In the main hall of Dongyou Temple, the candles had been extinguished, leaving only one lamp with a lampshade placed under the eaves for the servants on night duty to walk around.
The courtyard gate had long been locked, and Xiao Shunzi, who was in charge of guarding the gate tonight, was dozing off in the small hut by the gate with a quilt in his arms. Unexpectedly, in the dark of night, someone knocked on the door.
Xiao Shunzi suddenly woke up and jumped up to open the door—he almost guessed who it was, so he knelt down the moment he opened the door.
Yinzhen took two steps past him and then stopped, but instead of calling out, he asked the person next to him, "Is it him?"
"Reporting to Your Majesty, it was him!" Zhang Defu quickly replied, then, seeing the look in Yinzhen's eyes, he understood and kicked Xiao Shunzi, "Tell me, what were you trying to do with the Prince just now!"
"This servant, this servant didn't mean to do anything!" Xiao Shunzi was terrified. He never expected that the prince had seen him. He didn't dare to move after being kicked and immediately knelt down on the spot. "Your Highness, please understand, this servant didn't do anything!"
"Why are you following me?" Yinzhen asked coldly.
Xiao Shunzi trembled. He dared not lie to Yinzhen, but he also did not want to betray his master. After hesitating for a moment, he began to kowtow repeatedly without saying a word.
Yinzhen disliked watching people do these things, so he gave Su Peisheng a look and went inside.
Su Peisheng took a slight breath, a smile playing on his lips, and helped Xiao Shunzi up with both hands: "Good little brother, come on, tell your big brother..."
Green Cloud, who was on night duty under the eaves, had just seen the courtyard gate open when she went to call Qingxue. As soon as Qingxue saw Yinzhen arrive, she rushed in to call Qian Shengyan, but it was too late.
As soon as Yinzhen entered, he saw Qian Shengyan, still half asleep and pulled up by Qing Xuesheng, standing unsteadily, seemingly trying to bow to him. Looking at her half-closed eyes, he was both annoyed and amused: "Never mind."
"Thank you...Master..." Qian Shengyan mumbled, as if she had woken up. Qingxue loosened her grip slightly, but Qian Shengyan suddenly fell onto the bed and leaned backward due to inertia.
Qingxue was startled, but it was too late when she reached out again. Qian Shengyan pressed down on her back, causing a child's "woo-wah" to escape!
Qian Shengyan was fully awake now. She nimbly rolled over onto her stomach on the bed, carefully patting Yuan Shou with both hands, saying, "Oh, good boy, don't cry, don't cry, Mommy's here..."
"..." Yinzhen rubbed his temples with a headache, glanced at Qingxue who looked very guilty, and said nothing. He waved for someone to come and change his nightgown.
At this moment, Su Peisheng walked in, helping him comb his hair while reporting Xiao Shunzi's words.
After hearing this, Yinzhen felt even more helpless. Even though he knew Qian Shengyan wasn't cunning, he couldn't have guessed that she would be... so foolish!
He seems like a very insightful person, yet he always seems to do some inexplicably silly things.
The servants all withdrew, and Qingxue led people to carry Yuanshou away. Qian Shengyan, who had regained consciousness, sat on the bed in a plain white nightgown, her fingers nervously gripping the crimson curtains. When she saw Yinzhen sit down, she quickly put on a smile: "Your Highness, this servant... this servant is just afraid of the cold. Yuanshou is so warm, like a little stove."
"Hmm." Yinzhen actually knew that she was sure he had gone to the main courtyard and thought he wouldn't come back, so she was not very angry. A mother's love for her son is a matter of course, and he had no reason to pursue Qian Shengyan's actions. He even felt gratified.
He sat on the edge of the bed, and Qian Shengyan moved closer, still looking at him with some hesitation: "Why did you suddenly..."
"You sent Xiao Shunzi to stop me, wasn't it because you wanted me to come over?" Yinzhen glanced at her, his tone subtle.
Qian Shengyan was startled upon hearing this and quickly sat up straight: "This servant did not!"
"No? Xiao Shunzi confessed, saying you told him to stop me as soon as I entered the backyard..."
"I didn't ask him to stop me! I just wanted to see where Master went!" Qian Shengyan felt wronged and wished she could swear to the heavens, "Even if you gave me another chance, I wouldn't dare to stop Master!"
"Oh? Then why do you want to know where I went to rest?" Yinzhen raised an eyebrow, then immediately cut her off. "It couldn't be to hold our son while we slept, could it? Wasn't I warm enough?"
Qian Shengyan: ...
Seeing those slender white fingers frantically gripping the bed curtains again, Yinzhen narrowed his phoenix eyes: "Hmm?"
"Master...this servant, this servant..." Qian Shengyan hesitated. Although she had already decided to meddle in the Fifth Prince's affairs if Yinzhen came, she didn't know how to say it. Seeing the encouraging look in Yinzhen's eyes, she gritted her teeth and said, "This servant went to see the Fifth Prince today. That child...is too thin..."
"Hmm." Speaking of the Fifth Prince, Yinzhen could only sigh, "Imperial Physician Li has already examined him; it's a congenital weakness."
"Ah..." Since the imperial physician has said that, should she continue?
Qian Shengyan's hesitation seemed even more genuine to Yinzhen, and he couldn't help but smile slightly, raising his hand to grasp Qian Shengyan's hand that was gripping the curtain: "What's wrong?"
“This servant…” Qian Shengyan bit her lip, recalling the Fifth Prince’s thin neck and big head, and finally said, “When this servant gave birth to Yuanshou, there was no one by my side, and I didn’t understand anything. When Yuanshou was a month old, his face was yellow. One day, this servant took him up the mountain to find food, and we happened to meet an old lady…”
The old woman, Qian Shengyan, who had created the idiom "nothing out of nothing," recounted all the methods for treating jaundice she knew from her previous life, including eating more and defecating more, getting more sun exposure, and burping the baby after feeding to prevent spitting up, etc.
Qian Shengyan rattled off all the methods she knew for raising a baby. She didn't know if the Fifth Prince was weak in the womb, but the few problems she could see were definitely correctable.
She finished speaking in one breath, no longer looking at Yinzhen's expression. She lowered her head, one hand held by Yinzhen, the other clutching the tassel on the pillow, feeling that she might really be a big fool.
Why should she worry about her competitor's child? Besides, if things go wrong after she does what he says, wouldn't that be even more trouble for him?
But... it's still more reassuring to say it out loud.
Her hand, which was holding the tassel, suddenly paused. She looked up at Yinzhen in disbelief: "Your Highness..."
Before she could finish speaking, all the buttons on her nightgown were undone, and both her hands were grabbed and pressed onto the pillow...
The next day, when Qian Shengyan woke up, she heard that Yinzhen got up early and went to the main courtyard before entering the palace. She didn't know what he said, but Wu Mama from the main courtyard followed him out through the side gate. She didn't know what she went to do.
Qian Shengyan didn't care about any of that. She had done her best and had a clear conscience. When she played with Yuan Shou again, she felt much more at ease, making the chubby little boy laugh like a little goose, swaying back and forth as he sat there.
A few days later, the Emperor returned to the capital, and Yinzhen became even busier. He often returned to his residence in the middle of the night and went out again after resting for less than two hours.
For more than ten days, she did not come to the back courtyard. It was not until a few days before the Golden Festival that Ulanara's illness finally improved and she was willing to see people. She first sent someone to see the scriptures copied by Li, then inquired about Geng's health, and finally specially sent Wu Mama to Dongyou Courtyard to deliver new clothes to Yuanshou and inform her of the rules for entering the palace on the Golden Festival.
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