Chapter 143 Xie Yun's Disappointment with Empress Zheng
She slapped him across the face. Xie Yunyang didn't dodge. The nail guards on Empress Zheng's little and ring fingers grazed his cheek, leaving two thin red marks.
It hurts like fire.
It's nothing compared to the pain in my heart.
The moment Empress Zheng raised her hand, he already knew the answer to his question.
"He's your own brother, what do you mean by this?!"
Empress Zheng's hands trembled, and the palace servants around her all knelt down, not daring to look at the mother and son any longer.
The Empress struck the Crown Prince!
Xie Yunyang received the slap, but instead of saying anything, she smiled faintly.
A few drops of blood seeped from her slightly flushed cheeks. Although it was daytime, a sense of melancholy, belonging to the night, arose for no reason. She looked up, her eyes calm and indifferent.
Empress Zheng was taken aback again. Xie Yun was always gentle, and even when she was being lectured, she would remain silent. She had never been like this before.
Startled by his cold gaze, Empress Zheng's trembling heart calmed down. She seemed to realize what she had done, looked at her hand, and grabbed Xie Yunyang's arm: "Yang'er, Mother... Mother didn't mean it, it's just..."
Xie Yunyang remained calm, showing no emotion even when she saw Empress Zheng's panic. She simply asked her, "Cuilan, is she one of your people?"
Empress Zheng keenly noticed that Xie Yun-shang had stopped using honorifics.
It only took a few short sentences to go from "you" to "you (formal)".
Loss of control, panic, fear—many emotions I'd never felt before flashed through my mind in an instant, as if something was slipping away.
But no matter how many fleeting emotions there are, they can't outweigh that one thing.
What are you saying?
Empress Zheng calmed down and coldly rebuked him, "I don't know where you heard this news from. Did those two from Yuqing Palace tell you? I've already told you to stay away from them. You are the Crown Prince; you need to stand up for yourself. Don't spend your days associating with those insignificant people, hanging around with just anyone! I haven't even said anything yet, but didn't you go to—"
"Where is Sheng Sheng? Why did you want to harm her?"
Empress Zheng's words came to an abrupt halt, stuck in her throat.
Seeing that something was wrong, Caiyun quickly said, "Your Highness, how could Her Majesty want to harm the Second Princess? Her Majesty and the Princess have only met a few times, how could she..."
Xie Yun closed his eyes briefly and exhaled deeply. "That's enough."
The boy's hands, hanging by his sides, clenched into fists. Although he already knew the answer, seeing it with his own eyes brought a different feeling.
Xie Yunyang thought of many things in that instant: grievance, helplessness, anger, disappointment...
Has she considered him when she does this?
Putting aside the fact that Empress Zheng never considered whether Xie Yun-yang actually wanted to do anything, Xie Yun-yang was born into the royal family and was expected to shoulder responsibilities, and he tried his best.
However, he never felt that the price of ascending the throne was losing his family and friends!
Empress Zheng is trying to harm Sheng Sheng, to hurt his own sister. Has she ever considered how he would face Sheng Sheng and Xie Yunchuan if she really killed him?
Or perhaps she never thought about any of this, and was only seeking revenge for Xie Yunyang—her deceased third brother—a revenge that didn't even exist?
Xie Yun suddenly opened her eyes, turned around and left.
Empress Zheng was first provoked into hitting him, and then she was flustered by Cuilan's matter, and didn't realize the current situation at all.
As Xie Yun turned to leave, she instinctively wanted to stop him, but she was the Empress, the mother of the nation, and Xie Yun was acting like a prince.
"Stop right there!"
Caiyun could easily see that Xie Yun must have found out something, and she anxiously tried to tell Empress Zheng to stop talking like that, but Empress Zheng was like a wild horse that had broken free of its reins, and she couldn't stop her from speaking.
"Do you even respect me as your mother anymore?! From childhood to adulthood, I've given you whatever you wanted. I only have one request of you: to be a good Crown Prince. How could you—"
"Mother."
Xie Yun stopped in her tracks, didn't turn around, and called out calmly, with a hint of determination.
Empress Zheng was taken aback and suddenly didn't want him to continue.
She felt that if she let him continue talking now, something would break free from her grasp and she would never be able to hold onto it again.
But she couldn't stop Xie Yun.
“You used to call me Ah Yang. You called me Yang’er, which means Third Brother.”
Although the two words have different tones, Empress Zheng seemed completely unaware and continued to call her that for six years.
For the previous nine years, she had always called him "Ah-Yang".
At this moment, Xie Yunyang had to admit that Empress Zheng's obsession was truly too deep.
He understood Empress Zheng's pain and longing for her lost son as a mother, and he also loved and missed his younger brother very much.
But this doesn't mean he has to endlessly tolerate her treating him like her deceased brother, nor does it mean he can tolerate her using this as an excuse to hurt others.
She could rely on him for the rest of her life, but he hoped she would respect him.
If Empress Zheng had done even one of these things, the mother and son would not be in this situation today.
For the past six years, Xie Yun-yang has always compromised.
The incident involving Sheng Sheng was merely a trigger, something that made him unable to tolerate it any longer.
After saying that, Xie Yun walked out of Kunning Palace without looking back, and no matter how much Empress Zheng called out to her after she came to her senses, she did not stop walking.
...
Two days later, news of Empress Zheng hiring someone to commit murder suddenly spread throughout the palace.
Subsequently, someone anonymously presented the details of how Empress Zheng bribed Cuilan through Granny Wu, including Cuilan's indenture and the message found in the Empress's palace.
Xie Yuxiao was furious and ordered Empress Zheng to be placed under house arrest in Kunning Palace. He confiscated her imperial seal, handed over the power to manage the six palaces to Consort Rong, and lifted the confinement of Consort Jing.
Everyone assumed that Xie Yun-yang would plead for Empress Zheng, but she did not.
Even Sheng Sheng thought so.
Xiao Tuanzi was once very worried that Xie Yunchuan and Xie Yunyang's relationship would sour, but to everyone's surprise, the two continued to get along as usual, without any change.
Sheng Sheng knew that Xie Yunchuan must have released that message in the palace, and that he was also the one who anonymously presented the evidence.
Sheng Sheng nudged Xiao Hei and asked him, "Xiao Hei, do you know how your brother found out about those things?"
Xiao Hei ate his cheese and shook his head: "I don't know. I was only responsible for moving things into that room. You know, I can't read, so I don't know what's written on it."
Sheng Sheng pouted and propped her head up with her hand: "Well, at least the bad guys got punished. Being under house arrest all the time... must be so boring."
Sheng Sheng didn't mean to sympathize with or pity her; she simply thought it would be very boring to spend her whole life in an empty palace.
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