Chapter 95: Audience with the Emperor (Part 1)

Chapter 95: Audience with the Emperor (Part 1)

Le Wuya figured, fine, still not awake—this is a dream.

He lazily snuggled back into his pillow, stretched his body out into a long, thin line, then burrowed back under the covers.

Zhi Jie watched him laze in bed, fondness warming his heart, a smile creeping into his eyes.

Le Wuya turned onto his side, propping his head on one hand, ready to have a word with this Xiaoliu in his dream: "What made you think of this?"

Zhi Jie: "I've been thinking about it for a while."

"How long?"

Zhi Jie lowered his eyes: "Four years ago, in the snow."

That year, snow blanketed the palace paths, and ten thousand blossoms fell.

Zhi Jie looked up at the resplendent plaque that read "Zhaoming Hall."

The north wind howled, biting to the bone, but Zhi Jie seemed to feel nothing.

In the distance, the emperor was receiving his ministers, people coming and going.

When the hall doors opened, he gazed at the dragon throne carved with coiling dragons, his eyes blazing like fire.

Zhi Jie had always been a single-minded, stubborn man.

From that moment on, the thought had taken root, his heart had been stirred, and to this day, his resolve had never wavered.

Le Wuya, on the other hand, didn't have such grand thoughts.

A night had passed, and Zhi Jie's face was bare of makeup, yet his features remained delicate and handsome, pure and unblemished—truly blessed in appearance.

If there could really be such a handsome emperor, he'd surely go down in history.

Le Wuya finished his idle musings and asked lightly: "What do you need me for? Your humble servant holds a lowly seventh-rank post, just a small county magistrate, worlds apart from that exalted seat. If the Sixth Prince is looking for allies, why come to me?"

Zhi Jie, however, was dead serious.

Since this was serious business, he naturally adopted a serious tone: "Teacher, if your face hadn't changed, I would never have troubled you with this."

"I know you." He gazed at Le Wuya's animated features. "You'd never be content to stay under anyone's thumb. The little town of Nanting could never hold your talents. But once you stick your head out, you'll inevitably be dragged into the treacherous currents of officialdom, tossed about by unpredictable tides. Others seeing your face, even if they don't get suspicious, will surely scheme about you and keep an eye on you."

He touched his chest: "I think, for you to live freely, someone has to protect you. The status of a prince isn't nearly enough."

Le Wuya: "And the emperor would be enough? The emperor's got no shortage of constraints—above, tied to heaven and earth; below, to all living beings."

Zhi Jie: "More or less. To aim any higher, I'd probably have to cultivate immortality."

Le Wuya: "Don't even. The late emperor, he—"

"I haven't forgotten." Zhi Jie said gently, "I cultivate the Way, not immortality. I only seek a hundred years, not a next life."

Le Wuya swallowed hard, starting to feel that something was off.

He'd been rambling with his dream Xiaoliu, yet the other had circled back to this topic, refusing to budge an inch.

This didn't feel like a dream.

Le Wuya smiled uneasily: "The way you say it, it sounds like you're pretty damn sure."

"Before, I had only thirty percent certainty. With you, Teacher..." Zhi Jie lowered his head, modestly, "I dare not claim much certainty, but I already have a hundred percent resolve."

"Resolve alone is enough? The old emperor's in his prime. After the late emperor's fall, he learned his lesson—won't touch a single golden pill. Isn't he still doing his Five Animals Exercises morning and night, downing three bowls of health tonic a day? You'll wait for him to hand you the throne? You'll be waiting a long time. The ones he wore down before, you've seen them all. He loves to trample people—can you stand it, endure being trampled by him like that?"

Zhi Jie: "I'm a man of the Way. The Way values acting according to one's nature—facing life and death without joy or fear, seeing life as death and death as life. If my father should unfortunately die young, I'll follow Zhuangzi's example and sing at his funeral drum."

Le Wuya: ...Holy shit.

He'd jumped straight to planning the old emperor's funeral.

Unexpectedly, Zhi Jie's mind was even faster than his: "Just now, Teacher was afraid I'd be trampled... Saying that, Teacher cares about me a little, doesn't he?"

Le Wuya: "..."

"When we were young, Little Seven asked which of us you favored more. Teacher said, the palm and the back of the hand are both flesh." He looked at Le Wuya earnestly. "Can I be the palm?"

Le Wuya said irritably: "Weren't you just talking about wu wei? Count on your own fingers."

Zhi Jie: "..." Bad move.

Seeing that Zhi Jie answered every question directly, as if he'd truly planned it all out, Le Wuya could no longer muster a smile.

Under the covers, he tried to secretly pinch his own thigh to test if this was a dream.

But before he could put in the effort, Zhi Jie caught his wrist and pulled it out from under the covers.

"Teacher, don't pinch yourself," Zhi Jie said. "If you want to confirm, I'll do it for you."

With that, Zhi Jie leaned down, his warm, soft lips gently brushing Le Wuya's forehead.

"I wanted to do this last night." Facing the stiff-limbed Le Wuya, Zhi Jie was unusually candid. "If Teacher woke up and didn't remember, that would be a problem; but if he remembered and couldn't tell reality from dream, he'd fret and waver, his mind unsettled..."

He lowered his eyes, smiling gently and innocently: "Now it's fine. Teacher, don't worry. Get some good rest, and then make your plans."

He turned over, sat up, straightened his clothes, and handed a pouch to Le Wuya: "Now, you're a chess piece. Though placed at the edge, to me, you're the most crucial one.—Would Teacher find this role more comfortable and at ease?"

After delivering this gentle yet startling speech, Zhi Jie made a clean exit, leaving Le Wuya alone in the room, dazed.

Being openly treated as a chess piece should have enraged and disappointed any scholar with ambition.

But Le Wuya oddly felt at peace.

He asked for nothing else in life but to be of use to others.

He said he wished others would dote on him unconditionally, but he was equally the type to devote himself wholeheartedly to others.

If others asked nothing of him, then what was the point of Le Wuya's existence?

Even as a swaddled infant, he'd been a chess piece, a bargaining chip.

Having long been used to being a chess piece, he might as well keep at it—it was actually more comfortable that way.

After who knows how long, Le Wuya raised his hand, squeezed the plain pouch, and pulled out a jade-carved chess piece.

It was in the style of a Chinese chess piece, unmarked as soldier or general, elephant or chariot—a clean white piece.

Le Wuya looked it over and over, finding only that the jade was quite beautiful, its quality excellent.

He'd always had skin as thick as leather, and when he came across something good, he'd slyly squirrel it away. He even started planning whether to drill a hole in the jade chess piece and hang it around his neck.

He'd endured all sorts of blows since childhood, and could be said to be seasoned and tough as nails.

Getting hit with a thunderbolt first thing in the morning, Le Wuya could still just go back to sleep.

He lay back on the bed and began recalling Xiaoliu from childhood—that sweet, well-behaved kid whose gaze toward him was always sincere, always worried. Every time they met, he'd hand him something, like he was scared Le Wuya might be getting the short end of the stick.

But the more he tried to recall, the fuzzier that face got.

Just before he dozed off for that second round of sleep, what floated in front of his eyes was Xiaoliu's Adam's apple bobbing slightly and the gentle but oddly sharp, dead-set ambition in his eyes.

That look was strange and exciting all at once, and it sent a little shiver through Le Wuya.

...

Ru Feng, ever on top of things, had the carriage ready long ago, his eyes on the pale sun just peeking over the horizon, figuring out what time they'd make it back to the prefecture.

Before long, he saw Zhi Jie hurry out the back door of the post station, face all flushed, with Jiang He, who'd been up on the roof all night chasing cicadas, hot on his heels.

Jiang He looked worried and kept asking, "Sixth Master, what the heck is going on?"

Zhi Jie didn't answer, just kept his head down and hurried over to the carriage. He shot Ru Feng a look, then pulled back the curtain and ducked in.

Seeing Jiang He frown—which was rare—Ru Feng couldn't help asking, "Guard Jiang, what's wrong?"

Jiang He said seriously, "The Sixth Prince is sick, burning up with fever, his face all red. I asked him what was wrong, but he didn't hear me."

Jiang He was genuinely freaked out.

Back at Tianlang Camp, he'd seen a soldier run a high fever for days and end up deaf from it.

Hearing that, Ru Feng pulled his hand back and reassured him, "He's fine. He's just being a wild one."

Jiang He didn't quite get it. "...What?"

Before Ru Feng could speak, Zhi Jie's voice came, muffled, from inside the carriage: "Ru Feng, drive back to the city. And don't say weird stuff to Guard Jiang."

Ru Feng answered respectfully, "Yes, sir."

Jiang He was still scratching his head, but hearing the Sixth Prince answer with his own ears, he knew the guy wasn't going deaf, and that put his mind at ease.

...

After all the commotion that day, the post station went dead quiet.

Le Wuya rested a full day and night, took a nice long soak in a hot spring, and finally bounced back completely.

He just acted like none of it had ever happened.

The bigger the deal, the more you gotta keep your cool and stay grounded.

Loose lips sink ships.

Zhi Jie had trusted Le Wuya with the heavy duty of being a "pawn," but Le Wuya acted like it had never happened, eating and drinking as usual—actually eating even better and cutting loose even more than before.

Days slipped by like water, and Le Wuya's prediction came true.

Clearly, the Old Emperor was in a foul mood, dragging his feet and refusing to see them, dead set on grinding them down.

But that tactic didn't work on Le Wuya at all.

With the emperor not calling him in, he was more than happy to kick back, spending his days setting up chess puzzles, browsing book stalls, buying snacks, checking out antiques, and looking at lanterns—getting his fill of all the fun he'd missed out on in his past life.

Just as Le Wuya was itching to talk the Courier into building a swing set in the post station's backyard, someone finally came from the palace to summon him and Lü Deyao for a briefing.

Le Wuya's swing plan fell through, and he went to find Lü Deyao with a sour face, preparing to enter the palace together.

These past days, he'd put on a proper, dignified gentleman's act while tearing around the capital, having a blast, buying up half a carriage full of souvenirs, and having long since shoved Prefect Lyu to the back of his mind.

So when he ran into Prefect Lyu again, Le Wuya startled himself. "Ah."

The Old Emperor's power play hadn't fazed Le Wuya one bit, but it had left Lü Deyao completely rattled.

He'd always been tight-lipped, and even the people closest to him could only guess what he was thinking. After running around for days, Prefect Lyu probably hadn't dug up a single scrap of intel, and could only sit around the post station, racking his brain, picturing things getting worse and worse, until his cheeks were sunken and his face pale and gray, like he was holding back a serious illness but didn't even dare get sick.

Those twenty-odd days of waiting had cost him at least five years of his life.

Le Wuya offered a few words of concern, but seeing that Lü Deyao couldn't be bothered to respond, only snorting cold air through his nose like an old goat, his last shred of sympathy vanished.

With a ruddy complexion, he followed the withered, wood-like Lü Deyao into the palace.

It was an overcast day—maybe the emperor had picked it on purpose—but either way, the air was thick and stuffy, the sky dim, a perfect atmosphere for a trip to the execution ground.

The red walls around them were heavy and somber, and the two men walked with heads bowed under the guidance of silent eunuchs, like treading through a pool of dull-colored blood.

They wound through twists and turns until they were led into a hall.

The eunuchs told them to wait quietly there, then slipped away on tiptoe.

Lü Deyao was already in a daze, head drooping, not daring to breathe too loud.

But Le Wuya saw it clearly: this place looked grand and imposing, but it was just a side hall.

From that, he could tell the emperor was busy dealing with He Lian Che's envoy and couldn't be bothered to see them—he only wanted to scare them.

The question was, who would he send?

Le Wuya knew quite a few people at court, and could easily rattle off a long list.

But someone who could carry out such scoldings of officials on the emperor's behalf would have to be a trusted close minister.

Four or five years ago, it had been himself.

Four or five years later, it should be...

Before Le Wuya could finish the thought, the heavy sound of official boots echoed from outside, each step landing with great solemnity.

Lü Deyao's legs trembled, and he hit the ground with a thud, crying out loudly, "Long live the Emperor, ten thousand years, ten thousand—"

A cool, youthful voice cut him off. "Stop."

That voice absolutely did not belong to the emperor, who was pushing fifty.

Lü Deyao's words halted, but he'd already prostrated himself flat on the ground.

He tried to struggle to his feet, but his limbs had gone limp, and he couldn't muster the slightest strength.

In the end, it was that man he detested, Wen Ren, who, by some rare stroke of conscience, gave him a hand up, letting him barely straighten his back.

After doing this, he also bowed stiffly: "Magistrate of Nanting, Wenren Yue, pays respects to Lord Xie."

Le Wuya remembered Jie Jitong—that talented rising star—especially his appearance when he impeached him: his eyes blazed like sparks, his words simmered with barely contained anger, so radiant and spirited that one could hardly look away.

The emperor always did this—once one was toppled, he immediately replaced him with another docile and agreeable one.

Back then, it was Le Wuya who brought down Huang Ziying; later, it was Jie Jitong who impeached Le Wuya.

Le Wuya thought, it must be good to be the emperor—all the talents under heaven end up in his grasp.

No wonder Xiaoliu had his eye on that throne.