Chapter 57: Women Since Ancient Times
This year's Holy Ploughing Festival was not held as scheduled.
Although the palace tried its best to hide the news, someone still leaked it - the emperor was ill.
This news spread to all parts of the Great Zhou Dynasty, and the people were in a panic because this was a matter concerning their land.
Even if the emperor did not attend the Great Zhou's farming ceremony in person, other members of the royal family would perform the ceremony on his behalf, praying for good weather and good harvests in the coming year.
Never stopped.
...
grassland.
"The monarch of the Southern Kingdom is timid and cowardly and is unable to accomplish anything. Fortunately, there is an assassin in his palace who is willing to serve the king." said the staff of the eldest prince - now we should call him the Turkic King.
This aide, like his ancestors in the Central Plains, held a feather fan in his hand and wore a silk scarf on his head. He had narrow eyes, a white face and a beard, and was highly valued by the Turkic king.
The Turkic king laughed gruffly and said, "Great! The Great Zhou Emperor is nothing but an incompetent child. How can he occupy the fertile land of the Central Plains? This world should belong to us, the Turkic warriors!"
For a moment, the whole tent was filled with this rough sound, which made people's ears hurt.
The staff said nothing, just smiled slightly.
After the eldest prince ascended the throne, he first imprisoned the second prince and the people around him, and began to purge the power of the old Turkic king and suppress several of his uncles. In addition to the two princes, the old Turkic king also had many children with other women. The Turks did not attach importance to status, but they learned the customs of the Central Plains in the past hundred years, and it became like this.
The Turkic king was brave but not wise. Becoming the Turkic king would affect his entire body, so he killed as many people as he could. After suppressing the internal sphere, he contacted the rest of the tribes on the grassland. Among them, the Western Rongdi tribe was the most powerful. The assassination of the Central Plains emperor was a plan proposed by an aide named Yao San. He cooperated with the monarch of the Southern Kingdom and took advantage of the time when the Southern Kingdom's envoys came to Beijing this year to carry out the assassination.
Once the little emperor dies, it will be time for them to enter the Central Plains!
But who will rule the Central Plains then?
Yao San smiled secretly, naturally only their young master was qualified.
...
The capital of the Great Zhou Dynasty, the Imperial Palace.
"My lord concubine, you are here to see me?" Yan Xuanyu's face was pale and he wanted to get up but failed.
As Lian'er entered Chengtian Hall, she smelled a strong bitter smell of medicine, and her hands clenched under her wide sleeves.
She...she didn't want to...
Since meeting the emperor, she gradually discovered that the emperor was not as the rumors said. Instead, he treated her very well and regarded her as a treasure. However...
She looked anxious: "Your Majesty, please lie down quickly."
Yan Xuanyu looked at her and then slowly lay down with a smile.
"With the Imperial Concubine by my side, I will die without regrets."
"Your Majesty, please take back what you said!" For some reason, when Lian'er heard the word "death", her whole body trembled, and she felt a bit more genuinely anxious.
These days, she hadn't dared to think that because of her, a person with the most noble status in the Great Zhou was going to die...
"Today, please read this storybook to me to cheer me up." Yan Xuanyu said weakly.
Eunuch Li on the side quickly presented a storybook. Lian'er saw tears in his eyes and didn't know how long he had been sad.
Yan Xuanyu moved his fingers, and Li Zhongxian understood what he meant. He stepped back and said, "Yes, Your Majesty."
Then he left with the palace maids.
There were only two of them left in Chengtian Palace.
"Read it." Yan Xuanyu closed his eyes.
"Yes." Lian'er bowed, then sat down on the round stool with satin cushions that Li Zhongxian had just asked the palace servants to bring.
"Legend has it that there were two countries, one named Wu and the other named Yue. Wu and Yue went to war, and Yue was defeated. Its king, Gou Jian, was captured. Gou Jian had an aide named Fan Li..."
Lian'er continued reading and found that this was just the background of the story, and the real story in the book had just begun.
"There was a washerwoman named Xi Shi, famous for her beauty..."
In the middle, it also tells a story about "Dong Shi Xiou Pin". The wording is humorous and interesting, and Dong Shi's posture is described vividly, which makes Lian'er smile for a moment.
One day, Xi Shi was washing her silk by the stream when she rescued a young man. The man looked like nothing Xi Shi had ever seen before, a man of heaven. He was gentle, well-read, and had a pair of soulful eyes that captivated her.
Finally, the man expressed his feelings to Xi Shi and said that he was actually a young man from a noble family. He asked Xi Shi if she would be willing to go home with him.
Xi Shi fell in love and readily agreed, and they had a son on the way.
Until the child was born, the man revealed his name to Xi Shi. His lord Gou Jian was in danger, and he prayed to Xi Shi to help him rescue his lord.
"Gou Jian...presented Xi Shi...to the King of Wu..." Lian'er's originally rosy lips turned pale.
Why did the emperor suddenly let her read this storybook? Who wrote this storybook?!
"What's next?" Yan Xuanyu didn't open his eyes.
Lian'er looked at him and saw that his expression was normal, as if he was really just listening to her reading the story.
Next, King Fuchai of Wu fell in love with the stunningly beautiful Xi Shi, and let Gou Jian go despite the opposition of his court officials. In the end, Gou Jian slept on firewood and ate bitter food to destroy the State of Wu, and the King of Wu, named Fuchai, committed suicide.
Later on, more emphasis was placed on Goujian, but Lian'er subconsciously wanted to read the later story of Xi Shi.
But what disappointed her was that the ending of the story was only mentioned in a few sentences. After Gou Jian's victory, Fan Li saw that Gou Jian was suspicious and offered to leave. He left under a pseudonym and was never seen again in the world.
This story was, of course, commissioned by Yan Xuanyu, though it only added some additional content, leaving the general tone unchanged. In Yan Xuanyu's world, the real history of the story includes rumors that Fan Li took Xi Shi into seclusion, while others claim she was dead. In short, true and false, false and true, the stunningly beautiful washerwoman ultimately seems to have become a vassal and victim of power.
"My Lady, does Fan Li in this story really love Xi Shi?" Yan Xuanyu asked softly.
Lian'er didn't know what the emperor meant. She felt panicked and shocked, but there were also some other emotions that she couldn't understand clearly.
Love?
The storybook only shows pure exploitation. Did he love her or use her to control her by having a son? How much love was there in sending her to Fuchai's side?
Lian'er had only ever thought that man had so many reasons to be helpless. As an unfavored prince, he must have been treading on thin ice in the royal court. But he had his ambitions, and she... was willing...
The name Lian'er was given to him by that man. She was an ordinary commoner's daughter. That man said that he would only love her in his life and would marry her after the matter was settled.
Yan Xuanyu opened his eyes and looked at her, only to see that her face was empty.
When Lian'er met his eyes, her heart sank, and then her heart dropped. The emperor had always known it.
Yan Xuanyu said slowly, "Has the person behind you not contacted you for a long time?"
"You have a dagger in your sleeve. Now it's just you and me. Kill me and he'll be halfway there."
"Yes." Lian'er took out a delicate and small dagger from her sleeve. She knew how sharp the dagger was. As long as she stabbed it into the emperor's chest, the man could make his next plan.
Lian'er's hands were shaking so much that she could hardly hold the dagger.
"You have never been obsessed with me. This is your strategy..."
"You're not afraid of death, right?" Yan Xuanyu was lying down, but his face was calm and he didn't look like he was at a disadvantage at all.
"Have you ever thought about what the person behind you said about how to get you out of the capital safely?"
Every word Yan Xuanyu said seemed to hit Lian'er's heart hard.
"No, no... You just want to trick me into telling you who it is, right?" Lian'er's expression suddenly became sad.
With tears in her eyes, she threw the dagger to the ground.
"I'm a spy, kill me."
Yan Xuanyu was speechless. He had never known how to face this woman who was sent to his side as a chess piece. In order to dispel the suspicion of the prime minister and others, he had done several things in her name, which was already his limit.
Yan Xuanyu was indecisive on this matter and felt a bit guilty, so he never thought of taking Lian'er's life.
In his opinion, Lian'er is similar to many women in history, she is just... a victim.
He didn't think Lian'er was stupid, he just felt that she was a bit pitiful. In ancient times, there were only a few women who were brave and far-sighted and left their names in history compared to the women of the entire era.
Most of the women in this era seem to be craving for the love of men, because in this era they can only rely on men to survive.
And then what? They were accused of crimes that didn’t belong to them: beautiful women are the root of trouble, beautiful women are the downfall of the country.
"I am not King Fuchai, and you will not be Xi Shi." Yan Xuanyu sighed and stopped pretending to be sick. Instead, he slowly sat up.
"Open it and take a look." Yan Xuanyu pointed at the dagger.
Lian'er's legs went weak and she knelt down. She picked up the dagger beside her and pulled it open, only to find that only the wooden handle inlaid with exquisite gems was left.
Her pupils shrank. The dagger had been kept in her sleeve, and someone had replaced it without anyone noticing!
"I will not kill you, but now you know that I am not terminally ill, so I can only inconvenience you temporarily." Yan Xuanyu clapped his hands. The sound was not loud, but the shadows of the trees outside Chengtian Palace moved, and several men in black came flying in the air.
"I called you here today to ask you to send someone to disguise as her and act on her behalf in the palace during these days." Yan Xuanyu said without any expression.
"Place her in a dark place and don't let anyone in the palace find her." After all, there are many spies from outside in the palace.
"Yes." The masked man in black who was leading the group lowered his head.
Lian'er took a few steps back, her face full of shock and fear. It turned out that this was the true face of the emperor... He also had a group of secret guards that no one knew about!
The emperor must have done a lot of things in secret.
The leading secret guard stayed behind to disguise himself as Concubine Lian, while the other two took Lian'er away.
"I'll take my leave."
....
Lian'er didn't know why, but even though her future was uncertain, she finally no longer had to worry all day long.
She even felt like reminiscing about the past.
She also knew that the man had a secret guard who was dedicated to gathering intelligence, but even she could see that the martial arts of the emperor's secret guards were far superior to those people!
The secret guards around that person could no longer be called human. They had no human thoughts and only obeyed their master's orders. They were not afraid of pain or death, and most of them could not even speak...
"Miss, I'm sorry for being rude." said one of the secret guards.
"You can't say 'brusque', you should say 'offend'." The secret guard on the right suddenly spoke.
At first, the secret guard was silent for a while, and finally said "Oh".
Lian'er felt strange. Is this... really a trained secret guard?
The two men placed her in a place she had never seen in the palace. It was an underground stone chamber, but it was dry inside and not damp. It was fully equipped with beds, tables, chairs, etc. There were even places where light could penetrate so that the room was not dim. However, she did not know where this place was.
As they disappeared, Lian'er realized they were probably sent to monitor her. However, secret guards were difficult to train, and they had sent two for just one spy.
Arriving at this point, it was useless to think too much. Lian'er sat on the edge of the bed and looked up at the place where the light came through the stone chamber. She didn't know what to feel.
She was still holding the script that the emperor asked her to read, which was already wrinkled.
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