The imperial capital. The Princely Household of Ji.

The Princess sat before her dressing mirror, looking at the graceful, distinguished face reflected back at her, makeup applied to perfection — and yet the smile at the corner of her lips was slowly fading.

She turned a jade bracelet over and over in her fingers.

As her hand tightened into a fist, the bracelet shattered with a crack, though the shards left not a mark on her pale skin.

"You're saying Qingzhou's General never came to call on the household?" The Princess turned her gaze back from the mirror, voice perfectly calm, and yet somehow chilling.

She'd waited a full day and night in keen anticipation, having already rehearsed in her mind exactly how she would mock Jiang Yuanhua when he finally appeared.

And yet here it was, the gate of the household, still empty.

The handmaiden knelt on the floor, trembling from head to foot. "Princess... the General who came to the capital this time isn't the one you know... it's that black-armored young General who came to the household last time."

"..."

The Princess raised an eyebrow.

Qingzhou had a new General, then. What about Jiang Yuanhua?

Dead?

If so, the crisis Qingzhou was currently facing was probably far worse than she'd assumed.

"Hmph."

A cold smile. If Jiang Yuanhua's obedient little disciple wasn't coming, instead sending that young General Shen to come in her place — he was refusing to bow his head, then.

With that thought, the Princess gave a light wave of her sleeve. "If he comes to call, tell him I'm not in residence. The world doesn't give out favors that easily — if the main party won't show their face themselves, sending a junior to stand in front isn't going to cut it."

Did he really think that just because she'd given a young man the nominal title of General, she'd actually treat him as one?

"Princess..."

The handmaiden's slight frame shook harder than before, and she said quietly, dreading every word, "That General may not be coming to the household at all."

As…