"What outrageous thing has he done now?"
"Just a few days ago, didn't we stop Princess Yongchang's carriage and urge her to uphold the virtues of womanhood and be a model for noble ladies of the royal family?"
Queen Ashina's words were full of sarcasm.
How can a royal princess, who has always been unrestrained and willful, be expected to uphold traditional virtues?
Is this a joke?
The Helian royal family was originally from the Xianbei ethnic group, and women there have always held a high status.
Although family traditions are mostly passed down, men are still considered superior.
But women are not lowly appendages.
Leaving aside the royal family, even the Dugu family, one of the Eight Pillars of State in the court, has women who are known for their fierce and shrewish nature.
As a new bride, she dared to brandish a saber and threaten her husband against taking a concubine.
If there were truly maids or concubines, the mistress of the house could take a horsewhip and chase her husband all over the capital to beat him.
This is still just a subject's daughter.
The Three Obediences and Four Virtues advocated by Jia Yi were utter nonsense in the eyes of these genuine Xianbei noblewomen!
If it weren't for the fact that Jia Yi had a sage behind him, these nobles who weren't from aristocratic families would have twisted Jia Yi into a pretzel.
Princess Yongchang is the current emperor's elder sister, a full sibling.
He was of noble birth but arrogant by nature.
Even in front of the emperor, she dared to slam her fist on the table, kick the eunuchs, and throw a tantrum while pulling on the emperor's sleeve.
Sage: ...This is my eldest sister. She has been haunted by the shadow of bloodline suppression since childhood.
Princess Yongchang was five years older than the Emperor.
Intelligent and skilled in riding and archery, if she hadn't been a woman, the throne probably wouldn't have been hers.
The late emperor and empress dowager doted on her, treating her like their own flesh and blood.
Especially the Empress Dowager, when she first entered the palace, her rank was not high, she was just a concubine.
At that time, the Xianbei royal family still retained the outdated custom of "killing the mother when establishing the son as heir".
The women in the imperial harem dared not give birth to sons.
Because once a son is born, and that son is made crown prince, the birth mother will be forced to commit suicide.
After the Empress Dowager became pregnant, she was filled with anxiety and prayed every day that she would give birth to a little princess.
A few months later, the Empress Dowager gave birth to a daughter as she had wished.
Three years later, the late emperor abolished this outdated practice.
The Empress Dowager then became pregnant again and gave birth to the current emperor.
The Empress Dowager didn't say it aloud, but she was very grateful to her daughter: "It's thanks to Yongchang that I was able to live and become the Empress Dowager!"
To put it bluntly, if Yongchang had been a son, the current sage probably wouldn't even have had the chance to be born.
Therefore, from a young age, the Empress Dowager said to the Emperor: "Thanks to your elder sister, you must take good care of her in the future."
Having been instilled with this idea for over a decade, the sage indeed treated his elder sister Yongchang exceptionally well when she grew up.
As soon as the emperor ascended the throne, he conferred the title of Princess Yongchang and increased her fiefdom of 5,000 households to 10,000 households.
Yongchang's son-in-law was also a young and outstanding man carefully selected by the Empress Dowager and the Emperor.
Unfortunately, the prince consort died young, falling seriously ill less than five years after their marriage.
The emperor felt sorry for his sister and would not allow her to remain a widow.
In less than six months, she found her sister an excellent husband.
The second prince consort didn't last long either; he died in a riding accident less than three years later.
Princess Yongchang thus acquired a reputation for bringing misfortune to her husbands.
The sage, however, did not care and continued to choose a good family for his sister.
The third prince consort has taken office.
This prince consort was in good health, without any illness or disaster, and he did not cause any accidents.
But he himself deliberately chose to die—by keeping a mistress!
Princess Yongchang caught them red-handed.
Yongchang was a truly domineering man. After successfully catching his wife in adultery, he did not blame the mistress alone.
She even hit that despicable man, the prince consort.
Then, divorce!
Princess Yongchang, now single again, stormed into the palace, grabbed her brother the emperor by the collar, and declared, "I will never marry again!"
Of the three princes-in-law, only the first was her true love; the latter two left her with mixed feelings.
With her first husband, whom she considered her ideal love, in her heart, Princess Yongchang truly had no desire to get married again.
She's doing quite well now; the Empress Dowager is her biological mother, the Emperor is her younger brother, and the future Emperor is her nephew.
She had a salary, a fief, and estates and fortified villages left to her by the late emperor and empress dowager.
Because of Yongchang's noble status, many people fawned over him.
Those who voluntarily brought their family businesses to become her retainers, and those who paid exorbitant sums to be recommended by her...
Princess Yongchang was undoubtedly the most powerful and wealthiest princess in the Great Zhou Dynasty, without exception!
With wealth, status, and still single, Princess Yongchang had to support many male lovers.
A handsome young man, a dashing young man, a scion of a fallen noble family, a proud and aloof young man from a poor background...
The happiness of the emperor's own sister is beyond the imagination of the world!
Princess Yongchang was notorious throughout the capital for her unbridled, extravagant, and dissolute lifestyle.
Her greatest act of kindness was probably not forcibly taking a respectable man from the street.
Therefore, no one in the capital, inside or outside the court, had any objections.
What are you saying?
Yongchang is favored by the Empress Dowager and tolerated by the Emperor; she is a tigress that cannot be provoked.
As long as there is no divine retribution or public outrage, and as long as there is no heinous crime, Princess Yongchang will not be impeached.
Unfortunately, Jia Yi was stubborn.
Following the sage's instructions, while relentlessly attacking aristocratic families, he even went so far as to provoke Princess Yongchang.
"Heaven's sins may be forgiven, but self-inflicted sins are inescapable!"
"This fake husband really knows how to court death."
Empress Ashina was very familiar with her sister-in-law, Yongchang.
Tsk tsk, she's a spoiled woman.
Despite the emperor's high regard for Jia Yi, who even helped him fend off many attacks from court officials, Jia Yi still managed to escape criticism.
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