Chapter 146: Hidden Wounds

Yexue’s outburst settled, brittle enough that even breathing felt like it might crack it.

Qingyue remained where she stood, unmoving, her gaze lowered like she was standing in the echo of Yexue’s words rather than the room itself.

Lieyin stepped forward first, her presence cutting cleanly through the tension. Her expression was hard, composed in the way it always was when things threatened to slip out of control.

She did not look at Qingyue for long, her attention settling instead on Yexue, who stood rigid at the centre of the room. Her emotions were still raw and visible in the tight set of her shoulders.

"You’ve lost focus," Lieyin said to Yexue, her tone even but edged, "and you’re letting your emotions come in the way of everything we’ve worked hard for."

Yexue breathed in slowly, it sounded almost like a laugh. Though there was anything but amusement on her face. Her eyes were still bright with tears. "Is that what you think this is?"

"I know exactly what this is," Lieyin replied without hesitation, her gaze unyielding. "But we have a goal, and you’re letting something personal cloud your judgement."

"Personal?" Yexue looked at Qingyue with irritation. "Let me correct that sentence. She has a goal and we have to go along with it."

"Qingyue has always put us before herself, always made decisions that kept us alive and moving forward." Lieyin’s voice tightened a fraction. "You’re too caught up in your own feelings to see it."

The words landed heavily, but instead of faltering, Yexue’s expression shifted from hurt to something more defined and dangerous. "Don’t."

Lieyin frowned. "Don’t what?"

"Don’t stand there and act like you know her better than I do," Yexue replied.

"I’m not acting," Lieyin scoffed. "I’m only stating the truth."

"No, you’re repeating what’s convenient and treating my feelings like they don’t matter." Yexue’s hand loosened at her sides from defeat. "Just like you’ve always done."

Lieyin’s eyes narrowed into slits. "And what exactly is that supposed to mean?"

Yexue hesitated for a fraction of a second. And in that moment, she knew she was standing at the edge of something she wouldn’t be able to undo.

That whatever she said next would not be something she could take back, but the pressure in her chest had built too far. The frustration she felt was so deeply rooted, and she was tired of swallowing it.

"It means," she said slowly, her gaze locking onto Lieyin’s. "That it’s easy for you to hide behind that kind of thinking when you don’t have to face what’s actually in front of you."

Lieyin’s expression hardened, "I face things head on. That’s more than I can say for you right now."

"No, you don’t." Yexue countered. "You avoid them just as much as anyone else, you just do it differently."

"And how would you know that?" Lieyin asked, her voice dropping.

"Because unlike you," Yexue said, the words driven by something she could no longer hold back, "I don’t use violence to drown out the fact that I don’t know what to do with myself when Qingyue isn’t the one telling me what comes next."

The stillness that followed was immediate and absolute.

Even Yexue felt it the moment the words left her mouth, the weight of them settling in too quickly.

For a brief second, regret flickered across her face because she knew she had gone too far. That she had struck something deeper than she intended. But the moment already passed and there was no pulling back.

Lieyin did not react the way she usually did. She did not snap, did not step forward, did not retaliate with the same sharpness she was known for.

Instead she stood there, her expression unreadable. The words had landed in a place she hadn’t been prepared to defend.

Qingyue noticed it. That more than anything, she was the one responsible for all of this.

Yexue’s breath came unevenly as she looked away first, unable to face what she had just said. But she was still too hurt to apologize for it.

"Fine," Lieyin muttered, the word carrying no resolution...only exhaustion.

The room remained quiet, but it was no longer the same silence as before. This was heavier, fractured in a way that could not be ignored. Qingue felt it settle into her chest with a weight she was not used to carrying.

Because this time, it wasn’t a problem she could solve with logic or a plan. She registered the distance that had formed so suddenly between the three of them.

Guilt came first, quiet but insistent. It threaded through her thoughts as she replayed the last few days and the moments she had allowed to unfold without intervention.

She allowed herself to follow Yexue’s words to their roots instead of deflecting them. And what she found there unsettled her more than the argument itself.

Qingyue had always told herself that everything she did was for them, that the path to the throne was not a choice but a necessity. It was the only way she could truly protect them from the tragic fate their mother had met.

It was something she wanted to carry so they would not have to. But now standing in the quiet aftermath, she could not ignore the possibility that she had never truly asked if they wanted it in the same way she did.

That perhaps she had not led them forward, but pulled them along, binding their futures to hers without ever giving them the space to choose differently.

Qingyue felt colder— she could not predict how this would resolve, could not calculate the steps needed to bring her sisters back together. That uncertainty settled deeper than the guilt.

Fear followed it. Because fallouts like this did not simply disappear, and she didn’t know how to keep them from breaking completely.

Yexue finally moved, but not toward either of them. She turned to the door, her expression tight. "I need air."

Neither of them stopped her.

And this time when she left, the door sliding close behind her did not just end the argument. It left something behind that none of them knew how to fix.