The weeks following the wedding and the Matriarch's capture were a study in silent, seismic shift within the Black Dragon Citadel. The Ancestor's power, now at the very peak of what this world could contain before ascension, was an immutable fact, a law of nature as certain as gravity. But power alone could command fear; it required theater to command devotion.
The Ancestor understood this better than any. He had a dynasty to build, and a dynasty required more than a feared patriarch; it required a symbol. A figurehead of beauty, power, and legitimacy. He had the perfect candidate.
He summoned the entire Lu Clan leadership—the Patriarch, the Elders, the heads of every branch family—to the main audience hall. Su Wan was commanded to attend, dressed not in servant's robes or a concubine's silks, but in regalia he himself had designed.
She stood beside his throne, and the clan leaders could not help but stare. She wore a gown of profound black, the color of the Ancestor's own power, but shot through with threads of brilliant crimson that coiled like awakening phoenixes. The collar of black gold was now unmistakably a crown, set with a single ruby that pulsed in time with the Lewd Crest hidden beneath the fabric. Her hair was styled in an intricate crown of braids, severe and imposing. She held herself with a stillness that was neither submissive nor defiant, but regal. She was the portrait of a Queen, yet her eyes, those beautiful, sorrowful windows, held a hollow light that spoke of the absolute will that moved her.
"The Luo Region is ours," the Ancestor began, his childish voice devoid of warmth. "But ownership is a crude thing. To rule, truly rule, requires a face. A symbol that inspires not just fear, but awe. A focus for devotion."
He gestured to Su Wan. "You see the Mother of the Next Tyrant. The vessel of my will. Her beauty is without peer. Her power, though bound, is divine in origin. From this day forth, she is not merely my Noble Concubine. She is the official Overlord of the Luo Domain. All decrees will bear her seal. All judgments will be rendered in her name. You will look to her as your sovereign."
A stunned silence met this proclamation. Making a woman—a conquered woman from a rival clan—the official ruler? It was unprecedented. It was… insane.
But the Ancestor was not finished. "To mark this," he continued, "you will craft a token of your fealty. A statue of polished Soul-Reflecting Jade, carved in her exact image. It will be enshrined in the highest hall of the Ancestral Temple, beside the tablets of the clan founders. And you… will worship it."
The command was so blasphemous to their traditions that several elders audibly gasped. To place a living woman's image among the revered ancestors? To worship it?
The Ancestor's green gaze swept over them, and the temperature in the hall dropped to freezing. "You question this?" The threat in his voice was a physical pressure.
"N-No, Ancestor!" Patriarch Lu Zhen stammered, immediately dropping to his knees. "It will be done! We will commission the finest artisans at once!"
And so it was. The finest block of Soul-Reflecting Jade in the clan's treasury, a stone that could hold a wisp of spiritual essence, was brought forth. Master sculptors worked day and night under the Ancestor's direct supervision, carving not just Su Wan's likeness, but her essence—her tragic beauty, her hollow regality, the faint, terrifying aura of the Tyrant child she bore.
When it was completed, it was a masterpiece. The jade statue was life-sized, breathtakingly realistic, and seemed to glow with an internal light. It was placed upon a dais of black diamond in the Ancestral Temple, amidst the smoke of eternal incense. The clan was compelled to kneel before it, to offer prayers and devotion not just to their ancestors, but to the living woman who was now their Overlord.
The message to the Luo Region was clear and bewildering. The Lu Clan was not just led by a monstrously powerful Ancestor; it was now ruled by his breathtakingly beautiful Queen. Edicts began flowing from the Citadel, stamped with Su Wan's phoenix seal. They were ruthless, efficient, and demanding of total obedience—policies undoubtedly crafted by the Ancestor's will, but delivered in her name. Her face became synonymous with the new, unassailable power structure.
But within the Citadel, the truth was a dark joke known only to a few.
One evening, as Su Wan sat in the strategy chamber, mechanically stamping a decree that would raise tributes from a subjugated sect, the Ancestor entered. He looked at her, a cruel amusement in his eyes.
He walked up behind her, his small hands resting on her shoulders. He leaned close, his lips near her ear, his voice a whisper for her alone.
"Look at you," he murmured, his tone a mix of mockery and pride. "The Overlord of the Luo Domain. The most powerful figure in ten thousand miles. The clan kneels before your image. They think you a goddess of strategy and might."
One of his hands trailed down her arm, to the hand that held the phoenix seal. He guided it, forcing her to stamp another scroll.
"They pour their devotion onto a piece of polished rock," he giggled softly, the sound chilling. "They fear the name 'Su Wan'. They have no idea that the true power behind the throne… the real reason their beautiful Overlord holds the scepter…"
His other hand slid down her front, over the rich fabric of her gown, to rest possessively on the warmth between her legs.
"…is because she is utterly, completely, and perfectly in love with her Master's shaft."
The humiliation was so profound, so intimate, that it stole the breath from her lungs. She sat, frozen, the Overlord's seal in her hand, her body thrumming with shame and the terrifying, conditioned response to his touch.
"This is the joke," he whispered, the giggle gone, replaced by absolute, dark certainty. "This is the truth of power. They see a Queen. I own the woman. They worship a statue. I enjoy the living flesh. Let them have their symbol. I have the reality."
He straightened up, his presence withdrawing, leaving her cold.
"Continue your work, Overlord," he said, his voice now loud and formal. "The domain awaits your… command."
He left her then, sitting in the silent chamber, a puppet queen on a gilded throne, her strings pulled by the most intimate and degrading of chains. The entire Luo Domain was now under the rule of a woman whose authority was a fiction, whose power was a phantom, and whose every decree was a silent testament to the fact that she was, and would always be, nothing more than her Master's most cherished and obedient possession. The Ancestor had not just conquered the land; he had turned its entire governance into a monument to his own perverse victory.