For someone paralyzed in the lower limbs, answering nature’s call was practically taboo—a fatal weak point.
After asking the question, Xie Shuishan realized from Zhu Huan’s violent reaction that it had sounded almost deliberately humiliating...
But Xie Shuishan had no intention of trying to smooth things over. She figured that once Zhu Huan finished coughing and flew into a thunderous rage, wouldn’t he simply have her killed?
Sure enough, a large group of black-clad warriors swooped down from the darkness among the rafters, blades in hand. Once again, their edges came to rest against Xie Shuishan’s neck.
Jiang Yi, dressed in purple robes, landed on the ground. In his haste, he twisted his ankle, but he had no time to pause and recover. Like a great roc spreading its wings, he flew toward Zhu Huan.
At the same time, a large group of palace attendants “awoke” at just the right moment and began converging on Zhu Huan with practiced efficiency.
The black-clad warriors escorted Xie Shuishan to the side and made her stand there.
With a gleaming blade pressed to her throat, Xie Shuishan stood straight and relaxed, as composed as a pine or a crane.
She also pinpointed the leader of the group with remarkable accuracy—and met Yin Kai’s eyes.
Yin Kai: “...”
He had a hawkish face, and two long scars ran across it, completely cutting through his brow bones in a crooked, intersecting pattern.
Having spent years moving through the “shadows,” he possessed a dark, savage air. Very few people could meet his gaze without shrinking back in fear.
No one had ever stared at him so directly.
This woman...
Xie Shuishan not only stared; she even curled her lips into a fearless little smile.
She remembered the system saying that Zhu Huan’s chief shadow guard and the female protagonist, Ling Bixiao, had studied under the same master.
There had once been a hazy, ambiguous relationship between them as well.
That was what made the later final battle so dramatic. Ling Bixiao searched for her missing senior fellow disciple for years, only to discover the object he had carried on him after she had personally killed him. The revelation dealt her a severe blow.
It was also one of the major causes of the emotional crisis between the male and female protagonists.
The system had said that Yin Kai was utterly loyal to Zhu Huan. He had ruined his own appearance and abandoned his identity, betraying his sect just to follow him.
Xie Shuishan smiled at Yin Kai because she genuinely found the situation rather amusing.
Anyone would have trouble not taking a second look at someone whose face had been marked with a giant X.
The technique used to disfigure him was a little too crude, wasn’t it?
He would have been better off wearing a mask. Ling Bixiao couldn’t even recognize that he was her senior fellow disciple. She must have been at least seven or eight hundred degrees nearsighted.
Xie Shuishan even had the leisure to turn her head and look the warriors over one by one.
She wanted to see whether anyone had a check mark on their face.
Yin Kai was watched for a while. Then, on top of being openly mocked to his face, he saw Xie Shuishan standing there with her back straight, like some indestructible club reaching the heavens. His grip tightened slightly around his sword.
He had never encountered anyone who dared mock his appearance before... As the saying went, a scholar might be killed, but never humiliated.
But when he remembered that this woman had just humiliated His Majesty, the hand gripping the hilt quietly loosened again.
He would await His Majesty’s judgment.
Having found no check marks, Xie Shuishan turned her head once more and watched the chaos unfolding in the hall. Every so often, Jiang Yi’s shrill cries of astonishment rang out amid the confusion.
Before long, the female physician was summoned again.
Zhu Huan once more became a porcupine.
Jiang Yi hovered nearby, unable to help and only getting in the way. After the female physician sharply scolded him twice, he had no choice but to retreat.
When he turned around and saw Xie Shuishan, he stormed toward her. With a flick of his whisk, he pointed at her and declared, “You blasphemed against His Majesty’s imperial person and uttered insulting, vile words to him. You are utterly beyond redemption!”
Jiang Yi continued, “You’re dead this time!”
“Come! Have the bronze pillar in the Inner Palace Prison heated first!”
Jiang Yi’s deeply furrowed old face was indeed quite intimidating when he put on a sinister expression.
He gazed at Xie Shuishan with a smile that was not quite a smile and said in a mocking tone, “Do you know what the bronze pillar in the Inner Palace Prison is for?”
“The pillar is hollow. They tie a person to it face-to-face, then have someone light a fire beneath it. The bronze pillar heats up little by little.”
“Until it finally turns red-hot, and the person tied to it—” Jiang Yi abruptly raised his voice. “—is cooked!”
Xie Shuishan understood. It was the punishment known as death by the bronze pillar.
It was one of Zhu Huan’s favorite forms of torture.
Watching Jiang Yi’s deliberately frightening expression, Xie Shuishan remained utterly unmoved.
Even if they really subjected her to that punishment, she wasn’t afraid.
Desensitization to pain had been one of the exercises in her heir training, and a fairly important one at that.
After all, if someone from the Xie family was captured, the family’s honor could not be recovered so easily after just anyone beat them a few times, tortured them, or did something disgraceful to them.
Xie Shuishan had trained not only with pain, but also with all kinds of drugs. The only thing she had never actually tried was narcotics.
Xie Shuishan was not afraid of painful torture.
She was only afraid that Jiang Yi might be all bark and no bite—that he might not actually have the authority to make decisions for Zhu Huan.
And after Jiang Yi had issued a whole string of threats, it turned out that he truly could not make decisions for Zhu Huan.
Once Zhu Huan had recovered again, his punishment for Xie Shuishan was to send her back to sleep—and give her a silk quilt.
Xie Shuishan returned to the side hall, feeling deeply disappointed in both Jiang Yi and Zhu Huan.
She simply had someone summon Jiang Yi, then dragged him to the washing area. Pointing at the “pickle jar,” she said, “Replace it.”
“I want a white one, spotlessly clean. Then have someone cut plenty of soft cloth to size, and order them to heat water and prepare a scented bath.”
Xie Shuishan paid no attention to whether Jiang Yi looked as though he had seen a ghost, or whether the wrinkles on his face alone could crush someone to death.
She clearly and concisely stated what she wanted, then finished with, “If you don’t do it, I’ll go to His Majesty’s bed and...”
Xie Shuishan curled her lips. She did not say what exactly she planned to do on His Majesty’s bed.
Jiang Yi trembled slightly. He was furious—furious enough to tremble.
“What do you think you are?!”
“His Majesty spared your life only because he has yet to determine your origins.”
“And now you’re demanding fine food and luxurious living?”
“Do you really think I’ll let you return to the main hall? Guards! Seal off this side hall!”
Jiang Yi let out a cold snort, flicked his whisk, and turned to leave.
Xie Shuishan was in no hurry. She merely said, “It is His Majesty who wants to keep me alive.”
“I’m a very fragile person. If things become unbearable, I’ll simply stop living.”
“Chief Eunuch Jiang, His Majesty thought I was trying to assassinate him tonight, but I wasn’t. He still hasn’t figured out what happened to me. Perhaps he still has some use for me. If I were to die under your care...”
“How would you explain yourself?”
Jiang Yi whipped around and glared at Xie Shuishan.
“You think I have no way to deal with you? I’ve spent my entire life in the palace. What kind of filthy business haven’t I seen? You dare threaten me?”
“Tie her up! Bind her hands and feet, stuff her mouth, and tie her to a pillar!”
Several attendants in yellow rushed over, twisted Xie Shuishan’s arms behind her, and began wrapping rope around her wrists.
Xie Shuishan did not resist.
She merely looked at Jiang Yi and said, “Then you’d better tie me up until I’m dead. Otherwise, the moment you let me go...”
Xie Shuishan smiled sweetly at Jiang Yi, leaving the rest unsaid.
By then, her hands had already been twisted behind her back and bound.
But Jiang Yi’s expression contorted several times. When the attendants prepared to follow his order and bind Xie Shuishan’s feet as well, he still shouted, “Stop!”
He did not dare to gamble.
Because this woman really was someone His Majesty had specifically ordered them to keep before he fell into his coma.
Besides… besides, this woman had repeatedly insulted even His Majesty without the slightest regard for her own life. She truly did not fear death.
And when someone was determined to die…
It wasn’t the number of people watching them that could keep them alive.
The earlier incident of carrying her to Changle Palace to attend His Majesty’s bedchamber had happened because of Jiang Yi’s negligence. If he let her die again because no one was keeping a close enough watch… His Majesty would certainly take his anger out on him.
Thus, after a brief standoff, Jiang Yi could only grit his teeth and compromise for the time being.
Xie Shuishan was given a new chamber pot.
But the moment she saw its color, she was dissatisfied. She gave Jiang Yi a succinct order: “Change it.”
Jiang Yi felt the back of his head throb repeatedly, as though he were on the verge of a stroke.
It was replaced twice more, until they finally brought out a brand-new wooden bucket that had not yet been painted. At least that met Xie Shuishan’s requirement that it be “white.”
Then she found the soft cloth provided for wiping herself unsatisfactory as well.
By then, the fifth watch had already passed.
Jiang Yi had been running himself ragged all night. He was suppressing a raging fire inside him, utterly exhausted in both body and mind.
At last, Xie Shuishan tugged at the lining of Jiang Yi’s robe and said to him, “I want something cut from this material.”
It was simply too absurd. Jiang Yi’s anger had been worn away completely, leaving him only numb amusement.
His robe was a third-rank official’s uniform!
If the emperor dared use fabric like this to wipe his backside, the censorial officials would impeach him to death once word got out.
By now, the sky outside had already brightened, and Xie Shuishan finally settled on one material.
It was the soft silk used to make sleeping clothes for the imperial consorts—worth a thousand gold pieces per chi.
Xie Shuishan managed to relieve herself, bathed in fragrant water, and emerged with a clean, glowing face and a vibrant spirit. After one night, it seemed she had absorbed what little vitality Jiang Yi possessed and taken it all for herself.
Jiang Yi stood in the side hall, his face an unhealthy bluish-green. Clutching his whisk, he looked like some pitiful old man who had been battered by a violent storm all night.
Xie Shuishan was indeed a little sleepy. She yawned and decided to stop tormenting the old man Jiang Yi—for the time being.
She waved him off as one might dismiss a puppy. “Go on. I’m going to sleep.”
Then she returned to the bed, which had been remade three more times and was as soft as a cloud, and fell asleep wrapped in a silk quilt.
Before drifting into her dreams, she was still thinking:
Zhu Huan was all show and no substance, while Jiang Yi was a genuine good-for-nothing!
After all that fuss, they still hadn’t dared kill her.
She had survived another day.
What a nuisance!
