strictlysupreme Chapter 122 The Substitute Bride 38
Chapter 122 The Substitute Bride 38
The gilded beast-shaped incense burner in the Zichen Palace emitted wisps of green smoke. Chu Qingyun watched as his father's finger traced the star map presented as tribute from the Western Regions, on which the positions of the twenty-eight constellations were marked in cinnabar.
Ji Xiaosong suddenly pressed the jade pendant at her waist—the shape formed by those stars was clearly a blood sacrifice array she had seen in the space.
Because her memories of the worlds she had experienced before had been erased, she didn't know when she had collected the blood sacrifice array in the space; perhaps it was something she had casually placed there in some cultivation world.
"Several years ago, when I was traveling in the southern border region, I met a Taoist priest who said that I have the supreme power of the emperor but no lifespan. Qingyun, tell me, isn't this a regrettable thing?"
Before Chu Qingyun could reply, the Emperor Emeritus continued, "I didn't believe it at first, but who told your Empress to have the abilities of an immortal? Three years ago, I found this in the Langhuan Pavilion."
The moment the parchment scroll was unfurled, all the candlelight in the hall went out, and the totem depicting a human face and a snake's body shimmered with phosphorescence in the moonlight.
The prayer beads in the Empress Dowager's hand suddenly snapped, the sandalwood beads rolling across the jade bricks: "So you believed that sorcerer's nonsense? You wanted to sacrifice your daughter-in-law in the ritual?"
The pearl on her phoenix crown trembled; for the first time in decades, she tore off her mask of gentleness.
In recent years, they have traveled to mountains, rivers, lakes and seas, and the Empress Dowager has long known the Emperor Emeritus's purpose.
She was still hesitant at first, after all, Ji Xiaosong was just a daughter-in-law. Anyway, she had already given birth to an heir, so it didn't matter what happened in the future.
But now she doesn't think so anymore. She is very clear about how important Ji Xiaosong is to the country.
Compared to national security, she hoped for peace and prosperity for the country, so that her son and grandson could live safely and healthily.
If the retired emperor were to live forever, it's uncertain what would become of her children and grandchildren.
A barely perceptible spiritual light condensed at Ji Xiaosong's fingertips. The places where the Emperor Emeritus had previously lingered the longest when he came into contact with her power distribution now perfectly overlapped with the blood-red markings on the star chart.
"Use the Empress's blood to give me another hundred years of life."
An eerie blush rose to the Emperor Emeritus's face. "Since the Empress possesses such extraordinary abilities, perhaps..."
Before he could finish speaking, the Empress Dowager suddenly pulled out her nine-tailed phoenix hairpin, the blood-stained tip pressed against his throat. "That year you held Qingyun, who was just a month old, and said, 'My son will surely create a prosperous era,' but now you want to use his wife as a sacrifice?"
Before the Emperor Emeritus could offer any resistance, the Empress Dowager plunged the nine-tailed phoenix hairpin directly into his throat.
Chu Qingyun's finger was still pressed on the constellation of the Horn constellation on the star chart when the parchment scroll suddenly glowed with a bloody light.
He watched as the gold hairpin in his mother's hair sank into his father's throat, black blood winding down the tail feathers of the nine phoenixes, blooming into ink plum blossoms on the green jade bricks.
"Mother!"
As he lunged forward, Ji Xiaosong grabbed his sleeve, and the twenty-eight bronze candlesticks simultaneously burst into blue flames.
The constellations marked on the star chart began to writhe, and the stars marked with cinnabar, like living leeches, swam towards the body of the retired emperor along the lines of the parchment scroll.
The Empress Dowager slammed the blood-stained phoenix hairpin onto the star map: "When you taught me to identify herbs, you said that aconite juice is deadly when it comes into contact with blood."
The pearl in her hair reflected the flickering candlelight, casting a huge phoenix shadow on the wall. "Qingyun, I..."
"Mother, Father Emperor suddenly fell seriously ill and passed away."
Chu Qingyun was filled with grief, but at this moment he had no choice but to make this decision.
This is a royal scandal and must never be known to outsiders.
"Summon the imperial physician! Father... Father is experiencing a heart attack!"
Chu Qingyun's tearful roar pierced through the vermilion gate.
When the guards broke down the door, they found the Emperor Emeritus lying peacefully in Chu Qingyun's arms, and the Empress Dowager holding the newly strung Buddhist prayer beads, tears streaming down her face.
At midnight, as the drums sounded, twenty-eight figures wrapped in cloaks quietly left the palace.
They carried sandalwood boxes inlaid with pearls and went to the imperial mausoleum, the ancestral temple, and the observatory.
Each box contains a talisman for breaking formations written by Ji Xiaosong with phoenix feathers, soaked in the morning dew and sunset she collected each morning.
As the first rays of sunlight pierced the clouds, the meteorite pillar presented as tribute from the southern border turned to rust at the bottom of the lotus pond in the imperial garden, while the jade tripod presented from the western border shattered into dust in a hidden compartment of the library.
After resolving all of this, Ji Xiaosong went alone to the lakeside pavilion in the Imperial Garden.
Chu Qingyun was handling the aftermath when the Empress Dowager requested to go to a Taoist temple for quiet cultivation. Chu Yuze was unaware of why his grandfather, who had doted on him just a few days ago, had suddenly passed away.
Everyone is busy, except for Ji Xiaosong.
She sat alone in the pavilion in the middle of the lake for a whole day until the sun set, when Chu Qingyun came to her side.
"Qingyun, will you blame me?"
The glazed tiles of the pavilion in the middle of the lake were bathed in twilight, and Ji Xiaosong's fingertips brushed against the frost flowers that had condensed on the white jade railing.
"Should I blame you for breaking the blood sacrifice formation without telling me, or should I thank you for saving my mother's life?"
Chu Qingyun took off his black fox fur cloak and wrapped it around his wife, placing his palm on her swollen belly.
“Song’er, you are my wife and the mother of our children. I, as your son and husband, cannot judge the fact that Father Emperor took action against you for his own selfish reasons. But if it happened again, I would not stop Mother either.”
Ji Xiaosong seemed to understand; this was his choice.
At this moment, she knew even more clearly that every world she had traveled through was real.
Everything in the world has its own emotions.
Benefit, selfishness, love, hate, and fulfillment...
"Let's go, the night dew is heavy, Yuze should be worried about you."
Chu Qingyun, holding Ji Xiaosong's hand, rowed away from the lakeside pavilion.
A few months later, Ji Xiaosong gave birth as scheduled.
The Empress Dowager also returned to the palace early, waiting for the birth of these children.
At the third quarter of the hour of Yin (3:45 AM) on the autumnal equinox, the aroma of benzoin wafted through the maternity ward of the rear hall of the Zichen Palace.
Eighty-one glass palace lanterns illuminated the Five Elements and Eight Trigrams diagram on the wall. Ji Xiaosong lay on a maternity quilt woven from Tianshan snow silkworm silk, the vermilion mark on her forehead flickering.
"Your Majesty, breathe in rhythm with this old servant."
Before the head maid finished speaking, a clear and melodious crane cry suddenly came from outside the window.
Three black cranes carrying Kunlun Lingzhi mushrooms flew over the eaves, casting swirling, ethereal shadows in front of the moon-shaped window.
The Empress Dowager's hand holding the jade Buddhist prayer beads suddenly tightened, because at that moment the bronze chimes of the Imperial Ancestral Temple rang seven times.
"Good! Good! Good!"
She said "good" three times in a row, and tears welled up in her eyes.
Zixi carried one child after another out, while Chu Qingyun and Chu Yuze watched with longing eyes.
"Father, my brothers look like monkeys!"
The Empress Dowager smiled awkwardly upon hearing Chu Yuze's voice.
"Newborn babies all look like this; they'll grow out of it as they get older."
Chu Qingyun also said, "Yes, but Yu Ze's appearance was different when he was born, like a celestial child under Guanyin's seat."
When Chu Qingyun praised him, Chu Yuze proudly raised his head.
"Your subject knows that you are the best. Although your younger brothers are ugly, they are still your younger brothers, and your subject will treat them well in the future."
Chu Qingyun and the Empress Dowager both laughed. After the last child was born, the three of them couldn't wait to go in and check on Ji Xiaosong.