
Lady Paxton has a sudden change in personality overnight. She presents a strange iced dessert to the moody, violent Emperor. I watch as she, now one of the Nine Concubines, acts arrogantly before me, the Empress, saying, 'How could a woman like you, shackled by feudal etiquette, possibly compete with a top student from the 21st century?' I smile without a word. The scene from my past life where she was beheaded is fresh in my mind.