As the Empress Dowager fell, Li Ying also hurried over. Door gods were pasted on the entrance to Penglai Palace, which should have prevented her, a ghost, from entering. She had forced her way in with the help of the Buddha’s Top Relic hanging around her neck. Even so, her vital energy was severely damaged. Li Ying suppressed the bloody taste in her mouth, rushed to the Empress Dowager’s side, knelt, and helped her up.

The Empress Dowager grabbed her sleeve: “Mingyue Zhu, is it Mingyue Zhu?”

Li Ying replied tearfully: “Mother, it’s Mingyue Zhu.”

The Empress Dowager still couldn’t believe it. With trembling hands, she caressed Li Ying’s face: “Is Mother dreaming? My Mingyue Zhu is gone. How could she possibly return? Mother is dreaming again…”

Li Ying bit her lip, her eyes brimming with tears. Over these years, Mother must have dreamed of her countless times, which is why she still thought this was a dream. The Empress Dowager stroked her face. Though the young woman’s skin wasn’t as warm as a living person’s, but rather cool and cold, the feeling against her palm was real. The Empress Dowager’s lips quivered, her eyes blurred with tears as she pulled Li Ying into her embrace: “If this is a dream, let Mother continue dreaming forever. Mother’s daughter, Mother’s Mingyue Zhu…”

Li Ying rested in her embrace, hearing the Empress Dowager’s extremely suppressed sobs. Li Ying also shed tears, murmuring: “Mother, this is not a dream. Mingyue Zhu has returned, but Mingyue Zhu is also dead.”

The Empress Dowager’s arms around her stiffened. Li Ying slowly moved away from her embrace: “Mother, Mingyue Zhu is now a ghost.”

To convince her mother that she wasn’t a dream but a ghost, Li Ying’s fingertips lit up with green ghost fire. In the soft green light, the scenes outside the hall gradually became clear: the Qianniu Guards holding swords and spears protecting Penglai Palace, the young palace maids with hanging braids sweeping the courtyard, the attendant cautiously reporting back to Emperor Longxing, and the Tianwei Army dependents continuing to cry for justice at the petition drum, as well as the Imperial Academy scholars risking their lives sitting silently outside the Danfeng Gate.

Scene after scene of ongoing events passed before the Empress Dowager’s eyes. When the green ghost fire slowly disappeared and Penglai Palace returned to its spacious silence, the Empress Dowager stared blankly at Li Ying. Li Ying said tearfully: “Mother, Mingyue Zhu’s soul has returned to see you…”

“Mingyue Zhu’s soul has returned to see Mother…”

The Empress Dowager murmured, repeating this sentence. She reached out to touch the golden flower hairpin in Li Ying’s hair. The golden leaves of the hairpin pricked her fingertip. The sharp pain finally convinced her this was real. The soul of her beloved daughter, dead for thirty years, had returned to see her.

She whispered: “Mingyue Zhu’s soul… has returned to see Mother…”

The Empress Dowager was already in tears. She suddenly reached out and hugged Li Ying tightly again, as if afraid that letting go would make her disappear. The current Empress Dowager, who stood at the pinnacle of power in the Great Zhou and was known for her ruthlessness, sobbed uncontrollably: “Mingyue Zhu, thirty years, thirty years. Mother has been without you for thirty years. Your soul has finally returned to see Mother…”

At this moment, she was no longer the Great Zhou Empress Dowager who held the power of life and death, but merely a mother heartbroken at the loss of her beloved daughter.

She held Li Ying, crying mournfully. After a while, she suddenly realized something: “No, Mingyue Zhu, you shouldn’t be here! You should be reincarnated, reborn! Why is your soul still in the mortal world?”

Li Ying sobbed, saying vaguely: “Couldn’t find the person who killed me, so I couldn’t be reincarnated…”

“The person who killed you?” the Empress Dowager murmured. A flash of extreme pain and hatred crossed her eyes: “The person who killed you was your Father!”

“No…”

Li Ying was about to deny it, but before she could finish, the tightly closed camphor wood door was knocked twice, and an attendant loudly asked: “Reporting to the Empress Dowager, Censor Ouyang requests an audience.”

Seeking an audience at this time? The Empress Dowager was impatient. She pressed her lips together and asked harshly: “What matter?”

The attendant trembled in fear: “Censor Ouyang says His Majesty ordered him to interrogate Cui Xun, but the Empress Dowager has forbidden further torture. He wishes to seek an audience with the Empress Dowager to ask how he should proceed with the interrogation.”

The Empress Dowager had no mood to see him now. She angrily said: “How to proceed? Let him decide for himself. Why ask me?”

The attendant dared not say more, so he replied “Yes” and quickly left the chamber to report back to Censor Ouyang.

While the Empress Dowager was speaking with the attendant, she continued to hold onto Li Ying’s sleeve, fearing that letting go would make her disappear. Li Ying, hearing the conversation involving Cui Xun, felt extremely anxious. But then she noticed the five-colored peony brocade pouch that had fallen when the Empress Dowager got off the couch earlier. Was that… her pouch?

She hurriedly crawled over, reached out, and picked it up. The pouch was damaged and stained with Cui Xun’s blood. Li Ying cradled it in her hands as if it were the most precious treasure. She opened the pouch and stroked the well-preserved locks of hair tied with red cord inside. These were the locks of hair that Cui Xun had protected with his life.

She turned back, bit her lip, and looked at the Empress Dowager as tears fell: “Mother, please save Cui Xun. I beg you… save him…”

The Empress Dowager was completely stunned: “Cui Xun? What relationship do you have with Cui Xun?”

Li Ying took out the red cord-tied locks of hair from the pouch and showed them tearfully to the Empress Dowager: “Mother, this is Mingyue Zhu’s hair, and Cui Xun’s.”

A lock of hair from a man and a woman, tied together with a red cord—even the most obtuse person would understand what relationship existed between such a pair.

So, her daughter’s soul remained in the mortal world because she had fallen in love with Cui Xun?

This was such an extraordinary thing that the Empress Dowager was momentarily speechless, unable to react. Li Ying seemed to perceive her confusion and nodded with a choked voice: “Mother, Cui Xun is indeed my beloved. His life is now hanging by a thread. Please, save him…”

The Empress Dowager stared at Li Ying. Li Ying’s words seemed to remind her of something from long ago. She stood in a daze for a while, as if finally understanding something. Her face gradually turned pale, her body began to shake, and even her fingertips trembled. By the time the incense in the burner had burned out, her pale lips moved, and she finally spoke: “Mingyue Zhu, how… did you die?”

“I…”

Before Li Ying could speak, the Empress Dowager suddenly used all her strength to grip Li Ying’s hand tightly: “It wasn’t your Father who killed you, was it?”

Li Ying blankly shook her head: “No, Father wanted to kill me, but at the last moment, he held back…”

“Yes, it wasn’t him… it wasn’t him…” the Empress Dowager murmured, and finally began to laugh: “It wasn’t him… it wasn’t him…”

Li Ying said uneasily: “Mother, what’s wrong…”

By the end of her laughter, the Empress Dowager’s eyes were filled with tears. Her expression showed an extremely painful realization: “So that’s how it was… that’s how it was…”

Li Ying didn’t understand, but she instinctively felt it was related to her death. She asked the Empress Dowager: “Mother, how… was it?”

The Empress Dowager didn’t answer, but stroked Li Ying’s face, both laughing and crying: “Mingyue Zhu, where has your soul been these thirty years? In the underworld?”

Li Ying lowered her eyes and fought back tears: “No, in… the lotus pond in the palace.”

“The lotus pond?”

Li Ying nodded: “After I died, my soul was trapped in the lotus pond until I met Cui Xun. My soul was only freed with his help. I asked Cui Xun to help me investigate the truth about my death. During this process, I fell in love with him and could no longer leave him…”

She had intended to continue, to persuade the Empress Dowager to save Cui Xun, but the Empress Dowager seemed not to have heard the next sentence at all. Her expression was one of heart-wrenching pain: “Mingyue Zhu, the lotus pond must have been very cold, very dark…”

This one sentence suddenly made Li Ying’s tears flow like a spring. In this world, those who care most for their children are always the mothers who carried them for ten months.

She wept uncontrollably: “Not cold… not dark…”

“How could it not be cold? How could it not be dark?” The Empress Dowager was grief-stricken: “It’s Mother’s fault. Mother didn’t realize. Mother has failed you…”

Li Ying bit her lip. She used her sleeve to desperately wipe away the continuously flowing tears. She very much wanted to tell Mother that she had done nothing wrong, that she hadn’t failed her, that she was the best mother in the world. But she had no time left. A burning pain continued to spread in her chest. She couldn’t maintain this form for much longer. She had to be brief and persuade Mother quickly to save Cui Xun.

She held the Empress Dowager’s hand: “Mother, those who have passed are gone. I originally didn’t want to see you because the meeting would only increase our sorrow. But I had to come see you. Cui Xun is still imprisoned in the Dali Temple. Mother, please, save him…”

The Empress Dowager’s eyes glistened with tears. She finally heard the plea to save Cui Xun: “Mingyue Zhu, you say, save Cui Xun?”

“Yes.” Li Ying nodded: “Save Cui Xun, save my Seventeen.”

Cui Xun was the seventeenth son in his clan, and Li Ying called him by this intimate name. The Empress Dowager was stunned. Li Ying bit her lip and steeled herself to plead: “Mother, if anything happens to Seventeen, I… though I’m already dead, I… I fear I’ll die a second time…”

These words struck the Empress Dowager like lightning. She was shocked, and after a moment, asked incredulously: “Mingyue Zhu, do you truly love him that much?”

Li Ying nodded. Her voice carried the choke of someone who had been crying, but it was very firm: “I love him very much. I can’t imagine what would happen to me if I lost him…”

She pulled out the Buddha’s Top Relic hanging from her pearl necklace: “Mother, to save me, he sought the Buddha’s Top Relic. He no longer has a next life, so in this life, I must save him… Mother, Mingyue Zhu, has never asked you for anything. I’m asking just this once. Please, release him…”

The Empress Dowager stared blankly at the luminous Buddha’s Top Relic. So Cui Xun had seized the Buddha’s Top Relic for her daughter? However, releasing Cui Xun would be easy, but would he give up investigating the Tianwei Army case?

The Empress Dowager pressed her lips together and lowered her eyes in pain: “Mingyue Zhu, Cui Xun wants to kill your brother!”

“I know he wants to kill Brother.”

“You know?” The Empress Dowager asked incredulously, “You know, and yet you still want to save him? That’s your brother! Your brother was born from the same mother!”

“No! He is not my brother!” Li Ying gritted her teeth: “I do not have a brother who betrays frontier soldiers. I do not have a brother who betrays his people!”

The Empress Dowager was stunned.

“He is not worthy to be my brother.” Li Ying suppressed the pain of the surging blood in her chest: “Mother, I’m not saying this just to save Seventeen. I’m not abandoning Brother for love. But, Mother, you know very well what Brother has done. Like this, is he still worthy to be the Emperor of the Great Zhou? Is he still worthy of being revered by thousands and called ‘Your Majesty’ by the common people?”

The Empress Dowager could not refute this. She could only murmur: “But you have only this one brother, and Mother has only this one son. Mother cannot give him up…”

The Empress Dowager’s expression grew increasingly pained. Her face, which had once looked like that of a beautiful woman in her forties, had aged considerably in recent days. Deep wrinkles now lined her face: “Mingyue Zhu, after you were gone, seven years passed before Mother had your brother. Mother feared that the Maitreya Bodhisattva statue would take him away just as it took you, so Mother gave him a milk name: Pusa Bao (Protected by Bodhisattva). When Pusa Bao was young, he was obedient and sensible like you, helping Mother somewhat ease the pain of losing a daughter. He has been by Mother’s side for twenty-three years. He always felt Mother didn’t love him, but that’s not true. Just as you are flesh of Mother’s flesh, so is he. In this world, no mother would not love her child. Mingyue Zhu, Mother’s heart has already broken once. Mother doesn’t want it to break a second time…”

Li Ying was in tears: “Mother, Brother is flesh of your flesh, and you don’t want your heart to break a second time. But, Mother, the fifty thousand Tianwei Army soldiers, the people of the six prefectures—they all have mothers too! They are also flesh of their mothers’ flesh. What wrong did their mothers do to lose their children and have their hearts broken?”

The Empress Dowager shuddered and froze.

Li Ying wiped her tears and continued: “Mother, in the Tianwei Army, there was a young man named Cao Wulang. He was Seventeen’s best friend. He was an only son, and it was to serve the Great Zhou that he joined the army with a loyal heart. Cao Wulang fought bloody battles at the frontier, never retreating. But he never imagined that he would be sent to the battlefield at Luyan Ridge by the sovereign father he swore to protect with his life. His sovereign father, for his purposes, sent him to his death! His remains are scattered at Luyan Ridge, still uncollected… His mother couldn’t bear the shock and hanged herself. And in the Tianwei Army, in the six prefectures of Guannei Circuit, how many more innocent Cao Wulangs were there? How many more heartbroken mothers…”

She continued slowly: “Mother, you always taught me that a princess, supported by all people, must give back to them. I did that. But what about Brother? He is the Emperor, supported and revered by all people. Has he given back to them? No! Instead, he has delivered his people to be trampled under the iron hooves of the Turks! Mother, tell me, how is such a brother worthy to be my brother?”

The Empress Dowager’s expression was conflicted. She wept: “Mingyue Zhu, stop talking!”

“Mother…” Li Ying, enduring her heartache, continued: “You are the Empress Dowager of the Great Zhou. You are not only Brother’s mother, but also the mother of all people in the world! The sons of the Tianwei Army, the people of the six prefectures—they are all your children! How can you allow one child to harm your other children? Mother, this is not how things should be…”

Her words made the Empress Dowager even more stunned. Indeed, this was not how things should be!

Wave after wave of burning pain surged from Li Ying’s chest. She felt increasingly dizzy. She clutched her collar, breathing heavily, and said to the Empress Dowager: “Mother, Mingyue Zhu must leave now, and will not return… Mother is the Empress Dowager of the Great Zhou. From now on, be the mother of all people in the world…”

Her figure grew fainter and fainter. The Empress Dowager frantically rushed forward to embrace her: “Mingyue Zhu, don’t go! Don’t leave Mother again!”

But her beloved daughter’s body gradually disappeared from her arms. Li Ying’s last words to her were:

“Mother… take care…”

“In the next life… Mingyue Zhu still wants to be Mother’s daughter…”

The body in her arms completely vanished. The Empress Dowager’s arms were empty. She knew her daughter had truly disappeared.

She would never return.

The Empress Dowager of the Great Zhou collapsed on the ground, weeping uncontrollably.

When the first ray of morning light filtered through the window lattice into the chamber, the palace maids who had been waiting outside all night grew increasingly anxious. Finally, one palace maid couldn’t bear it anymore and knocked on the tightly closed camphor wood door, but the chamber remained silent.

The palace maids looked at each other, each wondering if something had happened to the Empress Dowager.

One palace maid was so frightened that she pushed open the door. She saw the Empress Dowager sitting stiffly on the black wood floor, tightly gripping a five-colored peony brocade pouch. Her eyes were swollen, as if she hadn’t slept all night.

The crowd of palace maids fearfully knelt: “Empress Dowager, please forgive us. This slave did not mean to disturb the Empress Dowager…”

But the Empress Dowager’s voice was unusually calm: “Rise.”

The palace maids rose tremblingly. One bolder palace maid looked up and screamed in shock.

In just one night, the Empress Dowager’s once jet-black waterfall of hair had turned completely white.

The Empress Dowager of the Great Zhou had turned white-haired overnight, frightening all the palace maids so much that they knelt again, trembling like sieves.

The Empress Dowager clutched the pouch tightly and slowly stood up. Though her eyes still showed pain, she had made some kind of determination.