Gao Yuexing untied the colorful thin ribbons from her hair, and the two small buns instantly unraveled. Her long black hair, with a slight curl, cascaded onto her shoulders.
Li Fuxiang, sitting on the couch, watched for a while before he couldn’t resist crawling over to reach out and grab it.
Seeing his movement through the makeup mirror, Gao Yuexing said without turning her head, “Don’t pull my hair.”
Li Fuxiang’s already raised hand made a detour in mid-air and returned to rest on his lap.
Etiquette and distinctions between right and wrong—he hadn’t fully grasped them yet. Tutor Liu had been trying to teach him bit by bit, but the child had already passed the most malleable age. The emperor, unwilling to let him suffer, allowed him to live a leisurely life unlike the usual noble children who studied late into the night and woke before dawn. Li Fuxiang, in contrast, rested at sunset and only woke when he was fully satisfied. Indeed, no one expected him to amount to much.
But Gao Yuexing held expectations for him. She warned, “If you go out acting like this, people will think you’re a scoundrel, and you’ll get beaten.”
Li Fuxiang was terrified of being beaten. His eyes widened immediately.
Gao Yuexing felt an odd pang of pity, patting his back and coaxing him again. She was extremely puzzled. Looking at his current personality—timid, afraid of death, and lazy—how could he possibly grow up to become a young general and a pillar of the nation?
After a moment of thought, Gao Yuexing figured it out herself.
Timidity breeds caution.
Fear of death drives survival in desperate situations.
Laziness, yet still capable—this must mean he’s a genius!
No matter how others saw Li Fuxiang, Gao Yuexing found him endearing in every way. In her eyes, he was an unparalleled talent, an extraordinary figure of dragon-like elegance and phoenix-like grace, with a brilliance unmatched by the world.
However, Gao Yuexing still had serious matters on her mind. “You said there were no traces of jackals at the scene? Did you intentionally observe?”
Li Fuxiang pointed to his eyes and said, “I looked with my eyes.”
Gao Yuexing understood his meaning. He hadn’t deliberately observed but had seen it and remembered. Propping her chin on her hand, a faint trace of worry flickered across her brows. “The Fifth Prince was harmed by someone. Who could it be?”
Although tonight’s analysis by Xi Heng and Ding Wenfu seemed to clarify the case, in truth, it plunged them deeper into an unfathomable fog.
Gao Yuexing unconditionally believed Li Fuxiang’s words.
If he said he saw it, then he must have seen it.
When their carriage passed the scene, there were no traces of jackals.
Yet the first group to climb the mountain to hunt jackals had set out that very night.
This meant that whoever fabricated the traces did so in the short time after they left and before the imperial guards arrived on the mountain.
Who could it be?
Could Li Fuyou himself know about it?
Gao Yuexing pondered, deciding to ask him during tomorrow’s visit. Even a single word of information would suffice.
Late at night, when all was quiet, Gao Yuexing and Li Fuxiang, though sharing the same tent, were separated into inner and outer sections.
Gao Yuexing did not sleep soundly that night. She had a dream.
The sound of a babbling brook echoed in the dream, and it was a spring day in a sun-drenched mountain wilderness.
Gao Yuexing followed the sound of water, seemingly searching for something in urgency.
Finally, she saw a figure from behind—a child. From his attire, Gao Yuexing recognized him as the Fifth Prince, Li Fuyou. She called out, “Your Highness, the Fifth Prince.”
Li Fuyou did not turn around. He was crouched by the water’s edge, fiddling with something.
Gao Yuexing cautiously approached and patted his shoulder.
Li Fuyou finally turned around. At the instant he did, his face grotesquely stretched and deformed, suddenly transforming into the ferocious visage of a jackal. It opened its mouth wide and lunged at her, its sharp teeth smeared with scraps of flesh and blood.
Gao Yuexing had a surreal sensation, almost as if she could smell the rancid, nauseating stench.
She squatted down on the spot, shielding her head.
The nightmare didn’t progress further. Gao Yuexing slowly removed the fingers covering her eyes and found that, across the brook, Li Fuxiang was on horseback, lowering his bow.
The beast struck by the arrow collapsed before her, kicking up a cloud of dust as it hit the ground. In that instant, it transformed back into the Fifth Prince’s form, a single feathered arrow piercing through his chest and back, with blood soaking through his clothes.
Gao Yuexing stared as he fell lifelessly before her. His body twitched for a moment before all vitality left him, and he died with his eyes wide open, unclosed in death.
On the other side of the brook, Li Fuxiang’s gaze was cold, devoid of any warmth. Gao Yuexing was terrified—this wasn’t her husband!
She trembled as she asked, “Who are you?”
Li Fuxiang didn’t answer. Instead, he reined in his horse and turned to leave.
Without a second thought, Gao Yuexing waded through the bone-chilling water to chase after him. The scenery around her suddenly shifted and distorted, leaving her in a vast emptiness. Before her eyes rose the towering palace city.
The palace city in the dream lacked its usual strict defenses. The gates were wide open, as if waiting for her arrival.
Following her memory, Gao Yuexing walked through the narrow palace paths and ascended the golden hall, a symbol of imperial supremacy. On the high throne, she saw Li Fuxiang clad in a dragon robe.
He was still young and bewildered, like a soulless doll placed upon that seat. Behind the golden bead curtain by the throne, the image of a ferocious beast’s face emerged, like ink spreading on a paper painting.
—
Before dawn, the camp was already alive with the sound of people rushing about.
Gao Yuexing, struggling in her dream, finally woke up in shock, her forehead drenched in cold sweat.
Opening her eyes, she realized the noise outside wasn’t ordinary commotion. Taking a deep breath to steady her pounding heart, she threw on her robes and went to check inside. Li Fuxiang seemed to be sleeping uneasily as well, his brows tightly furrowed, with a fine layer of sweat on his forehead. He must have been having a nightmare too.
Gao Yuexing quickly shook him awake and summoned the palace attendants into the tent to care for him. She then ran outside herself to find out what was going on.
The morning breeze cleared her head somewhat. Just as she steadied herself, she spotted a crowd gathered outside Noble Consort Xu’s tent in the distance.
Her heart sank immediately.
The originally white tent was now covered with opaque black veils, tightly secured with not a single gap visible. She saw the emperor’s personal eunuch and imperial guards anxiously stationed outside, indicating that the emperor must be inside.
Gao Yuexing was about to go over to investigate.
Suddenly, Ding Wenfu appeared out of nowhere and pressed her shoulder, saying, “Don’t go near.”
Gao Yuexing stared blankly and asked, “What’s wrong?”
Ding Wenfu replied, “The Fifth Prince cannot be exposed to light or touched by water. He’s entirely delirious, barking like a dog. The imperial physicians say rabies is highly contagious. If he bites someone in his madness, there is no cure. His Majesty has ordered me to watch over the two of you. You mustn’t go near.”
Gao Yuexing’s lips trembled as she tried to speak, opening and closing her mouth repeatedly, unable to steady her voice. “What did he do wrong?”
No one answered her.
She answered herself, “He was so young—what could he possibly have done wrong? Why must Heaven be so cruel as to take his life!”
Li Fuxiang also realized what had happened. Without even washing up, he rushed toward Noble Consort Xu’s tent.
Ding Wenfu, unwilling to risk his safety, forcibly carried him back and refused to let him leave no matter what.
When Gao Yuexing ran out, she was intercepted before she could get close. Zheng Yan and Zheng Yi blocked her path.
Zheng Yan said, “It’s dangerous.”
Gao Yuexing replied, “I know.”
Zheng Yan continued, “His Majesty and Noble Consort Xu are both there, and even the imperial physicians can do nothing. What can you accomplish by seeing him now?”
Gao Yuexing murmured, “Yes, what could I accomplish… Didn’t I already know the ending?”
Zheng Yan frowned. “What are you saying? What did you know beforehand?”
Gao Yuexing shook her head and turned away, despondent.
She sat alone, lost in thought.
She wondered if the Fifth Prince, so young, had any awareness of himself during his illness. Did he know he was about to die? How much pain and despair must he have felt?
Then she thought about the emperor, who had always been indifferent to him. Only recently had he shown genuine affection, and now he had to watch his own son suffer and die in agony. What must he be feeling?
She thought of Noble Consort Xu, whose only support in the deep palace had been her obedient and lovable son. As a mother, how unbearable must her pain be?
The abbot of Qingliang Temple had once said her destiny was connected to the past and future.
Would everything in the future proceed along the path she already knew, unchanging?
If so, what was the purpose of her journey through these events?
Was it merely to watch everything beautiful and good around her be destroyed, utterly powerless to stop it?
The first move in the chess game had already been played.
What about what came next?
In ten winters, would she still face an assassination attempt? Would she still, as she once experienced, die a wrongful and inexplicable death?
The black veil hung over Noble Consort Xu’s tent for an entire day and night. It wasn’t until noon the next day that the veil was finally removed.
A servant carried water inside.
The emperor, who had endured an entire night without rest, emerged, looking slightly disheveled. At last, no one restricted their movements. Gao Yuexing approached the tent and heard Noble Consort Xu’s intermittent sobbing.
The Fifth Prince, Li Fuyou, had passed away.
The new name he had just been given hadn’t even had time to be recorded in the imperial genealogy.
Xi Heng made progress in the investigation. He apprehended a servant who had attended to Li Fuyou and brought him before the Crown Prince. However, the Crown Prince identified the servant, stating that this was not the person he had encountered at the foot of the mountain that day.
According to the servant’s recollection, that day, Li Fuyou had grown bored. Hearing that Li Fuxiang had gone to the mountain palace to read, he decided to go find him and play together. However, entering and exiting the library required the emperor’s permission. Li Fuyou, being naturally introverted, had long been aware that the emperor didn’t favor him, so he tactfully avoided approaching the emperor. His plan was to call Li Fuxiang out through the window instead.
Unfortunately, on the way, he tripped over something unknown, tumbled down the roadside, and fell. When he got back up, the Fifth Prince was nowhere to be seen. The servant stubbornly assumed the prince had gone on ahead, so he continued chasing after him. It wasn’t until he reached the mountain palace and still didn’t see his master that he realized something was wrong. Panicking, he returned to report and call for help.
Meanwhile, the person the Crown Prince, Li Fuqian, had encountered at the foot of the mountain seemed to have vanished into thin air, leaving no trace despite thorough searching.
Xi Heng became ruthless. From the campsite to the mountain palace, he conducted a sweeping investigation, meticulously questioning every person who was breathing, leaving no one unchecked.
Gao Yuexing accompanied Li Fuxiang to visit Noble Consort Xu.
In just a few short days, Noble Consort Xu had become gaunt and unrecognizable. She neither ate nor drank, staying by her son’s coffin, clutching it as if wishing to follow him into death. Not even the emperor’s personal persuasion had any effect.
Li Fuxiang worriedly tugged at her hand and then personally held a bowl of medicinal soup, bringing it to her lips.
Only in Li Fuxiang’s presence could Noble Consort Xu summon the strength to show a glimmer of life. She lovingly embraced him, forcing herself to take the bowl and drink the medicine in one go.
Li Fuxiang stayed by her side for seven days.
On the seventh day, when the wake ended, Noble Consort Xu voluntarily left the mourning hall and went to see the emperor.
The emperor was about to extend his hand to help her.
But Noble Consort Xu knelt down to the ground and said, “Your Majesty, regarding my son’s funeral, I ask Your Majesty to keep it a secret for now.”