This is actually a fairly well-known story, a number of writers have commented on it. In ancient China, the emporer--who generally had a multitude of wives--would not infrequently have one of them butchered for use as the main course at a feast, especially if the feast included foreign dignitaries who'd be impressed by this. Little historical detail remains about the method of slaughter or the cooking, but one fact is confirmed from several sources, that is, that the head of the slaughtered woman would be placed on a platter and displayed at the banquet, the purpose of this being to show that the emporer had had one of his most beautiful wives killed for his guests' dining pleasure.
Without objection, Sin Wu allowed herself to be led to the dressing rooms; there, the two serving-girls attending her carefully made up her face, tinting her lips, shading her eyes, adjusting her coiffure to absolute perfection, adorning her hair with golden combs. Her clothing alone was not altered. It took considerable time, but at last, when they were finished, they led her down the long and ornate hallway to the emporer's kitchen.
The master-chef greeted her respectfully when she came in. "Ah, my lady, you look wonderful!" he said. "The emporer's guests will be most impressed, most impressed!"
She smiled a trifle. "I trust so, chef," she answered.
Taking her arm, he guided her to a smooth tiled table; docile, she followed. "We must get right to it," he said enthusiastically. "Right to it! Time is of the essence!"
She nodded, almost imperceptibly, and the serving girls who'd accompanied her began removing her simple silken dress. She wore nothing under it, and in a moment she was nude. Her smooth skin was the color of powdered gold, her legs long and beautifully tapered, her breasts small, pert.
"Ah, delightful!" the chef said, looking her up and down. "Come now, come now, quickly, up on the table!"
Two male assistants helped her up; she stretched out atop the tiles. The serving girls moved to her head, fitting a large white collar around her neck. Then they took hold of her wrists, holding her arms; the two men grasped her slim ankles.
The chef picked up a knife, began sharpening it with a whetstone. "Remember now, my lady," he said, looking at her face. "You must not cry, it will spoil your makeup!"
"I have not forgotten," she said in a small voice.
"Ah, good!" He put down the whetstone, bent over her body. He ran his hand up from her knee, squeezed her thigh, then her breast; her nipples rose in response. "Yes, excellent!" he exclaimed. "Such wonderful breasts, such fine legs, just excellent!" Once again, he looked back at her face. "We are ready to begin, my lady," he said, his hand resting on her stomach. "Are you?"
She nodded, very slightly. "I am prepared," she said formally. "You may proceed."
Turning his attention back to her torso, he pressed the edge of the knife against her skin, at the base of her breastbone, and began drawing it slowly downward toward her navel. Her skin parted cleanly as it passed, and red blood began to stain the powdered gold.
She stiffened, but she made no sound other than a quick intake of air. "I know this pains you, my Lady," the chef said, his tone matter-of-fact, "but, as we have told you, there is only one proper way to proceed." His knife moved past her navel, cutting it in half. Sin Wu made some little gasping sounds; the chef continued, opening her lower belly, his knife moving toward her hairless pubes. Her internal organs, glistening wetly, began to bulge up into the incision. "We stop," he commented, drawing the knife back just as it reached the apex of her genitals, "right here!"
He then worked his fingers into the center of the cut, where her navel had been, and started pulling it open. Reaching inside, he pulled up the descending part of her intestine and snipped it off at the lower end. For the first time since the procedure had started she moaned, and she squirmed a little on the table.
"Not much longer, my lady," the chef said as he began drawing her intestines out of her body, letting them trail down to the floor alongside the table. Blood vessels inside her abdomen parted, blood came washing out of the incision. "Not much longer. We must let your blood flow for a while to properly flavor your flesh; your heart must drive it, just for a little while. Do try not to cry."
She did not; she remained stoic as he extracted her entrails, her stomach following her intestines into the floor. Her body began quivering; the chef, his forearms drenched in blood, pulled out her kidneys and her liver. She lived still, her chest heaving, her head turning from side to side.
From a metal canister he dusted flour inside her now mostly empty abdomen; then he moved sideways and stood looking down at her face for a moment. One of the serving girls came around, held her head.
"It is over now, my lady," the chef said, examining her face. "You have done very well, very well indeed."
"I--am glad..." she managed to mutter in a ragged whisper.
He smiled at her, then putting the knife aside, he picked up a large meat cleaver. "Try to smile, my Lady," he said. "And open your eyes and your nostrils very widely." She did as he said, though her smile was tenuous; the chef watched her face carefully, and when he was satisfied with her expression he brought the cleaver down, one hard and expert blow across her throat, severing her head instantly.
The serving girl holding her head moved it quickly away from the jets of blood shooting from the headless and spasming torso; Sin Wu's eyes were moving wildly as she held it over a basin, letting the blood in the head drain. Once most of it was gone, the chef spread a rice paste over the severed neck, and her head was placed upright on a silver platter and surrounded by decorative fronds of leaves; the serving girl carefully held her eyelids up until they stiffened in that position. Sin Lu was as beautiful in death as she had been in life; while her body, once it was cooked, was served to the emporer's guests, her head would pass among them, mounted on this platter. Thus they would know that he had not sacrificed the least beautiful of his wives for their dining pleasure.