As Consort Xian fled to the doorway, the door suddenly slammed shut.
“Open the door! Someone, quickly open the door!” Consort Xian shouted frantically, pounding on the door in a state of near-madness.
A pair of ice-cold hands fell upon her neck from behind.
“Tell me, why did you harm Thirteenth Sister?”
“Let go of me, let go of me—” Consort Xian was nearly driven insane. She wanted to pry off those frigid hands, but realizing they belonged to a dead person, she dared not touch them. She could only shriek, completely disregarding the question.
“Tell me why you harmed Thirteenth Sister, and I’ll let you go. Otherwise, I cannot rest in peace!” The eerie voice echoed in Consort Xian’s ear.
For a moment, Consort Xian almost blurted out “Empress Dowager,” but the last shred of clarity in her mind stopped her.
The proximity of the Fourteenth Princess was driving her to the brink of collapse. To escape this terror, she involuntarily screamed, “Because I hate the Empress!”
A deathly silence fell over the room. Then, Consort Xian’s vision went black as she fainted.
Sometime later, Consort Xian awoke to find the Emperor and Empress before her eyes.
Consort Xian looked around in confusion. “Your Majesty, where am I?”
Emperor Jingming’s face was as cold as ice as he replied, “Where you are is not important. What’s important is whether you remember what happened?”
“I—” Consort Xian’s eyes darted around as she suddenly recalled.
A pale face, those ice-cold hands on her neck, that ghostly, resentful voice…
Wasn’t she in her chambers when she heard a knock at midnight? Fourteenth Princess had come to seek vengeance, demanding to know why she had harmed Princess Fuqing—but what was happening now?
Could it have been just a dream?
“You don’t remember?” Emperor Jingming stared intently at Consort Xian. Seeing her prolonged silence, he could barely restrain himself from dragging this vicious woman out and having her beaten to death.
He despised this act of feigning memory loss!
“It’s fine if you don’t remember. I’ll tell you. Your guilty conscience caused you to have a nightmare, and you cried out that you were the one who harmed Fuqing… Does that jog your memory?”
Consort Xian’s face turned ashen as she hurriedly denied it. “I didn’t harm Fuqing. Your Majesty must have misunderstood—”
Emperor Jingming, tired of Consort Xian’s excuses, coldly interjected, “Where is Consort Xian’s palace maid?”
Soon, a palace maid knelt before Emperor Jingming. Consort Xian recognized her as the maid who had been on night duty.
She remembered that when the knocking started, she had sent the maid to open the door and investigate. Then the maid had vanished into the darkness.
Emperor Jingming looked down at the palace maid, his face expressionless. “Tell Consort Xian what you witnessed.”
The palace maid, prostrate on the ground, trembled as she spoke, “The Consort couldn’t sleep tonight. Around midnight, she seemed to be in a state between sleep and wakefulness when she suddenly started sleep-talking—”
“What did she say?” the Emperor pressed.
The maid quickly glanced at Consort Xian before continuing, her face pale, “The Consort cried out for the Fourteenth Princess not to seek revenge on her. She said it wasn’t Fourteenth Princess she meant to harm, but Princess Fuqing—”
“You insolent slave, how dare you lie!” Consort Xian felt a chill run through her body as she screamed.
She certainly remembered what she had said, but that wasn’t a dream—the Fourteenth Princess had truly come to seek vengeance.
Emperor Jingming cast a cold glance at Consort Xian and ordered, “Continue.”
“The Consort also said… said that she harmed Princess Fuqing because she hated the Empress—” The maid bowed even lower, not daring to look up.
Consort Xian’s face changed drastically. “Your Majesty, please don’t listen to this slave’s nonsense—”
Emperor Jingming coldly interrupted Consort Xian. “Enough. Don’t take me for a fool. Now, I only want to hear your reason for hating the Empress.”
“Your Majesty, I didn’t—” Consort Xian struggled desperately.
Emperor Jingming fixed his gaze on her, his eyes filled with coldness. “Or would you prefer I summon the Fourth Prince into the palace to question him?”
All he needed was to confirm the mastermind between Consort Xian and Consort Ning. Whether there was evidence or whether they would confess after being exposed was irrelevant.
Consort Xian’s struggle would only increase his anger.
As for attributing the door-knocking incident to Consort Xian’s dream, it was to cover up the supernatural occurrence and provide a suitable explanation to the outside world.
After all, compared to a ghost knocking on doors, Consort Xian revealing the truth in her sleep was much more presentable.
He was the Son of Heaven, with the dragon’s aura to ward off evil. How could he let it be known that ghosts could haunt the imperial palace? Where would he put his face?
Emperor Jingming’s words struck at Consort Xian’s weakness, rendering her unable to defend herself further.
Consort Xian’s face turned ashen gray as she collapsed weakly.
Emperor Jingming showed no sign of pity, coldly saying, “Speak. I have no time to waste with you.”
Consort Xian lay on the ground. Although it was a midsummer night, a chill seeped from the jade bricks into her very bones.
A tear rolled from the corner of her eye, mixing with the bitter taste in her mouth.
Consort Xian bit her tongue and choked out, “I was momentarily possessed by evil thoughts. I was jealous that the Empress had taken away the Seventh Prince…”
The Empress, who had remained silent until now, let out a cold laugh. “You were jealous that I took Jiner away?”
The words “Jiner” momentarily confused Consort Xian before she realized it referred to Yu Jin.
As the realization hit her, blood rushed to her throat.
This shameless Empress dared to call the Seventh Prince “Jiner”—was she flaunting her victory?
The Empress tightened her lips, her eyes meeting Consort Xian’s.
She was indeed kicking a dog while it was down. Did anyone expect her to show mercy to the person who had harmed her daughter?
Not only was she kicking the fallen dog, but she also intended to drag out the one who had raised it.
The Empress didn’t believe that Consort Xian would harm Princess Fuqing solely for this reason.
If Consort Xian truly cared for Prince Yan, she wouldn’t have ignored him all this time.
As a mother herself, the Empress would worry about even the smallest details, like whether her daughter might kick off her blanket at night. Consort Xian’s supposed maternal love didn’t seem genuine.
“Jiner was the child you abandoned. His Majesty picked him up and gave him to me. This reason alone is not enough to convince me,” the Empress stated.
Emperor Jingming’s mouth twitched at the side.
Did he pick him up? The Seventh Prince was his son too.
Panic flashed in Consort Xian’s eyes as she cried out, “Even if I didn’t want him, I would rather have destroyed him than given him away freely. You took my son, so you had to pay with your daughter—”
Emperor Jingming erupted in anger. “Enough! You are truly beyond redemption. Guards—”
The Empress intervened, “Your Majesty, I believe Consort Xian is hiding something. She might have been manipulated by someone.”
Consort Xian’s heart tightened.
With the truth exposed, all she could do now was to avoid implicating the Empress Dowager. That was the only way she and Zhuang’er could avoid complete ruin.
Now, she could only gamble on the Empress Dowager’s determination to deal with the Empress.
His Majesty was extremely filial towards the Empress Dowager. As long as the Empress Dowager wholeheartedly supported Zhuang’er, he would have a chance to rise again, rather than remaining out of favor with no hope for the future.
It might seem like she had lost, but connecting Zhuang’er with the Empress Dowager, wasn’t a complete defeat.
As for whether the Empress Dowager would keep her promise, she had her backup plan.
Consort Xian raised her head, looking at the Empress with a cold smile. “The Empress’s words are interesting. Although I may not be as noble as the Empress, I am still one of the four consorts. Who in this palace could manipulate me? Could it be the Empress, His Majesty, or perhaps the Empress Dowager?”
“Silence!” Emperor Jingming’s face turned ashen. “If you continue to spout nonsense, don’t blame me for being merciless.”