"—The Empress Dowager has passed away!"

"—The Empress Dowager has passed away!"

"—The Empress Dowager has passed away!"

Inside the palace, the eunuchs relayed messages from one palace to another, and the news naturally reached Yuwen Xuanhong as well.

Upon hearing the news of his mother's death, the man vomited blood and fell into a coma.

The little girl's trip wasn't in vain; at least someone treated her.

"Come on, you're not going back today. This is something for tonight."

After leaving the Emperor's palace, Hou Xiangxiang grabbed Huo Xiaolong's sleeve, preventing her from going home, because the person inside had spoken: he wouldn't see anyone but Lan Tingche.

"Do you want to see him, Brother Tingche?"

Long'er has always respected the people around him; if he doesn't want to go, he doesn't have to.

Do I have to listen to you?

Lan Tingche smiled and said softly to Long'er:

"I'll go see him. Don't worry, I'll be right back."

When he was settling accounts himself, Huo Xiaolong didn't stop him, and waited while holding a Green Dragon Crescent Blade in his hand.

They chatted casually with Lu Kai, who had aged considerably in the past few days; his chubby face was gone.

"Chief Steward Lu, what do you plan to do now that the Emperor is gone?"

Lu Kai did not reprimand the girl for her disrespect; at this point, the result was already in.

"Let our family be buried with the Emperor in the imperial mausoleum."

"Huh? To be buried alive with you? Don't you want to go out and see?"

"The Prince of Zhenbei won't kill me?" Lu Kai asked rhetorically.

“I have done many bad things for the Emperor.”

"What bad thing happened? Tell me, or I'll kill you."

The girl in the python robe turned to look at him, and the man smiled knowingly, waving his hand and saying:

"No need, Your Highness. Thank you for your concern, but my mind is made up. You are the moon of Physician Hou and the King of the Grasslands, and the Emperor is also my moon. I have no other skills but to serve people."

"The Emperor knows nothing. Even in the underworld, I will have to continue serving him."

Having said that, the old eunuch waved his whisk, leaving Long'er with only his back turned.

The girl muttered behind him:

"This old man is quite stubborn."

Inside the Emperor's bedchamber, Yuwen Xuanhong's face was covered in needle marks. Lan Tingche approached the man, sat down on the edge of the bed, and said:

"Grand Uncle, I've arrived."

The man used all his strength to open his eyes, looked at Lan Tingche, and without saying anything superfluous, slowly asked:

"If I die, who will be emperor? You? Or the Prince of Zhenbei?"

Lan Tingche replied without hesitation:

"Long'er".

"And what about you?"

"I'll be the empress." The man's tone was so self-righteous. I'm her man, if I'm not the empress, who will be?

"Absurd! How could the Yuwen family's empire fall into...fall into the hands of others!"

Yuwen Xuanhong struggled to sit up, took out an imperial edict from beside him, handed it to Lan Tingche, and said to him:

"Among my sons, none of them are capable of shouldering heavy responsibilities. This is a blank imperial edict. The imperial seal is there; you can take it anytime and write whatever you want on it."

"This is my opportunity to rightfully become emperor. This is an imperial decree, and even the Prince of Zhenbei cannot disobey it."

Lan Tingche's expression was somewhat indescribable, but he still put everything away, especially the imperial seal, which he stuffed directly into his pocket.

Then, he said earnestly to the Emperor:

"Grand Uncle, you still don't understand."

"Imperial power and imperial edicts are worthless to Long'er. She didn't lead troops into the capital simply because she was afraid of causing too many deaths."

“You are not suitable to be the emperor, and neither am I. She is the most suitable. She can make the Great Yan Kingdom a better place.”

Yuwen Xuanhong grabbed Lan Tingche's arm and said through gritted teeth, enunciating each word clearly:

"But her surname is Huo! Not Yuwen!"

"It's fine if her empress's surname is Yuwen. If she has children, and the children have the blood of the Yuwen family, that's enough!"

Lan Tingche spoke earnestly, but Yuwen Xuanhong didn't understand. He had already handed the throne to his grandson, so why couldn't he understand?

Woman, once you ascend the throne, won't you have as much as you want?

"Did you know that your mother was a spy on the grasslands?"

Lan Tingche didn't take the Empress Dowager's words to heart at all; he was about to speak.

Who told him to rebel? So we bully him.

Unexpectedly, Yuwen Xuanhong gave a self-deprecating laugh and said:

"I guessed it..."

"Then why don't you lock her up? If you can't bring yourself to kill her, can't you at least imprison her?"

“Tingche, she is my mother…if it were your mother…”

Before the Emperor could finish speaking, Lan Tingche interrupted him, saying confidently:

“My mother wouldn’t do anything to make things difficult for me; she’s just using you.”

Yuwen Xuanhong nodded without refuting.

Did he regret it as he lay on his bed?

You might regret it.

But she also regretted not having someone kill her when Huo Xiaolong was conquering the grasslands.

As for other things, he couldn't defy the Empress Dowager.

He knew that the Empress Dowager was controlling and using him.

But he had neither the will to resist nor the ability to do so.