, do you know about our Royal Yan’s bloodline curse?”

“Royal Yan’s bloodline curse?”

“It’s really disappointing that as a princess, you don’t have the slightest clue about the power coursing through our bloodline. Listen carefully. Long ago, our ancestor killed a terrifyingly powerful evil dragon. Before it died, the dragon cast a forbidden spell and spat a drop of blood into his eyes, which blinded him for the rest of his life. The curse didn’t end there—all his descendants were also born blind.

After hundreds of generations, a genius was born in our family. She mastered sealing techniques and, after dedicating five hundred years to research, created the Forbidden Dragon Curse Subduing Seal. She discovered that the dragon’s curse of blindness wasn’t really a curse but a boon.”

“Y-y-you mean we’re a family of blind and she somehow knows to lift the curse and turn it into a boon?” Her beautiful eyes were burning with curiousness.

“To be exact, she tested the seal on herself first, and it worked. However, when she applied it to others, their curses went berserk. Most of them went insane or died from unknown blood diseases. Everyone in our Yan family perished, except for one youth who survived the pandemic with just a slight fever. The genius woman was guilt-ridden over the deaths of her family members, but her curiosity about her work triumphed over her sorrow. She married the youth, who was several generations younger than her.

These two were also our true ancestors, just as a reminder. They had twenty-three sons and nineteen daughters, all born with perfectly healthy eyes.”