The great hall stood vast and empty, the light dim and murky, the silence complete.

A fourteen-year-old boy, clad in mourning white as snow, his face pallid and wan — a gaunt, slight figure — knelt silently before the memorial tablet of his mother, who had died ten years ago.

Before the tablet, a perpetual lamp had been offered, its single flame burning ceaselessly, day and night. In front of it stood a spirit altar table, upon which sat a small incense brazier with burning incense inserted within. Nearby also stood a jug of offering wine and a plate of offering fruit.

The boy’s gaze was fixed upon that perpetual flame, unmoving.

At the entrance to the hall, the sound of approaching footsteps gradually drew near from a distance.

The founding emperor of the Great Zhou dynasty — his Imperial Father — had trudged through the snow in the deep of night and finally arrived at his mother’s spirit hall.

But he did not enter. Instead, he halted outside the hall.

The Emperor was in his prime, at the most vigorous age a man could be in his lifetime. Though he wore mourning dress for the Empress Dowager and carried fatigue upon his face, his supreme imperial dignity still made others dare not look upon him directly.

He glanced into the dim interior of the hall, then turned toward Nanny Mu and asked, “What is the matter?”

Nanny Mu, who had been by Xi’er’s side all these years, knelt within the threshold and said in a low voice, “Your Majesty, tomorrow is the tenth anniversary of the late Empress’s death. It was therefore His Highness who took the liberty of requesting Your Majesty to come here tonight.”

Behind him, a fierce wind howled, carrying snow from the pitch-black night sky, surging down from the towering eaves toward the wide-open doors of the hall. The wind lifted the hem of the Emperor’s robe, revealing from beneath the mourning garments a corner of the yellow dragon-patterned inner robe.

His figure remained rigid for a moment, then he finally stepped forward and crossed the threshold.

“All of you, withdraw.”

Nanny Mu kowtowed, rose, and retreated outside.

A single hall door shut the howling snow and wind away beyond the threshold.

The Emperor followed the guidance of that flickering, dim perpetual flame deep within the hall, walking slowly until he came to a stop behind the boy.

The boy rose from before his mother’s memorial tablet, turned to face the Emperor, and knelt once more, bowing in reverence.

He could not speak.

From ten years ago, after escaping from Pucheng, he had been unable to speak.

Once such a bright and lively child, he had completely lost the ability to speak overnight, becoming mute.

Later, even though the Imperial Physicians exhausted every method, it was entirely without effect.

Palace attendants privately spread word that the first Imperial Prince must have suffered an enormous fright in his early childhood, causing him to lose his voice and become unable to speak.

The Emperor glanced at the memorial tablet, was silent for a moment, then spoke to the slight figure bowing upon the ground before him: “Tomorrow, your Imperial Father will have people come here to offer sacrifices to your mother, the late Empress.”

The boy remained prostrated on the ground, as though he had not heard.

The Emperor walked to stand before the boy, bent down, and gently reached out to take hold of his shoulders, meaning to help him up from the floor.

The boy slowly raised his face.

This face was pallid and lean, yet the brows, eyes, and features were clean and handsome.

The Emperor had risen from humble origins and seized the realm on horseback; he was venerated by his ministers as a ruler of unparalleled brilliance rarely seen in any age. But by account, in his youth, he had been fine-featured and refined in bearing, resembling a man of letters.

The contours of the boy’s face bore a strong resemblance to the Emperor’s, while his brows and eyes — so palace attendants whispered — actually looked more like those of the first Empress.

The first Empress had died ten years ago. According to those who had seen her, the first Empress had borne the title of the greatest beauty of the Changsha Kingdom, a peerless face of her generation, her looks like those of a celestial being.

The first Imperial Prince’s appearance, combining the finest features of both parents — dragon blood and phoenix marrow — was naturally outstanding.

The only regret was that he had lost the ability to speak.

The Emperor gazed at the pair of limpid eyes looking back at him — eyes that seemed so familiar — and a flash of complex emotion passed through the depths of his gaze. He said in a low voice, “Xi’er, I know there must be some resentment in your heart. Do not blame your Imperial Father. You are my eldest son, and I know you are exceptionally clever. If only you could speak, how could I not make you Crown Prince?”

He paused.

“Even if you cannot become Crown Prince, I will ensure that you spend your life in peace and happiness. If your mother’s spirit has consciousness, she should also be at ease.”

The boy gazed at the Emperor, and a faint smile surfaced at the corner of his lips. He kowtowed to the Emperor, then rose, went before the offering table, took up the wine jug, and turned over the three upended cups one by one, filling each with wine.

He took the first cup and poured it onto the ground as an offering to his deceased mother. The second cup he respectfully offered before the memorial tablet, then drank it himself.

Having done all this, he stepped aside and knelt upon the ground once more, his gaze fixed on the Emperor as he solemnly kowtowed to him.

The Emperor hesitated, then finally stepped forward, took up the third cup of offering wine, offered it to the spirit, and drank it.

He set down the cup and turned to say, “Rise. The floor is cold.”

At that moment, had an outsider been present, they would surely have been astonished.

The tone in which the Emperor spoke those words was a gentleness rarely heard from him.

The boy did not rise. His eyes remained fixed on the Emperor.

“Imperial Father, your son is grateful for your regard. But I have no desire to become Crown Prince.”

He had actually spoken aloud.

“I only wish to ask Imperial Father one thing — tomorrow, on the tenth anniversary, on such an important occasion, why will you not come yourself to offer sacrifices to my mother?”

The boy’s voice was somewhat low, yet each word was spoken with exceptional clarity.

The air inside the hall seemed to freeze solid in an instant.

The perpetual flame before the memorial tablet suddenly flickered, its light wavering and uncertain.

The Emperor stared at the boy for a long moment, as though only just coming back to his senses.

“Xi’er! You can speak?”

“Since when could you speak?”

For a moment, he gave no thought to the disrespect concealed within the boy’s words, stepped forward, and an expression of unbounded joy appeared on his face.

“Several years ago, I was already able to speak. I simply had no wish to open my mouth.”

The boy said so, glancing at the memorial tablet.

“Imperial Father, if your son’s memory serves me correctly, all these years, you have not set foot here a single time. Tonight, if not for your son’s request, Imperial Father, you likely would not have come at all — is that not so?”

The Emperor gazed at the boy, whose expression was cold and detached. The joy that had appeared on his face a moment ago vanished, and he made no sound.

“Imperial Father, was it that you deemed it beneath you to come, or that you never placed my mother’s death upon your heart, not even by a hair’s breadth?”

The boy abruptly raised his voice, each word like an accusation.

The Emperor seemed pricked by a needle and furrowed his brow.

“Insolent! How dare you speak this way?”

The boy looked at the Emperor and laughed.

“Indeed, you are the founding ruler of Great Zhou. This new dynasty, under your governance, is thriving and the people live in peace and contentment. In time to come, it will certainly enjoy a prosperous and enduring legacy. Your son can foresee that, many years from now, when the court historians compose their imperial records of you, even if your achievements cannot rival the Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors, you will stand equal to the First Emperor of Qin or Emperor Wu of Han.”

“You are not only the ruler, but also the father who sired me. Were it not for your vital essence, how would I have this flesh and blood today?”

“But I tell you — no matter how they praise you or venerate you — in my eyes, Father, you are a cold-blooded man without conscience!”

The Emperor stared at the boy before him, his expression darkening, with a hidden current of rage flowing through the depths of his eyes.

Yet the boy’s face showed not the slightest trace of fear. He slowly rose from the ground, straightening his slight yet upright frame.

“When the Hanlin compilers revised your ancestral records, they carefully avoided your youth, saying only that you had harbored great ambitions from childhood and were exceptional in valor. They dared not say a single ill word of you. Yet you yourself know well in your heart — your origins were those of a highwayman and bandit! It was by relying on my maternal grandfather that you entered officialdom and rose swiftly from there. To say my mother had no cause for grievance when she married down to you — is that not accurate? Yet how did you treat her? In the very first year she married you, you could not wait to bring another woman into the household!”

“During those years, I cannot recall what my father’s face looked like. When I grew a little older, all I remember is that every single morning, without exception, regardless of cold or heat, my mother had to rise early to serve tea and food to Grandmother. While that woman named Qi Shi, called a concubine in name, was able to remain at Grandmother’s side, smiling as she watched my once-noble mother endure, right before her eyes, all manner of fault-finding from Grandmother!”

The Emperor’s brow remained deeply furrowed, but the anger that had appeared on his face a moment ago seemed to have gradually receded somewhat. He watched the boy silently, making no attempt to interrupt.

“Let all of that pass. Father, later, my mother died! After she sent me away, unwilling to be a burden to you, and knowing you would never yield for her sake, she took her own life!”

“I will never forget — that day, when General Yuan led me in flight and I broke free of his hand covering my eyes and turned back, the scene I saw!”

The boy’s eyes reddened, his voice trembling faintly.

“She was a daughter of the Prince of Changsha — once such a beautiful and noble woman. She should never have been treated that way! She died, yet those people did not let her be even then. The weather was so cold, yet she had not a single decent garment on her body. What she had were only the wounds left by the blades and swords of enemies who hated you. Blood — her entire body was covered in blood! Her head downward, her feet bound with rope, she had been hung upside down from the city wall, the wind making her sway ceaselessly. In the midst of the soldiers’ unbridled, shameless laughter and mockery, she was so helpless, so wretched…”

The boy shed tears, his gaunt figure rigid as though he had become a stone.

The Emperor’s expression stiffened. He closed his eyes, then opened them, and slowly walked toward the boy, reaching out to grip his arm.

“Xi’er…” He called the boy by his childhood name, his voice hoarse.

But a flash of loathing passed through the boy’s eyes. He wrenched himself free from his father’s grasp with a single pull and retreated several sharp steps backward.

“Father, ten years have passed — you must have long forgotten my mother. But I cannot forget her! I dream of her always. I will never forget the sight of her hanging from the city wall!”

“I dare not accuse you of whether, during that year-long captivity, while you were fighting for your realm, you truly exhausted every effort to find a way to save us. Nor do I have the standing to demand that you abandon, for the sake of Mother and me, that city won through the sacrifice of your soldiers. You had your own considerations and judgments — I understand! But Father, what I cannot forgive is what you did afterward. How did you treat my mother?”

“You granted her the empty title of first Empress, added a string of flowery posthumous honorifics before her name, had a place built to house her memorial tablet, and from that point on, you believed you could be at peace with yourself — is that it?”

The boy’s tone grew impassioned, and a flush of red spread across his pallid face.

“I always feel she has not left this place. She is watching me, and she is watching you, my Imperial Father!”

“Xi’er! Enough!”

The Emperor let out a sharp shout.

“Far from enough! If not for the fact that you used her, married her, and then ruined her, how could she have come to such an end? All these years, if you had harbored even half a trace of guilt toward her, I would have let it rest. But you are heartless and faithless — you cannot even come to offer sacrifices yourself on her tenth anniversary!”

“Xie. Chang. Geng!”

The boy’s eyes were scarlet, as though dyed with blood. He fixed his gaze on the Emperor before him and called out his name, syllable by syllable.

“You were not only unworthy of my mother — you are the very one who caused her death!”

“You are insolent! Speak such nonsense again, and I will have you severely punished!”

The Emperor’s face had turned ashen.

After a brief pause, he eased his tone somewhat.

“You do not yet know that it was Qi Shi who caused you and your mother to fall into enemy hands. It was that vile woman who leaked the information to Prince Qi’s people. I only learned of this matter afterward. Just now, before coming here, I already issued the order for her to be executed.”

The boy stared fixedly at the Emperor with an odd expression, then suddenly burst into laughter.

“Imperial Father, do you believe that by doing this, my mother has finally been able to rest in peace — that she would even feel grateful to you for avenging her?”

He laughed without stopping, until tears nearly streamed from his eyes before he finally ceased.

“Ten full years! My mother has been dead for ten years, and you have only acted now…”

“Imperial Father, allow your son to ask you this: did you truly avenge my mother, or was it out of hatred for Qi Shi’s betrayal of you? And you waited until Grandmother had passed before moving against her?”

The Emperor’s brow deepened into a frown, and he said coldly, “After your grandmother suffered her apoplexy, she became muddled and could not be without her. She was nothing but a living corpse — why trouble over sooner or later? It is late. You should return and rest.”

Having said this, he turned and began to step out of the spirit hall, but after only a few strides, his pace gradually slowed, and his figure swayed.

He steadied himself, then slowly turned back around.

In the boy’s hand, appearing from nowhere, was a long sword.

The candlelight flickered; the blade’s gleam was cold and sharp.

The Emperor swiftly glanced at the offering wine jug on the altar table, then fixed his gaze on the boy. Within his eyes, an expression of disbelieving fury blazed.

“You actually dare to move against Us?” He ground his teeth.

The boy smiled.

“Imperial Father, do you feel right now as though your entire body has lost its strength, your breathing has become difficult, and you can barely stand? Let me tell you — I have always read the medical texts my mother left behind. One day, I came across a remarkably potent formula in those books, and I taught myself to prepare it…”

“You wretched son!”

The Emperor’s face twisted.

“Guards!”

He roared toward the outside of the hall at the top of his voice.

After the shout, the Emperor suddenly remembered.

His first Imperial Prince had, for all these years, absolutely not permitted any outsiders to set foot within his late mother’s spirit hall by so much as a step, considering it a desecration of his mother.

How could he not have known this? That was precisely why, when arriving earlier, in order to avoid this eldest son toward whom he always felt he had been remiss, he had deliberately left all his attendants outside the palace gate.

Only at this moment did the Emperor finally understand.

To wait for this single moment, his own son had undoubtedly been preparing for a very long time.

The forbearance and depth of scheming this son of his possessed — it was terrifyingly profound to such a degree!

The Emperor’s shout reverberated through the spirit hall.

The great door was pushed open and Nanny Mu came rushing in. Seeing the Emperor’s swaying figure from behind, she was struck with alarm, not knowing at all what had happened.

The perpetual flame was blown by the gusting night wind into a violent frenzy of flickering, the shadows of figures swaying wildly. The Emperor glared furiously at his son and, rather than retreating, advanced — staggering, step by step, pressing toward him.

“Wretched son! We don’t believe you truly dare kill Us!”

He walked until he stood before his son, then could no longer hold himself up and collapsed forward onto the ground.

The boy watched him with cold eyes, as though looking upon a lifeless sacrificial offering laid upon an altar table. Only when the Emperor had fallen at his feet did he finally smile.

He raised his hand, and his slender fingers lightly traced the cold edge of the blade.

“Imperial Father, do you still recognize this sword? On the day you captured Pucheng and saw me afterward, you unsheathed it from your body and gave it to me. This blade has been stained with the blood of countless people; you told me to be a real man.”

The boy slowly crouched down, settling before his father who lay on the ground, meeting his eyes face to face.

The Emperor glared at him with furious eyes.

The smile on the boy’s face vanished. He raised his arm and swept the sword toward the Emperor.

In the midst of Nanny Mu’s terrified cry, the Emperor felt an icy blade edge sweep across his face.

There was no blood.

A soft “ding” rang out.

The topknot crown atop his head was severed in two.

The hair bound within the crown was cut off at the roots, cascading to the ground.

The Emperor remained motionless, watching his son slowly rise from the ground.

“Imperial Father, I have heard that when you were my age, you killed a man to avenge your father. Your son is without talent, but in the heart to avenge a mother, I am no less than you. If I followed only my own nature, I would have killed you by now.”

“But I cannot take your life. If you died, the realm would descend into chaos once more, and I fear that if I met my mother, she would reproach me.”

“Hear me: I cut your topknot now as though I were killing you. For a son to slay his father is against the natural order of Heaven — from this day forward, I have no father, and you have no son in me!”

He lifted the severed lock of black hair with the tip of his sword, then without looking at the Emperor once more, turned and walked to stand before the first Empress’s memorial tablet. He placed the hair upon the offering table, bowed down in reverence, then rose. Facing the memorial tablet, he asked, word by word, “A’Niang, is what your son has done right or wrong?”

There was no echo in the great hall. Only the suppressed sobbing of Nanny Mu, who knelt to one side.

The perpetual flame swayed violently.

The boy slowly looked around him and said with desolation, “A’Niang, all these years, your son has always felt you are right by my side. I remember when I was small, he was always away from home. Sometimes your son would wake in the middle of the night and see that A’Niang was still awake — so very alone. In truth, that day, you should not have let General Yuan take me away. Your son did not want you to leave alone in such solitude. Your son is coming to keep you company now. We will never be parted from A’Niang again.”

He closed his eyes, tilted his head back sharply, swung the sword toward his own throat, and drew it across.

“Xi’er!”

The Emperor let out a great roar, his eyes wide enough to split. With a strength that seemed to come from nowhere, he struggled up from the ground and, together with Nanny Mu, lunged toward the white-clad boy before them.

But it was too late.

The blade swept across and blood sprayed upon the spirit altar, extinguishing the perpetual lamp in one sweep.

The hall plunged instantly into darkness, leaving only the Emperor’s heartbreaking, soul-rending cries.

A moment later, the palace attendants who had finally been alerted came rushing in carrying lanterns through the hall doors, and were frozen in shock by the scene before them.

The Emperor, his hair loose and disheveled, held the first Imperial Prince in his arms and had collapsed before the first Empress’s memorial tablet, murmuring over and over, “Xi’er… it is not that your Father did not want to come… it is that he did not dare come…”

The sword lay on the ground; both figures were spotted all over with blood.

……

That pain — like ten thousand arrows piercing her heart — came surging over her once more.

Mu Fulan’s body slowly slid downward.

She shut her eyes tightly, curling herself into a tight ball, lying face down on the couch without moving.

Nanny Mu waited outside, filled with uneasy anxiety, when she suddenly saw the door open and Xie Changgeng walk out. She hurried forward to meet him and was just about to speak when she saw that his expression was grim. He strode away in large steps without a single word, and not knowing what had just transpired, she had no time to spare for him. She quickly turned and went inside to first check on the Princess.

Xie Changgeng went straight out of the Prince’s residence and returned to the post station, where he immediately ordered them to set out that same night.

His attendants were greatly surprised.

He ordinarily never showed joy or anger outwardly, but at this moment, his expression was quite unpleasant. Everyone quietly alarmed, they had no idea what had happened at the night banquet to bring him to such a state. Yet how would any dare ask? They hastily packed up their things, completed the task quickly, and the entire party left the post station and made their way toward the city gate.

When they were nearly at the city gate, the sound of galloping hooves came chasing after them from behind.

Changsha Kingdom’s Prime Minister, Lu Lin, came riding up on horseback, calling loudly, “Circuit Intendant Xie! Please stop!”

Xie Changgeng slowly reined in his horse.

Lu Lin rode up close, leaped down from his horse, and came running toward him, gasping for breath.

He wore no official cap, and the boots on his feet were on the wrong feet, left and right reversed.

“Circuit Intendant Xie, what is the meaning of this? What matter could require departing in the middle of the night?”

Xie Changgeng’s expression had already returned to its usual composure, and he smiled. “Before my departure just now, I left a written message at the post station steward’s office, intending to have it forwarded on my behalf come morning. The purpose of this visit was twofold: firstly, to pay respects at the late Prince’s memorial, and secondly, to bring my wife home. The late Prince’s memorial has already been paid. As for my wife — after she arrived at my Kuizhou, she was unaccustomed to the local conditions and her health was not good, though I did not mention this at the time. As she had already returned here, I thought it best to let her remain and slowly recuperate. As I have another urgent matter requiring my attention, I am departing tonight. My gratitude to the Prince of Changsha and the Prime Minister for their hospitality is immense. Prime Minister, please do not see me further — I shall take my leave first. Until we meet again.”

Lu Lin had only just returned to the residence and had barely lain down when word came that Xie Changgeng’s party intended to leave during the night. Not knowing why, he had rushed to catch up.

He had originally been worried that they had somehow given offense and that Xie had departed in anger. Now that he had caught up and found him smiling and at ease, he let out a breath of relief. He offered some words of farewell, which were also abandoned, and said that the Prince of Changsha had drunk too much at the night banquet; he would act on the Prince’s behalf to see him out of the city.

Xie Changgeng did not decline, and allowed Lu Lin to see him off.

The city gate opened. Lu Lin saw him out, and after further courteous exchanges, finally watched as his silhouette galloped away and disappeared into the night, before slowly exhaling and returning to the city with lingering doubts, saying no more.

Xie Changgeng galloped at full speed for a stretch of road, then suddenly stopped.

His attendants, seeing that he seemed to have something on his mind, also drew up their horses, all of them watching him.

Xie Changgeng turned his head and gazed for a long while at the city behind him — its silhouette traced in pitch black by the night — then turned his face back and instructed an attendant skilled in tracking and intelligence, a man called Zhu Liuhu: “You stay behind and keep out of sight. Whatever news there is from the Changsha Kingdom, pass it on to me.”

“In particular, keep a close watch on the Princess’s movements for me. In all matters — the more detailed, the better.”

Xie Changgeng gave the instructions with a calm expression.