The crown prince went to the empress's palace, puzzled.

The head palace maid, Jin Ge, knelt down sadly to pay her respects and said, "Your Highness, please go and see Her Majesty the Empress."

What's going on? His father told him to look at his mother, and his aunt Jin Ge also told him to look at his mother.

What happened to Mother?

He strode to the Empress's palace, where he saw that the Empress was pale and her once black temples were now gray.

"Mother, what's wrong?"

"It's alright." Seeing him return, the Empress coughed for a while, covering her mouth with a handkerchief, and asked in a hoarse voice, "When did you return?"

"Your Majesty, I arrived at noon. Why are you so ill? What did the imperial physician say?"

"Mother, it's alright, it's just that my heart aches." The Empress burst into tears again, "My grandson..."

"Imperial grandson?" the Crown Prince asked, startled. "Mother, what's going on?"

When he returned to the court, many people looked strange. For the first time ever, his father did not scold him. Could it be that something had happened to his son (the eldest grandson of the emperor, Zhou Wenrang)?

"Rang'er and Fen'er are both gone. They succumbed to smallpox..."

The empress was crying, and the crown prince was stunned after hearing it.

"Mother, what did you say?"

"My grandson..." the Empress sobbed uncontrollably.

"They're all gone?" the Crown Prince roared. "What are you crying about? When I left, is this how you looked after my house? You, the Empress, couldn't even protect your two grandsons. What right do you have to cry?"

The Empress was stunned for a moment by his angry shout, and looked at him with tears in her eyes.

The Crown Prince has been pampered by the Wei family since childhood. His Majesty's treatment of the Crown Prince is neither good nor bad. The Crown Prince has everything a Crown Prince should have.

The crown prince had a smooth life and obtained everything too easily, so he had never experienced setbacks and couldn't even handle the uprising of the people in Zhongzhou.

The sudden loss of his two sons was a devastating blow to him, marking his first loss.

He can't accept it!

Seeing the Empress crying, the Crown Prince ignored her and stood up to leave.

Shi Xiu had been waiting for him and was about to ask him a question with a smile when she saw that the Crown Prince had changed from his usual expressionless demeanor to one filled with anger, sorrow, and gloom.

Shi Xiu quickly led the horse over, and the Crown Prince, without saying a word, mounted his horse at the palace gate and hurried back to his residence.

Shi Xiu quickly followed.

Along the way, the Crown Prince kept urging his horse onward, even though it startled the people and trampled their stalls. He didn't care and rode straight back to the Crown Prince's residence.

There was nothing unusual at the main gate of the Crown Prince's residence, but once inside, one could see that the entire residence was filled with sorrow.

He ignored everyone who came to pay their respects, and ran straight to the Crown Princess's courtyard. He saw that the Crown Princess, Shi Yingying, was emaciated and had no life in her eyes. She did not even react when the Crown Prince returned.

"Your Highness, what's going on?" The Crown Prince walked over, grabbed Shi Yingying, and shook her vigorously.

Shi Yingying seemed startled, her eyes widened, and after a while, confirming that it was the Crown Prince who had returned, she knelt down with a thud and murmured, "Your Highness, you've finally returned."

She fainted as soon as she finished speaking.

Enraged, the prince grabbed a pot of ice-cold tea from the table and poured it directly on her face.

Shi Yingying woke up again after being splashed with cold water.

The crown prince grabbed her by the neck and said viciously, "Don't try to pull any of those fake fainting or madness tricks on me, or I'll slaughter your entire maternal clan! Tell me what happened properly, or you'll die!"

Shi Yingying was terrified by his ferocity, and when he grabbed her by the neck, she trembled all over, and her face turned blue in a moment.

Shi Yingying's personal maid knelt down and kowtowed, pleading with the Crown Prince: "Your Highness, please release the Crown Princess first..."

The crown prince released his grip and roared, "Explain yourselves clearly! What exactly happened? If you can't explain, bury us alive!"

Shi Yingying coughed so hard she pounded her chest and lungs. The Crown Prince was extremely annoyed, kicked her, cursed her as "useless," and said to the maid, "You, speak!"

The maidservant, trembling, recounted in detail to the Crown Prince the events surrounding Zhou Wenrang and Zhou Wenfen's smallpox, their lives before and after death.

The prince's hands clenched so tightly they cracked, and the maid was so frightened she was scared out of her wits and lay on the ground, too afraid to move.

"So, even though Rang'er and Fen'er are gone, Father didn't order an investigation into who infected them, nor did he hold the Imperial Medical Bureau accountable?"

"This servant is unaware of what's going on here."

The Crown Prince left the Crown Princess's courtyard, summoned the steward, and then called over all the servants in the mansion, his personal nanny, and several concubines.

Before he could speak, a chorus of sobs erupted.

"Shut up, all of you!" The prince's sinister words silenced everyone.

Wei Chuchu remained silent, her face naturally showing sadness, but she did not cry like the others.

The Crown Prince said, "Chuchu, you speak."

Wei Chuchu didn't put on airs or try to sow discord between the Crown Princess and the Crown Prince. She calmly and clearly recounted the whole story.

"There was nothing unusual before the two young princes went to the academy; the academy's food utensils were found to be normal."

"The illness came on suddenly. On the same day the child was diagnosed with smallpox, the two eunuchs who accompanied the child also developed a high fever. The imperial physician also diagnosed them with smallpox, and the two eunuchs had already died."

“The day before yesterday, the four maids who served the imperial grandson contracted smallpox one after another and have died.”

"The child is gone. His Majesty and the Empress are heartbroken and have come to the palace. His Majesty is so sad that he sheds tears. After returning to the palace, the head of the Imperial Medical Bureau was ordered to commit suicide."

After Wei Chuchu finished speaking, the Crown Prince remained silent for a long time.

So, the child died of a serious illness?

But why were all the servants of the Crown Prince's residence infected, while none of the children in the academy were infected?

The steward said, "The Duke of Cheng'en and the Empress have investigated. After the two young princes fell ill, the entire academy was closed, the whole academy was disinfected with medicine, and all the children received smallpox treatment."

My dear reader, there's more to this chapter! Please click the next page to continue reading—even more exciting content awaits!