The next day, Xiao Zhi woke up with a clarity that frightened her.
For a while now, she had been drifting, reacting instead of thinking, letting not only fear and pain but also false tenderness pull her off course. Kabil's carefully timed sweetness had dulled her instincts, and the quiet comfort of Ruhan's presence had lulled her into forgetting where she was and what kind of story she had fallen into. But the events of the past nights snapped something back into place. The story was no longer merely threatening to unfold. It was unfolding.
And if she did not act now, she would be swallowed by it.
She sat up slowly, ignoring the soreness that lingered in her body, and forced herself to think.
I need to get back on track. I need to get out of here.
She had transmigrated into this world with an unknown purpose, whether she liked it or not. If the plot continued the way she remembered, her fate was already written. She would suffer. She would die. And only after that would the story move forward.
She refused to accept that.
In the original story, her death became the spark. Shen Han, driven mad by grief and rage, led an attack against Tughril. Borders burned. Blood followed. The war that destroyed kingdoms began with her corpse.
Which meant Shen Han was the key.
If she wanted to survive in this world, if she wanted to break the loop entirely, she needed to reach him before the story reached that point.
First things first. She had to contact him.
Xiao Zhi sat at the desk and stared at the blank paper for a long moment before picking up the brush. This letter was different from the one she had written before. She was not writing as a daughter now, but as a victim of a tragic fate.
She was asking for help.
Her hand trembled as she wrote Shen Han's name.
She explained where she was, what had happened, and how dangerous her situation had become. She did not embellish, nor did she soften the truth. If he was ever going to act, he needed to understand that she was trapped inside a palace that would never protect her.
At the end of the letter, she hesitated, then added a single line.
Please save me.
When she finished, her fingers were numb.
***
Ruhan arrived later that afternoon, as he always did, quiet and efficient, carrying medicine and fresh linens. Xiao Zhi watched him carefully this time. He had been quieter for over a week now, even before the wedding. It was as if he were carrying something heavy in his heart, something she could not understand. Fewer and fewer words were exchanged between them, and that distance hurt her more than any slap Kabil had ever landed on her face.
"Ruhan," she said, holding out the folded letter. "I need you to help me send this to Hua."
Ruhan stopped what he was doing and turned towards her. He hesitated for a moment before accepting the paper in her hand without question.
"Yes, Your Highness," he replied.
The answer came too quickly. Too smoothly. And cold.
Xiao Zhi frowned. "Are you alright?"
Ruhan paused for half a second, then smiled. It was the same gentle expression he always wore, but this time it felt thin... and forced.
"I'm fine," he said. "Just tired. Palace work is… exhausting."
She studied his face, searching for signs of injury, fear, anything out of place. Had Kabil done something to him? Had the Khan questioned him? Threatened him?
"Nothing happened?" she pressed.
"Nothing," he repeated. "Please don't worry."
She wanted to ask more, but something in his eyes told her not to push. So she nodded and let him go, though unease curled tightly in her chest.
***
When Ruhan returned to his room, the smile vanished from his face.
He closed the door quietly and remained where he stood, the letter still clenched in his hand.
After a moment, he unfolded it.
Xiao Zhi's handwriting was uneven. The ink pressed too hard into the paper in places, as if her hand had shaken while she wrote. The letter was short, but Ruhan could read all of her pain in it.
She wrote of bruises she tried to hide, of pain she could not explain away, of Kabil's temper and the nights she feared the most. She did not name everything directly, but she did not need to. The spaces between her sentences said enough.
Near the end, the tone changed.
She begged.
Not with dignity, not with pride, but with raw desperation. She asked Shen Han to save her, to come for her.
Ruhan's chest tightened.
By the time he finished reading, his fingers had curled so tightly around the paper that the edges were creased.
Only then did he cross the room and open the drawer beneath his desk.
Inside lay another letter.
The one she had written before. The one meant for her mother. The one where she wrote that everything was alright.
Unsent.
He placed the new letter beside it carefully, as though stacking evidence of his own failure.
For a long moment, he simply stood there, staring down at the two envelopes.
Then he closed the drawer.
His hand lingered on the wood.
"I'm sorry," he said quietly, to no one at all.
And to himself.
He sat down heavily on the bed, then lay back and covered his face with his arm, pressing the fabric into his eyes as if that might stop the thoughts clawing at him.
He hated himself.
The letters remained where they were.
Unread.
Unsent.
And heavy enough to crush him.