darknovel Chapter 288 Pei Linghua
Chapter 288 Pei Linghua
Li Yuanke approached her with almost pious devotion, worshipping her like a snow-covered figure under the moonlight.
The wedding candles burned all night long.
Last night, the red quilt was churned with waves, and Li Yuanke was more excited than ever before, even more so than when he took the boar-breeding drug given by Ping Meiren. He was like a tireless perpetual motion machine, making Shen Shixi finally exhausted.
Finally, Shen Shixi threatened him, "Li Yuanke, you were working so hard the other day, I might already be pregnant with your child. If anything happens to you, you'll regret it!"
He immediately reduced the intensity, gently ending the encounter, and considerately carried her to rinse off the dishes before returning to sleep peacefully.
The next day, the imperial relatives entered the palace to recognize their kin. It was understandable that the concubines were not qualified to participate, but the emperor and empress seemed to have forgotten everything and did not instruct the concubines to perform any grand ceremony for the empress. This made people uneasy.
There was no such thing as a homecoming ceremony for the emperor and empress's wedding. On the third day, the women of the Shen family submitted their names to the palace. Shen Shixi invited them to lunch at Zhaoyang Palace, bestowed upon them a great deal of gifts, and then sent people to escort them out of the palace.
The men of the Shen family, young and old, have all gone to their respective workplaces, leaving only Shen Shiyu in the capital. He is currently observing politics at the Ministry of Personnel and taking care of the women in his family.
The emperor's brother-in-law is a prominent figure wherever he goes, and countless people try to get close to him.
Shen Shiyu may look like a bookworm, but she is quick-witted and shrewd, no less so than Shen Shixi.
He was the only one among the brothers who wasn't severely harmed by Shen Shixi.
He was also a man of few words. No matter who spoke to him, he always had a blank expression, saying "yes" or "no" without saying a single extra word, as if speaking would shorten his life by two years.
He seemed dull, and more importantly, he was very stubborn when it came to work, so gradually no one wanted to deal with him anymore.
Consort Jing wanted to see Shen Shixi, and Shen Shixi also felt that it was time to meet.
Compared to the once magnificent Fengyi Palace, Jiafu Palace is rather shabby.
Consort Jing still couldn't get up, so Shen Shixi had no choice but to come to her bedside.
Chao En scolded, "You don't even bow before the Empress!"
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Shen Shixi waved her hand, sat down directly on the embroidered stool in front of the bed, and said, "If you have anything to say to me, just say it!"
Consort Jing wanted to see the Emperor, but he refused to come no matter what. She had no choice but to seek an answer from Shen Shixi.
She and Shen Shixi didn't get along, but she also knew that Shen Shixi wouldn't stoop to lying to her.
"Now that you've got what you wanted, aren't you smug?" Before Consort Jing could even begin to speak, tears streamed down her face.
Shen Shixi smiled and said, "Although the late emperor made the emperor the crown prince, he was deeply in love with Empress Wenzhen and wavered between the emperor and Li Yuanzhi, and wanted to depose her several times."
Only after the Emperor carried you into the Eastern Palace and promised to make you Empress did the late Emperor close his eyes in peace. Pei Linghua, who can you blame for this?
Consort Jing trembled all over. "You're lying! You're deceiving me! It's not like that! The Emperor has been deceived by you, that's why he's so heartless towards me!"
Shen Shixi looked at her with pity. "Even so, Pei Linghua, I'll tell you something else: if I hadn't been born a few years later, you still wouldn't be sitting on this empress's seat!"
He never bothered to deceive anyone in his life, and he especially disdained breaking his word. But on the night he ascended the throne, he asked my grandfather, "Do I really have to make you empress? Is it not enough to make you a concubine?"
Grandfather instructed him to prioritize the well-being of the nation; he sat on the imperial steps all night. The next day, your father, leading the court officials, forced him to issue an edict making you empress! Pei, be content!
Consort Jing couldn't bear the blow and went mad, roaring, "Contentment? Why should I be content? What does their struggle have to do with me? I have never let him down. I have devoted myself to being his empress, taking care of the concubines, and protecting the illegitimate imperial heirs. Why has he treated me like this? Am I not innocent?"
"Innocent? You're innocent, but isn't he innocent too? Aren't I innocent? You're also a daughter carefully raised by the Pei family, yet you utter such foolish words!"
On what grounds? On what grounds? On what grounds you are the daughter of the Pei family, and on what grounds your Pei family has always wanted to dethrone him! No matter how much he fails to fight back, the Pei family will not spare his life! Why blame him? Blame your Pei family yourselves!
This isn't a personal grudge between you and me. If we fail, it will be a catastrophe, and our entire family will be wiped out! You've enjoyed the wealth and glory the Pei family has brought you, so you should also bear the humiliation and consequences they will bring you. What do you have to complain about?
Consort Jing cried out, "Shen Shixi, you don't love him, do you? If you did, how could you say such a thing? You don't understand my heart at all. Seeing him dote on you makes my heart bleed every day."
"But what about you? If you didn't want me to be pregnant with the Seventh Prince, would he have let me have his child? You could watch him have children with so many concubines without doing anything! What right do you, such a heartless person, have to stand here and say these things?"
Shen Shixi looked at her calmly, "Because if he doesn't have a child with you, the Pei family won't go all in. As long as you don't have a child, the Pei family won't take action. Dragging it out won't benefit the country."
Do you really think the Pei family is fighting for the throne for Li Yuanzhi?
Do you know that if he had lost, the one who would have been installed on the throne today wouldn't have been the Seventh Prince, but rather the son of your eldest brother and his cousin from the Gao family? The Seventh Prince might have already been strangled to death by your mother!
"No, no, it's impossible! You're lying to me! How could you slander the Pei family like this? The Pei family may not want the emperor to be emperor, but they would never do something like plotting to usurp the throne!"
Shen Shixi looked at her calmly, "Wake up! They will treat your eldest brother's son as your son and support him to the throne. In the eyes of outsiders, what's wrong with the legitimate son ascending the throne?"
"The emperor is too young to rule personally, so what's wrong with having his maternal grandfather assist him? When the emperor grows up, tell him his true parentage, and use this secret to control him. Who in the world will know?"
She walked over, pinched Consort Jing's chin, and forced her to look into her eyes. "Pei Linghua, everyone in this world is scheming against him, but I have never schemed against him. Tell me, compared to love in this world, which is more important?"
You keep talking about love, but what is love? Does deep affection mean you can take and give away whatever you want?
After speaking, Shen Shixi stood up, asked Granny Qu about the Seventh Prince, looked at the child with a tragic fate, gave him a few words of advice, and then left.
Consort Jing lay on the bed, crying her heart out, wailing, "No, she's lying! How could Father and Mother do this to me? The Seventh Prince is their grandson too! How could they have such a scheme against me?"
Granny Qu held her tightly, heartbroken, but could only offer words of comfort, "Your Highness, please try to think positively, it's all in the past!"
Consort Jing raised her head. "He doesn't want to make me Empress, he doesn't have to! He hates me, he can refuse to let me enter the Eastern Palace, how could he treat me like this? Granny, what she said isn't true, the Emperor doesn't think that way, does he?"
The whole world has abandoned her!
Her parents and her husband both abandoned her!
Granny Qu patted her back, "Your Highness, please take it easy. It's all in the past. No matter how bad things were with Master and Madam, they're gone now. There's still the Emperor, he's the Emperor, Your Highness!"
"He is the emperor, and he is also my husband! I was so happy when he made me empress. He was willing to consummate our marriage, and I thought he had feelings for me. He was willing to have children with me, and I thought he really longed for a legitimate son... Waaah, none of that is true!"
He made me empress to appease the Pei family; he consummated our marriage to get Shen Shixi into the palace; he had a child with me to deceive my parents… And Father and Mother, tell me none of this is true, that Shen Shixi is lying to me, that it's not true!
What am I? What am I in their eyes? My sister is their daughter, but am I not? Am I not?
Granny Qu said with tears in her eyes, "Your Highness, please don't think about these things anymore. It's all in the past. From now on, you will raise the Seventh Prince to adulthood, and good days are yet to come."
She was exhausted. She lay on her pillow, catching her breath for a while. The hatred in her heart, ironically, calmed her down, and she let out a sneer.
"What good days can a deposed empress like me have? She's about to make her move on me. Just you wait, she won't let me live much longer. I'm going to die sooner or later!"
Granny Qu shook her head. "No, Your Highness, please don't overthink it. Empress Chenyuan isn't that kind of person!"
He thought to himself, "She has no reason to lay a hand on you!"
The Empress smiled weakly. "Yes, when she first entered the palace, I at least protected her. If the Emperor hadn't doted on her so much, and she hadn't developed any ambitions of overstepping her bounds, I wouldn't have bothered to make things difficult for her later."
If she had any conscience, she wouldn't have harbored ill intentions towards me.
Tingqin chimed in, "Your Majesty, why listen to her side of the story? The Emperor is quite bewitched by her. Not only did he marry her, but he also went through all the proper rituals. I heard that the Emperor even offered incense at the Shen family's ancestral hall and took her to the Imperial Ancestral Temple to pay respects to their ancestors. It's clear she's a master of seduction. What she says may not be true!"