Chapter 568: Enthronement as the Carefree King

Chapter 568: Appointment as the Carefree Prince

Originally, after Su Da’s engagement banquet, Su Rao had intended to grab Su Wu by the ear and give him an earful about his bold move of dragging Yun Muyue home.

But now, it seemed there was no need for Su Rao to worry about this matter.

In Su Wu’s courtyard within the Su residence, Mu Mingjin had been pummeled to a pulp, his limbs limp and sprawled out. Su Wu and Yun Muyue looked just as worse for wear—one had a black eye, while the other had a swollen lip with blood still seeping from the corner, making their injuries appear even more severe.

The three of them had engaged in a purely brute-force two-against-one brawl. Su Wu was skilled in martial arts, and Mu Mingjin was no slouch either—his claim of not knowing martial arts was merely a disguise. Only Yun Muyue was truly out of his depth in this regard. Despite the fight being a contest of raw strength, Su Wu and Mu Mingjin’s fists were harder than Yun Muyue’s. If it hadn’t been two against one, it would have been truly difficult to knock Mu Mingjin down, leaving him bruised, swollen, and seeing double.

Lying on the ground, staring up at the dazzling sky, Mu Mingjin suddenly burst into laughter, hearty and unrestrained.

“Still got the nerve to laugh? Seems like we didn’t hit him hard enough.”

Grimacing and rubbing their sore faces, Su Wu and Yun Muyue exchanged a glance before winding up for another beating at Mu Mingjin from both sides.

Just as their fists were about to land, Mu Mingjin hastily pulled out the imperial decree with dragon motifs from his robe and held it up before Su Wu and Yun Muyue. Against the bright yellow background, a silver dragon with five claws soared through the clouds, leaping into the sky.

As the imperial edict was revealed, Mu Mingjin urgently shouted, “Eighth Prince, receive the decree!” Su Wu and Yun Muyue’s fists, already inches away, immediately lost most of their momentum.

Their punches no longer struck Mu Mingjin, and both Su Wu and Yun Muyue’s expressions shifted in an instant.

A moment later, before Yun Muyue could kneel to receive the decree, Su Wu had already snatched it from Mu Mingjin’s hands with blatant disregard for protocol.

His eyes scanned the text rapidly before settling on the phrases “Carefree Prince” and “enfeoffed with Yun County as his domain.”

Yun Muyue, who had leaned in to look, froze in stunned silence.

“Little Eighth, His Majesty is a ruler with family bonds. He has never feared that his throne might be threatened by other princes. He once said that since he had the ability to ascend the throne, he also had the means to defend it. He became emperor to protect those he cares about, not to covet the supreme imperial power.”

Su Wu and Yun Muyue’s reactions were within Mu Mingjin’s expectations. Rubbing his cheeks, he sat up and relayed Yun Mujing’s intentions—this was why Yun Mujing had granted Yun Muyue this carefree title.

By enfeoffing Yun County to Yun Muyue, Yun Mujing harbored no fear that Yun Muyue might harbor ulterior motives, turning Yun County into a second Langjing that could directly threaten the capital and his throne. Because he had the ability to defend his seat on the dragon throne.

As for the matter of the Eighth Prince’s unauthorized departure from the capital and subsequent disappearance, Yun Mujing had passed it off as Yun Muyue’s own doing in Danliang, similar to how Su Er had ruined it. Thus, Yun Muyue’s capture by Danliang remained unknown to others. As for why he had now been “found,” that was a state secret.

Ordinary citizens had no way of knowing, let alone accessing such information. As for the ministers in Langjing, during the deposed crown prince’s rebellion, Mu Mingjin—who had originally left home to search for the Eighth Prince and Su Wu—had taken the hit meant for the new emperor in the Yun Palace, earning merit for saving the throne. The only thing the court officials knew was that Mu Mingjin was the new emperor’s trusted confidant. Thus, regardless of whether they were aware of the Eighth Prince’s disappearance, they wisely chose to feign ignorance.

“Yun Mujing’s intention here is for the sake of his elder brother.”

When the new emperor’s decree brought by Mu Mingjin was made known to the Su family that night, Su Rao did not dwell on it too deeply. Yun Mujing’s decision to send Yun Muyue to Yun County and enfeoff him as the Carefree Prince was aimed at creating checks and balances between Yun Muyue and the various century-old noble families in Yun County.

The great families would suspect that the new emperor had sent a prince to oversee them.

As for Yun Muyue, he would be monitored by the Su family—who had left government service and were now allied by marriage with the century-old military family, the Lius. If Yun Muyue truly harbored disloyal intentions, the Su family wouldn't just sit on their hands upon discovering it. This was Yun Mujing’s trust in her elder brother, Yun Ji, not in the Su family.

In the past, Su Rao would have read too much into this matter. But now, she understood clearly in her heart that everything Yun Mujing did was solely for the sake of her elder brother.

Yun Ji no longer wished to remain trapped in Langjing, so Yun Mujing released him to return to Yun County. Now, by granting Yun County as a fief to Yun Muyue—who was on good terms with Fifth Brother—and knowing that she and Yun Ji would eventually marry, Yun Mujing was effectively placing Yun County in Yun Ji’s hands.

With the former vassal state of Yunlang, now Yun County, as Yun Ji’s stronghold, if any unforeseen incidents arose in the future and she was too far away in Langjing to intervene, Yun County could provide Yun Ji a safe haven and buy her the time she needed to quell the crisis.

Yun Mujing’s show of protection left Su Rao without a shred of doubt. As the central figure, Yun Ji understood Yun Mujing’s intentions even more clearly.

Gazing at the true purpose behind Mu Mingjin’s visit to Yun County—this decree that ostensibly granted Yun Muyue freedom but was in fact a safeguard for him—Yun Ji’s phoenix eyes dark as obsidian shimmered with emotion.

His heart, once thawed only by Su Rao, now stirred because of Yun Mujing’s actions. A sunlike warmth, unnoticed even by himself, surfaced in his finely arched brows.

In his mind, the image of his younger brother embracing him at their parting resurfaced. At the time, he had suppressed his discomfort at being touched by someone unfamiliar. But now, recalling it, his chest inexplicably tightened with unnamed feeling.

Though it was painful, there was also a deep warmth, akin to the days spent with Rao Rao and her family—yet even more profound.

"Jing is always willful too, as willful as Rao Rao sometimes. It really leaves me helpless."

He didn’t find anything amiss in saying so, his words carrying the unconditional patience of an elder brother for his younger sibling.

"This is what family is. With an elder brother shielding us from the storm, we younger siblings can live without fear—doing as we please, never needing to worry. Even if the sky were to fall, our family would hold it up for us."

Turning her head slightly to look at him, Su Rao told Yun Ji that what he was experiencing now was what it feels like to have a family.

He was never alone. He had his grandparents who raised him with love, a younger brother who schemed for the throne just to protect him, loyal subordinates like Yun Ling, Yun Feng, and Xiao Mubai, his lifelong confidant Second Brother, and her—so many people who cared for him.

His heart had already sensed it, and under Su Rao’s words, he understood why his heart swelled. So this was what it meant to have a family. No wonder Yun Muhao had been so obsessed with it.

"Yun Muhao, perhaps you were right. Even a specter from hell might yearn to return to the mortal world. Even if the sunlight might scorch a creature of darkness like me, this world is warmer than hell. Here, there’s Rao Rao, and there’s that foolish brother of yours. I’m greedy—greedy enough to want to remain like this forever. So, I’ll cling to this pretense. And you, a wandering spirit, may you depart in peace."

One last attempt to persuade Yun Ji to relinquish control of this body, but there was no response.

Black and white—only these two starkly contrasting hues remained in the dream. No longer were their consciousnesses overlapping, allowing them to meet. Though they couldn’t see each other’s faces, they could feel one another—darkness and light, two opposing forces coexisting in the same mind.

Since the first time he awoke, they had faced each other day and night, separated by an abyss of black and white. They could see each other’s silhouettes but could never cross into each other’s domain, never fully seize the other’s territory and drive them out.

This time, the dream held only his own figure. Across the blinding radiance across the abyss, Yun Muhao—who had repeatedly bound him, disgusted him, even frightened him—was gone. Had he vanished just like that, without a sound?

His slender fingers reached out, touching the radiant white before him. The abyss separating black and white began to blur at his touch, the two colors slowly intertwining, merging into a pale gray, narrowing and even dissolving the chasm between them.

Lifting his foot, he tentatively took a step forward—and found himself standing under the sun. But the blinding light, bursting forth in an instant, was painfully dazzling, searing his eyes that had grown accustomed to years of darkness. A stabbing, writhing pain—his vision plunged into a gray world, stripped of color.

No black, no white—only a hollow, empty gray.

Whose world was this? Whose eyes saw like this?

"No... this isn’t me. This is the blind Yun Ji. I’m not him. I’m not Yun Ji. I’m not."

Muttering this, he withdrew the foot he had extended. The merged black and white split apart again, the dividing abyss reforming seamlessly.