When Liu Lanzhi woke for the second time, night had already fallen.
The faint glow of candlelight flickered against the carved wooden walls of the chamber, casting long shadows that swayed with the wind. The space beside her was cold and empty.
He was gone.
For a moment, she lay still, staring at the canopy above her, listening to the distant sound of rain. Her body felt weak, every muscle aching dully as if she had been ill for days. She could not tell how long she had slept, only that her limbs protested the slightest movement.
Outside, heavy rain poured relentlessly over the palace. From the partially open balcony doors, she could hear the wind howling through the corridors, carrying the scent of damp stone and wet earth. Dark clouds swallowed the sky, and the storm showed no signs of passing.
Liu Lanzhi's fingers curled slowly into the bedding.
She remembered this day.
In her previous life, she had awakened in this very chamber—confused, frightened, and broken. That night, her innocence had been taken by the infamous crown prince she loathed the most. At that time, she had been nothing more than his prisoner. She had not yet developed feelings for him. She had resisted him openly, desperately, foolishly.
And she had paid the price.
Her breathing grew shallow as memory after memory surfaced.
With trembling hands, Liu Lanzhi looked down at her body. A thick blanket covered her, warm and heavy. Her heart pounded violently in her chest as she hesitated, then slowly lifted the edge of the sheet.
She was braced for the sight of blood.
There was none.
The sheets were crumpled from her restless sleep, but they were clean—pure white, untouched.
Her mind went blank.
What…?
She froze, then checked again, her movements clumsy and frantic. Beneath the blanket, she wore a thin sleeping robe. Her body felt sore, exhausted—but there was no pain where there should have been.
No tearing pain.
No blood.
No proof of what should have happened.
Her hands clenched tightly into the fabric.
This was wrong.
Yun Qingyu should have sealed her fate last night.
Then why—
Why hadn't he touched her?
What had changed?
At this point in time, her status was clear. She was his captive, his future crown princess in name alone. A year from now, when he ascended the throne as emperor, she would not receive the phoenix crown she had once dreamed of. Instead, he would grant her the title of Imperial Noble Consort.
Never Empress.
Never equal.
A bitter smile curved Liu Lanzhi's lips.
In her previous life, she had done everything for him.
She had assisted him in eliminating the other princes, paving the way for him to secure the throne. She had endured suspicion, hatred, and isolation within the palace. And once her usefulness had ended, Yun Qingyu had turned his back on her completely.
He had killed their only child.
He had imprisoned her in the cold palace.
And while she rotted in silence, he indulged himself with Su Yue—his chosen empress.
How tragic.
Just as she was on the verge of ascending to immortality, the man she thought she loved and the sister she believed cared for her had joined hands to kill her instead.
If it were not for the so-called prophecy—that she bore the fate of a phoenix—would Yun Qingyu have spared her a single glance?
Or had she been a fake phoenix from the very beginning?
Liu Lanzhi let out a soft, humorless chuckle.
How laughable.
She could have saved herself. She could have saved her child. But she had been blinded by love—naive enough to believe that she was special, that she was worthy to stand at his side simply because she was born with the mark of a black phoenix on her back.
In the end, she had been nothing more than a tool.
And worse—
Everyone around her had betrayed her.
Even her most trusted attendant.
Liu Lanzhi wrapped herself in a thicker silk robe and slowly rose from the bed. Her legs wobbled as she stood, but she forced herself upright and made her way toward the vanity table.
Everything in the chamber was exactly as she remembered.
At this time, her eldest sister, Liu Huiying, had already begun to reveal her true abilities. The woman whom everyone had once dismissed as useless had risen swiftly, earning recognition through blood and battle.
Too bad she had realized the truth too late.
It had been their father's concubine—Concubine Qin—who had poisoned her.
No… that was not the whole truth.
Liu Lanzhi herself had nearly been poisoned as well.
If she had not accidentally overheard Concubine Qin speaking with her personal attendant, she would have shared the same fate. Liu Huiying had been too trusting. Too slow to see the danger lurking within their own household.
They were both Di daughters of the great Liu family of the Northern Lands.
After Liu Lanzhi's birth, their mother had died from childbirth complications. Their father had taken a concubine soon after. Bound by a promise he made to his late wife, he never elevated Concubine Qin to the position of legal wife.
That promise had fueled hatred.
Concubine Qin was domineering and ruthless. She despised both Liu Huiying and Liu Lanzhi. In her eyes, if not for their existence, she and her own daughters would have enjoyed everything the Liu sisters possessed—status, legitimacy, and power.
After Yun Qingyu took Liu Lanzhi away from the Northern Lands, Liu Huiying managed to purge the poison from her body completely. Within a year, she rose to become a renowned general of their land.
Under the banner of the Scarlet Dragon Empire, she forged an alliance with Yun Qingyu.
Together, they waged war against Nan Yi of the south.
In exchange for her loyalty, Yun Qingyu supplied the Northern Lands with crops and raw materials—resources their frozen homeland desperately lacked.
By the time the war against Nan Yi began, Liu Lanzhi had already lost Yun Qingyu's favor.
She had been cast into the cold palace.
It was only through the sacrifice of another servant that she managed to escape.
That was when she learned the dark arts of the demon clan.
As a mortal, her cultivation had been stuck at level three, unable to advance further. But after cultivating demonic arts for two years, she had nearly reached level six—the threshold of immortality.
When she returned, the world rejected her.
They called her a demon incarnate.
They hunted her.
They feared her.
She had slaughtered thousands from both the Northern Lands and the Scarlet Dragon Empire in revenge.
A demoness, they said.
Liu Lanzhi smiled faintly.
She had liked that title.
A weak groan escaped her lips as she leaned closer to the mirror. Candlelight reflected a face she barely recognized—smooth, youthful, untouched by scars.
The disfiguring wound that once ruined her right eye was gone.
"I'm… still alive?" she whispered.
Her fingers trembled as she reached up to touch her cheek, confirming the impossible truth.
Then she laughed.
At first softly.
Then uncontrollably.
"Hahahaha!"
So she wasn't dead.
Her final struggle to survive had thrown her back into the past—into a time where everything could still be changed.
In her previous life, she had been blind.
This time, she would see clearly.
Liu Lanzhi's laughter faded, her expression hardening as resolve settled into her eyes.
She would not waste this second chance.
In this lifetime, she would see exactly who dared to harm her.
And she would make them pay.