An excruciating scream emanated from prince ZiShu's room. It sounded like Ah Xiang.
When Lao Wen and other servants rushed there, all they saw was Cao's dead body in Ah Xiang's arms. His neck had been broken. Ah Xiang was weeping heavily, with one hand still holding her hairpin that had been lodged into prince ZiShu's shoulder.
The servants immediately pulled Ah Xiang and locked her away so she could not harm the prince any further.
Once they moved Cao's body out of the room, and the imperial doctor tended to prince ZiShu's wound, everybody was dismissed.
Only Lao Wen remained.
"Ah Xu, what happened?"
ZiShu just stared at Wen Ke Xing, his eyes showing acute torment to a level that Wen Ke Xing had never witnessed before.
"Talk to me please. " Lao Wen begged.
Ah Xu did not answer. But his eyes spoke a million emotions: guilt, agitation, fear, resentment, hostility, regret, terror, surprise, disbelief, confusion, distress, uncertainty, shock, disorientation, panic, hatred, sorrow, remorse, shame, you name it.
He was in total turmoil.
"Tell me, Ah Xu. Who killed Cao?" Lao Wen asked again.
Ah Xu still did not answer. But his eyes did. They basically told Lao Wen that he, prince ZiShu of Song, killed Cao, his door guard. The man to whom he was going to marry Ah Xiang to, because he was their matchmaker.
"YOU did?" Lao Wen could not believe it.
"Why? What did Cao do?" Lao Wen asked.
"Is that why Ah Xiang stabbed you?" Lao Wen continued pushing for answers.
"What did he do that caused you to break his neck? Why did you let Ah Xiang stab you? You could easily fight her off. Talk to me, Ah Xu!"
When ZiShu finally spoke, he simply asked with a cracked, shaky voice. "Do you love me?"
"Of course I do."
"Then prove it."
"How?"
"Take your clothes off." ZiShu ordered.
"What?!" Wen Ke Xing was startled. He thought he mis-heard Ah Xu.
"PROVE ME THAT YOU LOVE ME !!!" ZiShu shouted with an assertive, commanding tone, yet filled with misery at the same time.
"What's gotten into you? You just killed Cao, and now you want me to strip?"
"I'm not asking twice. If you love me, do it, or else just GO!" The prince pointed at the door.
Wen Ke Xing turned around angrily and walked towards the door.
So there he went. Cao was right. It was all a big lie.
ZiShu's world turned upside-down.
His soul began disintegrating.
His heart prepared to explode.
Wen Ke Xing stopped at the door, locked it, and then turned back to look at prince ZiShu.
The prince didn't know what to think, how to process. He figured Lao Wen was going to walk out but he didn't. A glitter of hope suddenly shone. Perhaps Cao was wrong.
With his face showing full dissatisfaction, his eyes angrily staring at prince ZiShu, he walked towards the bed, as he disrobed layer by layer. When he arrived at the edge of the bed, he was at the last layer, and his reddened eyes painfully teared up.
