It was already dark when Ren Lei found himself standing outside Yun Meili's bed chambers. From that day, that room belonged to him just as much as it did to her.
All the servants had already made themselves scarce. The two newlyweds were about to consummate their marriage, after all.
The sound of the opening door seemed to reverberate in the completely silent courtyard. His hands were shaking but neither in excitement nor in anticipation.
He took a deep breath, entered the room and closed the door behind him in one smooth motion.
Yun Meili's room was much simpler than he thought. This was the bedroom of the Ether Cloud Princess, after all. Surely, it was supposed to be grand and luxurious.
Yet all he saw was a simple bedroom with a bed to one side, a table and two chairs and a few bookshelves. A closet stood at one corner of the room.
The room still carried some evidence of the owner's identity. The curtains were made of silk comparable in quality to the silk his robes were made of. The simple-looking bookshelf was made of ironwood and so were the tables and chairs.
Yet, all things considered, it could almost be considered quaint. At least it wasn't gaudy.
Then, there was the Princess. She sat in the middle of the bed, looking towards the ground. When he entered the room, she abruptly stood up.
She was still wearing all of her jewellery and a veil still covered her countenance. It was tradition for the husband to take off her jewellery and remove her veil on the wedding night.
Ren Lei walked up to her and began taking off her jewellery. Most of it was made of solid gold. A normal woman would have been under considerable discomfort under the sheer weight of it.
Even Ren Lei had a bit of trouble with the weight of some of them. Yun Meili silently supported his hands whenever he had trouble with the particularly heavy ones.
When all the jewellery had been removed, he moved his hands towards her only to stop. Yun Meili looked up and their eyes met.
For a moment, it seemed as though time itself had stopped. Her beautiful blue eyes mesmerised him. They were so warm and inviting that it made him want to lose all reason and get lost in them.
If he didn't know better, he would have thought she used some sort of bewitching arts on him.
"Young Master Ren?" She spoke softly. Her voice was like music to his ears. Soothing, calming and accepting.
Ren Lei softly exhaled and removed all the unnecessary thoughts from his head as he removed her veil.
Such beauty, he couldn't help but think. Forcefully controlling himself, he looked away.
While he couldn't deny that he felt a great sense of attraction towards her physical form, that was all it was. His heart remained unmoved. He still couldn't bring himself to accept how things were.
"Would you like some wine?" Yun Meili said.
Ren Lei had never drunk wine before but he nodded. Might as well try it, he thought.
The couple sat at the table, atop which there was a bottle of wine and two cups. Yun Meili poured some wine into both cups before sitting down.
She lifted the cup, in a toast, but didn't say anything else. Ren Lei followed suit before downing the cup in a single swig. He still had to fulfil his duties as a husband and it would be much easier if he were drunk.
He was just a mortal, after all. Only the first cup and he was already beginning to feel tipsy. When he placed the cup down, Yun Meili refilled it with some more wine.
She had already finished her cup as well but she chose not to drink more. For a martial artist in the 8th stage of Body Tempering, drinking wine was no different than drinking water. The profound energy in her body would simply purify it.
Ren Lei drank cup after cup of wine. But the more he drank, the more aware he became of the paper packet in his pocket. It was like burning coal, searing his leg.
"Nervous?" Yun Meili asked, seeing him drinking so much wine.
"Yes." He lied.
"I am quite nervous too." She blushed and lowered her head.
Ren Lei let out a teasing chuckle. "I won't do anything bad. There is no need to be so nervous, Princess."
He felt his cheeks burn with embarrassment but the alcohol had given him enough courage to act flirtatious.
The Princess blushed even harder. As the daughter of the Governor, a martial arts prodigy, no one had ever dared to speak to her like that. Thus the impact of his words was far more severe than it would have been on a normal woman.
Then again, if anyone had the right to speak to her like that, it was Ren Lei, her husband.
As for him, he wasn't simply flirting. He wanted to distract her for a moment.
If the situation was normal, a mere mortal, being able to dodge the eyes of a Body Tempering martial artist was impossible. But the situation wasn't normal. Yun Meili had put her guard down or rather, she wasn't weary around him from the start.
Taking advantage of the moment, he tore open the paper packet and emptied its powdery content into his cup. Yun Meili, in her embarrassed state, completely missed his movement.
With a trembling hand, he picked up the cup and brought it towards his lips. He felt hesitation for a brief moment but he forcefully moved his hands and downed the contents of the cup.
A wave of dizziness hit him almost immediately. His movement became slower and clumsier. He felt like he was losing control of his body. He didn't have much time to waste.
He stood up from the chair before picking up Yun Meili and moving towards the bed. She let out a surprised yelp but didn't struggle. She was aware that he was very drunk thus, she tried to position herself to make it as easy as it was possible for him to carry her.
His eyes were going blurry and he could barely even see anymore. He fumbled with her clothes but was unable to remove them. In irritation and frustration, he just started tearing it off.
Yun Meili's cheeks were completely scarlet red. In her excited state, if she lost control of her strength, she might have accidentally killed him. Thus she focused on keeping herself stable even when he was acting like a beast, ripping off her clothes and ravaging her body.
By the time he came to, he was laying on top of her, heavily panting. There was no strength left in his arms and his vision was slowly going dark as he drifted into a state of unconsciousness.
This is it.
That was the last thing he thought as darkness engulfed him. His breathing slowed down and his heart stopped beating.
Yun Meili immediately realised something was wrong. His life force was rapidly thinning out. It was normal for a man's life force to temporarily weaken after losing their vital yang but it shouldn't have been that drastic.
Seeing his life force rapidly dwindle, she started panicking. She quickly took out a few life-saving pills from her space ring before shoving them into his mouth.
Each of these pills was extremely expensive. If another martial artist saw her wasting them on a mere mortal, they would cry rivers of blood.
She hardly cared about it, though. Her husband's life was far more precious to her than a few pills.
After a third pill, his life forced finally stabilised. His breathing resumed as well, however it was very faint. Like a candle in the wind, it could go out at any moment.
Yun Meili hastily put on some clothes and summoned her personal guards. These three female guards were responsible for her safety and were supposed to be with her at all times.
On that night, they had stayed a bit farther than they usually would have on her orders. Upon hearing her summons, they immediately made their way to her and kneeled.
"Bring the healers here. Immediately."
"My lady?"
"Hurry up and go, now!"
Seeing their mild-mannered mistress raise her voice, the guards immediately realised something was very, very wrong.
Only then did they realise that their new master was lying on the bed, barely alive. Others might not have known, but they knew exactly how much Ren Lei meant to their Princess.
The entire state was roused as the entourage of healers rushed towards the Princess' courtyard.
"What's happening?" A few servants acquired.
"Dunno. The healers are rushing towards the Princess' courtyard, I hear."
"Were the newlyweds a bit too passionate, perhaps, hehe."
"Oh shut up, you! This is the Princess you're talking about. Do you want to be beheaded?"
The healers walked swiftly. As soon as they reached Yun Meili's room, they rushed towards Ren Lei. It was easy for them to tell something was wrong. Placing their hands on his body, they started circulating their profound energies.
Since it was a medical emergency, the younger healers had rushed ahead and the elderly ones were falling behind. It took a while for all of them the enter. The last one was an old lady with completely white hair.
"Granny Chu." Yun Meili greeted her with a bow as soon as she saw her. Only a few people would ever receive a bow from the Princess of Ether Cloud. Granny Chu was one of them. She was one of the most respected and experienced doctors in the entire Kingdom, let alone Ether Cloud.
"What happened?" Granny Chu asked the Princess while eyeing Ren Lei who was being surrounded by healers who were attempting to stabilise him.
"We..."
"I was young too, once. No need to be embarrassed, child. I need to know so I can help him."
Yun Meili forcefully calmed her panicking heart. The situation was dire, her losing control of her emotions didn't help matters. She took a deep breath and started speaking.
"When we started making love, his life force started becoming unstable. I thought it was because he lost his vital yang and didn't think much of it. When he climaxed, he collapsed atop me and his life force started burning out rapidly. I fed him three Life Fire pills before his life force became somewhat stable."
"Three Life Fire pills?" Granny Chu's voice didn't hide her surprise. "And he's still in such a state?"
Granny Chu pushed aside one of the healers and put a hand on Ren Lei's body. Mere moments had passed before a frown appeared on her face. Her frown only deepened with time before it was replaced with complete shock. Even her eyes became as wide as saucers.
"Soul Shredding poison?" Granny Chu's entire body shook as she barely spat out the words. "Who would want to harm this young man to such a degree. How vicious!"
Yun Meili felt her entire body go cold. She didn't know what the Soul Shredding poison was but from the name alone, she could deduce that it was nothing good. Even Granny Chu had let out an involuntary shudder at its mention.
"This... Granny Chu, what does this mean?" She asked, tears welling up in her eyes.
Alongside those tears, she was feeling such intense anger that the killing intent she exuded made some of the healers step away from her involuntarily.
She wanted nothing more than to find the ones responsible for her husband's state and tear them apart, bit by bit.
A simple death would be far too easy for them.
"Did he consume anything recently?" Granny Chu asked, trying to distract the Princess.
"He drank wine." Yun Meili forcefully calmed herself down once more before pointing towards the table.
Granny Chu picked up the bottle and smelled its contents before shaking her head and putting it down. Then she smelled the cups. When she brought Ren Lei's cup close to her nose, she immediately frowned.
Most people would have never picked up the smell. Even experienced healers would simply overlook it. That was how faint the smell was. Fortunately, just "experienced" wasn't enough to describe Granny Chu.
It didn't take her much longer to find the torn paper packet casually tossed under the table. It was still a bit wet, and the liquid on it was definitely wine. It was easy to tell that someone with wine all over their hand had torn it.
Bang!
The sound of Yun Meili's knees hitting the floor boomed like thunder. The atmosphere turned heavy and oppressive as if a mountain was pressing down on everyone in that room.
She couldn't believe her eyes. Even though the evidence was right in front of her, she couldn't believe it.
She knew that there was no one besides Ren Lei who could have ripped apart that paper packet. There was no one besides him that could have poisoned his drink.
She couldn't believe it. She didn't want to believe it.
Yet that wasn't all. Granny Chu knew that things remained to be said. She knew, the longer she kept it to herself, the harder it would be for the Princess to hear. With great difficulty, she forced herself to speak.
"His life force will slowly recover but his soul... He has lost too much spiritual energy. His soul has been heavily damaged, to the point it cannot even be called alive anymore. His body remains alive but Ren Lei... Ren Lei is dead."
Tears rolled down the face of the Princess. She felt sorrow, grief and a sense of helplessness. All the happiness she felt not long ago seemed to be an illusion. The anger she had felt upon learning that he had been poisoned faded like a mirage.
"Why?" Her incredibly pained voice asked. Was she asking fate why it was so cruel? Was she asking Ren Lei why he had done this?
No one besides her knew.