Chapter 134: Unbreakable

Ru Yi did not bother with an answer. She walked to the place she’d dumped her robe and put it back on. She did not look down on the beads that were now scattered on the floor. Didn’t reach for what she had broken.

Instead she looked at Han Shuying from over her shoulder— In that moment she saw something in the way Han Shuying looked at her.

For the first time she saw the general’s daughter and her ruthlessness. Someone unafraid to take what she wanted and destroy whoever stood in her way.

Without a second thought, Ru Yi turned and began to walk away. Her steps were uneven but her back remained straight, as though she had already severed whatever thread had tried to form between them.

Han Shuying watched her go. She did not call after her. Did not step forward.

She simply stood there, still and silent. Her eyes followed the line of Ru Yi’s retreating form until it blurred, until the steam around them swallowed her and there was nothing left to see.

And still—

She did not move.

The quiet returned slowly, settling into the space Ru Yi left behind. For a short moment, Han Shuying remained where she was.

Then her gaze dropped.

The beads laid scattered at her feet, small and unremarkable. Pieces of something that had once been whole and now wasn’t.

Broken.

Discarded.

Meaningless.

Just like her...

Slowly, she bent down. Her fingers brushed against the stone as she picked up the nearest bead, rolling it lightly between her fingers.

She should’ve left the beads on the floor. Should have let it remain where it had fallen, forgotten and unimportant.

But she couldn’t.

Instead, she reached for another bead. And another. Gathering them one by one, her movements unhurried, precise like there was purpose in it.

Her gaze shifted toward the bath. A few beads had fallen in.

They were gone now, lost beneath the surface, swallowed by the water. For a moment she simply stared at the bath, then she stood up.

The water rippled as she entered, the warmth rising around her again. Her gaze remained fixed and searching, her hand slipping beneath the surface as she felt along the stone, tracing where the beads might have settled.

It was unnecessary and pointless. Han Shuying knew that, but it didn’t stop her from searching for the rest of the beads inside the water.

Silence filled the bathhouse, broken only by the faint movement of water as Han Shuying searched for the last few pieces.

Why was she doing this? Why was she inside a bath fully clothed and looking for tiny beads in the middle of the night?

The questions were endless, but Han Shuying didn’t have an answer to any of them.

Something about Ru Yi lingered even after she was gone. It refused to be dismissed as easily, settling under Han Shuying’s skin.

Why was she drawn to her?

Han Shuying was never meant to exist. From the moment she was born, she had already failed. Not because she was weak, not because she lacked talent...

It was all because she was not a son.

General Han Zheng, her father...had wanted an heir who would inherit his title, his legacy, his command.

A boy who would stand beside him, then replace him. Someone worthy of the armor he wore. Instead, he’d been given a daughter. And that daughter took her mother with her on the way into the world.

It was never said outright—at least not in words—but it lived in the way General Han Zheng looked at Han Shuying.

In the cold, measured disappointment that never softened, no matter how skilled she became, no matter how many victories she carved out for herself.

Han Shuying learned from a young age that excellence alone was not enough for General Han Zheng.

She was faster, sharper, and more ruthless than any soldier under her command. Yet, it would not change the simple truth of what she was not.

Han Shuying stopped her search briefly to touch the short strands of her wet hair. She’d stuck to cutting her hair short like a man’s because of her father, hoping that one day he would look in her direction.

He never did.

Empress Lihua was the only person—before Ru Yi—to look at Han Shuying without disappointment in her gaze. There was no quiet resentment tucked behind politeness.

When she spoke to Han Shuying, it was as though she were speaking to a person and not a failed expectation...not a failed substitute for something better.

The first time the Empress praised her, it had unsettled her more than any battlefield ever had.

"You’ve done well," Empress Lihua had said, her voice soft and fingers cupping Han Shuying’s cheek. "I’m very proud of you."

It was a simple thing that shouldn’t have mattered, but it did. Because no one had ever said it to her like that before.

After that, Han Shuying found herself drawing closer to the older woman. Not out of obligation or duty, but something quieter and dangerous.

A need she did not name, one she barely allowed herself to recognize on most nights. Because in the end Han Shuying was not foolish.

The Empress didn’t value her because she saw her. She valued Han Shuying because she was useful. A weapon...a loyal blade that she could wield at will.

But the part of her that had grown unseen, unwanted, and insufficient did not care. Until she met Ru Yi.

Han Shuying lifted herself out of the bath, all twenty-five beads secured in her palms. She was loyal to the Empress because somewhere along the way, she had chosen it.

But she was drawn to Ru Yi in ways she couldn’t explain.

Han Shuying had not been entirely honest to Ru Yi when she spoke about the dream. She hadn’t told her the part where the shadow had curled around Ru Yi’s wrist before finding its way to Han Shuying’s.

They’d been in what seemed like a battlefield, dead bodies all around them. But the only part that stuck with Han Shuying was how the shadow had curled around their wrists, as if binding them together.

Han Shuying knew in her gut that she and Ru Yi were bound in more ways than one.