How could Xiao Xun possibly forget this matter?
At the height of his momentum, advancing with irresistible force, the capital was within his grasp—yet in the blink of an eye, he became a prisoner.
“Your Highness,” Ning Kun’s voice was hoarse, “the Prince did it for you. You were being held hostage at the time, and the Prince couldn’t let you come to harm.”
Xiao Xun didn’t respond to his words, gazing at the thick greenery outside the window. This study was arranged just like his study in the Zhongshan Prince’s mansion, and even the scenery outside the window was the same.
“From the day I was born, I inherited my father’s ambition—to return to the capital and take the throne.”
“Father was crippled and monitored by the court, so I traveled on his behalf, recruiting and nurturing troops.”
“I was my father’s legs, hands, eyes—whatever Father asked me to do, I did.”
“Everything I did was my father’s wish.”
“How is it that at the moment of imminent success, Father gave it all up for my sake?”
“Doesn’t that make everything I did before a joke?”
Hearing this, Ning Kun said again: “To the Prince, Your Highness is—”
“Even if I were captured, it didn’t mean the situation was hopeless,” Xiao Xun interrupted him. “For the past year, I’ve been thinking—if I were Father, what would I have done in that situation?”
He turned to face Ning Kun.
“In that situation, there were countless ways to either rescue me or simply let me die.”
“Whether he rescued me or I died, neither would have stopped Father from entering the capital.”
“How could Father do nothing and just end it all?”
“I’ve racked my brains but cannot understand—why?”
“What exactly stopped Father?”
Ning Kun looked up: “Your Highness, as you said, it was only a delay, not a termination. Everything can continue. The Prince believes that you, like him, can wait.”
Xiao Xun replied: “I can wait.” He smiled slightly. “Before, I did whatever Father told me to do, and of course, I still do now. But now that I’m confined in the capital, cut off from the outside world, I want to wait with a clear mind.”
With a clear mind—what kind of clarity did he seek? Ning Kun remained silent.
“I know you’re afraid of saying the wrong thing and hurting the relationship between Father and me, but you’re overthinking,” Xiao Xun said softly. “What’s happened has happened. It doesn’t matter what you tell me. Whether you speak or not is immaterial.”
He picked up the gift list from the table and waved it.
“It’s just me being obsessive, insisting on understanding clearly. Don’t trouble yourself, Mr. Ning, you don’t need to say anything.”
Ning Kun looked at Xiao Xun. The Crown Prince was still as gentle and refined as before, his face still wearing a smile, but he was different now. Though confined in the post station rather than a dark prison cell, what difference did it make?
Like a bird with clipped wings, his eyes betrayed his melancholy.
His repeated questioning showed that he already had his suspicions. Not telling him would only make him imagine worse—
“Also, thank you for coming personally, Mr. Ning,” Xiao Xun continued. “You’ve been entrusted with important matters by Father and are very busy. I hear Father plans to have you teach my second brother. In the future, just send servants for these matters; you needn’t come specially.”
Ning Kun couldn’t bear these words. He stepped forward anxiously: “Your Highness, Ning Kun is your teacher, and yours alone.”
Xiao Xun smiled faintly: “Nothing in this world is forever. Don’t take it so seriously, Mr. Ning. Since I’m not by Father’s side, teach my second brother well so he won’t make the same mistakes I did.”
Ning Kun sighed inwardly. With things at this point, if he still didn’t speak, his relationship with the Crown Prince would truly be severed.
“It wasn’t Your Highness’s mistake,” he said in a low voice. “After returning, I made inquiries. At that time, Chu Zhao had also secretly amassed troops to threaten the Prince, saying that besides killing Your Highness, she would also kill the Prince and everyone in the Prince’s mansion. So the Prince felt he couldn’t risk it.”
Having said this, he quickly added an explanation.
“The root cause was that we overlooked the forces Chu Zhao had hidden. We only considered how powerful the Xie family and other aristocratic families might be. Who could have imagined that a general’s daughter, besides the Dragon Might Army, would also raise private troops—”
Xiao Xun no longer paid attention to what else he said, only hearing that Chu Zhao had hidden troops and threatened to kill the Prince, which made everything clear to him.
So it wasn’t just because he was threatened that his father gave up a victory within reach.
It turns out his father was also threatened.
Xiao Xun smiled.
“So that’s it. Chu Zhao truly kept her cards close,” he said, sighing deeply. “If I had known earlier that the Chu family also had hidden forces, I wouldn’t have let Chu Lan’s family approach me so easily. No, I would have eliminated them when Xiao Yu entered the city, rather than visiting the Chu family to see Chu Lan in the first place.”
Had the topic changed? Ning Kun hurriedly nodded: “Yes, yes, exactly. We underestimated Chu Wei—”
“We underestimated Chu Zhao,” Xiao Xun corrected.
Ning Kun couldn’t help thinking of before, saying: “Your Highness has always held Chu Zhao in high regard.” He nodded again. “Chu Zhao is indeed formidable. Even without Chu Wei, she has secured her position as Empress.”
Xiao Xun gazed out the window. Though confined in the post station, he wasn’t truly isolated from the world; his father still had many operatives hidden in the capital.
He knew how grand her return to the capital had been, knew that Grand Tutor Deng Yi complied with the Empress’s every word, knew that Xie Yanfang was extremely protective of the Empress, so protective that the Xie family women stayed away from the capital to ensure the Emperor had no female relatives in mind besides the Empress.
All of this, that girl had earned herself.
It had been a long time since he had seen her. Xiao Xun thought back, only recalling their first meeting by the river. In the water, he couldn’t see clearly; after rescuing her, he hadn’t bothered to look at her again.
“If I had known she was so formidable,” Xiao Xun said with a smile, “I would have kept her in the Zhongshan Prince’s mansion back then.”
At that time, not only was this girl weak, but Deng Yi was also just a minor official. Ning Kun sighed: “Not just kept her—we could have killed them all, and who could have done anything about it?”
What a pity, what a pity. Ning Kun was about to say more, but Xiao Xun ended the topic.
“So it was my mistake after all,” he said regretfully. “I have no one to blame but myself for being confined here.”
Ning Kun hurriedly said: “Your Highness shouldn’t say that. The Prince feels very guilty too, but he says that as long as one lives, there’s still hope.”
Xiao Xun smiled: “Tell Father not to worry, I understand everything now.”
Ning Kun studied his face. The Crown Prince indeed looked regretful, but the earlier gloom was gone. So even knowing that the Prince had also been threatened, in the Crown Prince’s mind, the hatred should still be directed at Chu Zhao.
That’s how it should be. The Prince had no choice; everything was because of Chu Zhao.
It was good that the Crown Prince had come to terms with it.
“I will tell the Prince,” he nodded, then continued with concern and sadness, “No matter how much Your Highness makes the best of this difficult situation, no matter how much gold, silver, jewelry, furniture, and decorations are sent, they cannot ease the Prince’s worry for you. While Your Highness lives in this cage in the capital, the Prince is also imprisoned by his own heart in Zhongshan Commandery. Please, Your Highness, endure and persevere through these difficult days.”
Xiao Xun nodded with a smile: “I know, I understand everything. As the saying goes, ‘When the child is ill, the mother’s heart aches.’ Go rest now. I’ll write a letter to Father with some jokes to cheer him up, and you can take it back to him.”
Ning Kun responded: “Then I’ll go wash up first.”
“Go ahead, take care of yourself,” Xiao Xun said. “Don’t count on Tie Ying.”
Ning Kun laughed: “How would I dare trouble him?” With that, he took his leave.
The room returned to silence. Xiao Xun stood at the desk but didn’t pick up a brush to write. Instead, he reached for a scroll from the vase on the desk and unrolled it.
It was a landscape painting. Xiao Xun examined it carefully, then peeled back its edge. This landscape painting had two layers—
As one layer was peeled away, it revealed another beneath—an imperial edict on bright yellow paper.
Xiao Xun silently read the edict, over and over again. There was no smile on his face; his eyes were clouded with mist, cold and grim.
“You gave me my life, but you can’t use me however you please,” he said slowly, reaching up to touch his face. “I, too, have a face, skin, and bones.”