The last thing she saw, before her eyes shut close was smoke and rubble everywhere. She had tried hard not to close her eyes as her comrades cried out to her. She was their leader and all the other members were new members. It wasn't even a mission, it was just some training she had taken the new trainees to train outside for the first time.
Upon their return they found their base under attack and everything was already in ruins except for a few old comrades who were still standing trying to hold down the forte even when they knew they were going to loose. But how could they loose without a fight. That was a home they had known since young. While other orphans were taken to the orphanages at birth...as for them they were taken to the base to be moulded to who they were, the top Mercenaries in the world.
Now that organisation that could make one tremble in fear was only left with a few standing some severely injured.
At that time they did not have time to think about anything else other than joining in the fight but it was too late the winner had already been decided. The remains comrades fell one after the other. Even the junior brothers she had taken for training. She and a few of the remains trainees made their way inside desperately trying to find survivors. And that when she saw hell in its glory. The villa where the infant children were taken cared for by the nanny's was nothing but debris. Human body parts everywhere ..tiny hands feet fingers she could not count how many times she felt her heart hurting. With every step came more disappointment and less hope.
The situation was the same in the other villas, the training grounds, the labs, the study hall the organisations library everything was gone.
And when she reached her villa just outside the situation could already speak on its own. She found her senior brother who had taken care of her since she could remember sprawled on the ground neck bended in a weird shape. His right leg missing and his left leg missing a foot.
And at the moment when she was taking it all in...she felt it. The sharpness of a bullet piercing through her chest. The burning pain spreading to the whole if her chest as her world sank into darkness and eventually nothingness.
She died not knowing what led to the massacre of her entire organisation. Whether it was a well organised massacre or if it was a betrayal or just a competitor getting rid of competition in the market. No one was to know.
---
Shi Yue expected to be on her way to Nirvana. Even though she has never experienced nirvan or death she didn't feel right. This wasn't it.
The feeling of laying on something soft. When she moved she could feel that her body was covered in something delicate she could hardly feel it. Instead of the strong smell of Ash it was replaced with the faint trace of jasmine and incense. Her head throbbed with an almost killing pain. It was disorienting.
Her eyes flickered open.
What came at sight was not the nirvan River but an ornate canopy overhead, gold threaded fabric shimmering under the filtered light. She widened her eyes even more...in utter disbelief trying to make of what was right on her face.
Her hands almost instinctively darted to her chest. There was no wound or blood. She could only touch the soft silk robe she was wearing layered and embroidered in patterns she didn't recognise. Focusing on her surroundings she took it all in. She was laying on a massive bed, draped with sheer curtains, and the air was thick with an unnatural stillness.
"Hello, is anyone there?" She called. As a mercenary it was important to make sure she was in a safe place.
Yet the sound of her voice startled her. It wasn't her usual sharp, gravel-tough voice she knew of. Instead it was softer, much feminine, even younger. Panic started to crept in. Things were not looking positive. Everything was different but she was trying so hard deep down to refuse the thought of it.
Yue swang her legs over the side of the bed. Her bare feet coming into contact with a thick carpet embroidered with dragons. Each and every detail in the room screamed ancient luxury. Golden furniture, carved screens, almost life-like paintings, silk. It all screamed wealth that was too foreign for her modern mind to comprehend.
Yue found a mirror at the corner of the extravagant room. She moved towards it. The face staring back at her made her gasp, because that was nkt her face at all.
Her facial features had been roughened by years of training and missions. She had forgotten how her face looked before she joined the association or before when she started going on missions. Her face was full of scars from her missions. There wasn't a single part of her body that did nkt have a scar whether deep or shallow, small or large.
But the reflection showed someone else entirely. Totally different, a stranger. The girl, in the reflection was of someone much much younger, had very delicate features, her skin was as pale as porcelain, her hair so long it pooled at her waist. Her eyes were the only thing that Yue recognised. Her eyes were what she was used to. Eyes full of suspicion, sharp and observant.
"What in the world-"
Before she could process the bizarre..
"Your Majesty! Your Majesty!"
The doors leading to her room slammed open, and Yue instinctively dropped into a defensive stance. She turned towards the sound and almost at that same moment a group of women dressed in servants clothes walked in their faces pale with concern and their heads bowed low.
An older woman among them pushed passed all the others her faced tinged with worry and relief, "Your Majesty! Your finally awake! Surely the heaves have ears and listened to this old lady's plea. Thank the heavens. The imperial physicians said the heavens blesses you with recovery. Do you perhaps feel any discomfort anywhere your Majesty?"
Yue looked at the woman her mind in jumbles trying hard to remember her. "who..are you?"
The old woman looked at her in horror almost like it was the biggest crime ever made, for Yue to be unable to recognise her.
"You..you don't remember me your Majesty!" The old woman almost fell down if it were not for another young maid steadying her and avoiding the fall. The young maid looked at Yue with tears in her eyes like she had made the biggest crime ever.
After steadying herself, the old woman's face twitched with confusion, though she covered it quickly. "Your Majesty, I am madam Zhou, your chief attendant. Have you forgotten?"
"Your Majesty....?" Yue repeated. Her voice trailed off as realization struck her.
What we're they all calling her? Looking at her robes, and the finery around her, Yue couldn't believe her realisation. The bowing maids and the respectful almost worshipping manner they were behaving.
Before she could speak, madam Zhou added in a soft tone, "Empress Shi Yue, you frightened the day lights out of us all. Making even the Emperor himself praying for your recovery. You are indeed blessed by the heavens your Majesty. Now that you have passed such a tribulation, I believe there is goodness awaiting for you, your Majesty."
Empress.
It suddenly occurred to her. How rhey called to her. Her mind went blank, and for a second she thought she heard the sound of something exploding in her brain.
She could feel a tremor running through the hands that were curled into fists. She was in a different world and that too in a body that was not hers. What the hell was happening!
"Leave me," she ordered sharply. Her torn firmer than she expected.
All the other maids were trembling looking at Madam Zhou. Madam Zhou gestured for them to leave to with a wave of her hands and almost like they had seen a monster they scurried off in the fastest way possible.
Madam Zhou hesitated before she spoke, "as you command, your Majesty. Please call for us immediately if you feel faint again.
Yue had her hands shaking as she pressed her palms to her face. Her mind racing with different thoughts. She was a jumbled mess.
She knew she had died. She felt every bit of it. The pain, everything. How could she explain this bizarre situation she was in.
But she wasn't in the after life. Everything felt so real. It was not a time loop in hell either. It also wasn't a dream.
She looked back towards the mirror. Her gaze hard.
Of all things she had to be was an Empress. Really the gods must have decided to make fun of her.
All her lifetime experience in being a mercenary, she never was once etaught how to cope should she find herself in such a predicament. As a mercenary all she knew and learned to do is fight, kill and survive but never was she once taught to be an Empress, that to for an old dynasty heck she was never thought on how to be a proper lady let alone an Empress.
If god was making a joke on her, then he was making too big of a joke.
Yue knew her answers were there. About who she currently is now was just to think of how she could slowly become who's he is meant to be. She was surprised but not too stupid as to make use of the new opportunity at life given to her on a silver platter. She did not want to dwell on the whys or who's but rather on how she could integrate herself in the life that was now hers.
She knew for her body's owner to die for her to be able to take over the body, there must be a story behind it. It might be the shadow guards she could feel their breathing although faint or anyone. A palace is always a maze riddled in traps every corner.
And Shi Yue would be damned if she let herself be the next casualty again.