Chapter 2: Darling Diary
1191 Words
"Long Yi, how dare you disgrace Her Highness!"
The angry shout cracked through the air like a whip, sharp and barely restrained, as though the speaker was just one hair away from unsheathing a sword and going full wuxia drama. Meng’s hiccupped sobbing came to an abrupt halt when something soft and heavy settled over her shoulders. She blinked through her tears and looked up, directly into the face of another disgustingly attractive man. His features were straight out of a manhua cover: fair skin, eyes like dark pools of poetry, and lips set in an elegant frown of righteous fury.
Her gaze then snapped to the corner of the bed, where the previous pretty boy, Long Yi; sat with his shoulders hunched, looking like a student caught cheating on a royal exam.
Wait.
Hold on.
One hot guy? Okay, _fluke_. Two hot guys? _Suspicious_. And both orbiting her? **_Very suspicious_**.
‘What is this? A reverse harem historical romance? And why am I always underdressed in these nightmares?!’
Meng’s internal alarms screamed. Her half-nakedness, the luxurious bed, the ancient robes, and the palpable tension in the room spelled one thing: a scandal. If a reporter from “Midnight Gossip” appeared with a camera, her acting career would be over, cancelled, and reborn only to be cancelled again.
She didn’t know who these people were or why they were calling her Princess like they meant it, but one thing was certain:
She had to get out.
"Princess!"
Both men shouted as she abruptly darted toward the only exit that didn’t involve talking, the window. Her bare feet tapped across the polished wooden floor. She flung open the heavy curtains, yanked the latch, and with absolutely zero regard for decorum, dignity, or gravity, launched herself at freedom.
"Ahhh! Her Highness is committing suicide!"
The crashing of glass and the splintering of a priceless wooden window frame echoed behind her like a dramatic soundtrack. For one strange second, time slowed. Meng felt the night air whip past her skin. She wasn’t falling, she was flying. A dramatic, half-n***d swan dive of desperation and denial. Her long hair streamed behind her like a silky banner of shame.
‘If I had enough gall, I’d really go for it! But no! I just want to escape before the police find me in a bathrobe! Wuwu!’
She raised her arms to the moonlit sky and wailed, "May my ancestors save me from this fall, please!"
She squeezed her eyes shut dramatically, expecting pain, or at the very least a twisted ankle. Anything was better than getting caught in some old-timey scandal.
But... the pain never came.
Instead, she found herself pressed against something firm. Something warm. Something that smelled like leather and pine sap. Her eyes fluttered open.
Gloomy. Eyes. Right. There.
A masked man, dressed entirely in black, cradled her in his arms like a bride on a movie poster. His grip was firm, his descent graceful, like he'd jumped out of a third-floor window and landed without a squeak. Meng blinked in disbelief.
A ninja? A **really** hot ninja??
"W-wait! Don’t arrest me!" she shrieked, kicking her legs in his hold. “I didn’t even do anything illegal! I think!”
“Princess!” came two shouts from above.
She and her mystery ninja looked up in unison. Five stories above, framed by the now-ruined window, stood Long Yi and the other robe guy. Both looked frantic and pale.
Meng didn’t miss a beat.
“It’s him! It’s him!” she screeched, pointing an accusatory finger at Long Yi like she was starring in a courtroom drama. “He’s the one who brought me here! I- I thought this was a filming set!”
Long Yi looked visibly wounded. “But Princess… that is your room. This is your palace.”
Meng’s scream caught in her throat.
“My… my palace?” she repeated, dumbfounded.
The architecture, now that she noticed it, was old. Like, imperial-china-meets-gothic-dream-sequence old. Carved pillars, lanterns flickering in the wind, dark wooden beams, and heavy silk banners. The people’s clothing, the way they spoke, it wasn’t cosplay.
Her brain fizzled.
“I am… the princess, you say?”
Both men nodded solemnly.
“And this is… my palace?”
Another solemn nod.
Meng’s expression went blank. Her head c****d back like her soul was trying to escape from the top of her skull.
“The Princess has fainted!”
---
Morning arrived with gentle golden sunlight streaming through shattered glass, casting glittering rays over the ancient garden outside. Birds chirped merrily, as if nothing dramatic had happened the night before. Slender willow branches swayed in the breeze like gossiping aunts at a wedding.
Meng stared out of the broken window with dead eyes, sipping tea that tasted far too delicate for her rage.
“This,” she muttered in her mind, “is not my home.”
She was calm on the outside, posture straight, hands elegant around her porcelain cup. But inside?
Chaos. Absolute chaos.
She was beyond pissed. Her calm sipping was just a protective ritual to keep from screaming. Around her, a flock of maids buzzed like worried bees, tiptoeing and whispering nervously. They’d been with her since she woke up, acting like she was made of glass dipped in heartbreak.
Then, one of them; a tiny girl with teary eyes and trembling lips snapped.
“Wuwu! Your Highness is so pitiful!” she sobbed, falling to her knees with the grace of a tragic heroine. Meng flinched so hard she nearly spilled her tea.
“Eh? P-pitiful?” Meng echoed, confused and mildly terrified.
The crying intensified.
“Indeed! The Princess has been soiled by an unworthy man!”
“Please be strong, Your Highness! Do not leap from any windows again!”
“Oh, the tragedy! If His Majesty were here, that man would be short a few limbs and all his family jewels!”
Meng blinked. Were they crying for her? Was she… the victim of some ancient scandal? Were people always this dramatic in this place?
“C-calm down, please,” she said, attempting regal dignity. “Do not cry.”
“His Majesty is not here? Is he… my father?” she added, careful to sound princessy.
A beat of silence.
“She’s gone disoriented!”
“Wuwu! That man traumatized Her Highness into amnesia!”
Meng dropped her head into her hand. Their cries were now louder than a fire alarm. Her temples throbbed.
In the chaos, her elbow nudged her cup and the tea sloshed out, spilling across the table.
“Ah!” She jumped up, frantic. “Don’t let it touch the papers!”
She scrambled to rescue what looked like scrolls, delicate letters, and a few fragile old documents. In the mess, her fingers brushed something odd, a tattered, beat-up little book, completely out of place.
She pulled it free.
It was titled, in loopy cursive English: “Darling Diary.”
She blinked. That… was not in ancient Chinese.
She opened the cover.
And there it was.
In familiar, bold handwriting, almost exaggerated; or maybe exaggerated:
**TUTORIAL.**
- Writer
