Amid ice and blood, Lin stood staring at his hands.
They trembledâglowing with a deep, unnatural blue. A color no human should possess.
Around him, the arena was a massacre. A body here, a severed arm there⦠shredded limbs scattered across the snow.
The scent of blood mixed with a biting cold, one that pierced through bone and planted an eternal winter deep inside.
Then he collapsed to his knees, convulsing as if his spine were shattering, vertebra by vertebra.
He didnât lose consciousness right away. Instead, he began to coughâthick, black blood, boiling from within.
Each cough tore at him, dragging out gore and fragments of his insides.
He choked on his breath, his body twitching like a hanged puppet, caught in the throes of a slow death.
Veins burst across his neck and forehead. Blood streamed from his nose, eyes, and earsâred and black lines running down his face as if he were bleeding from every hole.
Then his body slammed into the ground, heavy and limp, as though it had been hurled from the sky. The earth trembled beneath him. Blood splattered around him like demonic flowers blooming in pain.
The White Queen didnât move.
She simply watched, her gaze cold and unreadable, like a scene she'd seen too many times to care.
Then she raised a hand and spoke in a voice that allowed no refusal:
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> âTake him⦠and clean him.â
The two maids didnât say a word.
They dragged his frozen body through the hallsâdownwardâthrough layers of silence and ice.
Deep within the palace, there was a bath.
A vast chamber with a domed ceiling, soft steam drifting like the breath of spirits.
At its center: a pool.
A basin of smooth black stone, filled with clear waterâcold as death.
Lin was unconscious.
He didnât resist, didnât groan, didnât even breathe like someone alive.
His body was placed gently into the water, like a nameless corpse.
He didnât wake⦠but the cold began gnawing at his bones, sinking into his soul.
This was no ordinary winter. This was winter carved into the spirit.
They began their task in silence.
One took a soft stone and scrubbed the frozen blood from his chest and neck.
The other washed his face, his hair, his limbs.
The water turned red⦠then pink⦠then clear once again.
They treated him not as a man, but as a body.
When the water had done its work, they lifted him out.
They dried him with a soft white cloth, then dressed him in a thin, pale robe. No symbols. No ornamentation.
A shroud prepared for an unholy ceremony.
Lin didnât open his eyes.
But his chest rose and fell.
He was breathing with the ice. Adapting to it. Absorbing it.
The halls leading to the Queenâs chamber werenât normal.
Every step echoed strangely.
As if the floor whispered. As if the walls watched.
Linâs eyes remained shut, but his pulse shifted.
Something inside⦠was waking up.
They reached a double doorâsilver ice, etched with runes that moved when you blinked.
> âBring him in,â
the Queen said.
The door opened on its own, a cold breath rushing out like wind from a grave.
Lin was pushed inside.
The room was no room.
It was another worldâwrapped in frost, haunted by spirits, rippling with ancient echoes.
At its center, a bed of white ice. A canopy above it, light as mist.
And upon the nearby throne⦠she sat.
The White Queen.
Her gown trailed behind her like light itself.
Her eyesâfrozen bloodâlit the snow not with warmth, but with judgment.
Lin awoke.
But he didnât move.
His body was drained, his gaze fogged, his breath ragged.
He felt empty⦠broken inside. And perhaps⦠a little afraid.
She looked at him, lying thereâbound, half-deadâbut not defeated.
She gripped the front of his robe.
Then said:
> âKneel.â
His knees struck the ground as if the earth itself demanded it.
She raised her hand.
From the air, black chains emergedâwrithing like creatures born from living night.
They coiled around him.
Wrist. Shoulder. Neck. Chestâ¦
Each link closed like a sentence passed in silence.
Then she approached.
Calm steps, slow and deliberate, until she stood before him.
She knelt, touched his forehead with icy fingers, and whispered:
> âYou still need some Rehabilitationâ¦â
Then she smiled.
That smileâborn from a frost without heart. Like a crack forming in the face of death itself.
> âPrepare for the marriage ceremony⦠my husband.â