When Su Jin emerged from the warm pavilion, the sound of horns bidding farewell to the old year and welcoming the new suddenly rang out from beyond the palace tower.
Only then did she realize that the twenty-fourth year of the Jingyuan era had passed amid the night’s turmoil. The horn blasts—three short and one long—carried a melancholy warrior’s spirit that echoed through the deep palace. Another year had withered and flourished.
Upon reaching the Qionghua Pavilion hall, Zhu Nanxian asked, “Is Lord Liu feeling better?”
Su Jin replied, “He has taken his medicine, but the illness came on too suddenly. It cannot be relieved in just a short while—we can only let him rest and recuperate for now.”
Zhu Nanxian acknowledged with a sound. “Tomorrow is the winter hunt, and my eldest brother still has matters to assign to me. I’ll return to the Eastern Palace first, but I’ll definitely come back at the hour of the Ox.” He glanced back at Shen Xi with some concern, then added, “If anything happens, send someone to the Eastern Palace to find me.”
Su Jin agreed, and after Zhu Nanxian left, only then did Shen Xi turn his face to look at her. He seemed somewhat more clear-headed now, as if pondering something. After a moment, he simply said, “Let’s go outside to talk.”
Outside the Qionghua Pavilion was a central courtyard where few people ventured, and even the accumulated snow had not been cleared away.
Shen Xi lowered his eyes to gaze at the vast expanse of snow covering the ground, saying softly, “Tonight was my fault. I wasn’t calm enough.”
He suddenly bent down, scooped up a handful of snow from the ground, and lifted his head to press it against his face, letting the bone-chillingly cold snow particles scrape across his cheeks. Then he shook his head, shedding a whole body’s worth of frost and snow.
Those peach-blossom eyes that saw through worldly affairs finally regained their clarity.
Shen Xi said, “Time is pressing. Let us first examine the situation.”
He walked to a corner of the courtyard, breaking off a branch of wintersweet from the treetop as he spoke: “Since the Gongqian Hall case until now, the Fourteenth Prince has fallen from power, and three princes have collapsed. Among the princes we previously discussed as possibly scheming, four remain—the Fourth, Ninth, Tenth, and Twelfth.”
He half-knelt in the snow, using the plum branch to write a character for “nine” in the accumulated snow: “First, we can rule out the Ninth Prince, because he belongs to Liu Yun.”
Su Jin lowered her eyes thoughtfully and said, “Judging from how the Ninth Prince was instructed to lure away the Third Prince when Lord Liu was assassinated tonight, he is indeed being manipulated by the Lord.”
“It’s more than that.” Shen Xi continued, “The reason Zhu Lao Jiu can be manipulated by Liu Yun is that Liu Yun has long held leverage over him.” His plum branch pointed toward the character for “nine.” “This leverage is concrete evidence of Zhu Yutang’s betrayal of the Fourteenth Prince.”
“I have a set of private accounts showing that since Zhu Jiyou was enfeoffed in Shanxi, he and the Fourteenth Prince have been embezzling money on a large scale—even later, when constructing the imperial villa and selling pardons to craftsmen, Zhu Yutang, though part of their group, never got his hands dirty with these evil deeds. That is, until the summer of the twenty-third year of Jingyuan, when Zhu Yutang suddenly threw caution to the wind, acting somewhat desperately. So I suspect that something irreversible must have happened at that time.” Shen Xi lifted his eyes to look at Su Jin. “Do you remember what occurred in the twenty-third year of Jingyuan—two years ago?”
Su Jin remembered. She would never forget it for the rest of her life.
In the late spring of the twenty-third year of Jingyuan, scholar-officials caused unrest. By early summer, after Zhu Jingyuan executed Yan Ziyan and a group of loyal court ministers, the matter was hastily concluded.
Shen Xi said, “It was later discovered that the Seventh Prince’s people had deliberately escalated the scholar-officials’ unrest. However, among the chief culprits who plotted this incident, only Zeng Ping from the Ministry of Personnel was punished.”
Su Jin added, “That day in Fengtian Hall, His Majesty handed Zeng Ping over to Lord Liu.”
“Yes, Zeng Ping was a man of the Seventh Prince, Zhu Zhaowei. After Liu Yun got hold of Zeng Ping, he must have used various methods to extract the fact that Zhu Lao Jiu had betrayed the Fourteenth Prince and submitted to the Seventh Prince, forcing him to confess and sign a statement. He then used this confession to threaten Zhu Lao Jiu. The Ninth Prince had no choice but to submit to Liu Yun—to this minister.
“This is also why, after Zeng Ping’s death, when Zeng Youliang repeatedly requested Zeng Ping’s confession from before his death, the Imperial Censorate ignored him—because this confession is precisely the leverage Liu Yun uses to manipulate Zhu Yutang.” As Shen Xi spoke, he used the plum branch to strike through the character for “nine” and wrote the character for “Liu” beside it. “A prince who can be manipulated by a minister cannot possibly have the power and ability to meticulously scheme for the position of Crown Prince.”
As he spoke, he let out a breath and wrote “four” and “twelve” in another patch of snow. “As for who plotted the Gongqian Hall case, I most suspect these two, because I’ve always suspected that Liu Yun is deeply entangled in this scheme through collusion with one of the princes. If I were him, I would definitely choose between these two.”
Shen Xi wrote the character “Shen” under “four” and the character “Qi” under “twelve”: “Naturally, looking at marriage alliances, the Fourth Prince’s consort is Shen Jun, and the Twelfth Prince’s consort is Miss Qi Huan, the eldest daughter of the Qi family. If these two had the support of the Shen and Qi families, their power would be considerable. However, there’s no need to discuss the Shen family—they stand with the Eastern Palace. The Qi family, as founding heroes of the dynasty, has managed to remain prosperous even after Zhu Jingyuan’s purge of meritorious officials because the Qi residence never participates in power struggles.”
“Without the support of the Shen and Qi residences, if the Twelfth and Fourth Princes want to compete for succession, they must have civil officials assisting them. Among the Six Ministries, the Ministry of War and the Ministry of Rites don’t take sides. The power divisions of the other four ministries are already clear. Although I haven’t seen through every other civil official, when it comes to the strongest among the remainder—” Shen Xi moved the withered branch to point at the character “Liu” he had just written, “—none surpass him.”
“If I were Liu Yun and wanted to cooperate with one of these two,” he drew a circle around the character “four” with the withered branch, “I would choose him.”
Su Jin said, “If Lord Liu has truly waded into these troubled waters, the Fourth Prince’s character is indeed steady and composed, making him a better choice than the Twelfth Prince.”
Shen Xi raised his eyes to look at Su Jin: “But not necessarily. Liu Yun is a man of deep cunning and superior intellect. As a prince, aren’t you afraid that placing such a person in the court while you yourself guard the borders might result in this person stealing the splendid realm you’ve earned?”
Finally, he wrote the character “ten” in the snow: “He is a variable.”
“If there were only the three mentioned above, my answer would be certain without doubt.” Shen Xi continued, “But there happens to be one more—Zhu Yiheng. I cannot see through this person.”
Su Jin understood Shen Xi’s meaning—each prince had their own strengths, some excelling in military strategy, others strong in civil affairs or financial resources.
Yet Su Jin’s impression of Zhu Yiheng consisted of only one thing: his beautiful appearance.
He was as handsome as jade, well-spoken, but beyond that? Nothing more.
Shen Xi said, “Both Zhu Yiheng and the Twelfth Prince are sons of Consort Shu, yet as children, they were fostered in Consort Gui’s palace. He once depended on Zhu Lao Jiu for survival and was tutored alongside the Fourth Prince for half a year. He was never favored, and it was the Fourteenth Prince who helped him obtain his enfeoffment decree.”
“Such a person has muddied these waters beyond recognition, creating far too many possibilities for strategic alliances and making everything unclear to me.” Shen Xi furrowed his brow. “Zhu Yiheng has no military power, his political achievements are mediocre, and while he appears mild-mannered, his ambitions run high, with schemes deeper and more unfathomable than the Seventh Prince’s. The succession struggle is a contest of power. If there were still time—if there were still ten years or even decades—then as a court minister, one could certainly choose someone like Zhu Yiheng, a promising talent, to slowly cultivate power together. But now we don’t even have a month left. Who would choose to support him? Even someone as formidable as Liu Yun shouldn’t make that choice. And as a prince, who would be willing to cooperate with someone so powerless yet unfathomable?”
“The reason Liu Yun would rather injure himself than remain uninvolved is probably because of this ‘Tenth Prince.’ He still cannot see the situation clearly. No one can truly control the situation, so he would rather watch from the sidelines and wait for an opportunity to act.”
Shen Xi threw the plum branch to the ground, staring at the sparse, rough characters in the snow: “I have an intuition that the real answer is right here, but I can’t figure it out. I must have overlooked something, must have miscalculated something.”
Su Jin looked at this ground full of chess pieces, also unable to discern the direction.
She vaguely felt Shen Xi was right—the answer was here—but she had only superficial acquaintance with these princes. If even Shen Xi, someone who grew up in the deep palace as an imperial relative, couldn’t see through this, how could she?
The accumulated snow illuminated the entire world. Zhu Nanxian returned precisely at the hour of the Ox.
Su Jin lowered her eyes to look at this chess game on the snowy ground that could be called cruel for Zhu Nanxian. Suddenly, she half-knelt down and swept away the snow marks with her long sleeve. “Since we no longer have time to find answers from the overall situation and the source, let us work backward from the results of the events. We’ll push back as far as we can.”
She picked up the plum branch Shen Xi had placed on the ground and said, “All our threads lead from the Gongqian Hall case, but we truly have only one clue in our hands.”
She wrote a sentence in the snow—
*Everything is false. In this life, I have only wronged the young prince. Even death cannot atone for my sins.*
This was the dying words of Prince Zhu Lin’s wet nurse.
Su Jin said, “For her to serve as the core of a case and lead to such a grand scheme, these dying words must hold deep meaning.”
She bent down and circled the character for “false”: “As for what is called ‘everything is false,’ looking at the results, it’s quite simple. First, the poison the young prince was given was not ordered by the Imperial Noble Consort. Second, Beauty Li was not killed by Qian Yu. But we could have figured out these two points even without her saying so. Therefore, the key lies not in the character ‘false’ but in these two characters.”
Su Jin circled the characters for “everything” with the plum branch.
“Since everything is false, then the outcome of this case can be false, and the consequences this case has created can also be false.
“In the Gongqian Hall incident, three parties were implicated—the Eastern Palace, the Fourteenth Prince, and the Seventh Prince. Among them, the Fourteenth Prince and the Seventh Prince were framed and set up, so we can set them aside for now. The greatest benefit went to the Eastern Palace.”
Shen Xi said, “Qian Yu, the former Deputy Commander of the Feathered Forest Guard, had always been a major threat to my brother-in-law. The Gongqian Hall incident allowed my brother-in-law to seize the opportunity to eliminate Qian Yu, and afterward, under the pretext of purging Qian Yu’s remaining faction, he cleansed the Feathered Forest Guard.” He paused here, suddenly realizing what Su Jin was getting at.
He watched as she wrote five characters in the snow—”Purge the Feathered Forest Guard”—then looked up and asked, “What if this outcome is false?”
Zhu Nanxian fell silent for a moment, then said, “Wu Yusheng, the Commander of the Feathered Forest Guard, has been following my elder brother for ten years. Are you suggesting that among the Feathered Forest Guard, the Deputy Commander Qian Yu, who was executed by design, was actually the one truly loyal to my elder brother, while the one who remained—Wu Yusheng—is the real problem?”
Su Jin said, “I’m not certain, but this is the only clear deduction I can draw at present. Perhaps many more things are hidden beneath this that I cannot see, but I cannot think of them right now.”
Shen Xi said, “Though this is merely a deduction, we must guard against it. Moreover, tomorrow is the winter hunt. If the Feathered Forest Guard betrays the Eastern Palace, the consequences would be unimaginable.”
The three fell silent for a moment.
Actually, the best solution right now would be for Zhu Minda to replace the Feathered Forest Guard.
However, Zhu Minda is obstinate and self-willed. To ask him to replace his own guards based on a mere deduction would undoubtedly be a joke to him.
Moreover, if the Feathered Forest Guard were replaced, who would protect his safety during the winter hunt?
The Golden Martial Guard? Would the dignified Crown Prince actually need the personal army led by the Thirteenth Prince to protect him? Where would his dignity as heir apparent be?
At this moment, Zhu Nanxian drew his long sword from his waist and used the scabbard as a writing instrument to draw an undulating mountain range in the snow. “The winter hunt takes place at Mount Fenglan, with the Tiger Guard in attendance. The Feathered Forest Guard will only send thirty riders, of which at most twelve will enter the forest to hunt. In that case, I’ll order the Golden Martial Guard to depart early and enter the mountains to secretly protect my elder brother. If the accompanying Feathered Forest Guard shows any suspicious movement, they can ambush and eliminate them.”
Su Jin asked, “Won’t they sweep the mountain before the winter hunt?”
“They will.” Zhu Nanxian replied. Then he drew one long and one short line on the left side of the mountain range with his scabbard, pointing to the long line: “Everything west of this line is a restricted area. The mountain sweep only covers within the hunting grounds; they don’t manage the restricted area.” Then he pointed to the short line: “This is a shortcut hidden in the restricted area that leads directly to the hunting grounds. I can order Zuo Qian to station the Golden Martial Guard outside the restricted area, and after the mountain sweep passes, they can infiltrate the hunting grounds through this shortcut.”
He continued, looking at Su Jin and Shen Xi: “Rest assured, this shortcut is a steep cliff that Zuo Qian and I discovered during a winter hunt years ago. Only the two of us know about it.”
Shen Xi asked, “Can you ensure the Golden Martial Guard can infiltrate the forest without a sound?”
Zhu Nanxian thought for a moment and said, “I can.” He again used the sword handle to mark eight crosses within the mountain range, saying, “Mount Fenglan has eight outposts distributed according to the mountain terrain and water flow. I can have thirty-two members of the Golden Martial Guard dress in outpost uniforms and linger near these outposts. In groups of four, if they discover my elder brother’s whereabouts, two will remain while the other two will track him under the guise of patrolling. Once my elder brother encounters danger, they can sound the horn to alert others.”
Shen Xi said, “That’s good. We won’t alert the enemy, and we can observe from the shadows whether these Feathered Forest Guards are truly loyal.”
Zhu Nanxian nodded: “Since each prince enters the mountains at different times, with these thirty-two Golden Martial Guards present, after I enter the mountains, I can learn my elder brother’s whereabouts from them at any time.”
He lowered his eyes slightly in thought, then added, “But time is too tight. I won’t have time to deploy in advance. If I suddenly mobilize thirty-two members of the Golden Martial Guard now, when the troops are mustered at the Northern Great Camp at dawn, they will certainly notice and report to the Ministry of War. Moreover, with so many people leaving the city in the middle of the night, we definitely cannot hide this from the gate guards and the patrolling censors.”
Shen Xi said, “He Xian, the Vice Minister of the Ministry of War, is my man. Although the Northern Great Camp must report missing personnel to the Ministry of War, as Vice Minister, he can help suppress the matter for a day without problem.”
Su Jin said, “After Your Highness assembles the Golden Martial Guard, you can order them to leave through Zhengyang Gate in the south of the city, then circle westward to Mount Fenglan.” She looked at Zhu Nanxian. “Tan Zhaolin was formerly the Commander of the Southern City Military Commission. My subordinate, Censor Zhai Di, once supervised the southern city censors. With the combined efforts of these two, having thirty-two Golden Martial Guards leave the city and keeping it secret for another two days shouldn’t be a problem.”
She glanced at the sky again: “Time is of the essence. We each make our arrangements. At the hour of Yin, I will wait for Your Highness and Lord Shen at Chengtian Gate.”
After Su Jin finished speaking and had taken only a few steps, she heard Shen Xi call out from behind her: “Su Shiyu.”
He lowered his eyes, the teardrop mole beneath his right eye gleaming with cold light: “This is the Eastern Palace’s crisis. Actually, you… need not get involved.”
However, Su Jin replied, “The Lord has helped me many times, and His Highness has shown me great kindness. I am not grass or wood—how could I remain unmoved?” As she spoke, she suddenly smiled faintly: “Zhai Di is on night duty tonight. I’ll go to the Imperial Censorate to find him first. If Your Highness and the Lord have time, please help me by going to the Su residence to bring Tan Zhaolin into the palace. His martial skills are excellent, and having him protect me during the winter hunt will give me peace of mind.”