After a while Ning Chen raised his head, like a man who had settled on something.
He walked toward the crown prince with a long stride.
The crown prince’s face was wild with delight. Ning Chen had chosen him.
The faces of the Empress and Prince Fu changed.
“Ning Chen, think it over again… You have a thousand musketeers, but we have tens of thousands. Choosing the crown prince is asking to die.”
The Empress said it furiously.
Ning Chen looked back at her and smiled slightly, and then all at once he took the Seal out of the crown prince’s hands.
The crown prince stood there stunned.
It was a while before he came to himself. “Ning Chen, what do you mean by this?”
Ning Chen paid no attention to him, but pressed the Seal into Eunuch Quan’s hands.
“Old Quan, this is not responsible of you… His Majesty put the Seal in your keeping, and you bring it out as easily as that?”
Without waiting for Eunuch Quan to speak, Ning Chen turned to look at the crown prince, and then let his eyes fall on the Empress and Prince Fu.
“My choice is… His Majesty.”
“The three of you are too stupid. You are all fond of being clever, and there is no future in throwing in with you… and the main thing is that I have an allergy to stupidity.”
Ning Chen’s whole face was scornful.
The crown prince, Prince Fu and the Empress were all left staring.
Is there something wrong with Ning Chen’s head?
The Empress laughed coldly. “Ning Chen, I always took you for an intelligent man. I never thought you were such a fool as to choose His Majesty.”
“This empress may as well tell you. His Majesty will never wake again.”
Ning Chen made a sound. “And what makes you so certain of that?”
Prince Fu took a step forward and said, pleased with himself, “Because what the Imperial Brother took was the King of Hell’s incense. It is made of a dozen or more poisons mixed together… and there is no medicine that answers it.”
Ning Chen’s eyebrow lifted a little. “So you are the one who put His Majesty into that sleep?”
Prince Fu raised his head. “Ning Chen, this prince gives you one more chance to choose.”
Ning Chen said it one word at a time. “I choose… His Majesty.”
“Ning Chen, is your head not right?”
Prince Fu was flying off the handle a little.
Ning Chen shrugged. “You expect me to choose the three of you? Don’t be absurd. The Empress has had me assassinated more than once to avenge the Empress’s brother… Helping you would be the same as handing you the knife to kill me with.”
“Still less will I choose the crown prince. I know his secret about killing the Second Prince, and he will not suffer me to live either.”
“So I choose His Majesty.”
Prince Fu said furiously, “You idiot. The Imperial Brother is never going to wake up.”
“And what of it? His Majesty in letters can take up a brush and settle the empire, and in arms can mount a horse and set heaven and earth in order. He is an enlightened ruler for the ages… A good emperor like that, and you creatures with the hearts of wolf cubs in you mean to take power and usurp the throne?”
“I swore an oath once… that for His Majesty I would climb a mountain of blades and go down into a sea of fire, and follow him in life and in death. I will find a way to wake His Majesty, whatever it takes.”
“And if His Majesty truly never wakes, then at worst I go along with him and drink tea with the King of Hell…
生當作人傑， 死亦為鬼雄。
Living, be a hero among men; dead, be a hero among ghosts.
Ning here would sooner die than wallow in the same mud as you contemptible creatures.”
Every word Ning Chen said rang, and the whole of it was full of fire.
He knew the Xuan Emperor was shamming the faint… and while he had the chance, he would lay on the flattery first and think afterward.
Just then Lu Yan, the crown prince’s personal bodyguard, came running in in a rush and knelt on the floor. “Crown prince, this is bad!”
“The Dragon Guard is bearing down on the palace city, the garrison is already inside the palace, and the imperial guards and the inner palace guards are coming toward the Hall of Cultivated Heart.”
The crown prince went white in the face and swayed on his feet, and was very nearly frightened into a faint.
The Empress and Prince Fu looked at each other, and both of them smiled.
Prince Fu laughed aloud. “Ning Chen, this prince’s men are nearly here… One more chance for you. Stand on this prince’s side and this prince can spare your life, and give you high place and fat pay besides.”
“Even if you hold this prince and the Empress hostage, you have no chance of winning.”
The Empress seemed to think of something.
“Ning Chen, this empress hears you have a sweetheart in the courtesans’ quarter, and that you treat her as a treasure. Shall this empress send someone to invite her into the palace?”
“And another thing. I hear His Majesty has long wanted to marry the Ninth Princess to you… Shall this empress send for the Ninth Princess too?”
Ning Chen’s eyes darkened. “You people are filthy as hell.”
The Empress said furiously, “Ning Chen, your chance is in front of you… If you still will not see what is good for you, this empress will have that girl called Yudie brought here and let the soldiers have her by turns in front of your face.”
“This empress orders you now to have your men put down the muskets… or this empress will have every person connected with you killed.”
Ning Chen was enraged. “You dare?”
“You watch whether this empress dares.”
Ning Chen’s eyes went cold, and he said it one word at a time. “You will all die very badly.”
The Empress laughed coldly and was about to speak, when all at once her eyes went wide, as though she had seen a ghost.
Prince Fu and the crown prince were the same. Their pupils spread, and their faces went a dreadful white in an instant.
Ning Chen’s cold expression stiffened a little, because he had heard footsteps and knew the Xuan Emperor had shown himself.
But what face am I supposed to meet His Majesty with?
Feigned shock? Weeping for joy?
No. The Xuan Emperor will talk to Old General Chen later on and find out I knew about the shamming… and if I overdo it, that will be very awkward.
Ning Chen turned. Seeing the Xuan Emperor, he was startled first and then delighted. “Your Majesty? You… you are all right? That is good. Your subject knew heaven looks after a good man and nothing would happen to Your Majesty.”
Ning Chen gave his own performance eighty out of a hundred. Not too much laid on, and it still got across how glad he truly was.
The Xuan Emperor came over and clapped Ning Chen on the shoulder, and said in a level voice, “You have done very well.”
Ning Chen was about to speak when he heard several thumps.
He turned his head. Prince Fu, the Empress and the crown prince had all sat down hard on the floor in their fright, every one of them with the face of somebody who had buried both their parents, and no blood left in their faces.
Ning Chen stole a look at the Xuan Emperor’s face and could not help being surprised.
The Xuan Emperor was actually quite calm.
The truth was that while he was listening inside, the blood had gone to his heart several times over and he had nearly fainted with rage.
“Good. Very good… You have all done very well.”
That sentence came out of the Xuan Emperor almost through his teeth.
So it seemed it was not that the Xuan Emperor was not angry. He was angry past all bearing.
“Father Emperor, spare me. Father Emperor, spare me…”
The crown prince scrambled up onto his knees and knocked his head on the floor again and again, begging, snot and tears together, shaking all over with fright.
Prince Fu and the Empress were the same, scrambling up in disorder to kneel properly and knocking their heads and begging.
The Xuan Emperor’s fist was clenched inside his sleeve, the knuckles white, the nails driven through the skin of his palm.
His son is in revolt.
His wife is carrying on with her husband’s younger brother.
Put that on any man and he would surely bring up three pints of blood.
The Xuan Emperor’s eyes fixed coldly on Prince Fu. “You. Well done. A fine brother you are to this emperor.”
Prince Fu knocked his head like a man pounding garlic. “Imperial Brother, spare me. This younger brother knows he was wrong. Imperial Brother, spare me…”
All at once the Xuan Emperor kicked the Empress over on the floor and said furiously, “You poisonous woman without shame in you. To be the mother of the nation and do a thing as sordid as this. Your crime deserves ten thousand deaths.”
There was no blood left in the Empress’s face, but her expression twisted by degrees.
She understood perfectly well. If she did not do something, she was dead.
“Yes. I am without shame. I am a poisonous woman… and everything I have become, you drove me to.”
“I am the mother of the nation. I am the Empress. I am your wife, married with a matchmaker and the full rites… And when did you ever look me straight in the face? You made me Empress only because you needed my father to work for you.”
“Everyone outside is mine now. I want you to send down an edict this minute and pass the throne to Prince Fu… For the sake of what we have been to each other as husband and wife, I will give you a decent way to die.”
The Empress got up off the floor and shouted it, and there was madness in her face.
(End of Chapter 231)