Chapter 512: The Illegitimate Child

Chapter 512: The Illegitimate Child

She thought for a moment, then decided to speak honestly, "Your Majesty's pulse is deep and sluggish, with irregular menstrual flow, combined with heat stagnation and a lack of vitality following bouts of anger. This is a classic case of chronic illness marked by qi stagnation."

"Your Majesty's body appears difficult to conceive, but the pulse isn't weak or deficient. Forgive me for asking, but has Your Majesty ever delivered a child prematurely?"

At these words, Empress Dowager Yuan shot up like a scalded cat, leaping to her feet in a rage.

"How dare you! That's absolute nonsense! Everyone in this palace knows that since I married the late Emperor, I've been tending to my health, yet for nearly twenty years, I've never conceived. How dare a nobody like you slander me with such baseless lies!?"

After speaking, she immediately shouted, "Guards! Drag this lying wench out and beat her to death with clubs!"

In an instant, two guards in blue robes rushed in from outside, ready to grab Ji Yuntang.

Ji Yuntang's face showed no fear. Even with both arms pinned by the guards, she continued, "Empress Dowager, I'm not done talking!"

"Besides the symptoms I just mentioned, you also have weakness in your lower back and knees, dizziness and ringing in the ears, frequent chest tightness and trouble catching your breath, and headaches so bad you can barely breathe."

"If I'm right, you've had these symptoms for seventeen or eighteen years now. You've tried all kinds of medicine, but they only ease the symptoms—they never cure them. Now the headaches and ringing in your ears are getting worse, and even the meds you take regularly aren't helping anymore."

"To be blunt, I'm the only one who can cure you. If I die, within six months, your head condition will cause a sudden brain hemorrhage. Best case, you'll be bedridden and paralyzed. Worst case, you'll die."

When Ji Yuntang finished speaking, Empress Dowager Yuan's heart lurched.

She'd never told Ji Yuntang a thing about her illness, yet every word she said hit the mark.

Her head condition had indeed been going on for nearly eighteen years. At first, it was just a dull ache, but over time it turned into a throbbing pain, and her ears started acting up too.

During court sessions, she often couldn't hear the ministers clearly. Sometimes her ears would ring with a roar like thunder.

Imperial Physician Wei had prescribed her many medicines, but over time, her body seemed to build up a tolerance. The meds just couldn't ease the pain anymore, and now she'd get chest tightness and shortness of breath out of nowhere.

Empress Dowager Yuan knew it all went back to that time she snuck off to a Taoist temple to give birth in secret.

She'd always had a hard time getting pregnant. After entering the palace, she'd shared the late Emperor's bed many times, but her belly never once showed any sign of life.

But one time, when she left the palace to visit her family, she drank too much out of misery and ended up spending a reckless night with her cousin—and came back pregnant.

Empress Dowager Yuan knew damn well the child wasn't the late Emperor's—it was her cousin Jiang Yanfan's.

At the time, she was both terrified and overjoyed. Terrified the late Emperor would find out and bring ruin on her and the entire Yuan family. Overjoyed that after seventeen years in the palace, she'd finally gotten pregnant.

Empress Dowager Yuan had thought about quietly getting rid of the child, but the imperial physician warned her that if she aborted this one, she might never get pregnant again.

Besides, she was already thirty-four, which was considered ancient for a pregnant woman back then.

Other consorts could have kids, but she couldn't. Others had kids running around and filling their lives with joy, but she had no sons or daughters at all.

The late Emperor might have seemed to dote on her, but Empress Dowager Yuan knew it was only because of the Yuan family's power. That so-called favor was just for show, to keep up appearances.

The moment he got real power back from the noble families, that favor would vanish, and she'd be doomed.

Empress Dowager Yuan had been groomed by the Yuan family since childhood to be an empress. She was skilled in music, chess, calligraphy, and painting, and she also learned horseback riding and archery.

She even had a private tutor come every month to teach her the art of palace intrigue.

Every day she was either learning something or on her way to learn something. Therefore, she considered herself different from other noble daughters, believing herself superior to others.

To prevent his daughter from being rebellious and disobedient, Yuan's father instilled in her the ideology that those who hold power rule the world, which also cultivated Empress Dowager Yuan's ambition for power.

Her understanding was very clear—she never loved the late Emperor, but rather the supreme imperial authority.

Only power could satisfy the desires in her heart.

But her inability to bear a child had always been her greatest worry.

Therefore, upon learning she was pregnant, she hesitated for a few days before deciding to give birth to the child.

To prevent the late Emperor from suddenly summoning her to his chambers, she declined for the first two months by claiming she was unwell and resting to recover.

Later, as the child grew and her belly began to show, she could no longer hide it. She made the excuse that the palace was not suitable for recuperation and that she wished to go to a Taoist temple for spiritual cultivation and to pray for the imperial family.

The late Emperor knew of her ambition and was unwilling to keep such a person by his side.

Therefore, when Empress Dowager Yuan proposed going to live at a Taoist temple for a period, he agreed without hesitation!

The place she went to happened to be Mount Taibai, known as the number one temple under heaven.

There, she gave birth to her first and only child.

Empress Dowager Yuan's cousin Jiang Yanfan was also a cultivator. During that time, he moved to Mount Taibai as well, taking care of Empress Dowager Yuan.

She was moved by his attentiveness, gradually shifting from initial resistance to acceptance.

But one thing had become a thorn in Empress Dowager Yuan's heart.

When she was seven months pregnant, the late Emperor sent someone to deliver a message saying he was ill and wanted her to return to the palace.

At that time, Empress Dowager Yuan's belly was already very large—how could she dare return to the palace?

But the late Emperor sent messengers repeatedly, and none of the eunuchs who came ever saw Empress Dowager Yuan in person.

The late Emperor sensed something was wrong and said he was worried about her safety, planning to send the Empress to visit her.

Fearing that her pregnancy would be exposed, Empress Dowager Yuan had no choice but to take a desperate risk. She used the strongest labor-inducing medicine and gritted her teeth to give birth.

A seven-month premature child was congenitally deficient, compounded by malnutrition and underdevelopment. From birth, the child required various precious medicines to sustain him.

As a result, even now at seventeen years old, the child remained weak and sickly, pale-faced, needing to drink medicine daily just to stay alive.

As for herself, because she didn't properly observe the postpartum confinement period after the premature birth, she also accumulated a body full of ailments.

These conditions had now accompanied her for seventeen full years, and there wasn't a single day she didn't hate the late Emperor for it.

Had he not sent people to urge her back to the palace, she wouldn't have risked using labor-inducing medicine, her son wouldn't have been congenitally deficient, and she wouldn't have suffered so many aftereffects.

It was the late Emperor who had harmed both mother and son.

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