The crescent moon hung like a curved hook above the dragon-carved flying eaves of the imperial city. Beneath the moon, the imperial palace stood in quiet majesty, casting its massive dark shadow heavily over all of peaceful Yingdu.
This silence was suddenly shattered by hoofbeats. The deep red palace gates, usually sealed tight at midnight, opened one by one. Several riders came flying as if treading clouds and moon, sweeping through layer upon layer of tall, broad palace gates in the blink of an eye.
Naturally, it was Qin Chang Ge who came flying on horseback.
She hadn’t even had time to change clothes, mounting her horse in casual house shoes. In her extreme haste, her unbelted long robe was blown by the cold night wind of early September, snapping and billowing like a flying banner.
A journey that normally took two quarters of an hour, she completed in one quarter, rushing into Longzhang Palace.
Longzhang Palace’s lights were sparse. Old Yu Hai stood wringing his hands in circles at the palace gate. Qin Chang Ge had no time to greet him, her steps swift as wind as she rushed straight in. Pearl curtains rolled and swayed behind her, creating tinkling collision sounds and flashing pearl light.
Before the delicate sound of pearl curtains had ceased, she had already swept into the rear hall.
“A’Jue, are you alright—”
Her voice abruptly stopped. Qin Chang Ge stood frozen at the rear hall entrance, staring at the handsome man reclining against the dragon couch, perfectly fine as he read memorials, now raising his head with a bright smile and sparkling eyes.
“Tch!”
Qin Chang Ge gave the play-acting emperor a vicious thumbs-down, then turned to leave.
Her body was suddenly pulled back.
Without turning around, Qin Chang Ge said: “Xiao Jue, aren’t you bored?”
A sigh came from behind, followed by warm arms suddenly enveloping her heavily.
The man behind her used an embracing posture to hold Qin Chang Ge tightly, even brazenly clasping her waist with both hands. Both wore thin clothing, and through the already soft, smooth fabric, each could feel the other’s warm skin beneath. Xiao Jue’s burning breath brushed against Qin Chang Ge’s ear, stirring a whirling wind in her heart.
In a trance, she recalled that year in Fengyi Palace on the broken bridge in snow, when this same person, drunk, had held her just as tightly, asking over and over: “Why haven’t you come back yet?”
How long had he waited? Five years—over sixteen hundred days and nights filled with longing, twenty cycles of spring, summer, autumn, and winter. Those days, cut with memory’s knife into a thousand pieces, each piece still complete, still capable of revealing a heart forever full and fresh with deep love.
Qin Chang Ge closed her eyes, her heart tangled with emotions too complex to sort.
Xiao Jue held her, seeming to treasure this intimate distance and solid feeling. His neck leaned forward, and in that movement, Qin Chang Ge suddenly caught a faint medicinal scent.
Alarmed, she immediately turned back: “You—”
Turning around, she met Xiao Jue’s face directly.
Like lightning streaking across black silk sky, startling and trembling.
The man’s pleasant pine fragrance immediately suffused the air. Though clearly a refreshing, bright scent, somehow it produced an intoxicating allure like fine wine, like the five-flower incense from the deep curtained inner hall’s Boshan incense burner, curling up thread by thread.
Xiao Jue’s skin was warmer than usual, his movements gentler than usual, yet within that gentleness lay an undeniable resolve. With slight force, he had already pulled Qin Chang Ge down onto the couch behind him.
The brocade cushions were soft—falling into them was like sinking into a colorful, bewildering dream. In the dream, the man leaned down, calling again and again the name he had missed so long.
“Chang Ge…”
Past life’s military campaigns bound two hearts; this life rarely sees flowers before moon. Bone-deep lovesickness was a torch burning against the wind, daily consuming him as he ran into the wind—painful and feverish, longing only for skin-like-snow coolness.
He turned over, drawing close to that dream.
Love was like a dream, but in the dream, the woman’s eyes gradually changed from earlier haziness to clarity. The black mist in those deep, bright, cool eyes gradually dispersed. Love’s passion became like countless empty flowers in an instant, exchanged for spiritual emptiness and extinction.
Qin Chang Ge’s hand slowly extended, pressing against his chest, stopping further exploration.
Xiao Jue stiffened, smiling bitterly.
After a long pause: “Chang Ge… let me hold you while I sleep a bit. I’m a little tired…”
Qin Chang Ge’s hand paused, her fingertip slowly moving to touch a certain spot on Xiao Jue’s chest. There was slightly thick bandaging. Qin Chang Ge frowned: “You’re really injured? Who did this?” But Xiao Jue didn’t answer, only turning to sleep beside her, holding her tight.
Qin Chang Ge didn’t continue asking, only softly humming in response.
Her response scattered in the vast inner hall space, sounding light and distant.
The dense, heavy smoke of five-flower incense swirled and danced in graceful arcs between the bright yellow flying dragon bed curtains. Light and shadow shifted on the gold-inlaid long windows, slowly changing from deep black to pale white.
Throughout this night, Qin Chang Ge never closed her eyes, staring wide-eyed and alert as she carefully sorted through all the various events of her two years since rebirth.
This night, Xiao Jue beside her actually slept very quietly, his breathing sounding very steady. Qin Chang Ge gently turned her head, carefully observing his still slightly furrowed brow in sleep. She vaguely recalled those many nights of sleeping in each other’s arms in the past—Xiao Jue had slept beside her just like this. When deeply asleep, he was always as quiet as a child, completely lacking his usual sharp, spirited air. Only then his features had been relaxed, his expression pleasant even in dreams, quite unlike now with his deeply troubled, locked brow.
What had he encountered? Why so melancholy and unhappy?
Very, very slowly, Qin Chang Ge extended her hand, gently pressing Xiao Jue’s sleep acupoint. Then she carefully withdrew his hands that gripped her arms tightly, slipping out of his embrace and soundlessly leaving the hall in soft shoes.
Old Yu Hai was loyally dozing outside the hall. Since the incident when Prince Zhao Xiao Chen had plotted to harm the Empress was exposed, the matter of Longzhang Palace eunuchs secretly colluding with royal family was also revealed. Yu Hai had spent considerable effort screening all of Longzhang Palace’s eunuchs and, despite his advanced age, personally guarded at Xiao Jue’s side.
Qin Chang Ge asked about the situation. Yu Hai tremblingly said: “Yesterday His Majesty went to Anping Palace. After returning, he was melancholy and unhappy. In the afternoon, Concubine Yao requested an audience. His Majesty originally said he wouldn’t see her, but later summoned her anyway. After just a few words, we heard Concubine Yao crying. Then His Majesty ordered this old slave to escort her out. She refused to leave, desperately grasping His Majesty’s robe while weeping. When this old slave went to request her departure, she suddenly pushed this old slave away and took out scissors from her clothes, stabbing His Majesty… This old slave is at fault. In my haste to block it, His Majesty didn’t want to hurt this old slave and pushed this old slave away first, which is why he was wounded.” He finished by repeatedly kowtowing in guilt.
“Get up. What fault is there in your loyal service to your master? His Majesty’s martial skills are profound—this minor wound is nothing. Don’t blame yourself,” Qin Chang Ge frowned as she listened, asking: “When Concubine Yao was crying, what did she say?”
“She just kept repeating that His Majesty was heartless.”
“Heartless?” Qin Chang Ge repeated the phrase with apparent understanding, waving for Yu Hai to withdraw. She returned to the hall, released Xiao Jue’s acupoint, and sat beside the bed hugging her knees as she watched him. Xiao Jue slowly opened his eyes, and seeing her first thing, smiled helplessly: “You’re truly heartless.”
“You’re truly boring,” Qin Chang Ge smiled at him. “A little flesh wound, yet you had the eunuch make such a scene, frightening me.”
“Did I frighten you?” Xiao Jue’s eyes lit up with uncontainable joy. “So you do worry about me a little.”
Qin Chang Ge smiled. Xiao Jue sat up, gently embracing her: “How could I bear to make you worry? It’s just that the situation was chaotic then. Yu Hai was so guilt-ridden he wanted to commit suicide, and I had to stop him. But given your position as Grand Tutor, according to court regulations, you’re the first person to be notified of my ‘stabbing.’ The reporting eunuch didn’t know the severity of the matter and was just shocked by the ’emperor being stabbed,’ causing you unnecessary panic.”
“However,” he suddenly laughed heartily, his deep black pupils becoming more brilliant, “later I thought about it and decided not to send someone to tell you I was fine. I thought that if I could see Chang Ge worry about me once more, this lifetime wouldn’t be in vain.”
“What foolish talk,” Qin Chang Ge covered his mouth. “This lifetime stretches far ahead. Besides, am I really as indifferent as you say?”
Xiao Jue lowered his head and kissed her palm, smiling: “So fragrant, so fragrant.”
Qin Chang Ge lightly patted his cheek in feigned anger: “Rogue! Rogue!”
Her light smile and gentle reproach made her eyes flow like water, her expression like a perfectly bloomed rose—fragrant and intoxicating. Xiao Jue stared somewhat dazedly, murmuring: “One who doesn’t know Chang Ge’s beauty has no eyes.”
“I think your eyesight is poor,” Qin Chang Ge smiled teasingly. “For this little grass like me, you want to give up an entire garden, and you nearly got stung by bees. What a loss for you.”
Xiao Jue paused, smiling bitterly: “You know? Yu Hai told you?”
“He wouldn’t dare,” Qin Chang Ge looked at him with a half-smile. “Concubine Yao said you were heartless, crying like that and desperately taking action, showing she was stimulated. Normally after so long, your neglect of the harem has become habit—there wouldn’t be such a scene without reason. That only means you told her to get lost.”
Xiao Jue swept his sleeve in a gesture as clean and decisive as dusting off dirt: “I’ve wanted to dismiss the harem for a long time, ever since you returned.”
Qin Chang Ge shook her head, sighing: “Why must you…”
“It’s necessary.” The pretty big head that suddenly poked in was naturally Xiao Baozi’s. His big eyes rolled around as he smiled: “If he wants to pursue you, of course he has to get rid of his concubines first. Otherwise I’d be the first to object.”
Xiao Jue raised his eyebrows, glaring at his son who always sided with outsiders: “You’d object? Would your objection matter?”
“It would matter,” Baozi, who always feared his mother but not his father, retorted immediately: “Where my mother lived in her past life, a man could only have one wife. A weirdo like you with many concubines has no competitive advantage at all. How can you compare to my godfather? Noble birth, devoted love, and still a virgin…”
“Xiao Rong!” His Majesty could no longer contain himself, roaring: “Where did you learn such vulgar language!”
Baozi made a face, slipped away, and fled at the fastest speed his little meatball body could achieve, leaving Qin Chang Ge and Xiao Jue looking at each other. After a long pause, Qin Chang Ge sighed in repentance: “Alright, it’s my fault. Those bedtime stories I told him seem to have covered too broad a range.” She looked at the sky: “Today’s morning court time has passed. I had Yu Hai send word earlier that you were unwell and wouldn’t hold court. Rest well—I’ll return to the mansion first.”
Just as she moved to leave, Xiao Jue suddenly grabbed her. Qin Chang Ge turned back, surprised to see Xiao Jue’s face was actually slightly flushed. He avoided her inquiring gaze, and after a long pause, stammered: “That… Chang Ge… that…”
“Hm?”
“…Do you… despise me for that…”
Qin Chang Ge paused, looking at his embarrassed expression and thinking it over. She hazily realized this poor father was taking his son’s nonsense to heart. He probably remembered that she was still a virgin in this life while he was no longer pure, worrying that she refused him because she felt shortchanged.
At once both amused and exasperated, yet truly unable to explain directly—could she say: “No, whether you’re a virgin doesn’t matter since you gave your virginity to me anyway”?
That would be too mortifying for His Majesty.
Qin Chang Ge could only touch her nose and walk out, pretending not to hear.
Just outside the palace gate, she saw two figures ahead acting suspiciously, poking their heads around furtively. Qin Chang Ge reined in her horse, smiling: “I’ll count to three. If you don’t come out, I’ll confiscate Fengman Tower—Three!”
Whoosh! Baozi appeared like divine soldiers descending from heaven in front of her horse.
Qin Chang Ge leaned forward slightly, smiling charmingly at Baozi: “Crown Prince, good morning. Have you finished today’s studies? Master Jia says your academic progress is excellent, your knowledge increasingly broad—he can barely teach you anymore and suggests adding more teachers. This subject also thinks Your Highness has made truly rapid, gratifying progress. This subject will find you a teacher right now.”
Saying this, she flicked her whip, nimbly circling around Baozi to depart. Baozi immediately leaped forward, fawning as he grabbed her horse’s head: “Grand Tutor…”
Qin Chang Ge shuddered. Baozi immediately turned to command Youtiao’er: “The Grand Tutor is cold! Go! Bring my purple sable cloak!”
Youtiao immediately scurried off to follow orders. Qin Chang Ge looked sideways at Baozi’s fawning expression, smiling: “Your cloak? For me to use as a scarf?”
She reached out to lift the little meatball, tossing him onto her saddle, whispering: “What do you want to do? Be honest!”
Baozi immediately snuggled into her embrace, murmuring: “I’ve studied for several days now. Take me out to relax. I heard father switched the Youzhou army and capital defense army, putting all the world’s troops under your command. You’ve selected elite troops for training, and godfather is personally helping you drill them. You must take me to see.”
“Want to go to the capital suburbs camp?” Qin Chang Ge smiled at him. “That’s a military zone—only military personnel can enter. You can go, but you’d have to be a common soldier, starting from the bottom. You can’t bring Youtiao’er. I’ll agree if you accept this.”
“We’ve supervised the country—are we afraid of being a soldier?” Baozi scoffed. “Deal!”
“Good then,” Qin Chang Ge patted her son’s big head. “First come with me somewhere.”
“Where?”
“To see your dear uncle.”
Anping Palace was located in the city’s southwest. Originally Emperor Yuanxian’s traveling palace, it later became where the Yuan Dynasty imprisoned wayward imperial relatives. After Xiliang’s founding, Xiao Jue was always simple and unpretentious, disliking extravagance. All former Yuan buildings were simply repaired and used as-is, including Anping Palace.
The most luxury-loving final Yuan emperor had built even this abandoned palace quite magnificently—vast grounds with continuous high walls. But due to long neglect, some green bricks at the palace wall bases had lost their red paint, and long grass grew from mottled brick seams, swaying in early September’s autumn wind, showing the desolation of faded prosperity.
Under the careful guidance of the palace-guarding chief eunuch, Qin Chang Ge took Baozi along brick paths equally overgrown with wild grass into Anping Palace. The scenery was uniformly decayed. Though traces of former glory remained, the artificial hills were crumbling, flowers wilted, grass lay in disarray everywhere, ponds were mostly dried up, and the wind-viewing pavilion railings over the pond were broken—from afar resembling a toothless, hollow mouth.
Worldly affairs were like chess—every piece in the game couldn’t control its own placement, could only passively accept its fate. Just as the once-prosperous Anping Palace couldn’t prevent its decline, just as the once-mighty Prince Zhao Xiao Chen couldn’t save his defeat.
Heroes’ miserable ends were like beauties helplessly aging—equally inspiring melancholy reflection. Moreover, if this scene appeared before the eyes of once deeply affectionate brothers, what painful feelings would it evoke?
Qin Chang Ge suddenly understood Xiao Jue’s mood yesterday, a faint pain rising in her heart.
Stopping in the wind that stirred up scattered grass, Qin Chang Ge gazed at the distant corner of flying eaves, instructing the eunuch: “You may withdraw. I’ll find him myself.”
The eunuch dared not speak further as he withdrew. Though knowing this violated regulations, who dared obstruct these two—one the current Crown Prince, one the all-powerful Grand Tutor?
Baozi, who had been very quiet since entering Anping Palace, suddenly tugged at Qin Chang Ge’s foot, saying seriously: “Mother, I want to ask you something.”
Qin Chang Ge crouched down, looking into her son’s clear eyes. With a vague premonition in her heart, she said calmly: “Ask.”
“I remembered Uncle Qi and Uncle Rong,” Baozi pressed his lips together, not looking at his mother but at the dried lotus pond ahead. “Tell me—where did they go?”
Taking a deep breath, Qin Chang Ge smiled faintly. She had waited long for her son to ask this question, originally thinking he should have asked earlier. She hadn’t expected this little fellow, who seemed rash and bold, to have such depth of mind, never asking until today when Anping Palace’s desolate, melancholy scenery stirred his emotions and he finally voiced the question.
Qin Chang Ge had thought many times about how to answer if her son asked, but today, truly hearing this question, she suddenly decided to tell the truth.
“Uncle Qi returned to Zhongchuan to be king. You can still see him if you go to Zhongchuan in the future. Uncle Rong… has passed away.”
“Died?” Baozi asked very calmly.
“Yes.”
Baozi turned his head away. After a long pause, he gently plucked a blade of grass, wound it around his fingers, and wove a very ugly grasshopper.
“Look,” he handed the grasshopper to Qin Chang Ge. “When I was little, I always liked searching the streets for mother. When I found and returned, Uncle Qi and Uncle Rong would apologize to people and send them back. I thought they’d scold me, but they never did. Uncle Qi made his scary candy for me to eat, Uncle Rong wove grasshoppers—he made them even uglier than mine.”
He gave Qin Chang Ge a dreamlike, big smile: “That candy was awful, those grasshoppers fell apart with one touch. So annoying.”
Qin Chang Ge stared at him steadily. After a long pause, she extended her hand, saying gently: “Son, if you want to cry, then cry.”
“Waaah!”
Baozi suddenly threw himself into his mother’s embrace, desperately burying his head in her arms. His voice came out muffled and broken, intermittent and unclear.
“…But I can never… never play with them again…”
Qin Chang Ge held her son, gently patting his small back, whispering in his ear: “Rong’er, in our lives, we’re always experiencing farewells. This is reality all people must accept. And you—you’re the future great emperor of Xiliang and perhaps the world. The cruel facts you must face will be more than ordinary people… My child… cry, cry, but hope that after this crying, you’ll never again fear facing any cold fate in this life…”
“Can I… not want this emperor position… to exchange for never having… to say farewell?”
“This isn’t a multiple choice question. Life has countless choices, but life and death isn’t one of them,” Qin Chang Ge wiped her son’s tears. “Those who accompanied your growth, those who once held you in their arms, those who loved you—they will leave one day, whether early or late. The only thing we can do is learn to accept it and make ourselves live better, helping those who didn’t have time to complete life’s journey live with double the brilliance.”
“I’m sorry,” she leaned close to the continuously sobbing Baozi’s ear, saying softly: “I’m truly sorry. I’m an unqualified mother. I made you lose your mother at age one, and before age four you had to search the streets for mother to fill the emptiness in your heart. I couldn’t give you a complete, happy childhood with both parents present. When you learned to speak, the first word you called wasn’t papa or mama but uncle. I couldn’t protect your uncle who was like family, and I even deliberately let you know too early about life’s cruelty and farewell’s helplessness. I keep shattering your crystal world but can’t provide you a happy, carefree childhood… Rong’er, I’m sorry.”
Baozi buried himself deeply in her embrace, extending his small arms to hug her with all his might, sobbing: “No… you came very timely. You let me find my real mother. You gave me the greatest freedom. You didn’t force me to stay in Guantang Palace stupidly being a wooden crown prince. You let the crown prince be a shopkeeper, you let the shopkeeper run around opening branches and advertising. You let me know what I should know, you let me get what I wanted… No one is better than you.”
Qin Chang Ge drew a breath, looking up at the sky, suddenly feeling she wanted to wail too.
In this life’s return, wandering and displaced, constantly dangerous, often feeling exhausted, often unbearably sad—yet today at this moment, she suddenly felt everything had been worthwhile after all.
She sighed softly, holding tight the small body in her arms, feeling this moment’s time was peaceful and good, requiring no more words.
She was unwilling to speak, but someone was unwilling to allow this mother and son’s quiet, intimate moment.
That warm embrace of big and small was piercingly bright to eyes that were defeated and cold-hearted.
“How touching… Noble Grand Tutor of Xiliang, oh no—noble Empress, when you want to cry, have you thought about how many people’s life-and-death partings you personally caused? Why didn’t you cry then?”
The voice was extremely mocking, carrying faint indifference and contempt.
“Someone like you would shed tears over partings? You… are worthy?”