kotchanipa

Amid the softly falling snow in the Cold Palace courtyard, Princess Xianlan drew her final breath silently.

She had been falsely accused of poisoning the Crown Prince, brutally flogged until her body was torn, and imprisoned without a shred of mercy all part of a cruel scheme orchestrated by Noble Consort Su Zhen, her stepmother, whose gentle appearance masked a heart of poison.

Meanwhile, the Emperor of Li the very man who claimed to love her above all never realized that the only daughter he cherished had been crushed to death by the hands of the one he trusted most.

But the heavens showed mercy.

Xianlan opened her eyes once more, reborn into her eight-year-old self in the time before everything shattered.

This time… she would not be a worthless pawn in a game of power.
She would become the master strategist, toppling each of her enemies one by one.

With icy composure and razor-sharp wit, Xianlan hid in the shadows, slowly gathering evidence, allies, and influence within the palace.
And fate brought her an unexpected ally

Feng Yuhan, Crown Prince of the Southern Yan Kingdom, known as the “Winter Tiger.”
Cold, brilliant, and seemingly heartless yet from their first meeting, something in her eyes held his gaze.

Together, they moved in the darkness.
Xianlan laid the plans. Feng Yuhan executed them.

As the Kingdom of Li fell into the depths of political games
As vipers hissed behind silken smiles in the inner palace
As even a father’s love could be twisted by deceit

⸻

When the phoenix returns to her nest she will never again let anyone trample her.
The will of the heavens may be written in ink…
But Xianlan will rewrite fate in the blood of her enemies.

Rebirth of the Phoenix Empress

The late afternoon sun cast its light over the Imperial Jade Pond. The reflection of Emperor Li Sicheng's face shimmered on the rippling surface—distorted, then vanishing as though it had never been there.

Beneath the pond's serene surface…

within Qianyi Palace, an ancient scroll was drawn from a sandalwood chest thick with dust.

"This imperial decree must remain unknown… even to the Empress."

The Emperor's voice was low and firm as he addressed his trusted eunuch.

His hand trembled slightly as he opened the scroll.

The decades-old court script documented the "sudden death of Consort Yu Fei," which—according to what he had always been told—was due to "heart disease."

But tucked within, hidden behind the official record, was another page…

"She did not perish from illness… but from medicine that was not of the palace.

The night before, she was feverish, dazed, as if possessed by a dark force.

I—Imperial Physician Ren Hua—leave this record in hopes that one day, the truth will surface."

The name struck the Emperor's heart harder than any announcement.

"Ren Hua… wasn't he the one exiled for malpractice?" he murmured.

Yet when he checked the court registry from that year, he discovered—

"The name Ren Hua does not appear in the year-end records.

Not in the death registers.

The Emperor fell into silence. One hand began to tremble.

This was the formless reflection—evidence no one dared touch, unseen by all unless they dared to look deeper.

He turned to the eunuch and spoke in a hushed tone:

"Send someone to investigate an imperial physician named Ren Hua.

Start with the old quarters once used by court doctors.

But not a whisper of this… not even to the Empress."

The eunuch paused. "Your Majesty, will you keep this from Her Grace?"

"Yes," the Emperor's voice turned to ice.

"Because if even those closest still believe what they see…

it means the reflection in the water has yet to show its true shape."

That night, he left his chambers in secret.

He made his way to the long-abandoned archives of the court physicians.

Near a pile of old ledgers, he found a bloodstained scrap of parchment—

dried, dark, and crusted with time.

On it, only a single sentence, written in a trembling hand:

I preserved the secret of the demon mother…"

By morning, no one in the palace knew where the Emperor had gone that night.

But in the shadows, among certain factions, a shift in the wind was beginning to be felt.

At her residence, Noble Consort Gui was sipping tea

when suddenly, her hand trembled—causing the porcelain cup to strike the edge of the table.

as if someone is opening the doors to the past…"

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The Formless Reflection