At night, Yinreng sat in the warm room, waiting for that moment to come.
As soon as midnight passed, eunuchs started calling outside.
"The Empress Dowager has passed away!" Yinreng stood up and rushed out of the room without any hesitation.
Even though water was freezing in the winter night, the Forbidden City was already in motion. Yinreng ran all the way to the Cining Palace, and as soon as he entered, he saw Kangxi slumped in front of Xiaozhuang's bed with a dejected look on his face.
Yinreng didn't say anything. He walked straight to Xiaozhuang's bed, knelt down, buried his head on the ground, and his tears quickly wet a small area of the floor tile.
When Kangxi saw his action, he suddenly laughed. Regardless of the tears streaming down his face, he got up and rushed over to pull Yinreng.
"Why are you kneeling? I'm asking you why you're kneeling! Mama is still alive, she's just asleep! She'll wake up soon!"
Yinreng let him tear it apart without saying a word.
Liang Jiugong didn't care about being sad when he saw this, he got up from the ground and went to support Kangxi. He was worried that Kangxi would hurt Yinreng and then get angry again.
"Your Majesty, this is the Crown Prince..."
Kangxi struggled hard, shook off Liang Jiugong's arm, and then kicked him.
"Bang!"
Liang Jiugong was kicked and fell several steps away. He lay on the ground but didn't even dare to groan.
Kangxi looked like a madman, pointing at the servants kneeling around him.
"You... have all lied to me! Traitors! All of you are traitors! Come on, drag them all away and chop them off!"
Then, Kangxi took off his shoes and socks, stood barefoot and with disheveled hair, and scolded and cursed.
No matter how Kangxi made a fuss, Yinreng knelt upright on the ground.
In his previous life, he rushed forward to persuade Kangxi with a few words, but was slapped twice in return, so he did nothing in this life.
Let Kangxi do whatever he wants.
In less than half an hour, he had no strength left.
At this time, the concubines in the harem and the older princes and princesses had also arrived and were kneeling outside the bedroom.
The Cining Palace was surrounded by people.
After Kangxi regained some sense, he told everyone to get out.
Only then did the Queen Mother muster up the courage to offer a few words of advice.
Kangxi closed his eyes in pain, and finally gathered some spirits. He asked the concubines to take the young princes and princesses back to their own palaces.
He also asked the eunuchs in charge of funeral ceremonies in the Imperial Household Department to change Empress Xiaozhuang's clothes and make her look solemn.
Kangxi just stood aside, not saying a word.
In this way, Yinreng stayed with Kangxi until the hour of Mao.
It was only after members of the royal family, led by Prince Yu Fuquan, entered the palace that Yinreng was rescued.
By this time he could no longer stand.
In fact, for Yinreng, the relationship between him and Xiaozhuang was lost again, so Xiaozhuang's death in this life was a much heavier blow to him than in his previous life.
He willingly knelt in the Cining Palace for several hours. Even when Xiaozhuang's body was carried into the mourning hall, he followed behind obediently and then kept vigil for Xiaozhuang.
There was a cushion in the mourning hall, which did not cause much damage to Yinreng's knees, but it did cause blood circulation in his legs to be blocked, causing his legs to become numb and weak and unable to stand.
Seeing Yinreng in this state, Fuquan and others nodded secretly.
Kangxi had not had a good night's sleep since December, so his condition was even worse at the moment.
Fuquan sighed, went up to comfort Kangxi, then turned around and told Yinreng to eat something first, otherwise it would be disrespectful to faint in front of the coffin.
When Yinreng heard the words "great disrespect", he obediently went downstairs to have breakfast.
When Yinreng appeared in the mourning hall again in a plain robe, he found that all the concubines and princes and princesses had also arrived.
Among the crowd, the obese Concubine De was very eye-catching.
In fact, Defei knew about her pregnancy long before she went to Changchun Garden to escape the summer heat. She wanted to find an opportunity to mention this to Kangxi, but she was not on the accompanying list, which made her very unhappy. Later, she thought that the living space in Changchun Garden was too small and there were too many people. She was afraid that something might happen to the baby in her belly, so she endured it for a few days.
It was only after Kangxi went to Changchun Garden that he told the imperial physician that she was pregnant.
When the summer vacation ended and Kangxi returned to the Forbidden City, Concubine De's belly was already slightly bulging.
And thanks to the child in her belly, Kangxi's attitude towards her actually became much better.
Yinreng sometimes admired her very much. As long as Defei wanted to do something, there was rarely anything she couldn't do.
Fourteen will be born in about half a month.
Yinreng walked to his own cushion and knelt down, then picked up the paper money and threw it into the brazier bit by bit.
At this time, Kangxi should be discussing funeral matters with the Ministry of Clan Affairs and the Ministry of Rites.
According to etiquette, the funeral should have been completed within the year, but Kangxi refused. He did not want Xiaozhuang to be buried so hastily, so he directly ordered the Ministry of Rites to extend the wake time.
He also required all women of the third rank and above in the capital to enter the palace to keep vigil for Empress Xiaozhuang.
In addition, all civil and military officials in the court and ordinary people had to keep vigil at home.
From the day of the Empress Dowager's death, people had to eat vegetarian food and wear plain clothes for the next hundred days. They were not allowed to have their hair cut, feast or have fun. And they were not allowed to slaughter animals within forty-nine days.
The vigil in the palace lasted for more than twenty days before Xiaozhuang's funeral was officially held.
During this period, Kangxi cut off his braids to express his grief over Xiaozhuang's death.
His fourteenth son, the famous General Wang in history books, was also born safely during this period.
In fact, given Defei's situation, she could have asked Emperor Kangxi for leave. After all, her pregnancy was indeed on the verge of delivery. But Defei gritted her teeth and held on, never complaining.
On the day she gave birth to her fourteenth child, she felt unwell as soon as she woke up in the morning, so she sent someone to ask for leave from Emperor Kangxi.
This action also completely eliminated the resentment that Kangxi had towards her.
Since Fourteenth's third day bath happened to be during the wake, Concubine De asked someone to hold a simple ceremony in the palace.
Kangxi felt guilty and later picked out a lot of good things from his private storehouse and gave them to Concubine De.
Because of Empress Xiaozhuang's will before her death, she did not want to waste money and manpower to transport her coffin back to Shengjing to be buried with Emperor Taizong Wen, and only wanted to guard Kangxi and his father Shunzhi.
So Kangxi demolished the newly built palaces in the Cining Palace and moved them outside the imperial mausoleum, calling it the "Zan'an Fengdian" as the place where Xiaozhuang's body was placed.
He would bury Mama when he had decided where to build Xiaozhuang's tomb.
After Xiaozhuang's funeral, it was the end of February.
According to the rules, Xiaozhuang was Kangxi's grandmother, and he was required to observe mourning for her for one year after her death. However, he refused and insisted on mourning for her for twenty-seven months. All the civil and military officials in the court advised him to take care of his health and put the affairs of the court first.
So he followed the advice and changed his way of mourning to using the day instead of the moon.
As for his children, he ordered them to observe mourning for one year.
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