An hour passed before Chen's rage finally cooled enough for rational thought to return.

He sat slumped against a boulder, the healing pill having done its work on his physical injuries while doing nothing for the wounds to his pride and dao heart.

The sound of shifting fabric made him look up. Yu Xiang's violet eyes were fluttering open, her consciousness returning as the effects of Tianlong's overwhelming presence finally faded.

"Yu Xiang!" Chen scrambled to his feet, rushing toward her with desperate concern. "Are you alright? Did you see what that bastard did? The way he-"

His words cut off abruptly as Yu Xiang's hand shot out, slapping his reaching fingers away with sharp precision.

"Don't touch me."

The words were spoken quietly, but they carried an edge that made Chen freeze mid-motion. Her violet eyes were open now, staring at him with an expression he couldn't quite read.

"What?" Chen's mouth twitched in confusion. "But Yu Xiang, didn't you see how he... how he touched you? How dare he lay his filthy hands on-"

"I said don't touch me," she repeated, her voice still quiet but carrying unmistakable steel. She closed her eyes, turning her face away from him.

Chen stared at her in growing bewilderment, his mind struggling to process this unexpected rejection. "I don't understand. What's wrong with you? That man just... he violated your personal space, he touched you inappropriately, and you're angry at me?"

Yu Xiang remained silent, her eyes squeezed shut as memories of Tianlong's touch flooded back. The warmth of his palm against her belly, the way her body had responded despite her mind's protests, the heat that had pooled in her core at his proximity...

She wasn't naive. She understood exactly what those touches had meant, what they had been designed to accomplish.

Even though he had helped her, had given her treasures beyond imagination, she had been caught completely off guard by the intimacy of his contact.

Her ambition had always been her armor, her calculating mind her sword. But in that moment, with Tianlong's hands on her body, she had felt both weapons slip from her grasp.

She had allowed a man to touch her in ways she had sworn never to permit, her defenses crumbling under the assault of his overwhelming presence.

But what confused her most wasn't her own reaction - it was his motivation.

'He used me,' she realized, the pieces clicking together in her sharp mind. 'Everything he did was designed to provoke Zhao Chen's reaction.'

And the realization that dawned on her was clearly causing her to clench her jaws. 'I was just a tool in whatever game he's playing.'

She opened her eyes, staring up at the canopy of leaves above them as she recalled Tianlong's casual reference to Chen as his "son."

Combined with his earlier cryptic comments about their family relationship...

"What exactly are you trying to accomplish, Emperor Tianlong?" she whispered to herself, but loud enough for Chen to hear.

"What did you say?" Chen moved closer, his frustration mounting at her continued distance. "Yu Xiang, talk to me! What's going on in your head?"

She finally looked at him, her violet eyes holding a calculating coldness that made him take an unconscious step back.

"Tell me something, Zhao Chen," she said quietly. "When he called you 'son'... what did he mean by that?"

Chen's face went pale, then flushed red with renewed anger. "That was just another insult! Another way to humiliate me! He's not my... he could never be my..."

But his protests died as he saw the analytical look in Yu Xiang's eyes, the way she was studying him like a puzzle to be solved.

For the first time since he'd known her, he felt like she was seeing past his carefully constructed persona to something deeper - and finding it lacking.

'Why in front of that guy does he seem stupid?' Looking toward Zhao Chen, especially how Tianlong, this guy definitely had some potential. She found how he appeared lacking in front of Tianlong, in one way or another, that guy exactly knew what could deal damage to Zhao Chen's mentality, which was smaller than it appeared.

Yu Xiang closed her eyes again, her mind racing through possibilities and implications. Whatever game Tianlong was playing, it involved her, Chen, and secrets that went deeper than simple sect politics.

And despite herself, despite her anger at being manipulated, she found herself looking forward to discovering what his next move would be.

The wedding he'd mentioned...

The silence stretched between them, heavy with unspoken tensions and half-formed realizations. Yu Xiang kept her eyes closed, trying to process the whirlwind of events that had just shattered her carefully laid plans.

But then, something soft brushed against her cheek.

Her violet eyes snapped open, expecting to see a falling leaf or insect. Instead, a white piece of paper drifted down from the sky above, landing gently on her chest.

Then another.

And another.

"What the hell?" Chen muttered, looking up as more papers began cascading from the heavens like oversized snowflakes.

Yu Xiang sat up abruptly, catching the paper that had landed on her. The parchment was thick, expensive - the kind used for official imperial decrees. Gold lettering gleamed across the top in elegant script.

But before she could read it properly, a shadow passed overhead. She looked up to see a cultivator standing on a flying sword, a massive cloth bag slung over his shoulder. With practiced motions, he was grabbing handfuls of identical papers and scattering them to the winds.

"Hey!" Yu Xiang called out, her voice sharp with confusion. In a fluid motion, she launched herself into the air, her cultivation carrying her up to meet the man. "What is this?"

The cultivator - a middle-aged man with a Foundation Establishment aura - paused in his paper-scattering to give her a respectful bow. "Ah, miss! You must be asking about the wedding announcements."

"Wedding announcements?" Her eyes narrowed.

"Indeed! His Imperial Majesty, Emperor Tianlong, ordered us to distribute these throughout the entire empire rather than sending formal invitations. He said it was more... democratic."

The man shrugged, as if he found the whole thing as bizarre as she did. "There are thousands of us doing this right now, and even more scribes back at the palace hand-writing copies with special dyes."

Yu Xiang blinked, processing this information. "Thousands?"

"Oh yes, miss. We're covering every mountain peak, every valley, every sect territory and mortal village. The Emperor wants everyone in the empire to know." The cultivator gestured broadly with his free hand. "Disciples, elders, farmers, merchants - everyone gets an invitation."

As if to emphasize his point, Yu Xiang's enhanced senses suddenly picked up the presence of dozens of other paper-scattering cultivators spread across the horizon. The entire sky was filled with a gentle snowfall of wedding announcements.

"Fascinating way to announce a wedding," she murmured, more to herself than to him.

The cultivator nodded enthusiastically. "Never seen anything like it in all my years! But then again, it's not every day an Emperor marries four wives simultaneously!"

"Four wives?" The words slipped out before she could stop them, her pupils clearly trembling as she realized that her hypothesis about him loving one woman or maybe two was wrong.

He is just like the other men; he has this urge to collect multiple wives.

Yet the confusion was still there.

'Why can I still not put my mind around how he is similar to other men?'

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