"I am staying on my knees in a huge and dark cell, the heavy chains are weighing my inferior and superior members. The clothes on me are almost thorn apart and my body is all covered in bruises and blood. You can not imagine that this pitiful creature was a few hours before the princess of a prosperous nation. The way I was looking then and the way I am looking now is completely different but that does not matter in this moment. I don't care about anything right now, I only want this torture to end faster. My eyes are filled with tears and my heart with sadness. I don't even have the strength to hate them anymore. I have lost everything I loved. I just want to sleep. Will they let me sleep now?

I have no strength to find out the answer. My eyes are slowly closing and the heavy body falls to the ground. I am losing my senses and can only feel the cold floor. Everything is dark."

"Suddenly , I am coming back to life when someone throws cold water on the lifeless body. An inquisitor sits on a chair in front and starts talking to me: "Your highness, do you admit your crimes? All this will end when you will confess. Don't you want it to end?"

Hearing that, I start to question him:

Crimes? What crimes? I haven't done any crime!

I don't even know why I am being imprisoned and treated like a slave. The only thing that I remember was the banquet last evening and that I was suddenly dragged down here, tortured and chained. This is the way to treat your princess? Who ordered you to do this? My father will never forgive your insolence!

He cuts my speech yelling at me:

You still dare to call yourself the princess of this state after murdering the Emperor? You unfiliar beast! You're guilty of killing the Emperor! You are going to be sentenced to death. Nothing can save you from this and no one would dare to defend the emperor's murderer. You killed your own father.

The room becomes silent for a couple of minutes.

I was shocked hearing these bad news. It seems that my father, the emperor, was killed during the last evening banquet and they made me the scapegoat. Who could have done it? My mind freezes but the tears continue to flow. I have no way to prove my innocence. These people won't simply believe the words of a prisoner. In the eye of my people I am only a murderer in the actual moment, the one who assassinated the emperor, the one who must pay for this crime.

I desperately try to explain every move I made during the banquet and to create a credible alibi but the inquisitor shows me the contradictory proves. How is this possible? All the clues lead to me. Someone must have falsified these clues.

I beg him to give me the chance to defend myself and ask him to investigate the matter carefully. I wasn't caught in the act, I was only being accused by someone. He only gives me three days to find out the truth.

Right now, only from one person I can ask for help, my loved sister. I hope that she believes in me. I would never hurt anyone. How can they say that I killed the Emperor? My father....

Our father...

After the inquisitor leaves I ask the guards to bring me paper and ink to write to A-Li.

(A-Li, A-Li Sun, the younger princess of the Empire and our protagonist's step sister.)

She is definitely going to go to the bottom of this story and find out the truth.

" Dear A-Li, I think that you're already aware of what happens in this moment and I'm asking you to believe in my innocence. I am innocent. Please convince our mother to investigate this issue and clear my name. Your sister Min Sun."

I give the letter to one of the guards and wait for my sister's reply. And wait, and wait, and wait but no answer comes back in the next hours. This waiting seems to take too long!

I am having so many fears while waiting for my sister to reply or visit me down here. I am wondering if she will be allowed to come to the prison and visit a state criminal but I never doubt her trust in me. I am sure that she will do everything in her power to free me.

My younger sister A-Li is a smart and gentle girl that everyone is proud of. She always struggles to be as good as her elders and I know that she admires me a lot. A-Li once told me that she will become my duplicate so that no one would tell us apart in the future but I am always advising her to be more like herself because she has a wonderful mind and body.

Now as I am staying in this dark and dusty cell and the minutes are passing slowly, more and more memories are coming back to me. I am suddenly seeing my defunct mother's face in front of my eyes. My poor mother! Everyone says that she died of an incurable illness but my nanny said that the doctor brought by her family told a different story. Soon after, the man was found dead in his residence. I don't know what happened back then because I was only three years old. I only remember her face from the few portraits that are kept in my father's study room.

At a short time after my mother's funerals, noble concubine Zhai became the new empress. The next year my sister A-Li was born and ten years later our brother, Huo, the current crown prince, came to this world. My mother only had me.

I am also seeing my father's image signing documents in his study room and yelling at eunuch Gui for being an old pesky man, the place's gardens, the imperial kitchen where we played as children and many other places and images from my childhood.

I am wondering if I will see them again in this life!

While having all these kind of thoughts in front of my eyes, I didn't realise how late it was.

It was probably midnight because I could hear the sound of the owls coming from outside.

Freedom seems to have become a distant feeling to my heart.

Once I am closing my eyes, I know nothing about this world. There's only darkness ahead, no warm blanket to cover my body, only the abyss but nothing ends there. My life continues and when the sun rises again I have to come back to reality, to this day nightmare.

It seems that the first day has passed and I received no answer from anyone. There were only two days left. My life isn't easy in the cell, the torture continues and my body is weakened minute by minute. They want me to say I have done it but I would rather die by torture than quietly wait for my execution day. I am going to struggle, scream, curse them if that makes my heart feel at ease but I will never admit defeat.

I can barely hear a voice saying, "She looks more strong that we thought". A woman 's voice but I can't recognize it. "What was A-Li doing", I faint with this thought in my head.

Before losing my consciousness, I can still hear conversations in that cell room.

Someone says, "keep her alive until she confesses, our master needs a scapegoat and she's the best candidate". Another answers, "I know, I know".Then the previous one, "We can take down all of our political adversaries by doing this".

What the hell were they plotting? Aren't they only going to sacrifice me? It will flow more blood in the next days, there's going to be a bath of red colour on the roads of the imperial capital.

Am I really that useful to them? They killed my father to seize the throne and now they want to remove all of his supporters. It's this one of our minister's work or it has something to do with our neighbouring nations? Oh no, my grandfather! They're going to get rid of my grandfather, all of the old general's families and the east fraction.

Suddenly my consciousness fades away and I can't hear any more words from the guys around me. It's dark again.