Da Li Temple - Chapter 83.1

Chapter 83.1
Husband and Wife

“Today is the first day of the month, isn’t it?” The Empress asked.
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The Nurse nodded in a daze and answered. The hall went silent again. The Empress looked at the steps in front of the hall in silence, and after a long time, she finally ordered, “According to the usual practice, the first and fifteenth are the times when the Emperor and Empress have dinner. Pass a message to the Emperor for me.”
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“Empress!” The Nurse immediately understood the Empress’s intention, and this call took on a choking tone.
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The Empress patted her hand, unexpectedly calm. She interrupted the Nurse’s words and said, “Just say that I’m waiting for him at the Cheng Huan Hall.”
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The two diamond-patterned wooden doors at the front of the hall closed, and the Empress dismissed all of the waiting palace staff. She scanned around aimlessly, feeling that the Cheng Huan Hall was empty and desperately needed something to fill it up, so she fetched the candles. She lit the candles, and the hall was as white as day. As if time was being rewinding, she recalled her first meeting with Emperor Yonghui on the 15th day of the first month at the Shangyuan Lantern Festival. In her memory, the colorful lanterns were bright that day. But she could never return to the past after more than ten years of struggling. She stored a beautiful cloak she wore when she was still a girl in the cabinet. That year, she wore it to attend the election of the Prince’s Harem, and he praised it for its beauty. She then quietly put away this cloak, and after so many years of careful care, she never wore it again. The Empress’s robe was too heavy, tied to the Chen family, the future, and the extravagant dream of love she could never reach. She could unload those things today, so she removed the dress and jewelry and replaced them with plain clothes and a simple hairpin.
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The night hung low, and the sole candle lingered longingly. When the last trace of light in the sky dissipated, outside the Cheng Huan Hall finally sounded the sound of footsteps; he came alone. The door was pushed open, and the visitor was stunned but did not make a sound, and a period of cold blankness appeared in the brightly lit hall. The Empress turned back and strode towards Emperor Yonghui.
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Emperor Yonghui furrowed his brows, walked to the top, and sat down. “What is there to say? Say it.” These were icy, cold words, like an interrogation.
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The Empress knelt to him, kowtowed, and chokingly said, “I confessed to the mistakes I made.”
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“Plead guilty?” Emperor Yonghui asked rhetorically, “What crime did the Empress confess to?”
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The Empress paused, then said, “Thirteen years ago, I conspired with King Liang to plot against Princess Anyang, framed the Xiao family, and poisoned the heir and his mother …… All of these sins, I confess to them.”
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Accompanied by sobs, the Empress looked up at Emperor Yonghui and said, “I don’t ask for forgiveness, but I beg the Emperor to look at the thirteen years you and I have been husband and wife, to take into account our old feelings, and to spare the Chen family and the Crown Prince.” As her words fell, Empress Chen waited for Emperor Yonghui’s cold smile.
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“Old feelings? Spare?” He stared at her, his large palm clenched beneath his dragon robe, “When you were in cahoots with King Liang, have you ever cared about your old feelings with my imperial sister? And have you ever spared my Qing Rong and royal son?!”

The Empress lurched, unable to stop her tears from flowing. “It’s all my fault. It’s because I was confused and tried to monopolize His Majesty’s favor and tried to gain honor for my mother’s family that I lost my footing and regretted it.” She crouched on the ground, knocking her forehead with a thud, her voice pleading.
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“But …… but Xun Er is young and knows nothing about it, and my mother’s family has never been involved in the matter of Royal Concubine Xiao and Princess Anyang back then. It’s all my fault ……” The Empress sobbed and cried unceasingly. Her forehead was dripping with blood. She kneeled forward, grabbed the corner of Emperor Yonghui’s clothes, and hissed, “I will kill myself to apologize for my sins.”
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“Heh ……” Emperor Yonghui, still sitting, coldly looking at this woman crouching at her feet, “You want to kill yourself?”
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The Empress was stunned at the words and withdrew her cries.
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“If I were to grant you death, it would be a mercy for you.” He paused. “Everything the Xiao family had experienced, I want you, the Chen family, to go through it all too. I also want you to savor the suffering Qing Rong has endured.” He slowed down his tone, leaned down, and cupped the Empress’s chin with one hand, with the determination and viciousness of an emperor in his eyes, “If you want to die, it’s not that easy. You will become the only Empress in the Nan Dynasty judged by three divisions. Don’t you want to leave a name for your family? I will fulfill you.”
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“Someone come!” Emperor Yonghui shouted sternly, “Take the Empress to the prison. Da Li Temple, Ministry of Justice and Imperial Historian Office will handle this case for a joint trial, and soon it will be announced to the world.”
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The cries came to an abrupt end. Empress Chen’s face was pale and paralyzed on the ground. She looked incredulously at the man in front of her, who had shared her bed for thirteen years, and suddenly felt like she had never occupied any position in his heart.
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The palace’s door opened, and Fu Gui led the staff in. The wind of the winter night was freezing, but it couldn’t compare to the coldness that was disjointed in her heart. She had always known that she was a pawn of the family and that she could never compare to Royal Concubine Xiao in the heart of the man in front of her. But thirteen years, more than 4,000 days and nights, and a son and a daughter she risked her life to bear for him had not earned her even a bit of mercy. She was his lawfully wedded wife. At some point, the red rope Yue Lao bolted on for her has become her shackles without her realizing it. She will be tightly bound to it and can’t move. The things she has been asking for all her life are becoming more like a joke. Empty laughter echoed in the Cheng Huan Hall, lonesome with a bleakness. After laughing her tears out, the Empress finally got up, stared deadly at Emperor Yonghui, and calmly said, “Your Majesty thinks that the person who killed Royal Concubine was me?”
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“But I think that the person who killed her was you, Emperor!”
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Seeing that things were not going well, Fu Gui winked at the people around her, but a wave of Emperor Yonghui’s broad sleeves stopped him.

“Let her speak on.” With the Emperor’s deep voice and cold face, no one dared to resist.
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Empress Chen smiled at him; her tears and the blood stains on her face dripped downwards, forming channels of bloody tears. “You gave her the favoritism that was not worthy of her name, gave the Xiao family the glory that ten thousand people envied. You did not kill her …….” She paused, looking straightly at the man at the top with reddened eyes, and said word by word: “You only gently brought her to the high position and turned her into a target, then removed her ladder, and then coldly watched her die.”
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“In the end, you are just as detestable as I am.” When the words dispersed, the empty hall instantly became so quiet that one could hear a pin drop, and the people held their breath as the air froze into ice.
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After a long time, Emperor Yonghui let out an expressionless sigh and waved his hand at Fu Gui. He turned his back and no longer looked at her.

The Empress did not let the palace staff get close to her. With the last glance in the Cheng Huan Hall, her eyes still lingered on the man at the top. She couldn’t say what her feeling was—nostalgia, unwillingness, resentment—but until she walked down the ninety-nine steps with her head held high and looked back, that person she had been secretly wishing for did not look at her again.