The Almighty Dominance novel Chapter 665

The emperor was escorted to the grand harem mansion.

Inside the bathroom, steam rose from a wooden tub. Clean linen towels waited on a bench. The four women who had carried him across half of Xia had already changed into simple but elegant robes—soft blues and creams that moved like water when they walked.

They helped him out of the filthy servant’s clothes without a word of command, their hands gentle and practiced. One tested the water temperature with her wrist. Another poured warm oil into the bath that smelled faintly of pine and something clean.

They washed the grime and smoke from his skin and hair with the same quiet efficiency they had used to spirit him out of a burning palace.

He ate afterward at a low table—rice porridge first, then thin slices of tender pork, steamed greens, and a clear broth that didn’t sit heavy in his starved stomach. The women served him without hovering. One kept the bowl warm with her hands. Another refilled his cup of weak tea the moment it emptied.

For three days the pattern held. He slept on a real bed with thick blankets that did not smell of mildew or fear. He woke without the sound of steel ringing in the streets. The same four women attended him—helping him dress, bringing food at regular hours, sitting nearby when the nightmares came so he would not wake alone.

Zhuge Liang visited once each morning and once each evening, always with the same calm voice, always asking only what he needed and delivering it without delay.

On the second day his hands stopped shaking when he lifted the spoon. On the third day he asked for a second bowl of rice without being prompted.

On the morning of the fourth day, Zhuge Liang entered the chamber while the boy was finishing breakfast.

“Governor Bai Xiaochun has returned from seclusion. He wishes to meet with you, Your Majesty. The hall is prepared whenever you are ready.”

The boy’s face lit with something close to hope for the first time in months.

“He has remained loyal,” he said, almost to himself. “I am glad to meet a governor who still honors the throne.”

Zhuge Liang bowed. “I will escort you when you are dressed.”

The great hall smelled of polished wood and the faint trace of incense. Morning light slanted through high windows and fell across a long table set with only two chairs. No courtiers lined the walls. No guards stood at attention inside the room itself. Only Zhuge Liang waited near the door, silent as stone.

The emperor—now clean, dressed in a simple but well-made robe of yellow—sat in the larger chair at the head of the table. He kept his back straight the way he had been taught, even though his heart beat too fast.

The doors opened.

Alex walked in alone.

He wore white traveling robes, the fabric still carrying the faint scent of mountain stone and cold air from the Wudang training realm.

His hair was tied back simply. No ornate symbols of office. He crossed the hall with the unhurried stride of a man who had never needed permission to enter any room he chose.

He did not bow. He did not pause at the foot of the dais or lower his eyes. He walked straight to the table, pulled out the second chair, and sat down beside the emperor as if they were old companions meeting for a private drink.

For a long moment the only sound was the soft creak of wood.

The boy stared. The man who sat beside him could not have been more than a few years older than some of the young officers he had seen in Luoyang, yet something in his presence filled the space like a second, heavier gravity. His eyes were steady and cold—ancient in a way that had nothing to do with age.

“Governor Bai,” the emperor tried again. “Why won’t you bow before the emperor?”

Alex smiled and shot back, “Do you bow before those who are powerless and weaker than you?”

“But I am the emperor,” he replied indignantly.

“Indeed, you have the title,” Alex said, his smile turning sharp. “But you lack the power to force belief. You can’t command executions for those who refuse to kneel. Yet you stand here speaking so rudely to the man who could end your life in an instant for your insolence

The fragile dream the boy had allowed himself—that a loyal governor would kneel, restore the old order, and treat him as something more than a name on a seal—died in that single look.

He was not going to be saved by a faithful subject. He was going to be claimed by another master.

Alex spoke first, voice quiet and even.

“No one is going to listen to you,” he said. “Not if that’s what you’re hoping for.”

The emperor’s fingers tightened on the arm of the chair. “Why?”

“Because that is not how any of this works.” Alex leaned back slightly, one arm resting on the table. “People use each other. If you have nothing they need, you are just a problem that will eventually be solved with a blade. And if you believe you can control me…” A faint, humorless curve touched his mouth. “No one with real power wants to be used by a weak emperor who controls nothing.”

The boy swallowed. His voice came out smaller than he wanted. “Then what do you want?”

“Something simple,” Alex answered. “I will not drag you onto a losing side, and I will not let myself be dragged onto one either. We find terms we can both live with. Mutual benefit. Nothing more, nothing less.”

He turned his head, studying the emperor the way a man might study a map before deciding which road to take.

“But let’s start with you,” Alex said. “What do you actually want?”

The emperor stared at the polished wood of the table for several heartbeats.

“I want you to listen to me,” he tried again. “I want to be treated as the emperor.”

Alex shook his head once, slow and final.

“That is not possible. Any general with soldiers, any governor with grain and walls, any faction that still holds power—they will not listen to a fourteen-year-old boy on a stolen throne unless it serves them. The moment you refuse an order, they will kill you and put your brother in your place, or find another child with the right blood who will say yes. That is the game. It has always been the game.”

The emperor’s breath hitched. “And if I refuse to obey you? Will you kill me as well?”

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