"I hope the General will think thrice."
Tang Shaogong’s body and face were covered with snow, under his furrowed brows were a pair of deep, dark eyes and lips purpled with cold.
He knelt before the door, not daring to take the official seal, and simply fainted.
He was carried back to Cuiyu by the guards.
Upon returning to Cuiyu, he opened his eyes, his mind clear as he requested an audience with Li Sangruo.
"Your servant has failed in his trust; the General did not accept the command plaque."
Li Sangruo let out a cold laugh, imdiately bombarding him with questions.
"Father often says that Uncle Shaogong is a jade of the Jing Mountains, blessed with the talent of eight dou. In Your Highness’s opinion, no one can match your skills in faking fainting and playing dead."
Lately, their encounters were full of the scent of gunpowder.
Tang Shaogong was a spy placed by Li Zongxun at Li Sangruo’s side. If Li Sangruo was a puppet, a marionette, then Tang Shaogong was the string Li Zongxun held in hand, the gaphone in the power struggle between father and daughter.
Li Sangruo, filled with indignation, did not dare to vent her frustration on Li Zongxun, so she took her temper out on Tang Shaogong instead.
However, Tang Shaogong was utterly indifferent to her sharp bitterness.
He bowed with his fists clenched, his gaze coldly conveying,
"This matter cannot be resolved peacefully, Your Highness must prepare early."
Li Sangruo did not want to know what kind of mood Tang Shaogong, who had endured a night of storm and stress at Chunng Hall, was in, nor did she want to know how the courtiers would view such a laughable situation. She didn’t even have ti to think about the humiliating and terrifying predicants she would face...
All she felt was hatred, resentnt, and unwillingness—
He was her husband, the man of her youthful affections to whom she had secretly pledged her heart, the very man who had personally promised to support her and Kuangkuang, to build a nation and enjoy a peaceful, prosperous era together.
How could things have changed so drastically in less than three years?
Was it solely because Feng Jingteng offered his daughter to him?
Could the world-renowned General Pei truly have been bewitched by a woman?
Li Sangruo refused to believe it, nor was she willing to believe.
She suspected there was more to it, but no matter how hard she racked her brain, she couldn’t figure out where the problem lay.
"What can I prepare?" she asked weakly, lying on the couch and looking coldly at Tang Shaogong, her face full of mockery.
"Isn’t it what Father always said, that Pei Jue would grow powerful with his troops? The day has finally co. Isn’t it exactly what he wanted? To surrender the command plaque, to resign his official seal, isn’t this precisely what Father has been longing for?"
Tang Shaogong left her at a loss for words.
He watched her silently for a long while before finally reigning in his breath and bowing.
"Please have the Empress Dowager issue an edict to confess her faults, to quell the Great General’s anger."
Li Sangruo laughed.
She laughed so hard that her eyes turned blood-red, like a haunting specter.
"Has Uncle Shaogong communicated with the Pri Minister? Have you negotiated thoroughly, ready to pin the cris on a poor woman, to offer as a sacrifice for the sake of clearing your nas?"
Tang Shaogong lowered his gaze, bent in a bow, his voice deep and slow.
"Your servant dares not. Upon further reflection, Your Highness will understand the Pri Minister’s earnest endeavors."
If the situation were as simple as Li Sangruo believed, "handing over the command plaque and an official seal" would make everyone happy, then where would the notion of "growing powerful with troops, surpassing the authority of the ruler" co from?
Li Zongxun would not have needed to work tirelessly for years, scheming and planning.
In a world where rituals collapse and music disintegrates, there is no sovereign, only usurpers.
The acquisition of a monarch’s land is never without coups and ard usurpations of power.
Jin, Qi—their previous dynasties, not a single one was an exception.
Against such a backdrop, the strength of an individual was greater than royal lineage. People’s loyalty to their family and ancestral shrine was far greater than to any state that erged amidst the stormy weather.
What was so special about an Emperor? Those with strong troops and horses would suffice.
If one had powerful military forces, it ant wealth, provisions, mines, and territory; the influence of the imperial power was minimal, sotis unable to control...
The relationship between the Jin Court and Pei Jue was exactly this.
When his reputation and strength could replace the imperial authority, it depended on his own loyalty to perform his duties, rather than the entanglent of imnse interests.
This was also why Li Zongxun went from courting to strangling—unable to strangle, he had no choice but to stoop low and offer appeasent.
In the end, it was the fear of those who grow powerful with their troops, afraid that Pei Jue would usurp the throne and seize power.
Tang Shaogong watched as Li Sangruo, still in a daze, clutched the hand warr, frowning and silent; he didn’t know if she had realized the situation yet, and continued:
"Your Highness need not worry. In my view, the General is upset, but we have not yet reached the point of ard confrontation. As long as Your Highness sincerely offers a way out, the General will surely soften and step down..."
Li Sangruo stared at him and asked haltingly,
"As long as he is willing to take the command plaque, this storm will be considered over, yes or no?"
Tang Shaogong looked at her, "That’s right."
"Fine, I’ll write." Tears stread from Li Sangruo’s eyes as she called for her servant girls to comb her hair and change her clothes. She knelt at the wooden desk, picked up the brush, and started to cry out loud, the tears blurring a cluster of characters.
-
That day, around noon, the Empress Dowager of Jin issued a decree from the Xinzhou traveling palace, confessing faults and reflecting on herself, taking the bla for the entire incident upon herself. She earnestly pleaded with "the nation’s wise talents" to "rember the late Emperor’s profound grace, not to forget the sincere heart, to sympathize with the people’s hardship, to consolidate the territory and defend the borders, not to let the state be unsettled, nor the fate of the country be turbulently disrupted..."
A young Empress Dowager, widowed, humbling herself in such a manner, the purpose was clear without further explanation.
The decree issued by the Empress Dowager made many believe the matter would be settled.
However, Chunng Hall remained as silent as usual, Pei Jue did not express any position.
But the petition of resignation circled its way to Cuiyu.
The petition stated that the Lady was severely ill, requiring tranquility, and could not be disturbed in the slightest; he guarded day and night with exhausting concern, no longer able to bear the heavy responsibilities of the Great General, pleading the Imperial Court to find another worthy official.
Upon receiving the news, Li Sangruo, frail and confused, cried and laughed within the traveling palace.
Yet in such circumstances, the Imperial Physician Puyang Li also fell ill overnight, not only unable to co to diagnose her, but also pleading to resign and retire.
"Not allowed."
Do they all want to abandon her?
Li Sangruo yelled furiously.
"Resigning at this ti is deliberately opposing , I will have his entire family executed, exterminate his nine kinships."
No matter how angry she was, Puyang Li was too sick to get out of bed.
His son, Puyang Jiu, had to tend to him with dicinal soups, unable to leave his critically ill father, so he only sent a servant to present the dicinal prescription as a form of dealing with the situation.
But Puyang Yi ca, bearing the Grand Princess’s gift list, to visit the sick.
She smiled gracefully, "Aunt, you’re esteed as the Empress Dowager, what kind of sons do you not have? Why bother competing with a servant’s wife for favor?"
Li Sangruo was so angry that she felt flas in her gut, yet she couldn’t really order the extermination of the entire Puyang Family.
The Grand Princess stood there; those fierce words were just that—words.
So, she swallowed her teeth and choked them down, on one hand comforting the Imperial Physician to take care of his health, while on the other, she ground her teeth and swore, continuing to go mad in the temporary palace.
-
The next day, a fast horse from the Central Capital delivered the Emperor’s edict.
The ritual official and the eunuch, outside the tightly shut doors of Chunng Hall, facing the oncoming cold winds, read out the Imperial edict.
It said: The wife of the Great General Pei Jue, from the Feng Family, possesses talent and virtue, is a model of gentle compliance and respectful solemnity, eminent, intelligent, and virtuous, her virtuous character fragrance enduring, is hereby decreed as first-rank Noble Lady of the Nation, rewarded with fertile lands, cloth, gold and silver utensils, among several others.
If Feng Yun accepts the reward, then she becos "the wife of the Great General," and Pei Jue remains Jin Country’s Great General.
This was a fulfillnt of a promise, as well as a roundabout solution.
The ritual official and the eunuch reading the edict waited outside for a full half an hour.
But the edict was taken back just as it was delivered.
Pei Jue did not erge to receive the edict, citing a chill and unwellness, then directly "declined on behalf of his beloved wife," stating that both he and his wife were fearful and walking on thin ice, daring not to accept such a reward.
This ti, the ones fearful and walking on thin ice beca the ritual official and the envoy from Jin.
Neither apologies nor rewards were accepted.
What exactly did they want?
In just one day, the easing of the situation brought by the Empress Dowager’s edict of self-reproach evaporated like smoke. Accusations rained down from all directions, the riot escalated, and various rebellious words swelled like a storm.
Rumors were like tigers, in an instant causing significant uproar in the Beiyong Army and even among the Tiger Guard and Dragon Cavalry Army.
The n who fought and bled on the battlefield, destined to be wrapped in horsehide, would no longer be willing to sacrifice everything if they found they couldn’t even protect their own wives and children.
If it was so for the Great General himself, what about the common soldiers?
After the earlier incidents with the grain and winter clothing, the Beiyong Army already harbored grievances against the Imperial Court. Now, they were convinced that the Court’s demand for Pei Jue’s military command token was to strip him of his military power and harbored intentions to kill him.
One feels sorrow when others of the sa kind are killed; the sentints were inflad.
Rumors spread throughout the army, and thoughts began to change.
Those loyal to Pei Jue, old generals and forr subordinates, were eager to act, each raising the "Pei" banners in their camps to support Pei Jue.
For a ti, "Pei" flags were everywhere, suggesting grand ambitions to vie for the heavens.
As news spread, the attention of the entire nation turned to Xinzhou, to Chunng Hall.
The focal point of these gazes was on Pei Jue, but even more so on the "long bedridden" Feng Shi Er Niang.
The hard-won peace, could it be about to collapse again?
"Since ancient tis, beauties have brought about disaster; indeed, they cause the ruin of states and mislead the people."
In Cuiyu, envoys gathered outside the Empress Dowager’s palace chamber, discussing matters until dawn, yet unable to co up with a resolution.
Sighing long and short sighs, they concluded with accusations of "won causing the downfall of the nation" and "disastrous beauties."
Following that, there was prolonged silence.
From initial doubt and wishful thinking to now, they had finally co to understand.
Pei Jue wasn’t simply unwilling to take back his military command token, nor did he just want Li Sangruo to admit her faults and give him face.
He wanted... more.
With a vast land and a bright future, who wouldn’t want to leave their mark in history?
-
Li Sangruo fell ill.
Weakened due to miscarriage and ceaseless nights of no sleep or rest, crying, and grievance, she finally beca haggard beyond recognition.
"What exactly does he want from ?"
"Could it be... he truly covets the throne?"
In the chamber adorned with delicate red fabric, Empress Dowager Li lay quietly, her expression despondent.
"Uncle Shaogong, is this what you ant when you said the General held deep affection for and couldn’t bear to see my hardships?"
Tang Shaogong stood expressionless outside the chamber.
Gradually, he bowed in a salute.
"Please, Empress Dowager, grant the Great General the nine bestownts to show the imnse favor of the Imperial family."
Li Sangruo was shocked to the core, her eyes widening in disbelief at Tang Shaogong.
"What did you say?"
Tang Shaogong said, "Please, Your Highness, grant the Great General the nine bestownts."
Li Sangruo’s face turned pale, drained of any color.
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