Zhou Chuyin next saw Ye Tingyan after the morning court session the following day.

That morning, while he sat in the garden playing the qin, he heard the sounds of carriage and horses outside the residence, and for once rose to his feet — though in recent days Ye Tingyan had often stayed overnight in the palace, yesterday Yu Qiushi had died, and that, he thought, ought to be somewhat different.

Bai Sensen appeared from nowhere, carrying a dish of peanuts and sidling up to him. Zhou Chuyin glanced sideways at him and frowned: “Why are you dressed like that?”

Bai Sensen had pasted white-and-gray whiskers to his face and was disguised as a fortune-telling old Taoist, making him look quite ridiculous.

Hearing his words, Bai Sensen lowered his voice in a mysterious air: “Do you know — there has been word from the southwest. Someone has recently been privately looking for me.”

Zhou Chuyin frowned and asked: “Many people look for you — and besides, you are in the capital. Someone goes to the southwest to find you. What is there to be afraid of?”

Bai Sensen shook his head: “That is not the point. I have come today precisely to tell the young master about this matter. Do you know who is looking for me?”

Zhou Chuyin said coldly: “Who?”

Bai Sensen said: “The Empress!”

“The Empress?” Zhou Chuyin was quite surprised, “Why would she have someone looking for you? Has someone in the inner palace fallen gravely ill?”

“I don’t know either. The Empress’s dead warriors have the tightest mouths — nothing could be coaxed out of them,” Bai Sensen tossed a peanut into the air and opened his mouth but failed to catch it, “When I found out, I had no choice but to disguise myself like this. Though few people in the capital know what I look like, what if someone recognizes me? This matter still needs to be reported to him before any decision is made.”

The two chatted idly as they walked to the front gate of the residence and happened to see Pei Xi and Ye Tingyan alighting from a carriage together.

The morning sun was already high. Ye Tingyan had a white silk band over his eyes, yet despite this, both of them could see at a glance his excessively pale complexion.

Bai Sensen thrust the peanuts in his hand into Pei Xi’s and shouted urgently: “Quickly help him inside!”

Ye Tingyan had just stepped over the threshold and stumbled. Hearing him, he even let out a resigned laugh: “Why are you shouting at me like that…”

Zhou Chuyin turned and dismissed the accompanying guards, then pulled him toward the shaded area under the eaves.

The moment they left the sunlight, Bai Sensen sighed, quickly drew a long needle from his sleeve, and delivered two quick needles to the Daling and Neiguan acupoints on his wrist, then struck lightly on the Xinshu acupoint on his back.

Ye Tingyan braced himself against the corridor column, and after several heavy coughs, actually coughed up a mouthful of blood.

Zhou Chuyin was alarmed and quickly supported his arm, calling out: “Ling Ye!”

Bai Sensen withdrew his needles and stroked his beard — only to pull too hard and yank off his fake whiskers. He waved the fake whiskers in his hand, so agitated he nearly jumped on the spot, but finally managed to press it down, drooping his head in dejection as he said quietly: “The ‘Withered Orchid’ is a rare and exceptional poison in the world. Purging it has exhausted all my life’s learning. If my master Jueming Zi were still alive, there might have been a better method. But my skills are inadequate — you suffered so much before the poison was fully purged, and you have still inevitably sustained major damage to your heart veins. I know you have great ambitions, and that expending yourself in worry and effort is unavoidable — but you should try to keep a more open mind. When the five organs are depressed and blood and vital energy stagnate, it is no sign of a long life.”

Ye Tingyan reached up and wiped the blood from his chin — smearing his sleeve in the process. He stared at the stain, laughing in fits and starts: “Even the ancient sages could not attain immortality or ten thousand years of life — what chance do the likes of us have? Give me a few years… that will be enough.”

Bai Sensen swept his sleeve and walked off toward the medicine room: “If you yourself don’t mind, then I have nothing more to say!”

Zhou Chuyin said nothing and helped him toward his room. As Ye Tingyan passed through the corridor, he suddenly reached up and removed the silk band from his eyes.

The morning light was just beginning to grow bright. He stood under the eaves, red-eyed, gazing at the branches swaying in the sunlight, silent for a long time, before suddenly asking: “Chuyin, does this residence have a hidden chamber?”

Zhou Chuyin thought for a moment: “There is one in the back garden.”

Ye Tingyan said: “Could you take me to have a look?”

And so the two of them went around through the study to the back garden and walked down the old steps. Ye Tingyan walked around the perimeter, pulled his sleeve over his mouth and said: “It’s so cold in here.”

Zhou Chuyin asked: “What do you want with a hidden chamber?”

Ye Tingyan said nothing. After they came out, Zhou Chuyin turned to look at him, and saw that his face was expressionless — blank of all emotion.

“Could you find me a secluded courtyard?” Ye Tingyan did not notice his gaze, and with eyes downcast murmured, “That place is too cold — a courtyard would be better. Even with the doors and windows closed, you can still see the sunlight.”

Zhou Chuyin seemed to understand what he meant and stopped in his tracks in astonishment. Ye Tingyan was wholly unaware, and continued walking forward on his own. After two steps, as if regretting his words, he turned back and said: “No — no light at all! Seal all the doors and windows — not a thread of light must get through!”

Having said this, without caring what reaction Zhou Chuyin might have, he turned and walked away in a daze, waving his hand to dismiss all the people outside his room.

His room was rarely lit even at night, let alone in the daytime. But at this moment, with the sun shining brightly, the interior was not dim.

Many light-blocking gauze curtains hung before the half-open round flower window. Leaning with his back against the door he had just closed behind him, he felt his vision growing darker and darker and darker. Feeling his way forward just one step, he sent the ailing plum bonsai beside him toppling to the ground.

The ceramic pot struck the floor and shattered, letting out a dull, heavy sound together with the earth.

Ye Tingyan slid down along the doorframe to the floor and urgently felt around for the fallen ailing plum. The plum tree’s dead branches had been pruned away almost entirely — only a single scarred trunk remained. He lowered his head and stared at it for a long time, tried to get up, but had no strength.

His vision went completely dark, dragging him down into some bottomless abyss of memory.

He was in the hidden chamber in Luowei’s palace. He had tumbled to the floor at the entrance, watching helplessly as she disappeared between the slowly closing walls, taking the last thread of light with her.

Cold sweat slid down his spine. He crawled a step outward, reaching out toward her, wanting to say “save me” — but it was as if an evil spirit had him by the throat, and he could not utter a single word.

Ye Tingyan groped along the wall frantically, trying to find the air vent he had located the last time. But whether it was because his mind was in such great turmoil today, he searched for a long while and found nothing.

Faint sounds drifted in from outside the wall.

“…You have not come to see me for so long — I couldn’t help but be suspicious. Today I agreed to Elder Sister’s request; you must not blame me.”

“I did not know you had built a hidden chamber here — for what purpose?”

“It was naturally for…”

He heard Song Lan’s voice, occasionally interspersed with a word or two of Luowei’s laughter-tinged speech. Their voices from just one wall away gradually receded, drifting off to some unknown place. He knelt there, his face drained of all color, barely noticing the danger of being discovered. He simply kept blindly groping along that wall, desperate to open that door.

Yet everything was exactly as Luowei had said — he was far too unfamiliar with this place. He could not even find where to light a lamp, let alone the mechanism to open the door.

Having searched everywhere and found nothing, he clenched his fist and in utter helplessness slammed it hard against the icy wall.

But the sounds around him only grew more and more clamorous.

When he opened his eyes again, the darkness had vanished.

He found himself inside a jade imperial carriage fragrant with incense, with fireworks bursting suddenly in the sky above. The light around him flickered between brightness and shadow. He reached out and braced himself against the icy gilded handle, just about to ask a question, when voices washed over him from all directions in a relentless tide.

“—Long life and peace to the Crown Prince on the Lantern Festival.”

The palanquin descended. He barely suppressed his discomfort, in a daze, and was helped down by someone. Following the stairs spread with red silk, he ascended all the way up.

Water sounds mingled with ritual music — it was like being caught within a dream.

At last he realized, belatedly, that this place was Tinghua Terrace.

No stone stele, no golden image — only colorful bright lanterns hung high overhead. This was the night of the Lantern Festival in the third year of Tianshou’s reign at Tinghua Terrace!

The young Crown Prince stood on the terrace. Buddhist monks and Taoist priests were arranged on either side — one side striking wooden fish and chanting sutras, the other side waving dust-whisks. An inner official unrolled the ceremonial scroll in hand and called out the auspicious verses in a loud voice. The Crown Prince, like a puppet on strings, knelt, rose, knelt again, rose again. Two palace maids with lovely faces scattered water and burned incense on either side of him. In the hazy fragrant mist, someone far away called out: “The rites — are — complete—”

Song Ling had felt an unsettling unease in his heart all along, as if a stone were blocking it. He pressed his hand to his chest and stood up, stumbling in his magnificent ceremonial robes. The guard at his side quickly came forward to support him and asked quietly: “Your Highness, what is wrong?”

“Nothing, nothing,” he said, “I simply feel a bit uneasy for some reason…”

But the sacrificial rites had already been completed — why should he be uneasy?

Below the terrace, the Imperial Guards were stationed in a tight cordon. Though the crowds were dense, order was more or less maintained. Song Ling swept his gaze across them, and the jade ornaments on his ceremonial crown rang and swayed before his eyes.

Perhaps noticing his ever-worsening complexion, the guard supporting his arm felt that the area around his wrist was faintly darkening, and was struck by terror: “Your Highness, I fear you have been poisoned!”

He suddenly found he could not take another step.

His chest was as blocked and dead as stone. Ever since passing through the Imperial Avenue, he had been feeling unwell — he had only been forcing himself to complete the rites. Now that the ceremony was finished, a wave of convulsive pain stronger than the last gripped his chest. Song Ling’s face turned white as paper, and maintaining his last shred of clarity, he said: “It is nothing. Help me onto the jade imperial carriage, summon the imperial physicians to wait outside Mingguang Gate with all haste, and do not… let it spread… anyone who defies this order… will be beheaded…”

Before his last words had fallen, a string of bright lanterns overhead suddenly and lazily toppled down.

He looked up — bright lanterns were falling from all directions, tumbling like a shower of fallen stars. The crowd, which had been quietly orderly, began to stir with the extinguishing of these light sources. Tinghua Terrace was far from the most bustling parts of the Bianhe district, and if so many light sources were suddenly extinguished all at once, the area would plunge directly into total darkness.

The guard at his side was abruptly on high alert. Dragging his almost entirely spent body, they retreated back to the terrace, drew his sword, and shouted: “Jintian Guard — protect His Highness!”

But the chaotic crowds had already swallowed up the Imperial Guards who had been stationed below the terrace. Someone had crossed the long steps and was rushing up toward the terrace, and everything below was thrown into utter chaos. Song Ling’s close-guard led him to a concealed spot behind the sacrificial altar and kept moving while saying: “Your Highness, hold on.”

Someone had engineered this — an assassination attempt?

Song Ling was suddenly filled with fury. He reached up and tried to draw the sword at his waist — but found that he could not even muster the strength to unsheathe it.

What had just been said… poisoned?

That was right — poisoned. He must have been given poison by now. All of this, everything, had been planned in advance!

Yet he had not eaten since rising that morning. The sacrificial wine had not been drunk by him alone, and the guards had been strict. How could there have been any mistake? If there was one thing he had consumed alone, it seemed to have been…

The bright lanterns fell extinguished, and the surroundings finally sank into total darkness. His trembling hand gripped the sword hilt, and before he had even finished thinking, he felt a sudden, violent pain below his right shoulder.

A plain, sharp dagger had been plunged into his chest.

Song Ling looked up in disbelief. In the distance, fireworks blazed to life — and for one instant, illuminated Lu Heng’s face.

The Jintian Guard’s blade still hung at Lu Heng’s waist. The bright red tassel on the hilt was something he himself had tied on. On every Jintian Guard’s scabbard were engraved the three characters: “virtue,” “truth,” and “compassion.”

And now the owner of this blade was expressionlessly plunging a different weapon — the most common sharp blade from any street market — into his chest. He was in too much pain to speak. His lips moved, and he barely squeezed out the word “you” before Lu Heng reached out a hand and gave him a light, casual push.

In the extinguished darkness, he fell back with his head tilted, unwilling to accept his fate — and from Tinghua Terrace, plunged abruptly into the icy, rushing waters of the Bianhe River.

A single firework flashed across the distant sky, making its final farewell.