Love In The Forbidden City (Completed)

Chapter I - The Fateful Accident - Part I (Revised)

I woke up to a grinding pain in my head.

"Where am I?" I murmured to my semi-conscious self. Someone had helped me don a pair of pajamas-like white clothes. "Have I landed in a hospital?"

The bed I was laying on was soft, and I could feel the smoothness of the purple silk comforter. Which hospital would offer a bed as comfortable as this? Wait a minute! Was I being... kidnapped? But this place looked majestic, unlike the den of some hooligans.

Right, this must be a hospital.

Through the thin slits of my eyes, I realized that I was surrounded by earth-tone walls. No, the walls themselves were actually built of wood. Ink-and-wash paintings of bamboo groves and peonies decorated the walls. White ceramic vases, rectangular and cylindrical, were arranged neatly along rows of wood tables. While I was studying the surroundings, women in green long-sleeved gowns hurried around the room, bringing this and that.

What a weird uniform the nurses are wearing, I thought, wincing.

Biting my lip, I tried to sit up. My joints creaked as I moved my limbs. The extreme discomfort made me feel like I had grown old all of a sudden. What had the nurses given me? Did they inject some pain killers when I was unconscious? If they did, the effect must've worn off now.

Out of habit, I raised my fingers to push my glasses up the bridge of my nose. That was when I realized -- where were my glasses? Squinting my eyes, I stretched out my fingers in front of my face. With a serious short-sighted vision, I could never finish reading a short sentence without feeling dizzy if I didn't wear my glasses. But now, I could even see the detailed palm prints as I waved my hands. The pink sheen of the nail polish startled me. I had never put on nail polish! 

As I forced my feeble brain to work on the logic, a sudden pain lanced through my head and I grabbed my temple. It was bandaged and I felt a wet, sticky lump. My fingers involuntarily slipped down my hair and then another realization struck me. My hair had grown long. I used to have shoulder-length hair, but now it reached my waist. I couldn't find any words to describe my confusion. This felt like a fairy tale come true. Had I become Rapunzel overnight? I chuckled at the thought and stopped. Where am I exactly? I studied the surrounding uneasily. Anxiety coursed through my veins. How long exactly have I been asleep?

A young lady scurried over to me.

She wore a cotton loose-fitting green gown which hung down from her body to her feet, topped with a yellow sleeveless vest. A pearl, translucent and large, was fastened at the middle of the collar. It made me feel like the pearl was trying its best to suffocate her. What surprised me was the thing on her head. She had her hair wrapped around a wide wood fillet that stretched out horizontally on her head. A fake palm-sized yellow peony was stitched at the middle of it. It gave me an impression like a hammerhead shark biting a flower. I would've laughed out loud at her peculiar attire, but the anxious look she wore on her face as she rushed to me frightened me.

"Second Miss, Second Miss, you have woken up!" she squealed.

"Who is Second Miss? You are second. Where am I? Who are you?" I asked angrily. Come to think of it, who would like to be called second?

"Second Miss, my name is Qiao Hui. You are now in the Eighth Bei'Le's house."

Bei'Le? I rose from the bed and stood in front of her. Bei'Le? Bei'Le seemed like the title of an emperor's son which I once read in a history book. "Bei'Le? Qing Dynasty?"

She nodded eagerly. A glint of fear rode across her eyes as she stared at me.

"Qing Dynasty?" I shouted. "Is this a prank? Who the hell had sent you here?" I prepared to launch at her but halted mid-way as the nagging pain at my temple returned. Who would hire this weirdo to joke with me? My ex? But cosplay wasn't cheap. He couldn't afford it.