Today is the day when Kyoto ushers in a new prosperous scene.
Tributes from all nations flowed along the streets toward the palace, while soldiers filled the streets. In the courtyard, the Qianniu Guards in scarlet brocade robes were lined up, and among them hundreds of officials offered birthday tributes. There were bursts of bells, gongs and drums, and the court officials shouted "Long live the emperor" in unison.
The emperor, wearing a crown and robes, ascended the throne. The current emperor was young and had no children yet. In previous years, the regent Xie Shiguan was usually the first to come forward to pay his respects at the grand court meeting.
But this year was different. The first person to step forward was Taifu Man, while Prince Yan, who should have been in the second seat on the right, was nowhere to be seen.
The Minister of Revenue Chen Mingjun, who came next to pay his respects, turned slightly and exchanged glances with the Minister of Justice next to him. Both of them saw some confusion in each other's eyes.
"Why is Jingzhou all here?" Chen Mingjun whispered, "Why didn't Prince Yan come today?"
"Who knows?" The Minister of Justice held an ivory tablet in his hand. Hearing this, he glanced at the hall again and whispered carefully in his ear, "I heard that on New Year's Eve yesterday, before midnight, the King of Yan came out of the palace. The merchants along the street lit lanterns to see him off. Many people saw that the King of Yan had his head cut open, and there was blood all over his forehead!"
Chen Mingjun was also surprised and murmured, "How could it be?"
"To be with the emperor is like being with a tiger," the Minister of Justice sighed softly, "He even asked for leave for the New Year's Day meeting. I heard that he was too sick to get out of bed. I'm afraid the Prince of Yan has really displeased the emperor this time."
Chen Mingjun didn't believe what he said. He lowered his voice and said, "Dislike? I don't think so. How can Xie Ling be defeated so easily?"
"Although the Saint is young, it does not mean that he has no power. After all, the Miao family is his mother's family, and Miao Zongping is the Saint's uncle. If it were you, who would you help?"
Chen Mingjun looked towards the hall. The young emperor was wearing a heavy crown with colorful tassels hanging in front and behind him. His face was covered with a layer of powder, which made him look paler and thinner.
When he stepped forward to wish him a happy birthday, he keenly noticed that there was a faint red in the emperor's eyes and a hint of blue-gray under his eyes, as if he had not slept all night.
Prince Yan was injured and had taken leave, but the emperor in front of him looked even more haggard than him.
With just one glance, Chen Mingjun knew that Xie Shiguan would not fall, and could not fall.
At this moment, Xie Shiguan, who was "too sick to get up", was having breakfast in the side hall of the palace. The wound on his brow bone had already scabbed over, with only a faint purple circle around it.
Shen was setting the table on the side when he heard Shen Xiangzhi and Xie Shiguan, who had just returned from outside, report: "Your Highness, it is said outside today that Prince Yan has lost power. There are a few short-sighted people in the Ministry of Justice who went to make friends with the Miao family after the court session."
Xie Shiguan raised his eyebrows slightly, but didn't take it to heart at all: "They are well-informed, but they are just a bunch of fence-sitters who change their stance according to the wind. It would be better if they changed their stance."
He paused, and then ordered Shen Que: "Tell the people from the outer palace to take down the red silk and colored lanterns on the gate of the palace."
Shen was a little confused, but he didn't ask any more questions and nodded obediently.
"Xiangzhi," Xie Shiguan looked at Shen Xiangzhi again, playing with the white jade chopstick pillow on the table in his hand nonchalantly, "arrange a few more people there to whisper a few words to those idiots in the Miao family and add fuel to the fire."
Having said that, Shen seemed to understand what Xie Shiguan was going to do.
After the falling out between the emperor and his ministers in the palace last night, the young emperor felt guilty towards Xie Shiguan. And the news of Prince Yan's loss of power would surely reach the emperor's ears. If at this time... the Miao family would take advantage of the situation to step on Xie Shiguan.
Too much is as bad as too little; everything will turn into the opposite when it reaches its extreme.
The more proud the Miao party was, the more guilty the emperor felt towards Xie Shiguan.
Shen Que's mind gradually became clear, but he was still a little scared. He didn't have a strong heart like the prince. After returning from the palace last night, he was so scared that he didn't dare to close his eyes all night.
He probably would never be able to handle a heavy task as lightly as the Yan Wang in his life. Even when he almost broke up with the emperor, he could still smile. The change of power, the rise and fall, in the eyes of the prince, was probably just a good show.
He was in the play, but his heart was outside of it. He looked coldly at the characters and souls in the play, like a golden Buddha, so gorgeous and yet so ruthless.
After finishing his shift, Shen Que picked up the New Year's goods that the little actor left behind yesterday, took a donkey cart to the vicinity of Pingkangli, and asked for directions from a merchant. When the old man selling Hu Bing saw him say "opera house" in his mouth, he smiled and said, "You are here too early, the opera troupe will not come until nightfall. When it gets dark, they will set up the stage on those pleasure boats. Look - that is the lake."
Shen looked in the direction he pointed, and saw a few boats parked sparsely on the lake, making it look a little deserted.
So Shen turned back, shook his head, and said, "I'll find someone."
The old man must have been old and his eyesight was very poor. His eyeballs were almost close to his lips before he finally understood what he meant: "Hey, you said you were here to look for someone. There are many opera troupes here. Who are you looking for? To the north is Boss Yun's Jingshui Tower, and to the south is Boss Xu's Tingli Pavilion..."
Hearing the word "Xu", Shen raised his hand to interrupt him and asked in lip language: "Xu Sixian?"
The old man clapped his hands and said, "Yes, it is Mr. Xu's name."
He paused for a moment, then winked at Chen: "Sir, I have been chatting with you for so long that I have delayed your business. Do you think that..."
Shen understood what he meant, and very politely took out four coins from his purse and handed them to him. The old man immediately smiled and wrapped two Hu pancakes for him, and then pointed the way cheerfully: "Look, it's there, just walk another half a mile south and you'll arrive."
He walked quite fast and was in a hurry to return something, so he arrived in a short while.
There was a large house on the side of the road, with a wooden carving of an oriole perched on each door knocker. Unlike the palace that looked very imposing at first glance, this house had a unique elegance.
Shen stood in front of the door for a while, and just as he was about to ring the doorknob, he heard the door creak and was opened from the inside.
The visitor was a young girl with wispy bangs hanging down on her full forehead. Her face was only half-done in makeup. It was a very cold day, but she was only wearing a cherry pink costume with long sleeves.
"Who are you looking for?" She raised her head and stared at Shen Que, speaking in a crisp voice.
Shen was a little stunned for a moment, and after a while he opened his mouth: "Sixian."
The little girl seemed a little curious and murmured, "Why don't you speak out loud? Do you have to take care of your voice like the class owner?"
Shen didn't say anything, but followed her in. The little girl stopped in front of a room and called out delicately outside the door: "Boss, your lover is here, and she has brought a lot of gifts!"
Before she finished her words, a man came out of the room and pinched her ear: "Next time I hear you talking nonsense, I'll slap you in the face!"
The little girl cried out "Ouch!" and covered her ears with both hands, mumbling: "I didn't come here to listen to the opera, and I had a bunch of things in my hands, and I went straight into your room. If not my lover, then who else could it be?"
Xu Sixian pretended to hit her, but when she saw Shen was staring at her, she stopped and glanced at him coldly: "Come in."
The furnishings in his room can be called luxurious. There is a basin of large red coral on the table in the hall. Seeing Chen staring at the coral, the little actor laughed self-deprecatingly: "Is it beautiful? It was given by Eunuch An in the uterus a few days ago. These eunuchs are more generous than the officials."
Shen said nothing, but felt the shocking red of the basin of coral in his eyes.
As if he had guessed what he was thinking, he stepped forward and touched the coral basin with his fingertips: "Do you think I am willing? An old, smelly eunuch, reeking of urine, unable to be a man, so I beat him up... But if I don't get close to him, my life will be even worse."
"The situation of the opera singer Xiaochang," Xu Sixian sat down next to the coral pot, "you people will never understand."
But what he said was wrong. Before entering the palace, the human trafficker had wanted to send Chen Que to a brothel. After all, his physique was different from that of ordinary people. If he was sent to a brothel, he could be considered a rare plaything.
Fortunately, he was poorly clothed and fed when he was young, was stunted, dark and thin, did not look pretty at all, and was also mute. Even if he was sold to a brothel, he would be despised. Fortunately, he was lucky enough to be bought back by Xie Shiguan, thus avoiding all these disasters.
However, Shen put the things he left at the palace, along with the two Hu cakes he had just bought, on the table.
Just as he put it down, he heard the laughter of several children outside the window. He looked out and saw the little girl who had opened the door for him just now.
"They also want to..." Shen Que slowly moved his hands, and halfway through the gesture, he suddenly couldn't ask any more.
Xu Sixian couldn't understand his sign language, but she could read his eyes: "What do you want to hear? Is there anyone here who is clean? There was also someone with a hot temper who refused to go, offended the official, and was forced to drink a bowl of raw lacquer, which poisoned his voice and made him insane. In the cold winter of last year, I don't know where he froze to death."
When he said this, his eyes were indifferent, as if he was talking about something very ordinary.
Shen's eyes widened, thinking of the little girl just now, and he lip-synched: "But how old are they?"
As if she felt that he was naive, Xu Sixian sneered and leaned down, leaning her whole body on the soft couch: "You know, you dumb, I went on stage when I was ten years old, and I was only eleven years old when I was named by a powerful master."
"No matter who you are, as long as you end up in this brothel, there is only this path to take, only this way of life to choose. If you want to be 'innocent', you should hit your head on the stage before going on stage. You can either shed blood or tears in this life."
He paused, tears welling up in his eyes, "I am a coward and I dare not face death, so I have no choice but to live in disgrace."
"Go now," the little actor wiped away her tears and turned her face away from him, "Be good to Dingxiang'er. He is the only child who left here with a clean conscience. If you don't treat him well, everyone in Tingli Pavilion will fight you to the death."
After Xu Sixian left that day, Yuanzhi mentioned to him the past events in Tingli Pavilion, saying that Sixian and his mother were a very close pair of senior and junior sisters. His mother was much older than Sixian, so she always took good care of him.
The two, one a Qingyi and the other a Huadan, agreed to act together forever and stay together until old age.
But who could have known that the vows made in youth could not be kept? Later, Huadan fell in love with the businessman who often came to flatter her. After only a few months, she entered his house without Sixian's knowledge and became his concubine.
For this reason, Si Xian even tried to commit suicide for a while, but his senior sister was already married to another man and was pregnant with an "illegitimate child", so he couldn't let her die.
He is the loneliest person in Tingli Pavilion, just because he is in the theater and still longs for a true heart that will never change.
After hearing this story, Shen Que felt more sympathy and pity for him. He also knew that he was not really attracted to her. What he wanted was the sincerity when he was willing to spend a hundred taels of silver to redeem Yuan Zhi. He was looking forward to the true love that was not motivated by desire.
It’s a pity that Shen could give him pity but not love.
Shen wanted to say something else to him, but the person in front of him didn't understand sign language and refused to look at him. If he took another step closer or stayed a little longer, the little actor might have some thoughts in his mind. He didn't want to get into a tangle with someone.
After much hesitation, Shen finally left without leaving anything behind and turned around and left.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
