“Tick…”
The water droplets fell into the water tank in the yard, making a slight sound, but did not liven up the atmosphere in the yard.
It had just rained and the air was still filled with a damp smell. Lin Chunhuan stood under the porch, watching the water droplets falling from the eaves, without moving for a long time.
"Your Majesty, the princess hasn't eaten for the whole day. Please go and persuade her." Caiyun was holding a tray with her master's favorite food on it.
But today, these things were delivered and returned intact, without being touched at all.
Caiyun saw it and was anxious, but she had no idea what to do and could only place her hope on Chang Huaijin.
But Chang Huaijin just shook his head when he heard this. "This incident has had a huge impact on Ah Huan. She can't accept it right now. I'm afraid no one can persuade her."
"But." Caiyun bit her lip, her eyes full of confusion. "My Lord, what is going on? Why is the Princess like this?"
"Please talk to me, I might be able to come up with some solution."
Hearing this, Chang Huaijin turned around slightly, stared at the colorful clouds in front of him for a long time, and said inexplicably, "Others may not know, but you."
"Caiyun, you know about the sharing of wives, right?"
At first, Caiyun was still confused, as if she didn't understand what Chang Huaijin was saying at all, but the moment she said the word "shared wife".
Caiyun's face turned pale. She looked at Chang Huaijin and took several deep breaths before turning her gaze in the direction of Lin Chunhuan. "So the eldest princess is like this now. Has she already known about the sharing of wives?"
"Who told her? How much does she know? Was it Princess Lingyan?"
Caiyun became more and more excited as she spoke, and for a moment she seemed to have forgotten where Lin Chunhuan was standing. In fact, he was not far away, and he would be able to hear her as long as she spoke louder.
Caiyun didn't come back to her senses until she saw Chang Huaijin looking behind her in silence. She turned around stiffly and met Lin Chunhuan's eyes, who had already walked behind her.
His grip loosened and the tray of food shattered onto the floor.
"I do know about the sharing of wives." Caiyun took a deep breath, knelt forward and grabbed the corner of Lin Chunhuan's clothes, "Please forgive me, Princess. I didn't mean to hide it from you."
"It's just that... I know your temper, and I can't bear to see you suffer, so I followed the Emperor's orders and led you out of the palace."
Lin Chunhuan opened his mouth slightly, but found that even his throat was so sore that he couldn't speak. "Tell me everything you know, without leaving a single word."
"From now on, you don't have to wait on me."
Caiyun kowtowed quickly.
Looking at Lin Chunhuan's expression, it was clear that she already knew the truth, so Caiyun no longer had any need to hide it. "It was the day you met Shen Yuming."
"That day, I deliberately coaxed you out of the palace, because that was the day the Yihe tribe came to our court to demand someone."
Before the establishment of the Sheng Kingdom, the largest force in this land was the Yihe tribe.
Although the Sheng Kingdom was established later, the Yihe tribe not only had the merit of following the emperor, but also had a large clan. At that time, there were many things in ruins and many places needed to be built. Emperor Sheng named the tribe leader the King of Yihe and allocated a large piece of land to them, allowing them to continue their previous way of life.
Ideological assimilation needs to be gradual, and at that time, all Emperor Sheng could do was try his best to appease all parties.
There is nothing wrong with this, but this land was really in chaos in the past. In order to avoid starvation, girls who were born weaker were almost destined to become food from birth.
When the wars stopped and cannibalism ceased to exist, there were not many women left in the Yihe tribe.
In addition, the Yihe people have always had a system of sharing wives. After the establishment of the new dynasty, they are no longer allowed to snatch women from outside. They can only take turns using one woman.
After this situation continued for a period of time, finally, the first deformed child appeared in the Yihe tribe.
Seeing the child with four arms but no legs, the Yihe tribe members panicked. They began to understand that they could not sleep with their daughters and sisters, and they realized that they had to find a woman who was not related to them by blood to have children.
But how could the Yihe tribe have so many unrelated women?
Therefore, they began to test the bottom line of the imperial court by robbing women from outside to give birth to children. However, there were hundreds of thousands of people in the Yihe tribe, and the problem could not be solved by robbing one or two people.
When there are too many people, they are bound to provoke some people who cannot be offended. After triggering several large-scale fights, they finally attracted the attention of the court.
"The Emperor had only been on the throne for a few years at the time, and was helpless when faced with such a situation. There was nothing wrong with the Yihe people wanting to reproduce, but outsiders were unwilling to marry their daughters to a place where women were not treated as human beings. The situation was at a stalemate for a while."
"Later, someone came up with the idea of having the imperial court select and send ten women to the Yihe tribe every year as part of a marriage alliance. Only then was the matter settled."
As Caiyun spoke, Lin Chunhuan sneered coldly, "During wartime, they considered women a burden and treated them as food. Now when they need women, they go and snatch treasures from others. This Yihe tribe really has the nerve."
Before, Lin Chunhuan had only heard some of what Mrs. Chang said.
Mrs. Chang knew this because she was one of the people who were almost kidnapped by the Yihe tribe. Lin Chunhuan also knew what happened afterwards.
The people of the Yihe tribe failed to capture Mrs. Chang, but instead took Aunt Jiang away. Aunt Jiang was injured because of this incident and could no longer have children.
But it was because she was infertile that Aunt Jiang was abandoned at the foot of the mountain. Otherwise, Aunt Jiang today would probably be one of the women suffering in the Yihe tribe.
"It's not that easy." Chang Huaijin took a long breath. "This method is okay at the beginning. There are always people who are willing to send their daughters to suffer for money and power. But as time goes by, such people are hard to find."
Caiyun nodded, agreeing with Chang Huaijin's words, "Your Highness is right. So when this so-called marriage entered its third year, the voices of dissatisfaction among the people grew louder and louder, and it looked like a riot was about to break out. The Emperor had no choice but to announce that the royal family would set an example."
"Every ten years, a royal woman will be sent along for marriage."
"It's just that women in the royal family do have some privileges. As soon as the next one arrives, the previous one can leave. If they are lucky, they may be able to live an ordinary life when they return. Compared to others, they still have hope."
Caiyun said, secretly looking up at Lin Chunhuan, "The first one is the emperor's sister, Princess Jing'an."
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