The midsummer sun was brutally scorching; even the cicadas on the treetops chirped with listless, exhausted sounds.
In the most remote woodshed at the back of the Duke's Estate, the air was as stifling as a steamer. A thick, suffocating heat wafted through the room, mingled with the foul stench of rot and mold.
A few piercing shafts of light filtered through the narrow window lattices. One beam fell precisely upon Fu Jing'an’s parched, cracked lips—lips that had once been as delicate as petals were now covered in tiny fissures, the blood oozing from them having long since dried into dark red scabs.
Chapter 125