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墨書 Inktalez
Mold slithered like a snake through the cracks of the blue bricks in the dungeon, and Su Qing curled up beneath the Xing Jia, the iron shackles on her wrists having already seeped into her bones and blood.
She counted the sounds of rain leaking in from the Shi Chuang, each drop striking her decayed collarbone, mingling with the taste of rust as it flowed into her embroidered wedding gown.
Three days ago, blood splattered on her collar when her eyes were gouged out, and now it had dried into dark brown scabs.
"Miss... have some soup," a woman said, her voice thick with sorrow as the foul smell of rice soup invaded Su Qing's nostrils. She groped for the coarse ceramic bowl.
Her fingertips brushed against the raised patterns at the bottom of the bowl, unmistakably the coiling dragon design from her mother's dowry. Suddenly, she broke into a violent cough, spilling the rice soup onto the straw mat, staining it with remnants of flowers.
The woman sighed as she picked up the broken bowl, revealing a half-torn yellowed letter hidden within the crack.
Su Qing's trembling fingers reached for the corner of that paper; the ink was already blurred, but she could still make out the words "Zhou Shi Wanjun."
She suddenly recalled Lu Jinyu's words from three days ago: "Before Wan Jun died, she clutched your Su Family's Aromatic Pouch."
The iron chains rattled abruptly as Lu Jinyu's dark Python Robe brushed against her decayed ankle.
As he crouched down, the scent of Dragon's Blood Incense mixed with blood rushed towards her: "Su Qing, do you know why I have kept you alive until now?"
The glint of Silver Scissors flashed by; Su Qing heard the sound of Silk Satin tearing as the Double Lotus on her wedding gown was completely stripped away.
"Because Wan Jun said before she breathed her last that what she wanted to see most was..." Lu Jinyu's fingertips grazed over her iron shackles. "It was your Su Family daughter being stripped of her skin, revealing bones crawling with maggots beneath."
He suddenly pinched her bloodied earlobe and forced a half-broken jade earring into her ear—an item her father had purchased from a merchant in the Western Regions as a Bride Price for Eldest Sister's coming-of-age ceremony.
A whimper escaped Su Qing's throat like that of a trapped beast; the sharp pain in her earlobe reminded her of Eldest Sister's last words three days ago: "The marriage contract under the shrine... Zhou Family and Su Family's Secret Contract..." She suddenly struggled against her chains, which scraped against the stone wall, sending sparks flying onto the damp ground.
"It seems Su Qing has remembered something," Lu Jinyu said suddenly as he tore open her blood-stained garment, exposing a grotesque scar over her heart. "Twenty years ago, on the night when Zhou Family was exterminated, I hid behind the beams in the ancestral hall."
He traced her collarbone with his fingertips, the pressure so intense it felt as if he were digging into her very marrow. "In the brazier lit by your Su Family, the blood oath of three hundred Zhou lives burns."
Su Qing felt her breath tighten as if gripped by an invisible hand. Three days prior, she had discovered a secret letter beneath the altar in the ancestral hall, penned in her grandfather's unmistakable handwriting: "Zhou's private salt case... Su Family must lend strong support."
The secret contract hidden within the marriage certificate was none other than the indenture pressed with Zhou Fu's blood seal.
"Take her away." Lu Jinyu suddenly released her, and Su Qing fell heavily onto a grass mat stained with mildew. She heard the dull thud of her bones striking the blue bricks, reminiscent of the sound when Eldest Sister's head struck the offering table in the ancestral hall as she breathed her last.
As two maids dragged her toward the water prison, she suddenly felt a piece of jade pendant hidden in her sleeve—the half piece that Chun Tao had slipped to her three days ago, engraved with the Su Family crest on its inner side.
The moment the iron chains entered the water, a foul stench mixed with coldness pierced her bones. Su Qing counted the faint light filtering above, each beam reflecting Lu Jinyu's sinister brows and eyes.
When he gouged out her eyes, he had said, "Wan Jun, before dying, expressed his hatred for the eyes of Su Family women." Yet now, in darkness, she saw all too clearly: bloodstains on the stone walls of the water prison clearly spelled out "injustice," etched by Zhou women’s nails twenty years ago.
"Can you recognize this character, Su Qing?" Lu Jinyu's voice came wrapped in rippling water as his boot ground against her festering ankle. "Each bloodstain is soaked with Zhou blood." He suddenly pressed the jade pendant into her palm. "Three days ago, when your Eldest Sister breathed her last, she clutched this—an emblem entrusted to her by Lin Jue."
Su Qing felt her heart tighten in an invisible grip. Three days prior, when Eldest Sister coughed up blood, she had given her half a jade pendant, claiming it was brought in by Lin Jue. At that moment, she hadn’t examined it closely, but now she felt the uneven surface inside—the distinct patterns of the Secret Contract between the Su and Zhou families.
"Too bad Lin Gongzi doesn’t know," Lu Jinyu's voice dripped with mockery. "His father once presented evidence of Zhou’s treason to protect your Su Family." He suddenly pinched her bloodied earlobe. "Just like your father, who poisoned his mistress to climb up to Lu Family."
Su Qing began to struggle violently; chains scraped against stone walls, sparks flying into the foul water. She recalled how three days ago, when her mother was dragged into the torture chamber, the curtain caught on a golden hairpin embroidered with Zhou’s family crest. And Eldest Sister’s last words about the poisoned Aromatic Pouch were now wafting from within her sleeve.
"Bring her up." Lu Jinyu abruptly swung open the iron gate. As foul water surged forth, Su Qing saw her mother’s body swollen and soaked. The golden hairpin was long gone; gray strands of hair stuck messily to her face like dust-covered ancestral tablets in the hall.
"Qing'er..." Her mother croaked as she grasped Su Qing's bloodied wedding dress with frail hands. "The marriage certificate under the altar... burn it..." Before she could finish speaking, Lu Jinyu's dagger had already sliced across her throat. Blood sprayed onto Su Qing’s face, mingling with the stench of decay from the water prison and filling her mouth with a nauseating taste.
"Do you see?" Lu Jinyu pressed his bloodied dagger against her collarbone wound. "Your Su Family owes Zhou a debt of blood that must be repaid with three generations of female kin's heart’s blood."
He suddenly tore open his own clothing to reveal a gruesome scar across his chest. "Twenty years ago that night, I personally plunged this dagger into a young girl from Zhou."
Su Qing felt her breath becoming increasingly labored as the putrid water in the dungeon crept over her rotting ankles.
She touched the poison pouch hidden in her sleeve, which her Eldest Sister had given her three days ago, saying, "This is what Father instructed me to give you... a mixture of musk and scorpion powder..." At that moment, she suddenly understood that the true deadly element within the pouch was the curse soaked in the Zhou family's Blood Oath.
"The time has come." Lu Jinyu suddenly yanked at her blood-stained wedding gown, the soles of his Python Pattern Boots grinding against her decaying collarbone. Su Qing heard the brittle crack of her bones, reminiscent of the Blood Flower that had bloomed from Eldest Sister's throat three days prior.
As she was dragged onto the execution platform, the spring rain mingled with the scent of blood, evoking memories of that night when Lin Jue had tucked a peach blossom behind her ear during her coming-of-age ceremony.
The Executioner's Ghost Head Blade glimmered in the rainlight, and Su Qing suddenly recalled how Lin Jue had burst in, covered in blood, and had used his sword to deflect Lu Jinyu's dagger.
At that moment, his bloodied profile overlapped with the flickering blade above her. She heard a guttural whimper escape her throat, yet Lu Jinyu's cold voice cut through: "Su Qing, legitimate daughter of the Su family, has consorted with an outsider and poisoned the matriarch. According to the laws of this dynasty, she shall be..."
"Lingchi." Su Qing interjected suddenly, her hoarse voice startling the crows perched at the edge of the platform. She gazed at Lu Jinyu's blood-stained Python Robe and recalled that night twenty years ago during the Zhou Clan Annihilation when her grandfather had concealed a Blood Oath in his sleeve—an agreement written in the heart's blood of Zhou family members.
With the sound of Silver Scissors slicing through the air, Su Qing's last sight was of Lu Jinyu's Twin Fish Jade Pendant swaying at his waist. It was a token Lin Jue had given her during her coming-of-age ceremony, now stained with her mother's blood and glinting ominously red in the rainlight.
She suddenly began to cough violently, blood frothing from her throat and staining the Double Lotus on her wedding gown, reminiscent of that spring day when they rode their Snowy Black Steed through a river of lanterns.
In that instant when the blade fell, Su Qing heard the sound of her heart shattering like silk satin tearing apart. The last thing she saw was a Peach Blossom Petal caught on Lu Jinyu's robe hem, swirling in the night wind on the execution platform before landing softly in her gradually cooling palm.
The petal was strikingly red, much like the seal on the Blood Oath belonging to the women of the Zhou family twenty years ago and eerily similar to the blossom Lin Jue had placed behind her ear during her coming-of-age ceremony.
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