Chapter 11
During the day, Zhong Wan competed in a battle of wits and bravery with Yu She in the library . After returning home, he was mentally drained and retired early for the night . Because he usually didn’t sleep much, he roused in the middle of the night, tossing and turning in bed, unable to catch the coattails of slumber .
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When he had first arrived at the capital, Lin Si told him a few things regarding Yu She from the past few years . Zhong Wan still held a flutter of hope that Yu She had become like this due to the emperor and others spoiling him . After all, the year Zhong Wan had left the capital, Yu She had only been in his teens . The nature of young people was easily influenced . They could grow up to be a variety of things . In this half of a month, he had encountered Yu She twice, and Zhong Wan hid his fear each time .
The Yu She at present possessed an eccentric temperament, within his eyes a thick, ferocious aura that couldn’t be hidden even if he tried . As if ready to pull everyone to their deaths at any time .
This deep, deep, grudge… Just where did it come from?
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Zhong Wan used his arm as a pillow, perturbed . Just as he was about to get up to light the candles, his ears caught a rustle from the lattice window .
He held his breath . Shortly after, someone knocked outside his window three times .
Relief covered him like a blanket, and Zhong Wan rose to his feet to dress . He climbed down the bed . Opened the window . In leapt Lin Si, lithely and without a sound .
“What are you doing here?” After lighting the candles, Zhong Wan said in a soft voice, “Didn’t I tell you not to come if I don’t call for you?”
Lin Si saluted Zhong Wan . With not enough time to find paper and a brush, he gestured with his hands, “Regarding Young Prince Yu, I was able to uncover a hint of something . ”
Rushing to the desk, Zhong Wan wrote, “What did you find out?”
Li Si gestured, “First I want to ask if it’s possible that Master knows Young Prince Yu’s birthday?”
Zhong Wan nodded . He wrote, “He was born on the first year of the Tianhe Era, March 16, at Mao Shi . ”
In the past, he had lived and eaten with Yu She for half a year . Back then, Yu She was still young . And he had worn an evil-warding talisman made of mahogany . Zhong Wan remembered that the words “born in march” had been etched onto its surface . One time, he had held that little wooden talisman to poke fun at Yu She . After Zhong Wan had asked for his birthday, the young Yu She had told him with his own mouth .
Lin Si used sign language to ask, “Master is certain?”
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A pause . Then a wrinkle formed between Zhong Wan’s brows, and he wrote, “What do you mean?”
It was just a slab of an evil-warding wooden talisman . Available at any temple in the capital . Naturally, it could not be used as evidence .
Rather, how could he be sure? Zhong hadn’t been there to witness Yu She’s birth . In fact, Princess Royal Anguo had given birth to Yu She while she was paying her filial respects to the previous emperor in the Royal Mausoleum villa . Word had it that Princess Anguo had gone into delivery half a month premature . Even the empress dowager in the capital could not send imperial physicians and midwives in time, and an old imperial physician who just happened to be near the villa had supervised the birth . No one apart from those who had been present knew how the situation had actually been . The people in the know had numbered few in the first place . The only thing certain was that the Princess Royal gave birth prematurely, and the labor had been difficult . She had spent a long time recovering, and after that, no longer had the ability to conceive .
Lin Si signaled, “This birthday for Young Prince Yu slightly differs from what I found recently . ”
All of a sudden, fear pierced Zhong Wan’s heart . He had come to a faint conclusion, but wanted to confirm further .
Sitting down, Zhong Wan whispered, “Speak . ”
With sign language, Lin Si said, “His Highness the Fourth Prince has been investigating Young Prince Yu’s birth in secret for the past few years . I expended much effort, but uncovered not a shred of information . For almost a year, Fourth Prince originally did not have such a thought, but recently, he learned some insider information from the spies he had sent to Fifth Prince . ”
A cold light flashed in Zhong Wan’s eyes . “So even Xuan Qiong is investigating him… Ah . Even though Yu She is his blood-related cousin brother…”
Lin Si nodded . He continued to gesture, “It’s because they have ties of kinship that it makes it more convenient . Hence, he was able to unearth more than us . Fifth Prince discovered that during June of the forty-seventh year of the Taiyu Era, the Imperial Academy of Medicine’s Imperial Physician Hu diagnosed Princess Royal Anguo with pregnancy through her pulse . The written diagnosis of that year is now in Fifth Prince’s estate . ”
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Itbcu Qjc ogbkcfv . Ktja kjrc’a j qgbyifw .
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Uglcmfrr Ebsji Ccueb’r qgfucjcms kjr vlrmbnfgfv lc Aecf . Ktf qgfnlber fwqfgbg ygfjatfv tlr ijra ygfjat lc Ajcejgs . Ca atja alwf, Uglcmfrr Ebsji Ccueb tjv ojiifc vffq lc uglfo veglcu tfg qgfucjcms jcv jiwbra reoofgfv jc jmmlvfca . Ojafg, rtf kfca ab atf Ebsji Zjerbifew, jcv lc Zjgmt, ujnf ylgat ab Te Vtf .
Lin Si gestured, “The key is, Fifth Prince discovered that in March of that year, there had been no births recorded in the villa near the Royal Mausoleum . ”
The speed of his heartbeat gradually quickened . All of a sudden, he felt dizzy . Zhong Wan composed himself and wrote, “What’s the evidence?”
“There aren’t many servants who served in the Royal Mausoleum villa back then that are still alive today,” gestured Lin Si . “After a strenuous search, they managed to find one to two, but they were all hard-labor servants . Even so, from the servants’ own lips, there had not been a hint of a baby’s cry during the month of March . ”
Enduring his bout of dizziness, Zhong Wan wrote, “Maybe Yu She was born without crying? Wasn’t he born premature? Premature babies are afflicted with debility, and may cry without much sound…”
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Yet Lin Si shook his head . He said with sign language, “That doesn’t add up . If he really couldn’t cry because he was so frail, the imperial physicians should have been in a state of extreme haste and disorder . After all, this was the eldest legitimate son of Princess Royal and Prince Yu . But the people that the Empress Dowager had sent came in and out of the doors, and not once did they see them in a state of urgency . I’ve even heard from the older female servants attending to Princess Royal that after childbirth, Princess Royal was afraid of seeing light and could not be blown by the wind . As such, no one was able to enter the delivery room . ”
Zhong Wan sucked in a deep breath . Wrote, “When did they notice the crying?”
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He raised his head, his gaze falling upon Lin Si . With a bit of hope fluttering in his chest, he asked, “April?”
The delivery should have occurred in April . Either that, or there was an error in the records .
Yet, Lin Si shook his head .
“May?” wrote Zhong Wan .
Lin Si shook his head once more .
His fingertips trembled ever so slightly . “June?” he wrote .
Lin Si gestured, “Princess Royal nurtured her pregnancy in the villa by the Royal Mausoleum until July . Back then, the servants had been changed many times . Even half the guards whose families had been in service for many generations were switched out . The rough-labor servant that Fifth Prince found had been sent away during that period . The day he had left the villa, he finally heard the sound of an infant’s cry . ”
Wiping off the beads of sweat clinging to his forehead, Lin Si used sign language to say, “That day had been the fifteenth of July . ”
Zhong Wan set down the brush in his hand .
The imperial physicians had diagnosed Princess Royal Anguo with pregnancy in June, and she gave birth to a child on July 15 of the following year… No matter what, the child could not be hers .
July 15th… The day of the Ghost Festival, the most inauspicious date .
Lin Si signed, “After that servant had left, within a few days it seemed that the steward of the Royal Mausoleum villa searched for a nursemaid . Another two to three days later, Princess Royal Anguo brought the little heir back to the capital . ”
Expressionless, Zhong Wan moved his brush as if it were flying . “Were there any people who couldn’t be blown by the wind traveling with them back to the capital? Was there someone with a special identity by Princess Anguo’s side? After returning to the capital, did Princess Royal arrange for someone to nurture their ailment in her hamlet?”
Lin Si shook his head . He gestured, “No, there wasn’t . The people Princess Royal brought back all had established identities . Nothing peculiar about them . ”
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Zhong Wan gritted his teeth .
So that woman must have been dealt with on the day of Yu She’s birth .
“There are two possibilities,” said Lin Si with sign language . “The first is that the identity of Young Prince Yu’s birth mother is exceedingly humble . As such, Princess Royal didn’t have to worry about that woman’s backing, and not wanting there to be trouble in the future, killed her . Or perhaps…”
Zhong Wan thought there was another possibility: that woman’s identity could not see the light of day .
Once people learned of “her,” they would gain more insider information .
Who was this person?
At this moment, Zhong Wan did not have the time to think about this . He looked at Lin Si and carefully wrote, “Is it possible for you to steal the diagnosis report of her pulse from Xuan Qiong?”
As long as he destroyed this pulse reading, this old piece of information would be deemed an inconclusive case .
Birthdays could be remembered wrong; Princess Royal could forget . It was fine as long as one could not prove that she was pregnant in June .
One pregnancy and one birth . As long as the ironclad proof was annihilated, they would never be able to discover the truth .
Lin Si watched Zhong Wan awkwardly .
Confused, Zhong Wan flashed a bitter smile .
Xuan Qiong wouldn’t so easily let anyone take such an important thing . In fact, even if Lin Si actually stole the record of the pulse reading, it would naturally fall into Xuan Jing’s hands .
It’s actually didn’t matter which of the two’s grasp it fell into . It’d be the same either way .
Xuan Qiong coveted the position of Crown Prince, but didn’t Xuan Jing as well?
Emperor Chongan’s utter bias toward Yu She had long since cultivated suspicions in the hearts of others . Aside from confronting each other tit-for-tat, would Fourth Prince and Fifth Prince secretly speculate whether their fighting benefitted a third party?
What if Yu She’s biological father was Emperor Chongan?
What if, before Emperor Chongan left the world, he wrote an imperial edict that answered the mystery of Yu She’s birth?
Then wouldn’t all those years of overt contention and covert struggle reveal themselves as a joke?
If Yu She truly was the bastard son of Emperor Chongan, once Xuan Jing and Xuan Qiong unearthed the truth, angered and shamed, wouldn’t Yu She be the first person they got rid of?
Once again, Zhong Wan gritted his teeth . “This plight of his…”
Aware that something was weighing down on Zhong Wan’s mind, Lin Si advised with sign language, “At present, we only know that Princess Royal Anguo did not give birth to Yu She, but the identity of his biological father is unknown . Without having determined anything, they wouldn’t dare to act rashly . In fact…”
Struck with another possibility, Lin Si signalled, “Perhaps after the emperor leaves this realm, Young Prince Yu really would…”
He pointed toward the sky, the meaning self-evident .
Zhong Wan felt as if his head were about to split open . “You’re forgetting about Prince Yu . ”
For a while, Lin Si did not respond .
Picking up the brush, Zhong Wan swiftly wrote, “Prince Yu is Xuan Qiong’s blood-related maternal uncle! One is someone else’s son, the other is his blood-related nephew . If you were him, who would you support?!”
Lin Si wasn’t as smart as Zhong Wan . Only after a moment of thought did realization strike him .
Lin Si hesitated, before gesturing with much uncertainty, “So Master is saying that all these years, Prince Yu was actually…”
Tired out of his mind, Zhong Wan said, “I don’t know…” He glanced at the flickering candlelight, his voice just a touch above a whisper as he said, “All I know is that people won’t wake early if there is no benefit to it . ”
Lin Si felt obliged to console him, doing so with difficulty . “Everything is still speculation,” he gestured .
“If those people actually discover anything, it would already be too late . ”
Zhong Wan tossed all the paper on the desk into the coal brazier . An instant later, the flames leapt a foot high .
“After His Majesty’s birthday, head back to Qian An with the children . I’ll stay in the capital . ”