Once we were in the main hall, we awaited for the prince to arrive. After he arrived and seated on his seat next to Madam and Shu Xienghao was seated next to the prince, the Madam called out, "Bring her in!"

I knew that she was referring to the maid when she said this. I pitied the maid, but I had no sympathy or empathy towards her. She got what was coming is all. When she planned on getting the prince to drink that aphrodisiac, and failed, she should have already known that this was her punishment.

When the guards brought in the maid, they placed her on the floor and grabbed a whip that was being handed to them by a runner.

"Now let me tell, you all what she did, this servant by the name of Mei, tried to seduce my son, but failed, now she is merely getting what she deserves."

After saying that sentence, the Madam motioned her hand and the guards whipped the maids body. Every whip made a new scar appear. Every whip caused everyone to see the color of scarlet appear on her body. Every whip, you could see she was in pain.

But no one wanted to help her. They knew if they did, they would also be punished. But most of all, it would be because they did not want to have a bloody death like her. "This is a warning to all the women here. Do not ever attempt to seduce my son in such a disgusting way like her or you'll end up even worse than her."

Once that sentence was said, the guard cut off the girl's head. This scene was so bloody and disgusting that every person there (except the heads of the house including the visitor) started to vomit and go pale. Many of the girls there were crying, barfing, getting sick, or just all of them at once.

Except me. I was used to seeing blood. Although I was just a secretary, I was also Lu Ming's personal assassin and spy. I have killed people before and seen many dead bodies before. Seeing death is not new to me. People would call horrible and cold for this, but as an assassin, we cannot let emotion get in our way and with the way I was brought up, it aided in my distant personality.

Seeing that Hao'er was turning pale and vomiting, we left. After when Hao'er was done I asked her if she was okay. A young girl like her shouldn't be seeing these things.

"Mistress Xiu, do you not feel sick at all?"

"No."

"Are you sure? After all, all the ladies there were vomiting the whole time."

"Hao'er, seeing death is normal for me. Seeing such bloody sights is normal for me."

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"What!? How could that be?"

"Hao'er, you have no idea about my past. You only knew me from 2 months ago, so I want to tell you that I am someone who sees death a lot. I may not see it everyday, but I see it enough to be used to it. I am not scared about seeing others die."

"Mistress if you are not scared about seeing others die, then why are you so pale?"

"I am scared about what may happen to me if I got framed."

"What do you mean? Mistress, you would most not be getting framed. You keep a low profile all the time and you never go out. Even I as your servant want to yell at you to try to do something to gain the prince's attention."

"Hao'er, please understand that what I am doing has nothing to do with the prince. All I am doing is trying to find a way back home. This is not my home and never will be. Hao'er, nobody in this world knows about my past. There is only one person who knows my past and is willing to bare it with me. To protect me, but that person is not here anymore."

"Mistress, is that why?"

"Yes."

"Mistress, I don't believe that the prince would punish unjustly. You have never seen his face until today. You have never sent anything to him. Not only that, you try your best to limit interactions with anybody from this place other than me. I don't believe that the prince would punish you like that. Mistress, why don't we start heading back, the sun is setting."

"Alright." But under my breath and in a quiet voice, I said, "Hao'er, you don't know yet about anything because you don't know my full story. You don't know that I've killed before. You don't know that I've been on the brink of death before. You don't know my true side. You don't know the realities of the world yet, Hao'er. And I'm scared to tell you about my past, but yet, I don't want to leave you behind in the unknowing. One day, one day, I'll tell you."

Nobody would have heard what Zhao Ling said, but Prince Wu, who was going to his court, had overheard the conversation that Zhao Ling and her maid had. He would not have had any interest, but it was the voice of the same lady who cursed in the morning. Prince Wu had thought she was going to be doing the same as the other ladies, but to his surprise, he heard something he would have never thought a lady who is from a scholar family would say.

Then he told himself, she is different. She is either a threat or not a threat, but he was on his guards.

With that, everybody left to their rightful quarters, while Zhao Ling is awake all the through the night.

Huh...I can't sleep.

"Hao'er."

"Yes, Sis Ling!"

"Can you get me some paper and ink?"

"Yes, right away! Mistress, what are you doing with it?"

"I can't sleep, so I'm going to write poems instead. Hao'er you should go to sleep. We can clear this up tomorrow morning."

"Alright, I'll do as you say."

Now, what should I write? With a dip in the black ink, I wrote, "The blossom has withered, with rise to the sword"

I wrote another poem, "The godly affairs has passed strife, thy born a new hero"

After that, I wrote many more poems. After writing got boring, I started to draw instead. I drew Lu Ming in his suit. He never wore many colors, but whenever I got fun and wanted to photograph him, I would tell him to wear colors like red or blue. He looked handsome in all styles of suits, but his favorite had always been black or dark grey.

With that, I also did another painting. It was me beside him holding hands. This was a moment I cherished in my life. On that day, he had learned about my hidden past. He held onto my hand while I was crying telling him how I hated myself. And yet, he said, "I don't care about your past, nor do I care that you may bring danger to me. Don't worry, I'll protect you."

It was the first time ever that I saw him look at me with such sincerity and passion. Overtime, I began to trust him with everything and started to rely on him. I wished for nothing more than to be by his side for helping me get through my rough patches.

I didn't wish to become his wife or anything. Just being able to be useful to him was more than enough. I didn't want to wish for more. I was scared that if I prayed to god to give me more, I would lose what I had. But it didn't matter that I didn't get to become his wife. I never wanted to become anyway.

I dealt with jealousy every where we went, but it didn't matter. Because I loved as my master, brother, and family. Over the years, I would always go with him to visit his family. I never knew why they were not hostile to me like I expected. They had a longing look in their eyes. I don't know what they were longing for, but they would always look at Lu Ming and me and then look at him again with a face that says, "Why haven't you done it?"

It was hard for me to understand them when it came to EQ, but when it came to IQ, I nailed it. All I know now is, I miss the Lu Family. They were like my second family.