The great edifice was about to collapse, as the imperial court had rotted completely from its roots. Even with Li Shubai, the Prince of Kui’s extraordinary talent and brilliant actions, what use were they now? In the end, it was merely the last ray of sunset before darkness.

In the Great Ming Palace, the majestic halls were now filled with autumn melancholy from the palace locust trees. Huang Zixia followed behind Li Shubai as they once again entered the Purple Dawn Hall.

After Li Shubai reported the current situation in Shu territory and presented various regional tributes, the Emperor maintained his usual gentle smile, though his once full chin now appeared somewhat gaunt. Following Princess Tongchang’s death, both he and Consort Guo Shu had been grief-stricken, causing significant weight loss.

“During the Double Ninth Festival a few days ago, all your brothers gathered in the palace for a feast, with only you, Fourth Brother, absent. Seventh Brother even quoted the Chancellor’s verse ‘All wearing cornel flowers save one man,'” the Emperor said, fingering his prayer beads while smiling. “You haven’t seen my newly renovated Twin Towers yet.”

“Twin Towers?” Li Shubai had heard of them but asked with deliberate neutrality.

“Yes, the Twin Phoenix Towers in the clouds of the imperial city. They’re the first buildings you see upon entering the Great Ming Palace. Since the Xiangluan and Qifeng pavilions in front of the Hanyuan Hall had become old, I ordered their renovation. The interior is completely renewed – Fourth Brother, you’ll surely approve when you see it.”

Li Shubai nodded but remained silent. He had already read about it in the court gazette while in Shu. This renovation of the Hanyuan Hall and Twin Towers far exceeded their previous scale. Agarwood beams, nanmu pillars, thousands of taels of gold for gilding and lacquer, hundreds of hu of pearls, plus rhinoceros horns, precious stones, and more. The rear bureau and Ministry of Works had torn down the east wall to patch the west, yet still couldn’t make ends meet.

The Emperor continued enthusiastically, “After the winter solstice ceremony this year, we’ll drink wine at the newly renovated Twin Towers, with dancing and singing in the distance. It will surely be recorded in history as an elegant affair of the Great Ming Palace.”

Li Shubai said, “Your Majesty speaks well, but this project seems enormously expensive. Yesterday the Ministry of Works came to me, saying they’re having difficulties with building one hundred and twenty pagodas to welcome the Buddha’s relics.”

The Emperor frowned, stroking his thin beard in thought before saying, “Li Yonghe truly doesn’t know how to manage affairs. With all the resources at the Ministry of Works’ disposal, how can he fail to build even one hundred and twenty pagodas?”

“There have been many projects this year – the Bi Palace at the beginning, the Princess’s tomb mid-year, and now the Twin Towers renovation. Building more pagodas might be stretching resources too thin.”

The Emperor sighed, “Fourth Brother, I’ve been feeling uneasy lately. Lingui was divinely inspired when her first words were ‘will live,’ but now she’s gone in an instant. I… an elder burying the young, like a candle in the wind. Who knows if I’ll live, where tomorrow or the day after leads?”

Li Shubai said, “Your Majesty is in your prime, how can you harbor such thoughts of mortality? The court and realm still rely on you – please don’t nurture such lonely sentiments. In my view, we need not welcome these Buddha relics.”

“The relics must be welcomed. I shall see them in life and die without regret,” the Emperor firmly refused, then asked, “Well… Fourth Brother, with your vast knowledge of classics and histories, what do you think of eighty-one pagodas, nine times nine?”

“Nine times nine returning to one – the number has merit,” Li Shubai said, his brow furrowing. “But if Your Majesty insists on welcoming the relics, I believe sincerity matters most. Buddhism speaks of Twelve Nidanas – twelve pagodas would suffice. Or perhaps just three pagodas, representing Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha – that would also be quite appropriate.”

“Fourth Brother truly doesn’t understand my devotion. How could such few towers be appropriate?” The Emperor showed his displeasure and waved for him to leave.

Li Shubai stood and retreated. At the hall entrance, he heard the Emperor say: “Seventy-two then, housing Buddhism’s seventy-two incenses – that’s not bad.”

“The last time Buddha’s relics were welcomed was in the fourteenth year of Yuanhe, fifty years ago.”

In the E Prince’s mansion, Li Run excitedly poured tea for Li Shubai, saying, “They say the spectacle was unprecedented then. This time should be another grand event – I hear city residents are already rushing to buy incense and candles to welcome the relics.”

Li Shubai held the freshly brewed tea and asked slowly, “Seventh Brother, do you know that on the day the relics left Famen Temple, an old woman waited outside with her young granddaughter? When the relics emerged, she forced her granddaughter to drink a bottle of mercury, offering her flesh as tribute?”

Li Run drew a sharp breath, eyes widening as he said, “But… this only shows Buddhism’s profundity and its many devotees. Some zealousness among faithful seeking Buddhist protection is inevitable.”

“Folk Buddhism normally isn’t so extreme, but when the royal family personally welcomes it and the court sets an example, it becomes disastrous. What good comes from using the nation’s resources to drive people to madness?” Li Shubai shook his head. “Back then, Han Yu was exiled for remonstrating against welcoming the relics. Now the court needs someone to take the lead in dissuading this again.”

“Brother, don’t do anything foolish!” Li Run said anxiously. “Since Princess Tongchang’s death, His Majesty has had frequent nightmares. Now he’s fixated on welcoming the relics to the palace for protection and blessing. Once his mind is made up, no one can persuade him otherwise!”

Li Shubai nodded slightly but didn’t respond.

Li Run drank half a cup of tea. Seeing Li Shubai had fallen silent, he finally calmed down. Looking up at Huang Zixia in women’s clothes, he quietly exclaimed “Oh?” and asked, “Brother finally has a maid?”

Huang Zixia curtsied to him with a nod.

“I feel like I’ve seen you somewhere…” At this point, he exclaimed “Ah!” and slapped his forehead, saying, “Yang Chonggu! Recently the capital has been buzzing with stories about Huang Zixia disguising herself as a eunuch, and the Prince of Kui solving the case in the south. Storytellers are already singing about it!”

Huang Zixia lowered her head and said, “I dared not reveal my identity before and didn’t mean to deceive Your Highness. Please forgive me.”

“Not at all. I met you once in the palace with Wang Yun three or four years ago. After several encounters, I didn’t recognize you – I failed to recognize a celestial being,” he said, gesturing for her to sit down. He poured her tea, then asked puzzledly, “But hasn’t Wang Yun returned to the capital? Why is Miss Huang still serving my brother?”

Huang Zixia sipped her tea in silence. Li Shubai said, “Yang Chonggu is a registered lowest-rank eunuch in my household. Whatever identity she takes on, unless I say otherwise, she can’t leave.”

Huang Zixia gave him a reproachful look that said “shameless,” while Li Run, seeing this side of Li Shubai for the first time, was completely stunned, forgetting even to refill the tea.

Huang Zixia took out a brocade bag from her sleeve and gently pushed it across the table to Li Run, saying, “Your Highness, this belongs to you.”

“What is it?” Li Run asked with slight surprise, taking it and opening the bag to remove its contents.

It was an extremely lustrous jade bracelet, its surface gleaming with a faint light as if shrouded in thin smoke. He silently held the bracelet in his hand, its color shifting and flowing with his movements, creating countless shimmers.

He stared at it for a long while before asking, “Did… Aruan ask you to return it to me?”

Li Shubai nodded slowly, saying, “Before her death, she entrusted Madam Gongsun to return it to you.”

“Death…?” He suddenly looked up, eyes wide with bewilderment.

“Since you’ve heard about Huang Zixia solving the case, surely you’ve heard that the clue began with the death of a singing girl?”

Li Run gazed at him dazedly, as if finally understanding. The vermillion mole between his brows appeared dim against his pale face. The teacup slipped from his hand, shattering on the blue brick floor, and scattering green tea leaves everywhere.

Li Shubai sighed softly, saying, “Seventh Brother, keep it safe for now. After all, it was the Consort’s old possession – it should return to its rightful owner.”

“Yes…” he responded numbly, clutching the bracelet tightly.

Seeing his gloomy expression, Li Shubai stood and said, “I’ve just returned to the capital and have some matters to attend to. Now that the bracelet is delivered, I’ll take my leave.”

“Fourth Brother…” Li Run reflexively reached out, grabbing his wrist.

Li Shubai turned to look at him. Biting his lower lip, Li Run said softly, “I want to ask Fourth Brother for help.”

Li Shubai sat back down and asked, “What is it?”

“I suspect…” he hesitated, the hand holding the bracelet gripping so tightly that his knuckles turned an unusual blue. He suddenly stood up, looking around at the open doors and windows. Only after confirming no one was there did he force himself to breathe deeply, trying to calm himself before saying, “I suspect my mother was murdered.”

Li Shubai frowned slightly, turning to look at Huang Zixia.

Huang Zixia pondered briefly before asking calmly, “Has Your Highness noticed something to suggest this?”

He bit his lower lip hard and nodded firmly: “Please follow me, Fourth Brother and Miss Huang.”

Consort Chen had been the previous Emperor’s consort and should have lived out her years in the Taiji Palace. But on the night the previous Emperor passed away, she went mad with grief. The palace maids in the Taiji Palace were negligent in their care, and when Li Run, then about ten years old, went to visit his mother, he found her disheveled and poorly cared for. He knelt before the Purple Dawn Hall, begging the Emperor to allow him to take his mother to his prince’s mansion for care.

After he brought Consort Chen to his mansion, although she still had episodes, the proper care in the prince’s mansion allowed her to rest peacefully. Li Run was filially devoted to his mother and set up a small hall behind the main hall for her to live near him. Though she had passed away now, he still maintained her former residence exactly as it was during her lifetime, not moving anything.

Li Run led Li Shubai and Huang Zixia into the small hall, where Consort Chen’s spirit tablet was enshrined. Fresh flowers and incense before the tablet made the hall’s atmosphere somewhat oppressive.

After Li Shubai and Huang Zixia offered incense to Consort Chen’s tablet, they looked at Li Run.

Li Run placed the bracelet before his mother’s tablet and silently prayed with clasped hands to her spirit. His expression was solemn, and after a long while, he turned to them and said, “My mother had a moment of clarity before her death. She told me that the Great Tang dynasty was about to fall.”

Hearing these words, Li Shubai and Huang Zixia immediately knew this matter was extraordinarily serious, and they focused intently on what he would say next.

“Mother had been unclear in mind for a long time by then, and I knew her condition. But during that moment of clarity, she was truly lucid, completely different from usual,” he recalled the situation with a soft sigh, saying, “So what she said then definitely wasn’t madness. I think she must have learned something when Father Emperor was dying, which led to her madness – it must have been an extremely important secret, otherwise, why would she think it concerned the fate of the Great Tang dynasty and the realm?”

Huang Zixia asked, “What exactly did your mother say then? Can Your Highness repeat it for us?”

Li Run opened a locked cabinet and took out a black lacquered dressing case. The case was inlaid with mother-of-pearl cut into flower patterns, its color aged, clearly a long-used item. Li Run carefully opened it, and removed the dim and clouded bronze mirror, revealing a gap behind it.

He then opened another small box nearby, took out a cotton paper with three ink blots drawn on it, folded it, and compared it to the gap behind the mirror, saying, “This is where my mother took out this drawing that she had hidden for who knows how long. She gave me this paper, telling me that she had drawn and hidden it with great difficulty and that I must keep it safe… saying it concerned the fate of the empire.”

“It seems the Consort’s thoughts were very clear then, definitely not in a state of madness.” Huang Zixia pondered the words ‘fate of the empire’ as she glanced at Li Shubai.

Li Shubai nodded slightly to her, then asked Li Run, “What else?”

“Mother said one more thing…” Li Run hesitated but finally spoke, “She told me not to get too close to Fourth Brother.”

Li Shubai lowered his eyes to look at the cotton paper in his hand, studying the three black ink stains on it, saying nothing.

Huang Zixia felt somewhat awkward and said, “Yet Your Highness still chose to tell us about this.”

“I grew up with Fourth Brother in the Great Ming Palace, and we were sent out together. We’ve been close brothers from childhood until now. I… know what Fourth Brother means to the Great Tang!” He pressed the white cotton paper on the table, seeming to lose all strength, barely managing to stand before the altar. “So I think Mother must have known something, and someone plotted against her, causing her madness and making her say such things. The person who harmed my mother must have had a strong connection to Father Emperor’s death, and must be an enemy of Fourth Brother.”

Li Shubai nodded slowly but said nothing.

Huang Zixia asked, “Is this where the Consort lived? Is everything arranged as it was?”

Li Run nodded, sitting down in a chair before the hall, holding his forehead as he said softly, “Miss Huang, please examine carefully, there might be some clues.”

Huang Zixia passed through the partition of the small hall to examine the Consort’s bedroom. The room wasn’t large – on the left was a small window with a daybed, dressing table, and chairs; on the right was a carved rosewood bed with brocade curtains, hung with peachwood and jade ornaments.

She walked around the dressing table. Consort Chen’s daily items had been put away, everything was empty, and because it was regularly cleaned, the room was very clean. Her hand slid along the table edge, then stopped.

After a brief pause, she bent down to look carefully at the table edge. Li Shubai watched her from the doorway and asked, “What is it?”

She turned to look at him and said, “There seem to be some indentations made by fingernails.”

Li Shubai casually took a stick of eye black from the dressing-case Li Run had brought out and handed it to her.

She lightly rubbed the blue-black cosmetic over the edge, and the indentations became clear – two messy characters carved by fingernails:

“Prince of Kui”

Li Shubai observed without expression, gesturing for her to continue rubbing.

The crooked writing gradually revealed itself:

“Disaster stems from the Prince of Kui”

Li Run had also come to the partition and looked at these characters, his expression bewildered: “This… my mother wrote this?”

Huang Zixia nodded at him and said, “There seems to be more.”

Her hand moved slowly to the right, spreading the blue-black cosmetic across the dark purple rosewood dressing table. Under the sunlight, the cosmetic showed a different shade of black, revealing a thin, long mark. Beneath that mark were shallow, messy engravings, twelve characters in total:

“Great Tang will fall, the court in chaos, disaster stems from Prince of Kui”

There were no other markings beyond these.

Huang Zixia searched her bed and cabinets but found nothing more.

She put the eye black back in the dressing case, took one more look at the twelve characters, and then slowly used her handkerchief to wipe away all traces of the cosmetic.

Li Run stood in the doorway, at a loss for what to do, only looking at Li Shubai and calling, “Fourth Brother…”

Li Shubai patted his shoulder and said, “I understand. I will investigate what happened back then, to see who was behind everything.”

On their way back, Li Shubai and Huang Zixia sat in the carriage watching the passing street scenes, both deep in thought.

“I wasn’t familiar with Consort Chen,” Li Shubai finally said, turning his gaze to her face.

Huang Zixia nodded and said, “When the previous Emperor passed away and the Consort went mad, you were only thirteen, right?”

“Yes, I always lived in the Great Ming Palace. Father would come to see me when he had time, but I rarely went to his quarters. So although Consort Chen attended to Father in his later years, I rarely met her. After Father’s death, I never saw her again.”

Huang Zixia’s finger slowly traced the carved decorations on the carriage window as she mused, “Why would Consort Chen be so fixated on a thirteen-year-old prince she rarely met, and in her madness believe he would bring down the empire?”

Li Shubai frowned slightly, his fingers tapping lightly on the small table as he asked, “What do you think?”

“I strongly agree with one thing the Prince of E said. If Consort Chen’s madness was deliberately caused, then that perpetrator must have harbored ill intentions toward you. That’s why they led her to develop such extreme malice toward you.”

His long, pale fingers pressed against the small table. After a long silence, he softly asked, “Zixia… do you trust me?”

She looked at him puzzled, not understanding why he suddenly said such a thing.

“Zhuangzi dreamed he was a butterfly, and upon waking didn’t know if he was a man who dreamed of being a butterfly or a butterfly dreaming of being a man. Just now, when we discovered those characters carved by Consort Chen, I suddenly thought of Yu Xuan,” he didn’t look at her, turning his face toward the window, his gaze drifting absently over the ordinary street scenes outside. “After killing your parents, he forgot everything, and instead became convinced that you were the murderer due to various suggestions.”

Huang Zixia’s eyes widened, and she hesitantly asked, “What do you mean, Your Highness?”

“Perhaps when I was thirteen, I did something that left a deep impression on Consort Chen?” His brows furrowed slightly, his gaze toward the outside wavering with the carriage’s movement. “And what connection is there between that little red fish that suddenly appeared in my life and the little red fish that disappeared when Yu Xuan lost that important memory?”

Everything before them suddenly seemed shrouded in darkness, no longer clear.

In that instant, Huang Zixia also began to doubt whether this rattling carriage, these passing street scenes, and even Li Shubai, so close she could touch him, were real or illusory.

Were their memories true or false? Had their lives up to now been altered by others, things they believed deeply added, things etched in their hearts deleted?

The carriage fell silent, neither speaking, as if a heavy pressure weighed upon them, making even breathing feel slow and difficult.

After a very long time, she gently reached out, placing her palm over the back of his hand, saying, “Whatever truth we ultimately uncover, I know that everything we’ve experienced together is real… At least, our feelings for each other now are real.”

Li Shubai silently lifted her hand and buried his face in her palms. In the quietness, she felt his somewhat heavy, irregular breathing flowing rapidly against her palms.

The lines in her palms, those lines representing life’s path that he had once used to identify her – now his breath touched her lifelines, leaving permanent marks in her blood, something she could never forget for all eternity.

After who knows how long, the carriage slowly stopped, and someone reported from outside, “The Ministry of Works has arrived.”

Li Shubai raised his head, holding her hand in his, pausing quietly for a moment before saying, “Let’s go.”

His voice returned to its cool, deep tone. Leaving the carriage, leaving this moment they shared alone, he had to return to being the cold, never-wavering Prince of Kui.

Huang Zixia silently followed behind him as they entered the main gate.

While Li Shubai discussed matters with Li Yonghe, Huang Zixia, now a woman, sat in the main hall for a while until the surrounding officials began whispering. She stood up and went to the front courtyard to look at the chrysanthemums.

It was almost the tenth month, and the chrysanthemums had already faced frost, beginning to wither. As she looked around absently, pondering the meaning of the words “disaster stems from the Prince of Kui,” suddenly someone rushed out shouting, “Chonggu! You are here!”

Huang Zixia turned to look – indeed, Zhou Ziqin was now the only one who still called her that.

Today he wore understated green clothes, which was quite rare, though unfortunately paired with a ginger-yellow belt, looking like a wheat stalk tied with straw around the middle. But Huang Zixia didn’t mind, asking with delight, “Ziqin? How did you come to the capital too?”

“You tell me first why you left without a word and ran off to the capital!” he questioned her first.

Huang Zixia gave a helpless bitter smile and casually said, “You know how it is, being constantly nagged by the elders in the clan was quite annoying.”

“That’s true, ah, we’re both driven away by our elders! Me too, I would have been finished if I hadn’t run!” Zhou Ziqin said, wiping his eyes as tears nearly fell, “Speaking of which, it’s terrible! My father, he’s forcing me to get married…”

Huang Zixia laughed and asked, “Which family’s daughter?”

“A concubine’s daughter from the Sichuan Granary Commissioner’s family. I heard she’s a tigress – even my reputation for loving corpses didn’t scare her away. I secretly asked their servants about her – they all say she’s incredibly fierce, barely literate, skilled with two butcher knives, and can carry a whole sheep on her shoulder like it’s nothing! How could I survive marrying such a woman!”

Huang Zixia thought for a moment and asked, “What’s her name?”

Zhou Ziqin replied with both grief and anger: “The most uncouth name ever! Something like Liu Erya! Doesn’t that name just sound deadly? It’s obvious my father saw that all other women were afraid to marry me, so he randomly found some fierce woman, intending to oppress me for life!”

“Hmm…” Huang Zixia nodded and said, “Yes, this seems quite troublesome. Although she’s very beautiful and has a lovely personality, the name Liu Erya isn’t very elegant…”

“…You know her?” Zhou Ziqin was stunned, then slapped his forehead, saying, “Of course you know her! You used to be a governor’s daughter, after all, your official families must have all met before.”

Huang Zixia smiled and said, “I have met her, but we only got acquainted recently.”

“Ah well, never mind that – quickly tell me, is this Liu Erya really as fierce and terrifying as the rumors say?”

“Yes, just like the rumors – skilled at butchering pigs and sheep, ordinary people would find it hard to bully her.”

Zhou Ziqin clutched his chest in despair: “There’s no hope…”

“Not only is she fierce in manner, but she’s also quick-witted, and likes to call people ‘Ha Captain.'”

“Ha? Why do these people all like to call others ‘Ha’…” Zhou Ziqin said before finally realizing something, freezing for a moment before stuttering, “Ha… Ha Captain?”

“Yes, skilled with two butcher knives, carries whole sheep on her shoulder like it’s nothing, likes to call people ‘Ha Captain,’ the second daughter.” Huang Zixia smiled at him knowingly.

Zhou Ziqin’s eyes were as round as saucers, his mouth wide enough to fit an egg: “Second… Second Miss?”

“What do you think?”

“But, but isn’t she an orphan?”

“Didn’t you see that fat Liu Xiying went to find her that day, saying he was a distant relative who wanted to adopt her? As far as I know, the Chengdu Granary Commissioner just resigned, and his replacement seems to be Commissioner Liu from Mian Prefecture.”

“I didn’t know! I heard the Commissioner changed but I never pay attention to these things!” Zhou Ziqin’s face turned bright red: “Could… could… could it be…”

“What do you think?” Huang Zixia patted the railing beside her. “You fled thousands of li to the capital to escape marriage, wasn’t it to ask the Prince of Kui to help persuade your father to cancel the engagement?”

Zhou Ziqin pressed his forehead, speechless.

Huang Zixia asked again, “So, do you still want to speak with the Prince of Kui about it?”

“Let… let me think about it…” he mumbled, squeezing out a few words, “After all… she is… someone we know, it might not be good to refuse… Besides, you know how rare it is to find a girl who isn’t afraid of corpses…”

“Well, think it over then.” Her face showed a meaningful smile.

Zhou Ziqin looked at her smile, wishing he could dig a hole to crawl into: “What… what is it?”

“Nothing.” She calmly looked up at the sky.

“Actually… you’re quite nice too,” Zhou Ziqin sighed, saying softly, “It’s just… just that we met at the wrong time, so I always thought of you as a little eunuch, and it was best when we were sworn brothers digging up graves and examining corpses together.”

Huang Zixia smiled silently, cupped her hands to him, and stood up asking, “So are you going to hurry back to Chengdu now and agree to the marriage?”

“No rush… anyway, we’re already engaged,” he said awkwardly, then suddenly remembered something and said, “Oh right, right, is the Prince of Kui’s talisman real?”

Huang Zixia was startled and asked, “You know about the talisman too?”

“Of course, I think the whole capital must have heard about it by now?” Zhou Ziqin pulled her while looking around, and seeing no one nearby, quickly drew her to a corner and said, “I arrived last night! Went to the West Market to eat my favorite Niu A’da flatbread… and guess what? The two people eating flatbread next to me were talking about the Prince of Kui’s mansion!”

Huang Zixia frowned slightly and asked, “What did they say?”

“They say… the Prince of Kui killed Pang Jun in Xuzhou!”

“…” Huang Zixia was somewhat helpless, “Is that even news? Doesn’t everyone know that?”

“No, no!” Zhou Ziqin mysteriously leaned close to her ear and whispered, “They say that after the Prince of Kui killed Pang Jun, his ghost possessed the Prince! Now, the soul in the Prince’s body isn’t his own, but Pang Jun’s!”

Huang Zixia was speechless at such baseless supernatural rumors, not knowing how to respond.

“They say, how could the Prince of Kui be so brilliant and talented if he were merely mortal? They say he received supernatural powers, that’s why he has perfect memory and superior wisdom!”

“What’s the evidence?” Huang Zixia couldn’t help asking, “Just because he’s too clever, it must be supernatural power?”

“Well…”

“Besides, when the Prince was young, the previous Emperor praised him to countless people, saying his intelligence was unmatched. All the Emperor’s sons were given princely titles at the age of ten and moved to their mansions, but he couldn’t bear to part with the Prince of Kui, keeping him in the Great Ming Palace to raise personally even after his investiture. At that time, who knew where Pang Jun was!”

Zhou Ziqin scratched his head, looking troubled: “That’s true…”

Huang Zixia pursed her lips in thought for a moment, then asked, “What else? What about the talisman?”

“Oh, they say when Pang Jun possessed the Prince of Kui, he left behind a fate-determining talisman! It foretells the Prince’s destiny, that he will eventually lose his mind, be controlled by Pang Jun, and finally…” He looked around mysteriously again before whispering in her ear, “When the character for ‘destruction’ appears on that talisman, he will completely lose consciousness to Pang Jun and bring down this empire!”

Huang Zixia suddenly stood up, asking in a trembling voice: “Have the street rumors… already gone so far?”

Seeing her terrible expression, Zhou Ziqin quickly waved his hands, making a gesture for silence, saying: “It’s just random talk from street storytellers, alley gossip, what’s there to worry about? Don’t… don’t take it so seriously…”

“You don’t understand…” she breathed heavily, sweat beginning to appear on her forehead.

The one who revealed the secret of the talisman must be the person who set up the plot. Now that all six characters were fixed, and the character for ‘destruction’ faintly appearing in the background had been made public, it signaled that the pressure on the Prince of Kui had reached its final stage.

The words “disaster stems from the Prince of Kui” in the Prince of E’s mansion coincided with the “bringing down the empire” now secretly circulating in the streets. The net laid four years ago was slowly closing, yet they still couldn’t identify who was pulling the strings.

They didn’t even have a chance to fight back.

Seeing her face turned deathly pale, Zhou Ziqin became flustered, pulling at her sleeve and calling softly: “Chonggu, what’s… what’s wrong? I was just talking nonsense, really…”

Huang Zixia leaned against the wall behind her, breathing heavily. Her chest felt ice-cold, filled with countless tangled threads impossible to unravel.

While Zhou Ziqin was panicking, not knowing what to do, voices came from behind. He turned to look – several officials from the Ministry of Works had come out, all looking pleased. Some who knew Zhou Ziqin immediately greeted him: “Ziqin, you’re back in the capital! Wasn’t Chengdu fun?”

“Oh, oh, Brother Qian, Brother Liang, Brother Yu…” he casually returned their greetings while worriedly pulling at Huang Zixia’s sleeve, seemingly regretting telling her about the rumors.

“Isn’t this… Miss Huang?” The men brightened up and also greeted Huang Zixia, “His Highness will be out shortly, please wait a moment longer, Miss.”

Huang Zixia nodded in acknowledgment.

Seeing their happy expressions, Zhou Ziqin asked, “Isn’t it said in the capital that the Ministry of Works needs to build one hundred and twenty pagodas, and you’re so short of money you might as well jump into the city moat? Why is everyone so happy today?”

“Nonsense, in a few days, our Ministry will have enough money to add three rows of railings to the city moat!”

Zhou Ziqin blinked: “You’re not planning to rob the Ministry of Revenue, are you?”

“Hah, as if the Ministry of Revenue has any money now! We have to rely on the Prince of Kui to solve our problems. Tomorrow the announcement will be made – when the court welcomes the Buddha’s relics to the capital, seventy-two pagodas will be planned along the route as resting places. Wealthy merchants and scholars who wish to gain merit by welcoming the relics can bid to build them. Think about it – with so many rich people in the empire and only seventy-two spots, won’t they fight over them?”

Someone else chimed in: “So, in the end, building these seventy-two pagodas won’t cost us a penny, and the Ministry will even make a huge profit…”

Zhou Ziqin suddenly understood, stroking his chin as he asked: “Then I also heard that on the day of welcoming the relics, the capital will be decorated with flowers and trees, and each ward will have decorated archways…”

“Of course, we can apply the same method – there are plenty of wealthy people who want to accumulate merit!”

Watching the Ministry officials happily go to draft reports, Zhou Ziqin turned back to Huang Zixia and said: “Brilliant… with the Prince of Kui around, all kinds of problems are solved easily!”

Huang Zixia stood quietly under the vast sky, looking at the desolate autumn day, and slowly said: “What use is it…”

“Huh?” Zhou Ziqin looked at her in confusion.

But she said no more, only raising her eyes to look at the setting sun. Golden light enveloped all of Chang’an, as dusk was about to bring darkness to the nine provinces.

The great edifice was about to collapse, as the imperial court had rotted completely from its roots. Even with Li Shubai, the Prince of Kui’s extraordinary talent and brilliant actions, what use were they now?

In the end, it was merely the last ray of sunset before darkness.