The doors and windows of the side hall in the imperial sleeping quarters had been sealed tight with cloth.
The bitter scent of the dozens of potent medicines being boiled in the air had grown so thick it seemed to cling to the skin.
The Chief Imperial Physician knelt prostrate before the couch, his wrinkled face held very low, both hands trembling uncontrollably.
From the rosewood medicine chest beside him, bound in ebony and edged with copper, he carefully pinched out a vermilion pill—the Pulse-Protecting Ginseng and Aconite Elixir.
The pill, no larger than a fingernail, gave off a sharp, bloody stench.
This was the life-saving draught into which the Chief Imperial Physician had poured everything he had learned in his lifetime—a medicine as fierce as a tiger or wolf!
He rolled the pill between his fingers for a long while, yet did not offer it.
He remembered how his own master had once prepared medicine for the late emperor. At the time, he had still been a young man in his prime and had not yet mastered such profound medical arts.
After entering the palace, his master had never returned.
The Chief Imperial Physician’s fingers shook, and the pill nearly slipped free.
Emperor Tiansheng lay on his back upon the bright-yellow imperial couch, his complexion gray and ashen as earth, his breathing as faint as a thread.
The Chief Imperial Physician did not dare take so much as one extra breath.
He crawled forward on his knees, pried open Emperor Tiansheng’s bloodless jaws, and forced the pill inside.
Then he drew three Thunderfire Divine Needles from his sleeve.
The needle tips had been soaked in medicinal liquid and gleamed with a sinister dark blue.
The Chief Imperial Physician clenched his teeth.
The long needles pierced the two major acupoints atop Emperor Tiansheng’s skull.
With the fierce medicinal power of the Pulse-Protecting Ginseng and Aconite Elixir, the Thunderfire Divine Needles transformed it into a powerful inner flame.
At once, it forced its way down the remnants of his extraordinary meridians, driving back the stagnant, poisoned blood clogging his chest.
Emperor Tiansheng, lying on the couch, struggled to swallow a mouthful of bloody phlegm mixed with the scent of medicine.
A sickly flush suddenly spread across his face.
After a long while, his breathing gradually steadied.
At last, those cloudy eyes opened once more, and within them gathered again a chill, fearsome authority.
“Get to the Imperial Pharmacy.”
The words were forced harshly through his clenched teeth.
The Chief Imperial Physician’s heart immediately eased. He had finally stabilized.
Eunuch Li emerged from the shadows and waved at several young eunuchs.
The Chief Imperial Physician did not even dare voice his congratulations. Several eunuchs lifted him, medicine chest and all, and dragged him silently from the side hall.
“You may leave as well.”
Eunuch Li did not dare disobey. He led the remaining attendants and palace maids out with their heads bowed, retreating backward as they closed the hall doors.
The vast side hall sank into deathly silence.
Only the few dying flames atop the octagonal bronze lamps flickered fitfully.
Emperor Tiansheng slowly struggled to his feet and sat alone on the edge of the couch.
He raised one hand and stared fixedly at his palm in the dim candlelight.
The back of his hand was already covered in dark brown age spots, the flesh loose, dry, and sunken.
Even though the tiger-and-wolf medicine had forcibly buoyed him with one last breath, it could not conceal the withered frailty of his old age. His five fingers trembled without pause.
He was old.
Emperor Tiansheng stared at the lines in his palm.
For decades, he had ruled the realm, slain powerful ministers, and kept the great clans in check.
He had secured his seat upon the imperial throne amid mountains of corpses and seas of blood.
This hand had once been able to overturn the fate of Great Qian with ease, reduce an army of a hundred thousand to ashes, and make every high official in the court kneel and weep blood.
Now, he could not even hold a wolf-hair brush steadily!
The flesh at the corner of his mouth twitched, pulling into a bleak smile.
Bitterness and venom seeped through that smile—resentment toward the years and the mandate of Heaven, as well as the sorrow of a hero in his twilight, powerless to turn back the tide.
He suddenly understood that the most merciless thing in this world was time…
He was old!
Time cared nothing for what kind of chair a person occupied.
It would strip away one’s sinews all the same and drain one’s vital essence dry.
A face flashed thunderously through his mind.
The Grand Secretary, Xu Jie.
Xu Jie’s face, furrowed with wrinkles and always hidden beneath drooping eyelids, appeared unusually clear in his thoughts.
Whenever a major matter arose, he summoned the Grand Secretary. This had long since become instinct carved into Emperor Tiansheng’s bones after decades of rule.
Which part of Great Qian’s military authority, money, provisions, or manpower did not pass through the Grand Secretariat’s hands?
He instinctively wanted to summon someone.
“Companion Li…”
The moment he had uttered half the words, Emperor Tiansheng’s hand reached toward the desk.
His fingers had just touched the wooden court baton carved with a five-clawed golden dragon when his movement abruptly halted.
No!
A profoundly wary light burst into Emperor Tiansheng’s eyes.
His five fingers slowly loosened.
He withdrew his hand from the baton, completely abandoning the thought of summoning the Grand Secretary.
Supporting himself against the edge of the desk, he struggled to stand.
His gaze swept across the tabletop. There lay a partially burned painting.
Eunuch Li had rescued it from a brazier the day before. Only half of the tiger and white crane remained, the charred edges still bearing traces of fire.
The tiger had been driven into a corner, while the crane’s neck was still wound around its body.
Emperor Tiansheng looked toward the dense darkness outside the window.
The northern wind howled mournfully beyond the palace walls.
I am not dead yet!
No one else has the right to decide the fate of this realm!
“Someone come.”
Eunuch Li had remained on guard outside the hall. Hearing the sound, he pushed open the door and entered as quietly as a cat.
Emperor Tiansheng stood before the desk and spoke in a hoarse, icy voice:
“Pass on an oral decree.”
“Two days from now, at noon, have every prince currently in the capital enter the side chamber of the Hall of Mental Cultivation to dine with Me. The Imperial Household Department is to personally deliver this decree to each residence. It must not pass through the Grand Secretariat for review.”
Eunuch Li prostrated himself on the floor and kowtowed as he received the decree.
…
The moment the oral decree was issued, the undercurrents of the succession struggle in the capital suddenly swelled into a monstrous tide.
The following day, the sun shone brightly.
The First Prince’s residence.
Three fine Ru ware cups had already been smashed in the flower hall.
Xiao Jingxing paced back and forth in the study.
His hands were clasped behind his back, his brows tightly furrowed, and the panic in his eyes impossible to suppress.
What was going on?
Why would Father issue a banquet invitation at a time like this?
He strode to the writing desk and snatched up several slips of paper.
“Speak! What use is it keeping all of you strategists around if, the moment a blade is placed against my neck, every one of you turns mute?”
Seven or eight advisers stood below him, each too frightened to breathe loudly.
Xiao Jingxing slapped the slips down upon the desk.
For the past two days, the inner palace defenses had been as impenetrable as an iron fortress.
Yesterday, he had sent three groups of trusted eunuchs to deliver a message to his mother, Noble Consort Wan. Every one of them had been intercepted halfway by agents of the Imperial City Office.
Not a single scrap of information had gotten through. Every covert channel had been severed.
It was far too strange.
His thoughts became a tangled mess, and he could not help recalling…
Could the private banquet he had held at the residence have been exposed?
No!
With Father’s disposition, he surely would not care about such a trivial matter.
He drew his brows together and issued a cold command.
“Call Left Chief Secretary here! At once! Have every adviser and retainer enter the study. Seal the residence gates!”
The advisers throughout the room could only answer meekly before turning around and hurriedly carrying out his orders.
Once they had gone, a mysterious smile suddenly surfaced at the corner of Xiao Jingxing’s lips.
…
Xiao Jingyan sat upright in a grand tutor’s chair, the bright-yellow decree left by the eunuch in his hands.
He did not lose his temper. He did not even shift his body in the slightest.
Yet his forehead was covered in a fine sheen of cold sweat.
Father claimed to be ill and refused to receive the court officials.
He had thrown Great Qian’s entire mess into the hands of the Grand Secretariat.
And yet he had summoned only his sons to the palace for a meal?
Xiao Jingyan understood the father seated high upon the imperial throne far too well.
Emperor Tiansheng had always regarded power as his life.
Xiao Jingyan drew a deep breath and clenched the decree into a tight ball.
He did not dare underestimate the situation. He and Xu Qinghuan had only just settled the overall strategy in the warm chamber. If he took even one wrong step now, he would be doomed beyond redemption.
With only those few retainers in his own household who were experts at scheming over money, there was no way they could see through Emperor Tiansheng’s dark and unfathomable imperial statecraft!
Xu Qinghuan.
She alone could unravel this mess!
He moved with urgent purpose, hastily picked up his brush, and dipped it in ink.
The brush raced across the rice paper, setting down a few brief sentences. He then blew several breaths of cold air over the page until the ink had dried.
Next, he rolled the letter into a slender tube, slipped it into a copper cylinder, and sealed it with red wax.
“Someone, come.”
From the shadows in the corner of the study, a figure emerged without a sound.
He was the most secretive death warrior in the prince’s residence.
Xiao Jingyan handed him the copper cylinder.
“Leave the residence through the underground passage.”
“Slip into the Chengyi Earl’s residence. Do not alert anyone. Deliver this directly into the hands of Princess Wanping, Xu Qinghuan!”
The death warrior accepted the copper cylinder with both hands.
In a flash, the figure vanished from the study once more.
