Chapter 28#

Holy crap. A fellow countryman!

I immediately claimed kinship with this transmigrated comrade from the same era.

After talking with Fang Xueying, I realized my fellow modern soul had it far worse than I did.

He used to be a man.

The gold-chain-wearing tough-guy type—the kind who went out with a kid trailing behind to peel garlic for him.

But after transmigrating, before he could accomplish anything, he first got cut “down there” and ended up inhabiting the body of a baby girl who had just died.

Her—ah, his—original family was truly despicable. The daughters were raised purely as tools to climb the social ladder and curry favor with the powerful. Luckily, at nine years old he found an opportunity to escape. He happened to meet the master of Guan Mingyue and the others, was taken in as a disciple, and now that he had completed his training and descended the mountain, he at least had medical skills to rely on.

“Good thing you met a benefactor,” I sighed after hearing Fang Xueying’s life story.

He smiled. “You’re my benefactor too.”

That confused me. When I tried to ask what he meant, he changed the subject and asked if I was hungry.

I had fake-died for ten days without food or water, so of course I was starving. Just like that, my attention was successfully redirected to breakfast.

The funds my sister-in-law prepared for me were enough to squander for two lifetimes. Fang Xueying and I decided to pose as siblings and travel the world together.

But the body my former gold-chain tough-guy friend now inhabited was truly beautiful, and at such a blossoming age. With both of us unmarried, it didn’t take long before flirtatious wastrels began approaching us along the road.

So before long, we changed our story and called ourselves husband and wife.

Fang Xueying even lamented with some twisted logic about how “a proper betrothal makes a wife, elopement makes a concubine—but somehow eloping with you made me the wife; if it had been a formal marriage, I’d probably end up a concubine.”

We traveled for less than half a year before both of us, modern transmigrators, agreed that ancient transportation was unbearable. If we had to sit in another carriage or ride another horse, we’d throw up.

So we settled in a picturesque town in Jiangnan, bought a shop with a rear courtyard, and opened a cosmetics store.

I was the nominal owner. Fang Xueying was the real boss lady.

At first I couldn’t understand why a former gold-chain macho man, whose professional skill this lifetime was medicine, would want to open a cosmetics shop.

Then he developed skincare and beauty formulas and ended up surrounded daily by ladies and young misses of all ages—fawning over him, chatting him up, crowding around him. Only then did I have to admit this brother was truly something else.

Fang Xueying spent his days mingling happily among his “sisters.”

Which made me, as his “husband,” feel a little lonely.

When I felt lonely, I would occasionally think of Chu Ruiyuan.

Think for a bit. Get irritated for a bit.

Think again. Get irritated again.

I feel that if not for “Broken Fate,” I probably would have liked him.

But there is no “if,” so I remain irritated.

The fact that I never hear news of him marrying and holding a grand wedding especially irritates me.

We lived in that Jiangnan town for nearly a year and a half before we could no longer stay.

It had nothing to do with me. Nothing to do with Fang Xueying.

It was because the neighboring southern kingdom had a new emperor ascend the throne—and he specifically demanded that our dynasty hand over the Prime Minister’s second son, Liu Jun’an. If refused, war.

When the news reached our town, Fang Xueying spat out his tea. I spat out mine too.

The gossiping townsfolk speculated whether the reportedly beautiful new ruler next door had something wrong with his head. My fellow transmigrator looked at me as if I were some fox spirit seductress.

“Hooking up with our own emperor wasn’t enough—you had to seduce the neighboring emperor too?!” Fang Xueying exclaimed that night after we closed shop, when only the two of us were present. “I don’t even think you’re that special-looking. How did you become such a calamity beauty?”

Becoming a disaster that ruins nations wasn’t exactly on my to-do list. I felt pretty innocent.

After thinking it over, judging by age and description, this southern emperor was likely the white-haired beauty who once tried to plant a love-gu on me.

Which left me even more bewildered. We’d only met that once.

Rather than believe he fell in love with me at first sight, I’d sooner believe he liked Chu Ruiyuan and, out of frustrated love turned to hate, decided that since he couldn’t have the CEO of our dynasty, he’d settle for the CEO’s lover.

Whether that man—Dugu Yan—truly had something wrong with his head or not, once he made such a declaration as a neighboring emperor, I couldn’t very well keep pretending to be dead.

The next day, Fang Xueying and I hung a sign on our cosmetics shop—“Proprietor Away on Business, Temporarily Closed”—and set off for the capital we had left two years before.

This trip was of uncertain fortune.

I initially urged Fang Xueying to stay behind.

He shut me up with one sentence: “I’m just going to watch the show from the front row.”

When we reached the capital, I told him to find his two senior brothers first, while I went straight to the palace.

I considered whether to visit my parents and brother and sister-in-law at the Prime Minister’s residence. But if I failed to return from this journey, it would be better for them to continue believing I had died two years ago—better that than joy followed by greater grief.

Back then, the CEO of our dynasty had given me a token that allowed free entry to the palace.

It was already evening. Under the “seeing-a-ghost” stares of eunuchs and palace maids, I made my way to Chu Ruiyuan’s sleeping chambers.

Eunuch Ning, who had served him closely since childhood, spoke to me with a trembling voice—but still managed to announce my arrival.

I casually surveyed the palace scenery I hadn’t seen in two years. It looked unchanged. But the man who stumbled out from within had changed greatly.

Chu Ruiyuan was still handsome—but much thinner.

He looked haggard, older. Though a year younger than me, he appeared more like a man past thirty. Threads of white had appeared in his hair.

An indescribable irritation welled up in me. I almost turned and left, barely managing to stay where I was as he approached and pulled me into a tight embrace.

“Mingzhi… Mingzhi…” he choked, calling my name twice, then said nothing more—only holding me tighter, trembling slightly.

I felt suffocated by irritation and tried gently to push him away. Instead, he scooped me up and carried me into the bedchamber.

He held me silently for a long time. When he finally spoke, he asked, “Mingzhi… have you eaten dinner? Are you hungry?”

I had rushed back and hadn’t eaten, so I nodded.

He held me while I ate.

After the meal, I expected him to question me—how I was alive, why I had faked my death—but instead he took me to bathe, changed me into soft new clothes, and carried me back to bed.

As he gently dried my hair with a towel, he finally began asking questions—but not about my resurrection. He asked how I had lived these two years, whether I had suffered.

He behaved as though he had always known I faked my death.

A chill ran down my spine.

Guilt and irritation twisted together inside me.

If he hadn’t been holding me so tightly, I would have run from the palace that very moment and never come back.

I told him about meeting a girl named Fang Xueying, how we had gotten along well, traveled together, and opened a small shop in Jiangnan.

As I rambled on, I felt the movements at my hair grow slower—until they stopped. I turned around.

He had fallen asleep, leaning against the bed.

I quietly summoned Eunuch Ning. Together we carefully helped him lie down. When I tried to withdraw my hand, I found his grip was so tight I couldn’t free myself.

Eunuch Ning suddenly knelt before me. “Since Young Master Liu left, His Majesty has not slept well. Now that you’ve returned, please stay and accompany him.”

His words only irritated me further. But I couldn’t say I wanted to leave. I lay stiffly beside Chu Ruiyuan for a long time before exhaustion from travel finally dragged me into sleep.

When I woke, the sun was already high. Chu Ruiyuan was beside me, propped up on one arm, watching me.

“Is it a day of rest?” I asked when I realized he hadn’t gone to court.

“Mingzhi’s return is a joyous matter. I’ve suspended court for three days to accompany you,” he said lightly, then ordered breakfast.

After breakfast he asked more about my past two years, then began recounting events in the capital.

By noon he was still talking idly. I finally steered the topic to the point.

“Your Majesty, I’ve heard the southern emperor wishes to… see me?”

He smiled and stroked my hair. “Mingzhi, do not fear. I will not grant his wish. Dugu Yan believes that sitting on the throne allows him to do as he pleases. He forgets that water can both bear a boat and overturn it. If he acts recklessly so soon after ascending, those who lifted him up can lift another in his place.”

I tried to speak again, but he drew me into his arms and chuckled softly. “Since Dugu Yan fled back south six years ago, I’ve been preparing for this. He cannot stir up a storm. You needn’t concern yourself with him.”

Seeing him so composed and calculating, I couldn’t help thinking that those who sit securely as CEO truly have black hearts. A rookie like Dugu Yan was no match.

What a pity for that pretty white-haired beauty of years ago.

He was even better-looking than the already damn handsome Chu Ruiyuan.

A fine person—why court disaster?

True to his word, Chu Ruiyuan stayed with me for three days straight. Not only eating and sleeping—he seemed to want to cling to me even when relieving himself.

I was utterly exasperated. This life was unbearable.

But he was the CEO of our dynasty, and his feelings were genuine. So I used every ounce of my acting ability to keep up the pretense.

Fortunately, in the latter two days he stopped chattering and instead occupied himself with more physical pursuits.

For two years I had lived respectably with Fang Xueying, either traveling or settled in a wholesome town. Naturally I couldn’t go seeking casual flings. I had been abstinent for two full years.

With someone as well-endowed and skilled as Chu Ruiyuan, of course it felt incredible.

Though I was irritated by him as a person, I truly couldn’t help feeling a little reluctant to part with that imperial dragon.

We shamelessly stayed shut in the bedchamber for three days. On the fourth morning, he finally went to court.

I had just woken and was about to drift back to sleep when the bedchamber doors were pushed open forcefully.

Then, surrounded by eunuchs and maids, the Empress Dowager—whom I had not seen in sixteen years but often remembered—entered.

“From the first time I saw you, I knew you were a calamity. I only regret I did not take your life then!” she sneered. “Since you died two years ago, you should behave like a dead man. Attend him—bring the wine!”

The first time she met me I had been ten—a perfectly ordinary official’s son. Her words felt like hindsight bravado.

Yes, I had indeed ruined her son—but not intentionally. It felt unjust for her to blame me entirely.

But she was the Empress Dowager, the most powerful woman in the dynasty.

Three eunuchs pinned me down and forced a cup of poisoned wine down my throat.

As pain twisted through my chest, perhaps because I was about to die, I suddenly felt less irritated with Chu Ruiyuan.

I even wanted to see him.

And I did see him.

I don’t know why he, who should have been at court, returned to the bedchamber.

To watch me die? That must be unbearable.

I watched as he ordered the imperial physicians summoned, crying so miserably—tears streaming down that beautiful face.

I couldn’t bear to see him suffer.

When a person is about to die, his words tend to be kind. I told him the truth:

“I was only drawn to your face. I never truly loved you. It was all acting. Don’t grieve for me. I’m not worth it.”

May he hate me. May he forget me.

May he not grieve too deeply.

It isn’t worth it.