Chapter 1

Chapter 1: Exile

“Stop playing dead. Get up!”

Half-drowned in gray fog, Shen Tang felt a boot slam into her side.

The kick wasn’t even the worst part. The voice above her kept cursing—impatient, casual—as if she were nothing but luggage.

[Fuck. Who kicked me?]

She curled tighter as pain flared and forced her eyes open.

The world snapped into brutal focus, like someone peeled away a blurred film and left her staring through hard glass.

[What the hell happened?]

Her head throbbed so viciously it felt ready to split. She dragged in a breath and stared at the unfamiliar scene, trying to make it make sense.

[Wasn’t I drinking last night?]

Whatever happened, it shouldn’t have ended here.

She pinched herself until the sting cut clean through the haze. Then she looked down and saw hands she didn’t recognize.

Four words hit her like a hammer:

She had transmigrated.

And everything that word implied came crawling in after it.

[Did I drink myself to death… or drop dead pulling an all-nighter?]

The harder she pushed at her thoughts, the worse the pain got, like something inside her skull was hammering on bone. Shen Tang clenched her jaw and stopped before she blacked out.

“Eat. Hurry up. Finish, then we move.”

She was pressing a hand to her temple when sunlight vanished under a tall shadow.

A man in straw sandals—his soles caked with dark mud—tossed something at her. A palm-sized cake, charred and rough, landed in the mud beside her skirt.

He didn’t care it was filthy. Didn’t care whether she could even chew. He was already shoving the next person’s ration into their hands.

A hand flashed in from Shen Tang’s side.

It snatched the cake and vanished.

Shen Tang turned a beat too late.

The thief was a disheveled woman with tangled, greasy hair and a face smeared with grime. She crammed the cake into her mouth with both hands like she hadn’t eaten in days—mud and all. In seconds it was gone, and she sucked crumbs off her fingers with loud, greedy satisfaction.

Shen Tang stared. “…Seriously?”

Up close, the woman was worse. Hair that should’ve been glossy black hung in oily cords, her scalp showing in streaks of yellowish buildup.

And the smell—

Sour and rancid, with a strange sweet edge, like old socks sealed up for weeks and crushed flowers ground into rot. The only mercy was that, under all that filth, her features were still pretty.

Shen Tang swallowed down nausea and kept her voice steady.

“Lady, that was my cake.”

The woman acted deaf. She smacked her lips, savoring the taste, and didn’t even glance over.

Shen Tang’s eyes dropped to the woman’s fingers—several shades lighter where she’d been licking them clean. Her throat tightened on reflex.

She wasn’t a neat freak, but this was enough to turn her stomach.

The woman caught Shen Tang’s expression and edged away, wary, like she expected the “idiot” to snap.

The movement tugged at Shen Tang’s waist.

She looked down.

A thick hemp rope looped around her midsection, tied to the filthy woman and a string of other women—different ages, all equally ragged—like grasshoppers strung together.

Shen Tang lifted her head and scanned the convoy.

Everywhere she looked were prisoners in rough hemp clothes, faces hollowed out by exhaustion. Old people. Women. Kids. Men, too.

Nearby, a dozen sturdy guards stood watch in matching gear, sabers hanging at their waists. Some kept lookout. Others stared the way bored, hungry men stare.

Whenever their eyes swept over a young woman with a decent figure, they lingered.

Shen Tang’s stomach sank.

This wasn’t a random arrest. This was a fall—the kind that swallowed an entire household whole.

Execution ground… or exile road. Either way, the difference was just dying sooner or dying later.

Her belly chose that moment to betray her, letting out a loud, hollow gurgle that turned heads.

Shen Tang pressed a hand to her stomach. Hunger flooded her mouth with saliva, and the more she swallowed, the sharper the emptiness felt—until it was all she could think about.

She tried to distract herself.

A prisoner nearby wolfed his cake down too fast. The dry mass lodged in his throat, and he started choking.

He beat his chest, face turning purple, legs kicking as he clawed at the dirt.

No one moved.

No one patted his back. No one offered water.

He crawled toward a constable, stretching out his right hand in a silent plea. Before he could reach, his fingers went slack and his arm dropped.

The constable walked over, kicked him twice, and muttered, “Bad luck.”

Then he drew a dagger, crouched, and sliced a strip of skin from the right side of the corpse’s face near the ear. He tossed it into a filthy cloth bag like it was nothing.

Shen Tang’s stomach lurched. “…What the hell…”

“Move!”

“Get up!”

“Don’t make me whip you!”

The prisoners were hauled to their feet and fitted with heavy wooden cangues.

The women’s were smaller—maybe thirty-five jin, heavy enough to bow shoulders. The men’s were larger by far, fifty at least, maybe closer to eighty.

The guards kicked anyone who didn’t react fast enough. If they still didn’t move, the whip came down, leaving finger-wide welts that split and bled.

Shen Tang kept her head down and walked, trying to dig up anything—anything—that belonged to this body.

Nothing came.

She glanced at the prisoners around her, then the constables guarding them, and felt something cold settle in her chest.

[Perfect. A hell start.]

Run mid-route?

Or follow them to the destination and look for an opening there?

Right now, both sounded like a joke with no punchline.

They marched under the blazing sun until the horizon bled red. A few prisoners collapsed on the road and never rose again. Only then were they allowed to stop for the night.

The constables gathered, built a fire, and simmered jerky in a clay pot. A pinch of salt, and the smell of meat drifted through the camp like a blade.

This time Shen Tang was faster. When her cake was thrown, she snatched it before anyone else could.

She sat and chewed slowly, letting saliva soften the hard, cold mass before swallowing. While she ate, she listened to the constables’ low conversation.

Most of it was useless chatter, but enough stuck.

These prisoners were one household.

Surname: Gong.

Old and young, even servants and maids—none of them escaped. Everyone had been taken.

They were split into three groups and escorted in batches. The men were sent to the frontier for conscript labor. The women were delivered to the Music Bureau in Xiao City.

Shen Tang’s batch was the second—mostly womenfolk and maids from the Gong Manor. Among them were a titled lady of the highest status, young madams in their prime, pretty concubines, children of various ages, and the servants who attended them.

Shen Tang looked down at her thin arms and small hands.

Judging by the frame she was wearing, this body was barely grown—around eighteen, give or take, starved down to bone. So she was either a maid or one of the younger members of the household.

Then she caught another detail, tossed out casually like it didn’t involve human lives.

Men were branded by tattooing their faces. Women were branded behind the ear.

If a prisoner died on the road, they’d cut off the marked skin—or the ear—as proof.

Shen Tang’s breath caught. She reached up and felt behind her left ear.

A scab. Tender flesh underneath.

Her stomach dropped straight through the ground.

“…Fuck.”