Chapter 314 Selection

After autumn, winter turned to spring. Under the warm sunshine of March, the peonies in the imperial garden of the palace were in full bloom. The empress was in a good mood as she looked at the brilliant spring scenery in the garden. She decided to share the joy with the people and invited all the noble ladies in the capital to come to the palace to enjoy the flowers.

Meimei was frightened by Meiyi's urging, but she still followed her daughter's wishes and accompanied her to the palace early. Meijuan accompanied her and complained in a low voice: "I have never seen a girl like you, rushing to meet people. It's amazing that the prince is not scared by you!"

Meiyi smiled and said, "I'm just anxious to see my brother the Crown Prince. He also wants to see me. He told my brother to come earlier and he will wait for me at the palace gate!"

"Our front door is open. If he wants to see you, just come. Who's stopping him?"

"What do you know? The prince has reached a certain age and cannot leave the palace easily. There are many things he needs to learn and do every day. My eldest brother has said that the prince is very tired!"

After entering the palace, the mother and her two daughters got out of the car one after another. They saw that there were already quite a few cars parked here. Many ladies of honor had brought their daughters here. The ladies of honor were fine, but all the noble ladies were dressed up gorgeously and walked around, with colorful clothes fluttering and faint fragrance in the air, giving people the illusion that they were already in the royal garden.

Meimei smiled bitterly: the royal family loves to do this kind of tricks. They say they invite people to appreciate the flowers, but in fact they ask people to send their daughters to the door, so that the royal children can choose the princess or concubine from them. These noble ladies flock to it and are proud to be chosen by the royal family. She looked at her two daughters beside her and sighed in her heart. Meiyi was her child. She had instilled in her many ideas that were considered rebellious in this dynasty since she was a child. Why did her precocious daughter fall in love with the prince? Can you say that she didn't know that the prince would become the emperor in the future, and there would be three palaces and six courtyards, and many women would compete with her for men? Meiyi is smart, what doesn't she understand? But she likes it, what can she do? Meimei talked too much many times, but she couldn't persuade her every time.

He deliberately pointed at the girls passing by him and said to his daughter with admiration: Look how pretty those girls are, and how beautiful that one is. They are all beauties with natural beauty. The princes must be dazzled by the choices!

Meijuan knew her mother's intentions, and kept nodding and smiling to agree with her sister that it was not too late to regret now, because she would be offended if she married the prince. Just look at the current queen. She went to the palace with her parents during the Lantern Festival. Others did not know, but Meijuan accidentally saw that the emperor abandoned the queen in order to protect his favorite concubine. The queen stepped on empty air. If there was no eunuch beside her, the queen would have twisted her ankle. The emperor held the concubine's hand tightly and left without even looking back. The queen stared at the beautiful woman beside the emperor, and the hatred that flashed in her eyes made Meijuan feel cold.

Meimei did not make any special preparations for the twelve-year-old twins this time. They were allowed to dress up as they pleased. The two sisters still wore double buns and wore the clothes they usually liked. In order to show their status and not to embarrass the Xu family, Meimei reminded her daughters to at least pick some expensive jewelry to wear. Meiyi only wore a string of South China Sea pearls around her neck and a few exquisite jadeite necklaces on her head. The simple dress showed her peerless elegance and natural beauty. Meimei gritted her teeth. This girl knew her advantages long ago. Looking at the string of pearls on her daughter's chest, each of them was round and large, and the brilliance was brilliant. She couldn't help but sigh. This string of pearls alone made the little girl's status very different. In the capital, the only people who had such pearls were princesses or county ladies. The emperor specially gave Xu Junying two strings to take home to Meiyi and Meijuan. The meaning was very clear: the status of these two girls was no different from that of princesses and county ladies, and they would marry into the palace sooner or later! Looking at the beautiful concubine again made her laugh and cry. She had her eyes and eyebrows painted, and put on rouge and powder. Even though her body was adorned with pearls and jade, she looked as gaudy and tacky as an eighteen-year-old landlord's wife. But she was too lazy to care and just went into the palace.

Groups of noble ladies formed a colorful square formation and slowly moved toward the inner courtyard. Suddenly, there was a commotion in front of them, and several tender and gentle exclamations came: "Prince!"

"The fifth prince—King of Jinling!"

"And there is also the Prince of Weiyuan!"

The crowd moved aside, and a dozen guards cleared the way. The eunuchs came towards them, escorting three tall, handsome and noble young men. Looking at the handsome boy in the front with a gentle and charming smile, Meimei sighed inwardly, thinking that Meiyi was mesmerized by this smile, right?

After not seeing each other for a few months, the Crown Prince had grown a lot taller. His noble Ming Dynasty dragon robe attracted the attention of all the noble ladies, who stared at him. The Fifth Prince, who was newly conferred the title of King of Jinling and was wearing a purple brocade robe with coiled dragons, and Xu Jiheng, the son of Weiyuan Marquis and wearing a jade-colored brocade robe with round flowers, were just insignificant foils beside the Crown Prince.

The prince walked towards the Xu family mother and daughter, his eyes locked on Meiyi, a bright smile spread across his face, and he reached out and held Meiyi's hand as if no one was around, saying softly, "I've been waiting for you for a long time, but you never came, so I couldn't help but run here to pick you up!"

There were sounds of gasps and even sobbing all around. Meimei thought of the garden of the wife of the Marquis of Changle. It was full of flowers. After the proud King Qi passed by, the sky became dim as if the sun had been lost. All the flowers withered instantly. The broken hearts there seemed to have moved here again. The children of the royal family are so awful!

In Kunning Palace, the Queen sat upright on the couch, examining Sun Meifu, the eldest granddaughter of Duke Dingguo, who was standing next to her sister-in-law Pang. She had willow-shaped eyebrows, phoenix eyes, and a cherry mouth. Although she looked a little fat, her figure was extremely well-proportioned and exquisite, and her skin was as white as jade. She had a charming and gentle temperament. Few men did not like her.

The queen nodded, "Very good. You have been carefully kept in the inner chamber for thirteen years. It is time for you to show up! Your virtuous and gentle demeanor is the most attractive. Although boys like thin beauties, they don't know what kind of women they actually want! Don't worry, the prince may resist, but he will like you after he gets to know you. He and the daughter of the Xu family grew up together, so they are close, but they may not really get along. The candidate for the crown princess is her, but it should still be our Sun family's daughter!"

Pang Shi was a little worried: "The Emperor..."

The Queen said calmly, "The Emperor and Marquis Xu are very close. He does want the Crown Prince to marry Meiyi, but he values ​​the Crown Prince the most. He is too concerned and will get confused. I have a way to convince him!"

"Then, King Jinling and Meiling?"

The Queen sighed, "Let's put that aside for now. The Crown Prince hasn't gotten married yet! Besides, Xiao Wu'er's personality is tougher than his brother's, and he is unpredictable. He likes the Xu family's concubines. He had dinner with the Empress Dowager in the Cining Palace a few days ago and said it directly in front of the Emperor and his brothers. This way, the princes can no longer have any thoughts about the concubines. But this child has won the Emperor's praise for this... Really!"

In the imperial garden, the ladies of honor surrounded the queen like stars surrounding the moon, flattering her and saying all kinds of nice things. The queen was noble and virtuous as always, with a smile as gentle as the spring breeze. She led the ladies to walk slowly among the flowers, instructing everyone to appreciate the gorgeous blooming peonies.

Meimei and Lin Runan followed by her side, leisurely enjoying the flowers and scenery, and asking and answering questions with the empress. The three of them occasionally exchanged glances and smiled knowingly, getting along well with the ladies of the court, and showing that they were intimate and in tune with each other. Over the years, whenever there was a party in the palace, the three good friends came like this.

Under another flower stand, young people gathered around the prince. Noble ladies did not dare to approach easily. Only relatives and best friends had this honor. The ones who could stand beside the prince were Meiyi, who was held by his hand for a moment, and Meiyi's inseparable relatives, as well as several cousins ​​between the ages of ten and fifteen. There were those from the Chen family, the empress dowager's family, and the thirteen-year-old Sun Meifu from the Sun family, the empress's family. She was generous and gentle, always with a sweet smile on her face. She took care of the prince and the princes with tea and snacks, and even took care of the Xu brothers and sisters. The prince asked Meiyi what she wanted to eat. Meiyi looked at the mung bean cake. Meifu stood up, stretched out her chubby little hand like jade, picked up a piece with silver chopsticks, put it on a small plate, and brought it to her, smiling, "Sister Meiyi, just try one piece. You will get sick of the same taste if you eat too much. There are other delicious foods. Which one do you want to eat?"

Before Meiyi could say thank you, the prince smiled at Meifu and said, "Cousin Meifu is very considerate. Let Meiyi eat this first. She can tell me what she wants to eat later!"

The concubine was sitting at the side, feeling very depressed. She whispered to the King of Jinling, "Why didn't you ask your cousins ​​when naming their daughters? Why did they also want the word 'beautiful' in it?"

Prince Jinling took a sip of tea and almost choked: "Please be kind, Meifu is one year older than you sisters..."

Meijuan snorted, "So what? My sister Meilian is married, isn't she older than her?"

Prince Jinling was speechless. He turned to look at the snacks on the table. Someone immediately brought a piece of pine nut cake on a plate and said in a sweet voice, "Cousin, this is your favorite. Did Ling'er get the right one?"

King Jinling glanced at the petite and pretty little girl and said, "You are wrong. I don't like this!"

He quickly got up and took a plate of rose cakes, then turned back to his wife and said, "Here, this is what you love!"

Meijuan looked at Meiling, then at King Jinling, and said, "Thank you, Your Highness. I don't like to eat anything too sweet!"

King Jinling glared at him, "You obviously love rose cakes. You and Meiyi picked roses from your yard and made cakes for us to eat!"

"That was made for you to eat. Did Your Highness see me eating it?"

"you……"

Seeing the beauty leave the flower stand and walk towards the pond, Prince Jinling hurriedly handed the plate to the maid beside her and followed her: "My beauty, who dressed you up today?"

"My mother, the wife of Marquis Weiyuan!"

"Madam Weiyuan has great taste. You look so beautiful in this dress and these pearls!"

"real?"

"real!"

Prince Jinling nodded, and hurriedly reached out to pull her: "Stop! Don't go any further, you will fall..."

As soon as he finished speaking, the prince from the pavilion exclaimed, "Meiyi, be careful!"

Then there was a splash, and someone fell into the water. Meifu's voice came: "Help..."