After the Lantern Festival night, Li Gu’s insomnia resolved itself without any medicine.

Though he was the Emperor, he was also a man of flesh and blood, and like any ordinary person, he could fall into such low, inescapable moods. In truth, one only needed to endure, and it would all pass.

As he himself had said — look back once you’ve walked through it, and everything becomes like drifting smoke.

A husband dies and can be replaced by remarriage. A wife dies and a man can take another. A child dies and another can be born. There is no such thing in this world as being remembered forever after death. Even the grief of losing a child can be walked out of.

Men especially so.

Those elegies that have been passed down through a thousand years are nothing more than a momentary burst of inspiration that struck the poets in the midst of that emotion and scene. Once the poem was finished, the poet turned around and resumed living as before.

After the New Year festivities of the seventh year of the Kaiyuan era came to an end, many sons of noble families and scholars made their way to Yunjing, for in the third month of that year, the Da Mu dynasty was to hold its first imperial examination.

Because it was the first time, the various rules and regulations had not yet been fully established — or rather, they had been drafted but were, for the time being, merely lying in the drawers of Prime Minister Mo’s desk, to be gradually implemented later. This first examination was nothing more than a preliminary test of the waters, and was still quite simple.

Those sitting the examination registered in their home localities, passed through a relatively simple preliminary test, and thereby gained the qualification to travel to the capital to sit the main examination. In some regions, sons of noble families were even exempted from the preliminary test and given direct qualification to sit the examination in the capital.

In short, after the New Year of that year, Yunjing was flooded with a great many people — not only those sitting the examination, but also those who had come specifically to watch the spectacle. The streets of Yunjing were, even after the New Year celebrations, livelier than during the New Year itself.

On the third day of the third month, the Upper Si Festival, Prime Minister Mo set up a platform by the banks of the Qu River to hold a public forum and discourse, which could also be called the Da Mu dynasty’s first Imperial Lecture.

The Emperor sat at the highest position, with Prime Minister Mo seated below him. This occasion was the domain of scholars, and gathered around Prime Minister Mo, many venerable Confucian masters were scattered like stars.

The sons of noble families gathered in one area, and if one looked closely, they were further divided by region, by surname, and by faction into various smaller groups. The commoner scholars also gathered as one group, further divided within by region.

On the outside, the inner imperial guard kept strict watch. All those permitted to enter had their backgrounds thoroughly investigated in advance, ensuring their origins were unblemished.

Officials sat composed within, while ordinary people observed from the outer perimeter. The young ladies had long since sent their household’s senior servants to reserve suitable picnic spots nearby. While laughing and playing among themselves, they listened as their household servants ran back and forth to relay to them which person from which place and of which surname had said something particularly admirable.

The scholars engaged in sharp debate by the riverbank, composing poetry over cups of wine floated on the flowing stream, sitting and discussing the great matters of governance. The occasion was magnificent, the grandest it had been in many years.

For historians of later generations, this marked the beginning of Da Mu’s era of civil governance.

Once this forum came to its rousing conclusion, the Emperor praised everyone present, bestowed rewards upon them, and then departed.

Only the Emperor did not return to Yunjing — he went to Huichun Plain. Because of the Imperial Lecture that day, the people of the capital had all gathered by the banks of the Qu River, and even those who would normally be enjoying spring outings at Huichun Plain were fewer than in previous years.

As for Xie Yuzhang, she had already been staying there for several days.

At the very beginning, when the Imperial Lecture was first being arranged, Li Gu had sent Liang Chen to ask Xie Yuzhang: “There is a hot spring in the garden on Huichun Plain. His Majesty asks whether Your Highness would like to go and stay there for a while?”

“Oh?” Xie Yuzhang asked. “The one Zhang Gong had built?”

Liang Chen said, “The very one,” and offered a word of praise: “That garden was built rather splendidly.”

At the time Zhang Gong had stopped construction, the garden had actually been nearly completed. Later, after Zhang Gong fell from power, that garden occupied the high ground of Huichun Plain with a commanding view of Yunjing, and no one dared reach for it — naturally it remained in Li Gu’s own hands.

The moment Xie Yuzhang heard there was a hot spring, her heart was moved. She smiled and said, “Tell him — I’ll go.”

Since the Princess had spoken, Li Gu’s people naturally put forth every effort to tidy the garden.

Before the Upper Si Festival, Xie Yuzhang had already moved in with her attendants. The garden was indeed built with extraordinary ingenuity and elegance, occupying a vast expanse of natural landscape. Bamboo groves lay hushed and tranquil, mountain air hung clear and still, clear springs and stone pools — all of it entirely natural.

Though she was plainly within a private estate, it felt as if she had merged into heaven and earth’s own creation, far removed from the dust and mundanity of the world.

With such a magnificent scene, it was no wonder that those in power wished to claim it exclusively for themselves.

Yet the first to move in and enjoy it was Princess Yongning, Xie Yuzhang.

Once the Imperial Lecture concluded, Li Gu departed and came directly to this place on Huichun Plain.

When he asked where Xie Yuzhang was, a maidservant answered, “The Princess is bathing in the hot spring.”

Li Gu had come on horseback, raising no small amount of dust, and also needed to wash up. He said “Oh,” and was just about to go over — when he suddenly stopped in his tracks.

On the fifth night of the first month, he had slept in Xie Yuzhang’s bed and had a most absurd and licentious dream.

The things within that dream defied all reason, yet they had seeped into his marrow with a bone-dissolving, soul-consuming intoxication that left him unable to forget.

So much so that when he later went to her again, even with the incense burning he could not fall asleep. He lay with eyes open, listening to her play the zither for him, listening to her voice — soft and sweet as an oriole — whispering softly to him. It should have been a moment to still the heart and mind, yet within the small world enclosed by that lowered curtain, he was in torment, desire surging and churning.

Fortunately the curtain had been let down long ago, and she could not see his disgraceful state of awakened lust. She had thought him asleep, extinguished the incense, and gone outside to rest.

He had been tormented by desire for half the night. Rising in the night, he went outside to look at her. Separated by an embroidered screen — to go over at that moment, to unfasten her sash and press her beneath him, would all have been the simplest of things. Li Gu was also certain that Xie Yuzhang would not refuse him anymore.

Only — would she truly be willing? Would she truly be happy and pleased? Li Gu could not be certain.

He had kissed her hand.

His heart had already hardened greatly, yet it uniquely dared not hurt her in the slightest. So, taking advantage of the fact that he could still control himself, he wrapped himself in his robe and left.

After the Lantern Festival night, he had finally walked out of that period of low spirits — but he had not forgotten that bewildering, sensuous dream. That single vivid red cinnabar mole on her chest danced often before his eyes.

Only the dreams he had afterward were all hollow and hazy. His palm held no sensation that approached reality, and waking from them was even more tormenting.

The more he thought on it, the stranger it seemed. He always felt that something was not quite right.

Those sensations, those smells — all of them far too vivid. Yet if he said they were real, it was also hazy, his body not his own, as if sleepwalking.

And Li Gu still remembered what they had spoken of that day — he had at last confessed to her the guilt he carried for having abandoned her all those years ago. Li Gu vaguely remembered that before he fell asleep, she seemed to have forgiven him. But this topic had not been touched upon by either of them again from the very next day.

Yet even if she forgave him now — what he had done back then could not be changed.

How could she have treated him the way she did in the dream?

It was impossible.

Only, that night’s dream had seeped into his marrow like an aphrodisiac, perpetually tormenting Li Gu and sending his blood and energy into churning chaos. At this very moment, that vivid red cinnabar mole wavered before his eyes again.

How could a dream contain such detail?

Li Gu’s footsteps halted. He turned and looked back. The maidservant who had made the report was not one of Xie Yuzhang’s personal attendants — judging by her attire, she was someone he had stationed in the garden.

He walked back over to her and asked, “What is your name?”

The maidservant was a palace girl dispatched from the palace. She knew how many people in the palace had died at the end of the previous year, and trembled as she answered.

The Emperor nodded and said, “Do something for Us.”

…

…

The mountains were her own mountains. The springs were her own springs.

The hot spring water was channeled into a white jade pool, mist and vapor drifting in gentle clouds. The attendants scattered flower petals into the water, their fragrance soaking into the water, lingering long without dispersing.

A maidservant placed a tray into the water and gave it a gentle push — it drifted toward Xie Yuzhang like a little boat. Xie Yuzhang lazily raised her hand and lifted from the tray a cup of mulberry wine, with a plum soaked within. It was cool and refreshing on the palate, just tempering the heat of the spring water.

When the maidservant walked in, Xie Yuzhang’s attendants naturally intercepted her.

The maidservant said, “His Majesty has arrived, and has sent me to relay a message to the Princess” — and so she passed through unimpeded and came to Xie Yuzhang’s side.

Xie Yuzhang asked, “Has the Imperial Lecture ended?”

The maidservant said, “Indeed it has.”

Xie Yuzhang asked, “Did it go smoothly?”

The maidservant said, “This servant does not know.”

Xie Yuzhang said, “Indeed — asking you would be useless. What message did he send you to convey?”

The maidservant raised her eyes and looked at that Princess whose face was like a peach blossom, languid and soft with beauty, and said, “His Majesty asks Your Highness — would you like to go hunting tomorrow?”

Xie Yuzhang laughed in spite of herself. “Just that? I thought it was something important. Understood — I’ll tell him myself in a moment.”

That Princess’s skin was lustrous and smooth, the creamy snow of her chest half-exposed above the water’s surface. The maidservant averted her gaze and respectfully replied, “Yes.”

She withdrew quietly and obediently, and could still hear the Princess saying from within, “I’ve soaked long enough — help me up. My legs have gone weak, I haven’t a scrap of strength.”

The maidservant quickened her pace and left, going to another part of the garden.

The Emperor was waiting there for her. When he saw her return, he said nothing — only looked at her.

The maidservant knelt and made her report. “This servant looked.”

The Emperor asked, “Was there one?”

The maidservant said, “There was.”

The Emperor asked, “At what position?”

The maidservant raised her hand and indicated a spot on her own chest. “Here.”

Having said this, she clearly felt a change in the aura emanating from the Emperor. The Emperor had killed so many people — he inspired fear. The maidservant pressed herself to the ground and dared not raise her head.

After a long silence, the Emperor said, “Withdraw.”

The young maidservant hastily retreated.

Xie Yuzhang was seated before her dressing table, with her attendants in the midst of pinning her hair back up.

The Emperor suddenly strode in with large steps and barked out, “All of you — out!”

The Emperor’s manner was not quite right — his eyes were a little red. The attendants were startled and frightened and withdrew one after another.

Xie Yuzhang stood up, bewildered. “What’s happened? Who’s angered you?”

Before the words had finished leaving her lips, Li Gu had already stridden over and swept her up in his arms in one motion.

Xie Yuzhang cried out in surprise. Li Gu said not a single word, turned, and set her down on the table. He reached out and stripped her garment from her shoulders, revealing her thin, snowy shoulders like early frost, her exquisitely carved collarbones, and her jade-colored bodice wrapping with its fine embroidery.

Xie Yuzhang snapped, “What madness has come over you!” — all while struggling.

Xie Yuzhang had already been left limp and spent from soaking in the spring. Against Li Gu’s strength, her resistance was utterly useless. Li Gu continued to say nothing, pressing her down onto the table with one hand and seizing her bodice wrapping with the other.

Xie Yuzhang’s expression changed.

She pressed her hand over Li Gu’s hand. “Li Gu!”

She called the Emperor directly by his name.

“Li Gu!” Her powdered face was full of fury as she commanded, “Do you know what you are doing?”

“I do,” Li Gu said in a low, resonant voice. “I want to look.”

Xie Yuzhang said coldly, “Then you had better think clearly. If you do this, you and I can never go back to how things were.”

Having said that, she released Li Gu’s hand.

Li Gu did indeed hesitate for a moment. But he only hesitated for that one second.

He tore off that bodice wrapping.

Xie Yuzhang’s landscape lay revealed before him.

Undulating peaks and valleys, ridge upon ridge. Li Gu saw with his own eyes — on the crest of that peak, a single vivid red dot, blooming like a flower, exactly the same as what he had seen in his “dream”!

The hot current surged through Li Gu’s veins!

He ground out in fury, “Xie! Yu! Zhang!”

That deceiver covered her eyes with the back of her hand and giggled.

What powdered face full of fury, what icy cold composure — all of it was deception! There was no woman in this world more adept at deception than she!

“Fool.” Xie Yuzhang spread her fingers apart, and through the gaps of her fingers, her phoenix eyes let slip a sliver of seductive charm. Her lips curved with a teasing smile. She sighed, “A fool!”

Li Gu pinched her waist hard. “Deceiver! You said that when you were willing, you would tell me!”

“I did tell you — I told you for an entire night,” Xie Yuzhang said. “Who told you not to remember it yourself.”

Li Gu was furious. “It is not that I couldn’t remember — it’s that you did something to me. My consciousness was distorted; I thought I was dreaming.”

Xie Yuzhang covered her eyes and laughed again.

Li Gu pinched her, and she could not bear it — she squirmed and tried to dodge away, and admitted, “It was the Spirit-Calming incense. That incense makes a person sleep deeply and recover energy well. Only — if the incense is not extinguished, one cannot wake. Even if roused to do something, it is like sleepwalking.”

Li Gu said furiously, “All those chaotic miscellaneous prescriptions of yours — hand every one of them over to me!”

Xie Yuzhang pulled her garment closed and sat up, laughing. “All right, all right, understood.”

Li Gu still could not believe it, and asked, “I abandoned you in Mobei — you aren’t angry with me?”

Xie Yuzhang said, “When I had just returned, I told you — when I was on the grasslands, I had sometimes imagined that perhaps one day, my general would ride a horse to come for me, and take me away from that barbaric land and bring me home. Do you remember?”

Those words had been heartbreaking. How could Li Gu not remember?

Xie Yuzhang, however, smoothed her disheveled hair and said slowly, “I was lying to you.”

Li Gu froze.

Xie Yuzhang said, “I never had such a fantasy. On the grasslands, I was fighting alone. In this world, no one would come for me. I had seen this reality too clearly, so I never had even a thread of such a fantasy.”

Li Gu stood stunned, and suddenly felt a great, shattering sorrow rising within him.

“Yuzhang!” He pulled her into his arms.

Xie Yuzhang leaned against his chest and said softly, “I truly could not have imagined that there was actually someone in this world who would disregard the tide of events, lose all reason, and ride a thousand li to come for me. Only, fate mocks people — in the end, you did not reach me. But so what? Which of us can contend with destiny? I know that for my sake you were once impulsive, once acted on the heat of emotion. No matter what came after — for the feelings you held toward me at that moment, I ought to respond to you and honor you.”

Xie Yuzhang lifted her face and looked at Li Gu.

Li Gu touched her face and said, “Yuzhang — be my wife, be my Empress. This time, I will not allow you to escape again!”

Xie Yuzhang smiled. “All right.”

She cast the dice to him, letting him decide their future.

But in the end, he had at last rolled the result she had wanted.

For her feelings toward him, she no longer wished to conceal and cover things up. She wanted to be together with him openly and legitimately.

Since she loved this man, she would naturally become his wife.

Li Gu, however, pinched her waist and said in a voice edged with pent-up grievance, “But right now — you owe me first!”

Xie Yuzhang blinked. “What?”

Li Gu said nothing. He reached out and grasped the front of Xie Yuzhang’s garment.

Xie Yuzhang sat on the table, tipping her face up with a smile as she looked at him, radiance blooming from her jade-like face.

Li Gu’s breathing grew heavier. He stripped away her garments.

The person he had longed for through more than ten years — her snowy body was beautiful and graceful, her slender waist supple, warm jade giving off a faint fragrance.

Like a celestial being, like a bewitching spirit.

The incense burner toppled. Ash scattered across the floor, sullying the costly carpet.

Li Gu pressed Xie Yuzhang down on the table, and kissed that single cinnabar dot on the peak of her landscape.