Chapter 70 It's his fault!
When the Turkic royal court was burned and the Turkic Khan was shot dead on the spot by muskets, the main Turkic force that was attacking the Central Plains had to return to reinforce it. The Jing Kingdom's general, taking advantage of his familiarity with the terrain, sent ten troops to ambush the Turks.
They routed the enemy's morale.
When news of Lu Xiuran leading nine hundred men to tear open the Turkic royal court like a sharp sword and killing the Turkic Khan reached Jing Kingdom, the entire country was shocked.
Everywhere, people sang about how this former top scholar was incredibly brave and handsome, practically a god descended from heaven.
With pen, one can bring peace to the world; with horse, one can conquer the universe.
The common people elevated him to the highest pedestal.
Later generations even called it 'the pinnacle of military strategy, the ultimate in warfare.'
Let's go back to the night of the raid.
The raging flames lit up the sky.
Having achieved their goal, Lord Lu, covered in blood, ordered everyone to retreat.
"Help! Help!" The Central Plains people, who had been treated as food by the Turks, also took advantage of the chaos to escape.
Amidst the scattering and running crowd,
Just then, the Turk's knife was about to fall on a middle-aged woman holding a child.
Without hesitation, Lu Xiuran swung his long sword at the Turk's head.
"Help me! Help me!" The old woman holding the child cried out in terror.
The young Lord Lu pulled the man onto the horse without the slightest hesitation.
It kicked its belly and galloped forward.
We arrived at the meeting point.
Of the eight hundred soldiers, only eighty-eight remained, each covered in blood and wounded.
Even though they were covered in wounds, they had no choice but to continue their march away.
Otherwise, nobody will survive.
After a night of exhaustion, the group found a sheltered, secluded spot to rest.
When Lu Xiuran undressed, sticky blood tore at his flesh, causing him to grit his teeth and furrow his brow.
Looking down, I saw a clear knife wound on my right chest.
The middle-aged woman appeared not far away with her back turned and said, "Sir, wash it with hot water."
Lu Xiuran glanced at her.
The woman rescued from the Turkic royal court not only knew how to ride a horse, but also spoke fluent Mandarin from the capital.
But now is clearly not the time for questioning.
He quickly washed up, bandaged his wounds, and, enduring his injuries, led his remaining troops on their way.
When they stopped again, Lu Xiuran called the middle-aged woman aside and asked, "Will I interrogate you, or will you confess yourself?"
The middle-aged woman immediately knelt down.
Just as Lu Xiuran had predicted, they were palace slaves who had escaped from the previous dynasty.
Lu Xiuran wore a long robe stained black with blood, which, set against the backdrop of the setting sun, made him appear even more handsome, though a sharp glint flashed in his eyes.
"The palace maids who fled that day were all killed by the officials who remained in the capital. How did you escape from the palace?"
The middle-aged woman flinched for a moment.
But under Lu Xiuran's intense gaze, she finally collapsed to the ground and wept bitterly. She glanced at her daughter not far away and then tearfully told him the truth.
"You escaped through the palace's secret passage?" Lu Xiuran's voice changed slightly. "You know about the palace's secret passage?"
After the woman bit her finger and drew a map with the cloth, she only said one sentence: "Please take good care of my daughter, sir."
Then, he pulled the sword from Lu Xiuran's body and was about to commit suicide.
Knowing such a shocking secret, only her death could save her daughter's life.
The longsword was stopped by Lu Xiuran just as it touched his neck.
Backlit, the young Lord Lu gripped the hilt of his sword and slowly shook his head. “Even when you were captured by the Turks, you did not offer this map to protect yourself. Your unwavering courage and loyalty are no less than that of any man. You are worthy of the sun and moon and have no shame before the people.”
The woman's eyes widened suddenly, her pupils trembling, and she choked out, "The current emperor is a good emperor. At least he gives us ordinary people something to look forward to, so we can eat our fill. If he dies, the world will be in chaos again, and it won't just be me and my daughter who will die."
After a moment of silence, Lord Lu slowly sheathed his longsword and gently instructed, "It will be much safer after traveling another hundred miles. Find a place to live in seclusion under an assumed name. Remember, take these memories with you to your grave."
Looking north, clutching the secret passage map in his hand, Lord Lu seemed to see the Forbidden City in the distance.
It was as if I could see that girl bound in a dark prison.
I saw her soul, which was like wildfire.
She should burn brightly and unrestrainedly.
If she were trapped in the confined space of the Forbidden City, the damp and treacherous atmosphere would extinguish her completely.
He had already watched her slip away once.
He had experienced enough of the pain of helplessness and powerlessness.
This time, he was finally able to repay what he owed her.
Instead of hiding in the shadows and only being able to watch from afar, unable to get even an inch closer.
This time, he wanted to be upright and honest in front of her.
After the Turks withdrew their troops, Xiao Shenjing bestowed upon Yunxi the title of Zhaoyi and granted her the Yongle Palace.
These days, unless absolutely necessary, she is confined to the imperial bed and has not stepped out of the Qianqing Palace.
Enraged, she overturned the dragon bed in the Qianqing Palace before leaving, ripped off the gauze curtains, and set them on fire.
Seeing her audacity, the chief steward Fu Shun called out to his ancestors while ordering dozens of palace maids and eunuchs to wait outside the door with buckets of water, fearing that the Qianqing Palace might be set on fire.
Seeing that he couldn't persuade her, Fu Shun had no choice but to confront Dao Yi, saying, "Commander Dao, stop her immediately!"
Upon hearing this, Yunxi suddenly glanced at Dao Yi.
That glance was a very clear warning.
If he dares to make a move, she will also sever all ties; it's either him or her.
Dao waved his hand and retreated repeatedly, saying, "I'll go see why His Majesty hasn't arrived yet."
Xiao Shenjing rushed over and saw that the Qianqing Palace was in a mess, with black fog billowing into the sky.
Before he could speak, Yun Xi rushed to Xiao Shenjing like the wind and slapped him across the face.
With his ever-vigilant knife aimed at cutting two people at once, it was impossible for her to succeed.
After a fight, Yunxi naturally couldn't touch Xiao Shenjing at all.
With a forced smile and a hint of sarcasm, she threw down the words, "Xiao Shenjing, you'd better get the hell out of here."
Finally, they drove off.
Looking around this palace, who would dare to speak to the emperor like that?
Yunxi not only said that, but when she arrived at Yongle Palace, she also wrote a line on the gate: "No dogs allowed."
The palace maids and eunuchs who were sent to serve him were so frightened that they trembled with fear.
They all thought they were about to have their heads chopped off by the emperor.
So when Fu Shun arrived with his men, all the palace maids, eunuchs, and head maids of Yongle Palace knelt in the courtyard.
While they were crying and begging for mercy, Fu Shun silently ordered people to clean the writing on the door and issued a gag order to these people.
After serving the emperor day and night, Yunxi was watched by the eyes of the palace. This time, she was promoted directly from a seventh-rank concubine to a second-rank Zhaoyi, only one step away from becoming a Guifei. The next step for a Guifei would make her the head of the six palaces.
The speed of this promotion is simply unheard of.
Countless eyes were watching her from the shadows, and everything she did would be immediately known to the palace.
Cen Yuwei slammed her hand on the table, splashing tea everywhere. Her eyes were filled with rage. "Keep away, you scoundrel! How dare she? How dare she!"
"Your Majesty, please don't be angry. His Majesty will surely punish her," Aunt Xueyu immediately comforted her.
Then Cen Yuwei waited and waited in Chengqian Palace, from the room full of splendor to the room becoming dim, she sat alone for a long time.
The next day, Yunxi finally received her punishment.
Her eyes were bloodshot from lack of sleep. She pinched the palace maid who came to report and asked, "Does His Majesty intend to send her to the Cold Palace?"
The palace maid shrank back and stammered, “Consort Yun has been punished with a year’s salary reduction, a month’s confinement, and forced to copy the ‘Admonitions for Women’ a hundred times.”
Cen Yuwei slumped heavily back into the chair behind her.
After a long while, she suddenly burst into laughter.
"Such treasonous words, and you only punish me with a year's salary? Hahaha! If it were her doing the same thing, how would you punish me, Brother Yin'an?"
Apart from Yunxi, who among the six concubines dared to offend the Emperor?
Therefore, the different Yunxi is different for Brother Yin'an.
After she finished laughing, she burst into a violent cough.
When her cough finally subsided, she gripped the golden nanmu chair with both hands, slowly lowered her eyes, and a cold, resolute smile appeared on her lips.
She couldn't wait any longer; it was time.
It's unclear whether Xiao Shenjing truly listened to the instructions, but in any case, he didn't appear at Yongle Palace after the punishment was read out.
Yunxi was quite comfortable as long as he wasn't around, except for the contraceptive soup.
She tried everything but couldn't get her hands on the contraceptive potion.
Even if she sneaks over the wall in the middle of the night, she will see several guards watching her.
In fact, she knew that she and Xiao Shenjing had been sleeping in the same bed for more than ten days, and drinking the contraceptive soup now would have no effect at all.
However, people always cling to a sliver of hope.
She defiantly attacked the guards, but two fists could not fight four hands, and in the end she was surrounded and sent back to Yongle Palace.
Xiao Shenjing was determined to get her pregnant.
Yunxi had a heart attack just thinking about it.
The sun was already high in the sky, and Yunxi lay in the room, enjoying the coolness of the ice chest.
Xiao Shenjing punished her by making her copy the "Admonitions for Women," but she tore up the paper and played with it, saying, "This damned, crappy place is so incredibly boring."
The following evening, thunder and lightning struck again, and rain fell.
The drizzling rain rolled down from the roof tiles, and even with the flashes of lightning, Yunxi, wanting to stay cool, closed her eyes and lay down under the window, not caring at all about the splashing rain wetting her skirt.
Just as she was dozing off, she saw the courtyard gate being pushed open.
She thought it was just a palace maid returning from an errand, until she heard a panicked cry of "Your Majesty!"
"What Empress?" Yunxi opened her eyes in bewilderment and saw a group of people rushing in.
And right in the center is Cen Yuwei, dressed in a phoenix robe.
The golden crown of nine pheasants reflected the bluish-gray light of the sky in the downpour, and sixteen pairs of pheasants with pearls in their beaks trembled in the rain curtain. The empress's silver-embroidered shoes, woven with gold and mud, crunched over the scattered jade flowers on the ground. Eight eunuchs carrying incense burners hurriedly retreated under the corridor, but dared not let the ambergris incense in the bronze incense burner with coiled dragon patterns go out even slightly.
The twelve deep blue brocade phoenix robes adorned with pearls were lifted up by the palace maids behind her. Aunt Xueyu lowered the twenty-eight-ribbed purple bamboo umbrella by half an inch, revealing the empress's jade hairpin cut from gold foil between her eyebrows. The blue phoenix, about to take flight, was torn into pieces of cold blades by the rain.
Staring at Cen Yuwei in the center, Yun Xi felt inexplicably strange. On this rainy day, with mud everywhere, she had come dressed in full headdress, which was too solemn and grand.
Was it just to show off his power in front of her?
Surrounded by palace maids and eunuchs, Cen Yuwei slowly walked up to Yun Xi and said condescendingly, "Consort Yun, would you like to have a word with me?"
It felt like a gift.
Yunxi had no intention of paying any attention to her.
But Cen Yuwei only whispered three words in her ear: "Red sleeves."
Yunxi was stunned, her expression changing completely. "What did you do to them?"
Cen Yuwei smiled slightly, "Consort Yun, shall we go inside and talk?"
Cen Yuwei entered the main room and waved to the palace maids and eunuchs behind her.
Aunt Xueyu was worried about "Empress".
Cen Yuwei shook her head. "Don't worry, Aunt. I only have a few private words with Consort Yun." She pointed to the open window and said with disdain, "Rain is falling everywhere. Close it."
Immediately, someone quietly went to close the window and then quietly left.
Soon, Yunxi's angry question rang out from inside the room: "Cen Yuwei, how dare you?"
When "Your Majesty" and Aunt Xueyu's expressions changed and they rushed in with their men, she was struck dumb, frozen in disbelief.
Cen Yuwei, dressed in a phoenix robe, lay on the ground. A dagger lay not far from Yun Xi's feet. Visible blood spurted from Cen Yuwei's neck, staining her robes and wetting the ground.
Yunxi stared wide-eyed at Cen Yuwei on the ground, her face filled with shock and disbelief.
"Your Majesty!" Xueyu screamed, collapsing to Cen Yuwei's side in a panic. "Quickly, quickly, summon the imperial physician!"
What followed was a period of intense and busy activity.
Soon, Xiao Shenjing and the imperial physician arrived.
He glanced at Yunxi, then stared blankly for a moment at Cen Yuwei, who was covered in blood on the bed. Before he could speak, Cen Yuwei slowly reached out her hand to him.
She wanted to call him "Brother Yin'an" again, just like before.
But all that was sprayed out was scarlet blood.
Just like when they were children, Xiao Shenjing strode over and reached out to grasp the hand, but the hand suddenly dropped.
The sound of weeping suddenly filled the room of the "Empress".
Xiao Shenjing grasped the drooping hand. "Yuwei"
The person on the bed had their eyes closed, their face was pale, and they were lifeless.
"Heal her for me!" Xiao Shenjing suddenly roared at the kneeling imperial physician.
The imperial physician rose shakily and, disregarding etiquette, took the patient's pulse with trembling hands.
Finally, with a thud, he touched his head to the ground and said, "Your Majesty, the Empress has passed away."
The palace maids and eunuchs in the room were all lying on the ground, sobbing softly, except for Yunxi, who stood in the middle of the room.
But at that moment, no one in the room had time to pay attention to her.
Xiao Shenjing held Cen Yuwei's hand.
Overwhelmed with regret and hatred, I tried to say something several times, but in the end, I couldn't utter a word.
He thought of the dilapidated temple on Wugong Mountain, where she, as a child, carried him on her back, and it was those hands that pulled him to safety.
And now she's dead.
He died at the hands of his concubine
After what seemed like an eternity, Xiao Shenjing lowered his head and slowly said, "Send the Empress back to Chengqian Palace."
Aunt Xueyu, her face streaked with tears, knelt heavily on both knees: "Your Majesty, please seek justice for Her Majesty the Empress!"
"Your Majesty, please seek justice for the Empress," she said, looking at Yunxi with extremely hostile eyes.
Everyone in the room left.
Xiao Shenjing turned his head, stared at Yun Xi with his cold, sharp eyes, and asked three words, "Why?"
"Whether you believe it or not, she committed suicide," Yunxi said calmly. "Otherwise, what reason would I have to kill her?"
"You're still trying to deny it!" Xiao Shenjing suddenly stood up from the bedside. "You've always been reckless and audacious, acting without thinking at all. You're so impulsive and reckless that you even dared to assassinate me. Is there anything you wouldn't dare to do, Yunxi?"
Staring into Xiao Shenjing's eyes, Yun Xi clenched her fists tightly, but slowly said, "I said it wasn't me, it was her who said she wanted to kill the people of Hongxiuzhao. I had just finished speaking when she smiled at me and took out a knife from her sleeve." Before she could finish speaking, Yun Xi saw Xiao Shenjing stride towards her. "What are you going to do, Xiao Shenjing!"
Dao Erdao and Dao Yi, who were guarding the door, were almost at their most tense.
"Lies, lies, lies!" Xiao Shenjing's eyes were filled with anger. He strode over to Yunxi and grabbed her chin tightly. "You still want to deceive me at a time like this!"
He was furious, his eyes were frighteningly dark.
Yunxi stood still, staring at him warily.
He grew angrier as he spoke, tightening his grip on her neck and saying with a violent expression, "It's my fault. I've repeatedly indulged you, which has led you to commit such a terrible disaster."
In that instant, Yunxi truly saw a fleeting killing intent in his eyes.
"Since you're so clever, why don't you think calmly about why I would kill your empress?" Yunxi stared at him relentlessly and asked, "What benefit would it bring me?"
She asked him in a calm tone she had never used before, with an almost submissive air she had never shown before.
Cen Yuwei is Xiao Shenjing's weakness and his Achilles' heel. Yunxi knows this better than anyone else, and it's obvious that Cen Yuwei knows this too, which is why she framed her in this way.
Yunxi didn't want to die so confusedly.
At the very least, we must not die because of Cen Yuwei's scheming.
Even if she dies, she should die with dignity; she doesn't want to die on her knees!
But Xiao Shenjing couldn't listen to anything at that moment.
Or rather, to him, she was merely a plaything he could tease when he was happy, and discard like trash when he was unhappy.
"Do you think I'll believe you just because you're making excuses like this?" Xiao Shenjing gripped her hand, his veins bulging. "She's the mistress of the six palaces, my empress, and what are you that she would risk her life to frame you?"
He was so strong that Yunxi winced in pain.
As her hand, hanging by her side, repeatedly clenched and unclenched in an attempt to resist, Xiao Shenjing abruptly flung her away.
She staggered and nearly fell.
As she flicked the strands of hair that had fallen across her cheek behind her back, she heard a cold, stern voice above her head: "It's my fault!"
"Guards, bring her to me!"
“Xiao Shenjing!” Yun Xi suddenly interrupted him.
She was then subjected to a variety of punishments.
But what did she do wrong from beginning to end?
She could no longer bear it, her breath trembling with rage. "It was all your fault to begin with. If you hadn't been so forceful and headstrong, why would Empress Cen Yuwei, a mere empress, have resorted to murder to scheme against me?"
"When a person dies, the light goes out. Stop pretending to be virtuous! If you had treated Cen Yuwei well when she was alive, how could she have been so desperate as to use her death to scheme against me?" Yun Xi stared at Xiao Shenjing with angry, red eyes. She even took a step forward. "If it weren't for you, she wouldn't have died. Xiao Shenjing, you forced her to her death with your own hands."
"Xiao Shenjing, you killed her with your own hands!"
A vein throbbed on Xiao Shenjing's forehead, and he suddenly raised his hand to slap Yunxi across the face.
Yunxi neither dodged nor avoided the situation, but instead looked up at the sky.
She could take this blow in order to survive.
Only by surviving could she escape this disgusting, damp place.
She wanted to live; she didn't want to rot in a place like this.
Xiao Shenjing looked at her, but ultimately did not strike.
He clenched his fist, then suddenly turned around and said, "Throw Yunxi into the Cold Palace for me."
Yun Xi took a very subtle, almost imperceptible deep breath.
It's just the Cold Palace; at least I can survive. As long as I can survive, I can escape.
When Yunxi was "invited" away by the eunuch, Xiao Shenjing looked at Yunxi with a fierceness that he was trying his best to suppress.
It's just a cold palace.
For her, it was just a change of scenery to enjoy herself. Once she was out of his sight, she would never be content and would always try to escape again.
He stared at Yunxi's back and pronounced almost word by word: "Use iron chains to bind his limbs, and nail his seven-inch mark to the doors and windows of the Yongxiang Palace."
Yunxi turned to look at Xiao Shenjing in disbelief.
He stood against the light, his gaze like a poisoned arrow.
It was as if he wished he could pierce her heart with a thousand arrows right then and there.
"He shall never leave without an imperial edict."
The violent voice sounded so sinister and terrifying.
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