Uncaged

Before, Fan Xian had never looked at Si Lili carefully. He'd never even paid attention to her beautiful face, because Fan Xian's face was much that way too. Yet since they had left the capital on this long journey, for some reason, little by little, she had left her mark on his mind.

Perhaps it was her pitiful past. Perhaps it was the cruelty of the Overwatch Council's methods. Perhaps it was what that former head of the Seventh Bureau had said the first time he entered the prison of the Overwatch Council - Fan Xian's methods might have been cruel, but his heart was soft. Every part of him could still easily weaken.

He kept on reminding himself that he couldn't have feelings for her, but more and more he felt a certain exquisite pity for Si Lili. It wasn't a false pity, but a feeling that came as a natural result of encountering someone with such a transient life, completely different from the beautiful and seemingly extraordinary Eldest Princess.