Chapter 1085: Chapter 317: Naked with Jade in Mouth (Seeking Monthly Pass!)_2

Every civil and military official who had come to court today had seen him, yet it seemed as if no one had seen him.

No one greeted him, no one spared him a second glance.

Some were concerned, some expectant, some anxious, and some secretly pleased... but all were silent.

The man kneeling there was the Eleventh Prince of Daqi, Palace Master Jiang Wuqi of the Long Life Palace.

Only after shedding the fox fur that had wrapped him for years did they realize how truly thin he was.

On his bare back, his vertebrae were nearly fully exposed to the air, conjuring only one term in people’s minds—gaunt.

"Cough, cough, cough, cough."

In the vast square, such silence today, no whispers to be heard. Only his occasional cough that could not be stifled and the slightly cold wind of the early morning.

Such a lonely cough.

Inside the Purple Pole Hall, it seemed as if everything was as usual.

The affairs were presented, the arguments were made. But there was always... something missing.

The four hours of morning court today were unbearably long for many.

The civil and military officials presenting affairs in the Purple Pole Hall were all pretending as if nothing was wrong, but who could really be focused elsewhere?

The master of the Long Life Palace being involved in a case of assassination against the Crown Prince meant... a sea of blood, in any country, in any dynasty.

The grand struggle for succession in Daqi seemed as if it was about to lose a contestant today, a matter that involved the fate of Qi Country as a whole. No one could remain indifferent.

Perhaps only Emperor Qi, seated high on his Dragon Throne, remained as unfazed as in the years passed, not a ripple to be seen.

The Emperor’s heart is inscrutable.

Regardless.

Whether it was agony or anticipation.

The long four hours had passed, the distracted presentations had ended.

Those officials who were usually the most eager to debate, today inevitably lacked their usual fervor. The winners of arguments did not show satisfaction, the losers did not show frustration.

Han Ling, a senior eunuch from the Ministry of Rites, stood before the Cinnabar Steps, and pronounced, "Court is dismissed!"

From his perspective, he watched as the civil and military officials ebbed away like the tide, streaming out of the Purple Pole Hall and spreading out into the vast square in different directions.

The only thing that had not changed was that void and the black dot within the void.

Emperor of Daqi did not make a sound.

And Han Ling seemed to have turned to stone.

It should not have been a lengthy period, but it felt very long.

The Emperor stood up.

Han Ling was about to call out "Ascend the carriage," but the Emperor gestured him to wait with a press of the hand.

As Emperor Qi’s closest eunuch, Han Ling never looked back from start to finish, but his voice was already swallowed.

The Emperor left the Dragon Throne and descended the Cinnabar Steps.

It was now the hour of the dragon, the time for breakfast. The common people usually ate their morning meal at this hour.

The sky was fully bright.

The sun beads hanging in the Purple Pole Hall had already retracted their light.

The Emperor slowly walked out, every step seeming to tread the daylight underfoot.

When he finally stepped out of the Purple Pole Hall and stood on those lofty steps.

On the vast white stone square, no other figures could be seen, except for Jiang Wuqi.

His son, bare-chested, kneeling on the ground, with hair disheveled and looking up at him.

"This child resembles me!"

The Emperor suddenly recalled having said this phrase.

So he cast down his gaze.

First looking at the huge white stones that paved the square before him, then to the knees flush with the ground, then to the bare, emaciated torso, then to the handsome face—if not for the lingering illness that marred it, this face would have been even more striking.

Jiang Wuqi, bare and disheveled, kneeled on the ground, far from dignified.

The Emperor looked into his son’s eyes, and then at the jade piece held in his mouth.

A jade in the mouth was a burial ritual of the nobility,

indicating that Jiang Wuqi already considered himself a dead man.

Jiang Wuqi should have been a dead man long ago,

as far back as... when he was still in his mother’s womb.

That was the winter night of the thirty-eighth year of Yuan Feng, when Emperor Qi personally led his troops outside to quell the rebels.

And Concubine Lei, the mother of Jiang Wuqi, still bearing him within her, was assassinated within the Great Qi Imperial Palace. With her last strength, she protected her unborn child.

When the powerful arrived in the palace, the assassin had already taken his own life.

To this day, the mastermind behind the scenes has not been found out.

By the time Emperor Qi rushed back, all he saw was the corpse of Concubine Lei and the child cut from her womb.

Emperor Qi shed tears and said, "My beloved concubine has abandoned me, but she never abandoned my son!"

Hence, the name Wuqi.

Jiang Wuqi received a fatal injury when he was still a fetus; only through the life-sacrificing efforts of an on-duty powerhouse in the palace that night was a sliver of hope for survival preserved.

But it was just a sliver.

Even Emperor Qi, with his ability to reach the heavens and penetrate the earth, could do nothing for an inherently deficient newborn, barely cut from the womb. 𝓯𝙧𝓮𝓮𝒘𝓮𝙗𝙣𝒐𝒗𝒆𝓵.𝓬𝓸𝒎

From then on, frost poison entered his fate, incurable by any medicine or stone. And as he grew, the frost poison deepened its grip. The head of the Imperial Medical Bureau at that time concluded that the child would not live past ten years of age.

At the age of nine, Emperor Qi intended to exchange Jiang Wuqi’s blood and bones, reconstructing a new body for him by employing the Secret Technique of The Royal Family to eliminate the frost poison that had entered his life.

At nine, he asked just one question, "After the blood and bone exchange, will I still be a prince of Great Qi?"

The answer, naturally, was negative.

Even if Emperor Qi loved him dearly, he could never exchange the flesh and blood of his other children for Jiang’s.

Therefore, Jiang Wuqi chose to refuse.

He would rather die than live a mediocre life. If he, Jiang Wuqi, were to die, he would do so with the stature of noble descent.

Otherwise, what was that woman, his mother, struggling for so long in the cold night?

Before he turned nine, he practiced martial arts and conditioned his body.

After turning nine, he began to open his meridians and cultivate.

He was afflicted by frost poison, which grew with his cultivation, making him stronger yet paradoxically speeding his death. But only through gaining strength could he have a chance to change his destiny.

It was a paradox.

Any outcome should have led to death.

No one believed he would survive, yet he did.

He not only made it past the age of ten but lived to this day.

Not only did he live to see this day, but he also earned Emperor Qi’s personal commission to construct Long Life Palace, making him one of the few most hopeful contenders for the position of Crown Prince!

He grappled with life from the moment he was born.

He seemed on the brink of death, as if he might expire at any moment, yet like a candle flickering in the wind for many years, not only did he flicker on, his light only grew more brilliant.

Today Jiang Wuqi knelt here, signifying he was already a dead man.

How could the heart of the Son of Heaven, belonging to the Great Qi Emperor, be completely undisturbed?

The Son of Heaven bears the mandate of heaven and rules over thousands of people, naturally meant to be solitary.

But could he truly be devoid of all emotion?

The campaign during the thirty-eighth year of Yuan Feng was to date the last time Emperor Qi personally led an expedition.

He never ventured out of Linzi City again after that.

Did his inscrutable heart ever consider that cold night from years past?

On the square in front of Purple Pole Hall, not a single Court Official dared to linger.

The bearing eunuch of the Ministry of Rites stood silently beside the great doors of Purple Pole Hall, his breathing so subdued he seemed to vanish into the background, showing no trace of his existence.

The Emperor of Da Qi descended the high steps and approached Jiang Wuqi, extending his hand to remove the piece of white jade from his mouth.

Jiang Wuqi grew up immersed in medicinal baths, averse to the cold. And on this day, he bared his body, kneeling outside Purple Pole Hall, awaiting his fate.

Each gust of cold wind cut deeper than a knife to someone with frost poison in their fate.

But his coughing had ceased before the Emperor appeared.

He suppressed the urge to cough in the presence of the Emperor.

Despite that over the years, these uncontrollable coughs had become his only means to alleviate some pain.

He was stubborn.

In this moment, he bit his lip and remained silent, yet tears rolled down from the corners of his eyes.

His tears, scalding.

The Emperor of Da Qi held the white jade in his hand, silently watching him.

After a pause, he asked, "Jiang Wuqi, was it you who ordered the assassination against me? Was it you who sent men to the Nine Returns Marquis Spirit Temple to tarnish my name with blood?"

Tears streaming, Jiang Wuqi replied, "Although it was not the act of your son, I am... guilty of neglect!"

The Emperor spoke indifferently, "The country has its laws, the family has its rules. For the crime of neglect, the punishment is not death."

Jiang Wuqi placed his hands on the ground and bowed his head, struggling to speak, "Imperial Father..."

With a flip of his hand, the Great Qi Emperor said, "This jade, I shall keep."

Then, with a flick of his wide sleeves, he turned and strode away.

Han Ling hurriedly followed.

He called out loudly, "Prepare the Emperor’s carriage!"

The command echoed far and wide across the vast square.