Jiang Yunshu discovered that Ji Lin was a child who didn’t know how to play.
Whenever the Empress summoned Jiang Yunshu to the palace, it was a rare day of rest for Ji Lin. Each time, it was Jiang Yunshu who suggested what to play, and Ji Lin would accompany her. After several such occasions, Jiang Yunshu grew embarrassed. She said to Ji Lin, "If there’s anything you’d like to play, I can join you too."
Ji Lin shook his head.
Jiang Yunshu asked, "Then what do you usually play by yourself?"
Ji Lin still shook his head.
Then Jiang Yunshu learned about Ji Lin’s daily "schedule" and realized he had no time for play—or even rest. From morning till night, he was always studying!
Jiang Yunshu looked at Ji Lin with sympathy. So this was how hard it was to be the Crown Prince.
"Next time I come to the palace, let’s play whatever you like," she said, thinking that since Ji Lin had so little time for leisure, he should at least enjoy his favorite activities.
Ji Lin nodded. "Alright."
On her next visit to the palace, Jiang Yunshu saw two beautiful ponies—one black, belonging to the Crown Prince, and the other a chestnut-colored pony, specially chosen by Ji Lin for her!
Ji Lin watched Jiang Yunshu nervously. He had picked this pony just for her, but five-year-old Jiang Yunshu was so small that the pony seemed enormous beside her.
"Ah—" Jiang Yunshu’s mouth fell open.
Ji Lin immediately moved to lead the pony away. Of course, little Yunshu was afraid of such a "big horse."
"This is amazing! Can I ride it?" Jiang Yunshu’s eyes sparkled as she looked at Ji Lin.
Ji Lin paused mid-motion… Huh? She wasn’t scared—she was excited?
Jiang Yunshu was indeed thrilled. In both her past and present life, she had never ridden a horse before.
Seeing her enthusiasm, Ji Lin had a palace attendant lift Jiang Yunshu onto the pony’s back. The attendant held the reins as she "rode" the pony.
Jiang Yunshu: "…" This was nothing like the galloping freedom she had imagined!
Glancing down at her short legs, which couldn’t even grip the pony’s sides, she sighed in resignation.
Still, sitting atop the pony and feeling the breeze was quite nice.
Ji Lin watched as Jiang Yunshu rode circle after circle, reluctant to dismount. He smiled. "I’ll give this pony to you."
Jiang Yunshu froze. After a moment, she slowly shook her head. "I’m afraid I wouldn’t take good care of it."
Keep the pony at Anping Marquis Mansion? For a fleeting second, the idea had tempted her, but reason quickly prevailed.
Though the Crown Prince and Empress now backed her, making life in the mansion slightly easier—and though her father and stepmother would certainly allow her to keep a gift from the Crown Prince—could she really care for it properly?
Anping Marquis Mansion was not a place where she felt secure.
The emotion in Jiang Yunshu’s eyes was something Ji Lin couldn’t decipher, but it inexplicably tugged at his heart.
"Then give it a name. It’ll still be your pony," he said. "We’ll keep it here in the palace with mine. You can ride it whenever you visit."
Jiang Yunshu thought for a moment, then gazed at the pony’s glossy coat. "Let’s call it Red Date."
Ji Lin burst out laughing. Who named their horse something so unimpressive?
And so, Jiang Yunshu’s Red Date remained in the palace, waiting for her visits. The palace attendants cared for the ponies, only daring to walk them—never ride them. Ji Lin occasionally rode Red Date himself, letting it run freely.
Despite living in the palace, Red Date seemed to recognize Jiang Yunshu as its true owner. Every time she visited, it greeted her with extra enthusiasm.
The days of Jiang Yunshu being summoned to the palace to play with Ji Lin flew by. In the blink of an eye, three years had passed.
Jiang Yunshu was now eight; Ji Lin, fifteen.
Gradually, her visits to the palace grew fewer.
There were many reasons: as Ji Lin grew older, his responsibilities left him with almost no leisure time—sometimes not even half a day in months.
The Empress, burdened by worries, fell into prolonged illness.
Meanwhile, the Emperor’s suspicion and the Eldest Prince’s ambition reached dangerous heights. The palace had become an invisible whirlpool, ready to crush anyone caught in its currents.
Neither the Empress nor Ji Lin wanted Jiang Yunshu entangled in it.
Like a sensitive little rabbit, Jiang Yunshu sensed the looming danger.
She was lazy by nature and timid at heart. Staying away from the Crown Prince was the safest choice…
But the Crown Prince was Ji Lin!
"Can I at least write to him?" she asked. She might not understand much, but what if she could help?
Ji Lin hesitated, then shook his head.
Every letter addressed to him would first be opened and read by the Emperor. He refused to subject Jiang Yunshu’s words to such scrutiny.
He’d rather receive no letters at all.
And so, the connection between Jiang Yunshu and the Crown Prince slowly faded.
She no longer entered the palace; he never visited Anping Marquis Mansion.
Only the annual gifts sent in the Empress’s name reminded her father and stepmother of her ties to the imperial family, ensuring her peaceful life in the mansion.
At first, Jiang Yunshu expected her status-obsessed father to interrogate her about the distance between her and the Crown Prince. The thought disgusted her.
Yet the Marquess Xiping never asked.
To others, her separation from Ji Lin seemed… natural. Why?
Belatedly, she realized: they had reached the age where propriety dictated distance between men and women.
Though only three years had passed, an eight-year-old was no longer a child—soon to be considered a "young lady" in this era.
And the fifteen-year-old Crown Prince? In two years, he’d be of marriageable age.
The thought left Jiang Yunshu silent for a long time before she finally sighed.
From then on, she and Ji Lin had no further contact. Only in the Empress’s seasonal gifts could she glimpse traces of him—
Among the Empress’s presents, there was always an item or two that clearly didn’t come from her.
A small clay figurine.
A few strands of Red Date’s tail hair.
Each time, Jiang Yunshu smiled knowingly and tucked them away carefully.
She assumed Ji Lin’s covert gifts wouldn’t last. Childhood companions inevitably drifted apart.
Yet this time, Jiang Yunshu was wrong. One year, two years, three… The Empress’s gifts always carried Ji Lin’s hidden tokens.
Nine years later, Jiang Yunshu was seventeen; Ji Lin, twenty-four.
By now, when people spoke of the Crown Prince, the first thing mentioned was his unmarried status at twenty-four.
The Emperor’s suppression of his son was no longer a secret.
The world knew: the Emperor refused to let the Crown Prince wed because marriage would make him an adult.
As long as the Crown Prince remained unmarried, the Emperor could keep treating him as a "child."
Everyone understood this couldn’t last.
Yet no one expected the upheaval to come so soon.
In Jiang Yunshu’s seventeenth year, just as Anping Marquis Mansion began arranging her marriage prospects—
The Emperor died.
The Eldest Prince died.
And the Crown Prince ascended the throne.
After Ji Lin ascended the throne, he issued three imperial decrees in succession.
The first was to recruit talented individuals from across the land to serve as officials.
The second was to confer the title of Empress Dowager upon his mother.
The third was to name Jiang Yunshu as Empress.
The first two decrees were expected by the capital’s elite, but the third left everyone stunned.
Who was the second daughter of the Marquess Xiping’s Mansion? No one had heard of her—apparently, she was a minor concubine-born girl…
Why had the Marquess Xiping’s family been chosen? Had the Marquess Xiping ever supported the Crown Prince before his ascension? No one had heard of such a thing…
The capital was in an uproar.
Jiang Yunshu was equally bewildered.
Her? Empress?
She and Ji Lin hadn’t seen each other in nine years. The last time they met, she was just an eight-year-old child, and Ji Lin was only fifteen!
After all these years, wasn’t Ji Lin afraid she might have grown… unattractive?
She was a little afraid he might have grown unattractive too…
Amid her nervousness, Jiang Yunshu found herself swept into the whirlwind of wedding preparations. Officials from the Ministry of Rites visited the Marquess Xiping’s Mansion daily, and there seemed to be an endless list of tasks to complete.
This frenzy continued until the day of the grand ceremony.
Before dawn, Jiang Yunshu rose to begin her elaborate bridal preparations. The rituals of an imperial wedding were exceedingly intricate, and it wasn’t until she sat on the bridal bed, veiled in red, that she finally had a moment to catch her breath.
Nervousness surged through her like a tide.
In her mind, she tried to picture what the Crown Prince—no, he was no longer the Crown Prince—looked like now. But after nine years apart, she couldn’t even begin to guess how he might have changed.
She was about to meet the young Emperor.
The thought made her so tense she could barely breathe. The stifling red veil didn’t help, so she secretly lifted a corner to let in some air.
Then, emboldened, she peeked a little further, stealing glances at the bridal chamber around her.
The room was furnished with nothing but the most exquisite and luxurious pieces, now draped in red, radiating jubilance. Yet beneath the festive decor, the chamber’s refined elegance remained unmistakable…
Huh? Jiang Yunshu’s gaze landed on a peculiar object atop a cabinet.
It was a crude pottery piece, shaped like… a lump of dung.
Jiang Yunshu was stunned.
Why would such a refined room house something like this?
With no one else in the chamber, she quietly stood and approached the cabinet, lifting the "dung" to examine it closely.
Then, a long-buried memory resurfaced.
She remembered—this was something she had molded with her own hands at the age of five, back when she had thrown it at Ji Lin’s head.
She’d assumed the maids had discarded it, but instead, Ji Lin had secretly kept it, even having it fired into pottery and preserving it all these years.
That same day, Ji Lin had also sculpted a little clay figurine—a likeness of her after she’d tripped and fallen. Where was that figurine now?
A sudden intuition guided her. She gently pulled open the drawer below and found the little clay figure resting inside a small box.
Jiang Yunshu frowned in confusion.
Why was one displayed openly while the other was hidden away?
Ji Lin’s figurine was exquisitely lifelike, while her dung sculpture was… well, unsightly. Shouldn’t the figurine be on display and the dung tucked away?
Why had Ji Lin done the opposite?
Before she could ponder further, footsteps echoed outside.
In a flurry, she shut the drawer and spun around—just as Ji Lin stepped into the room.
"Crown Prince!"
The childhood address slipped out before she could stop herself.
Their eyes met.
Jiang Yunshu saw Ji Lin as he was now—taller, more mature, and radiating the authority of a young Emperor.
Yet despite all the changes, the moment she saw him, the tension inside her melted away.
Suddenly, she wasn’t afraid at all.
Smiling, she realized—he was still himself. He hadn’t changed.
Ji Lin stepped forward, gently lifting the red veil Jiang Yunshu had already loosened. Then he removed the heavy phoenix crown from her head.
She exhaled in relief. "My neck was about to break…"
Ji Lin chuckled. "After all these years, Yunshu, you’re exactly the same."
"You haven’t changed either, Crown Prince," she replied at once.
But Ji Lin shook his head slowly. He had changed. As a child, he’d seen her only as a playmate, but over years of longing, that fondness had deepened into something more.
Love often begins unnoticed, yet grows ever stronger.
He remembered the first time he’d seen Jiang Yunshu—the memory as vivid as if it were yesterday.
Reaching out, he pulled her into his arms and sighed in contentment.
Perhaps she wasn’t wrong. Maybe he hadn’t changed after all.
From the very first moment he’d laid eyes on her, she had been irreplaceable.
[The End]
