Walking into my bedroom, I was surprised to see a tiny box left on my bed. It was a blue box, designed exquisitely, metallic, with golden embroidery.

I knew it was from only one person.

The one person who put all his faith in me.

Sure, I wasn't the brightest one of the bunch. I was far too hotheaded, impatient and angry all the time. Going in over my head, drowning in my fury on the battlefield. But he never gave up on me.

I was grateful to have a lord like him. He loved me, he cared for me, like no one ever has. We were related, and that gave him obligation to care, but it went even beyond that. I knew the love he had for me was far past the line. The look in his eyes, it was preserved for me, and only me.

The way he would say my name. The way he looked at me, the way he touched me.

I was his one and only, his special man.

And yet I wondered why.

There was nothing special about me.

I was just a simple soldier. I had given him my undying faith, my unwavering loyalty. In exchange for a heart, in exchange for love. He told me his vision, I threw my life on the line so he could see it.

And maybe that's why he loved me.

I was far from attractive. In fact, I think I'm ugly. Hideous, even. A one-eyed ogre. Every time I walked past someone, people would point and laugh at me. There were two of us, two Xiahous. Yuan and I.

He was the happy, cheerful one. I was the gruff and angry one. They laughed, they called me,"Blind Xiahou", or "Dun the One-Eyed."

It didn't make me happy, it made me feel like a complete failure. My lord had trusted me with the battle, and all I did was run out blindly, into the fray, losing my eye, and almost my life.

Perhaps "Blind Xiahou" was a good name for me.

Perhaps I deserved it.

I looked into the mirror in my room, eye narrowing on myself, my ugly face, my ugly eye patch. I was ugly, no matter how much he told me I wasn't, no matter how much he told me how lovely I was.

My fist retracting, I lashed it at the glass mirror, punching, shattering the mirror into a thousand pieces at the floor.

Fuck you and your seven years of bad luck. I've been cursed enough. I've paid my dues, I helped enough, only to lose my eye, to be ridiculed for a thousand years.

I looked down at the shattered glass pieces on the floor, each shard like a piece of my heart, a piece of my dignity, splattered to the floor.

I'm a failure of a general.

I'm a failure of a lover.

I'm a failure of a person.

A failure of a man.

A generals...no, a relative, a lover's responsibility is to protect the man he loves. Instead, I made a fool of myself. I ran headfirst into something I shouldn't have, and I paid the price.

I lost more than just my eye that night.

I lost my dignity, I lost my honor.

To a soldier, honor is everything.

Without it, I'm a loser, a nothing. A man without a hope, a shell of a man...a shell of a warrior.

I wouldn't have blamed him if he had thrown me out. I wanted him to. I couldn't face him. He would never want me, he could never want a pathetic man like me. And yet he never turned me away, he held on to me, begged me to stay.

I could see it in his actions, the way he treated me, like no other.

How could I ever repay him, my dastardly actions, my angry, hotheaded ways. I was a burden to him, nothing but a tragic burden. I was undeserving of his love, and I think he knew.

I think he always knew.

That's why he begged me to stay.

It would take me eternity to repay him...an eternity I'd gladly spend by his side.

I didn't deserve it, I deserved to die on that battlefield, but I you believed I was meant for something else.

I open the box you've left me. It was empty. Just as I expected.

Because there's nothing in this world that could describe our love, our devotion.

And nothing in this world that could describe my ugliness.

I am ugly.

And yet, you think I'm beautiful.

My Lord Cao Cao.

I am forever yours.