A Wish for Your Lasting Joy - Chapter 2

Wanyan Mingzhu was the last princess of Jiang. Before the kingdom fell, she was its ruler’s most beloved child.

On her tenth birthday, someone presented her with a merfolk boy.

“I hear merfolk shed pearls instead of tears.” In the freezing water dungeon, the richly dressed Wanyan Mingzhu looked over Xu Changhuan, who had been beaten until he was covered in blood.

She glanced at the pearls scattered across the floor, then spoke with disdain.

“I hardly think tears from a lowly thing like you deserve to be called precious pearls.”

“Your eyes are rather pretty, though.”

“Gouge them out.”

With those carelessly spoken words, Xu Changhuan lost both eyes. He was then abandoned in the depths of the palace to fend for himself. Only after Jiang fell did the heroine, Jiang Hua, find him and take him back to Mount Yuexuan. She healed both his eyes and his wounded heart. Together they fought monsters and grew stronger. With Jiang Hua by his side, Xu Changhuan eventually killed Wanyan Mingzhu with his own hands and rose to the pinnacle of cultivation.

In other words, it was a heartwarming story about a kind, good heroine saving a poor, pitiful male lead.

Everything about the story was perfectly normal—until the day I became Wanyan Mingzhu, the supporting villainess.

Absolutely ridiculous. To stay alive, I’d desperately tried to make Xu Changhuan like me, and somehow sent the whole plot careening off course.

In the end, his grudge against me for his eyes had escalated into a grudge over an attempt on his life. I’d long been prepared for him to seek revenge. But now that he had appeared before me like a vengeful ghost, I still wanted to go back in time and slap some sense into myself.

Wake up! He’s the male lead! Where did you find the nerve?

Standing in the dimly lit Hall of Rapture, I felt as weary as someone who’d lived through an entire age. I could see no end to the road ahead.

Forget tricking him out of the moonlight grass. At this rate, I’d be leaving my life here for his entertainment.

Come to think of it, ten years on Mount Taiheng—every day and every night—had felt shorter than these few days in the Hall of Rapture.

While my mind wandered, a cold laugh sounded above. I jolted and dropped to my knees with everyone else. When I looked up, I met Xu Changhuan’s icy gaze.

Seriously, sir, what was it this time? Terrorizing me all day was turning my brain numb.

After glancing at me, he turned to the beauty beside him.

“If you can’t attend to me properly, get out!”

Trembling, she climbed off his lap and knelt on the floor, sobbing softly.

How many beauties had he gone through today? Even with a harem of three thousand, you couldn’t go wasting them like this.

No one dared breathe. The hall fell quiet for a moment. Then, to my horror, Xu Changhuan pointed in my direction.

“You. Come here.”

I stiffly turned my head from side to side. Once I was sure he meant me, I reluctantly stood and walked over.

The tearful beauty kneeling beside him gave me a grateful look, sprang up, and ran out.

I had no words.

I inched up toward him. Xu Changhuan watched me coldly, that frosty smile on his lips. Finally he seemed to lose patience. He caught my wrist and gave a hard tug.

I pitched forward, lost my balance, and tumbled into his arms as the world spun.

The instant I saw his face and realized where I was, I tried to jump up as though my backside were on fire.

Even when we’d spent every day together in the palace of Jiang, we had never been this intimate. With a blood feud between us now, how could I dare sit here?

Xu Changhuan pressed me back down. He caught my chin, his face drawing closer, his expression turning suggestive.

“Of all the women in this world, yours is still the loveliest face in the Four Kingdoms,” he said flippantly. “If I’d noticed sooner, perhaps the last great secret of the royal family of Jiang would have been its princess’s debauchery with a merman.”

I knew he was trying to humiliate me. But he had no right to humiliate the Xu Changhuan of ten years ago. Indignant, I shot back.

“The feeling’s mutual. I never noticed how pretty your face was either. Otherwise, I’d have devoured you back in the palace, instead of leaving myself all these regrets.”

As soon as the words left my mouth, he froze. So did I. I clapped a hand over my mouth.

Oh, God. Thinking it was one thing. Saying it out loud was another!

The entire hall went so quiet you could hear a pin drop. Before my eyes, the shock in Xu Changhuan’s gaze darkened into something deep and unreadable. His hand tightened around my waist.

I was dead. The final boss was angry. Was I actually going to die here today?!