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WARNING: Depictions of rape.

"How did Your Majesty become interested in taking a stroll around today?" Su Xin looked at Qu Feiqing with her head propped up by her elbow on her knees. Her voice was chipper than usual.

The emperor was hard to see these past few days so she was pleased that she was finally here to talk to.

Like on many days, the beauty of the imperial garden today was no different.

It was a garden that was truly for royalty, a magnificent place that was excellently managed to give the highest delight to visitors.

If Qu Feiqing was talking to some other woman, the garden would surely be their medium of discussion, as there was not much to talk about.

Especially to a taciturn person like Qu Feiqing who did not initiate conversations willingly.

But Su Xin was different. When she was with Qu Feiqing, she didn"t feel like she was with the emperor whom everyone feared and despised. She rather liked to skip through the formalities and talk to her like how normal people would.

Seeing her eye to eye.

With not a soul in sight, Qu Feiqing suddenly had the urge to talk to Su Xin.

“Those officials want to force this emperor to take an imperial concubine."

Su Xin imagined a group of graceful, enchanting men waving their handkerchiefs coquettishly at Qu Feiqing whose face was annoyed. She couldn"t keep a straight face at the thought of it and burst into an unsuppressed laughter.

With her laughter, the emperor opened her eyes. She looked at Su Xin whose eyes were crinkling and hands were on her stomach from laughing too much.

"Feeling happy?" Qu Feiqing"s voice was a bit chilly.

Hearing the icy voice, Su Xin quickly choked back her laughter. She dropped her hands from her stomach and placed it on her lap gracefully. She felt a bit embarra.s.sed on how she could easily lose her composure.

"It"s hard to imagine." Su Xin shrugged her shoulders.

Qu Feiqing taking a concubine for herself was beyond the bounds of possibility. She couldn"t let a man touch her.

It was a nightmare she would never live through again.

Qu Feiqing being hailed as the first beauty among the four countries was not just a name made out of thin air.

Since childhood, she was already extraordinarily beautiful. So beautiful that even concubines envied her mother. She was popular and very cute, resembling a small dumpling.

Her beauty was already from birth, yet her cold personality wasn"t. She used to see the world in a different light, more naive and innocent.

Although she stuck in the cold palace, she had no qualms about living an old-fas.h.i.+oned, solitary life with just her mother.

However, the time when the cold palace could no longer be enough to sustain the princess" delight came, and Qu Feiqing wished to explore the world outside.

One day, a six-year old Qu Feiqing ran out of the cold palace to play, her face pink out of unadulterated happiness.

Evil lurks around every corner and one guard saw the lone child whose big eyes surveyed the place.

Her innocence aroused one imperial bodyguard that had an impure fetish with children. Seeing such a beautiful girl, and one that was alone, he thought of perverted ways to corrupt the defenseless child.

He asked her what palace she served, and Qu Feiqing  answered ignorantly, unaware of the man"s diabolical thoughts.

Dressed in a simple attire, he thought she was one of those palace maids serving the cold palace and was just here to flaunt her superiority, like all those wenches who thought highly of themselves and made sure to make him feel like dirt.

For a child to be so arrogant, he thought that there should be a price to pay.

With silent but heavy strides, he approached the girl, seizing her by her tiny body and m.u.f.fling her screams with his rough palms.

Her imperial concubine mother had been looking for Qu Feiqing for awhile. And she finally found her child to her horror, vigorously struggling underneath a man, unable to fight back from the difference in strength.

It was the first time that Qu Feiqing saw blood.

Her mother didn"t want to stretch out the matter. Afterall, Qu Feiqing had a reputation to maintain. Even though she was still a child, this incident would forever put her into disgrace. She was afraid that her daughter would never leave the cold palace, the place where consorts who fell out of favor such as her were condemned to live in a life of desolation.

The man must be silenced, so Qu Feiqing"s mother killed the man without batting an eyelid.

T/N: Tragic. I feel bad for Qu Feiqing.