Inlaid With Jade - Chapter 100

Chapter 100
Decapitate

“Your Majesty – Your Majesty – something bad has happened!”

It was the fifth period of the night; the night was dark, and the stars were invisible. Liu Jian’an stumbled to the front of Concubine Wan’s bedroom, holding the hat on his head. His wrinkled old face was as pale as rice paper, and he shouted urgently to the hall with trembling lips and a hoarse voice.

“Your Majesty, something happened. Ouch!”

He stepped on the stone steps weakly, so he slipped and fell on the steps in a mess.

The eunuch guarding the door outside the bedroom was awakened from his dream by his screams. He wiped the saliva from the corner of his mouth with his sleeve, climbed up from the ground, and reached out to help him.

Liu Jian’an picked up the hat that fell on the ground and pushed him away, sweating profusely: “You’re insensible! Why are you helping me? Go and invite the Emperor!”

The Emperor was resting in the palace with Lin Wan. How dare the eunuch break into the palace? He hesitantly looked at the closed palace door: “But, Eunuch Liu…”

Liu Jian’an hit him hard on the leg with a whisk and growled: “But what! Hurry up!”

Emperor Chong’an had been worried these days and couldn’t sleep at night. Liu Jian’an’s shouting woke him up from the bed.

When the young eunuch was about to push the door, two maids opened it from the inside with lanterns. Emperor Chong’an came out of the palace in his middle clothes with a cold face. Looking at Liu Jianan, who had not yet gotten up from the ground, he suppressed his anger and said, “Why are you howling like a ghost in the middle of the night?”

Several maids walked out with lanterns, illuminating Liu Jian’an’s pale face and a faint bloodstain on the sole of his shoe. Lin Wan came out with the help of the maids, holding her belly. She lowered her eyes to look at the dried bloodstain on the sole of Liu Jianan’s shoe and then moved her eyes away without making a sound.

She took Emperor Chong’an’s yellow robe from the maid and put it on him. She looked at the embarra$sed Liu Jian’an on the ground, frowned, and said to the eunuch beside her, “What are you doing? Hurry up and help Eunuch Liu up.”

Liu Jian’an ran here from Wuying Palace without stopping. He had just fallen hard, almost breaking all his bones. Now, his face was pale, and he was panting. He barely stood up with the help of two eunuchs.

Liu Jianan was an experienced man beside Emperor Chong’an. It was the first time that Emperor Chong’an saw him so agitated. He suddenly felt an ominous feeling in his heart and frowned and asked, “What happened?”

Liu Jian’an had just gotten up, and when he heard this, he pushed away the hand of the young eunuch beside him and knelt suddenly. He shook like a sieve, crying and saying, “Your Majesty, the Second Prince… The Second Prince decapitated the Sixth Prince…”

When these words came out, almost everyone present froze in place, and even Emperor Chong’an showed a look of surprise and confusion. Lin Wan was the first to react. With a pale face, she said to Liu Jian’an, “Do you know what you are saying, Eunuch?!”

The palace maids and eunuchs inside and outside the room reacted and immediately knelt on the ground. Liu Jian’an slammed his head to the ground, his voice shaking like a string: “Your Majesty, I saw it with my own eyes. I dare not say anything nonsense, the Second Prince — The Second Prince is holding the head of the Sixth Prince and waiting for you in Wuying Palace…”

Before he finished speaking, Emperor Chong’an rushed toward the direction of Wuying Palace, but after two steps, he stopped with a pale face covering his chest. Liu Jianan didn’t care about his injured leg, staggered to get up, and followed to help.

Lin Wan held her stomach and stepped out of the palace door, her face showing worry: “Your Majesty…”

Emperor Chong’an didn’t look back. He only said in a deep voice, “Go back, don’t come out,” and strode away.

Candles were lit in the Wuying Palace, but the outside was empty. There were no guards or maids. When Emperor Chong’an entered the hall, he saw Zhu Xi sitting quietly in a wheelchair with his back facing the hall door, with a pool of blood under his feet.

Hearing Emperor Chong’an’s footsteps, he slowly turned around by pushing the wooden wheel, raised his bloodstained hands, and saluted Emperor Chong’an as if nothing had happened: “Your son, Zhu Xi, pays respect.”

His tone was calm, and his posture was respectful, but the moment he turned around, Emperor Chong’an suddenly froze. The Emperor, a general who had fought in many battles and killed countless enemies, showed a panicked look when he stared at the bloody head on Zhu Xi’s knees. He blinked his eyes, which were no longer young and clear, and staggered back a step. He raised his trembling hands to hold the person behind him to stabilize his body, but Liu Jian’an was kneeling on the ground behind him. A cold night wind rushed into the palace door, and there was no one behind him to rely on.

Emperor Chong’an looked at Zhu Xi, who was covered in blood and looked like a Shura, and murmured in disbelief: “What did you do?”

His voice was as dry as the sound of a long sword being pulled out from a rusty scabbard, but Zhu Xi’s tone was terrifyingly calm: “Father loves Sixth Brother and can’t do it, so I, the ruthless brother, have to do it.”

He held up Zhu Ming’s head with one hand as he spoke. He looked at the severed head with eyes slightly closed and a ferocious face in his hand. Blood was still dripping from the neck cut by the sword. As the blood faded, it was hard to tell which one looked paler, Zhu Ming or the still injured Zhu Xi.

The two sons had always been at odds, and Emperor Chong’an knew it, but he never thought that one day, one of them would come to see him with the other’s head.

Emperor Chong’an held back his tears and slowly walked toward Zhu Xi, brushing the hair off Zhu Ming’s face with trembling fingers. After seeing the face of his beloved youngest son, the resolute Emperor suddenly showed a look of sorrow.

He looked at Zhu Xi, who looked calm before him, and his throat seemed choked: “…Why?”

His voice was trembling and dull: “He is your brother. What kind of hatred do you have that you want to kill him so cruelly!”

This question was bitter, but it puzzled Zhu Xi. He looked up at Emperor Chong’an’s painful expression: “I should ask this question to you. To what extent will Father indulge Sixth Brother in harming the people before you punish him?”

His tone was cold and solemn: “If the people don’t teach their children well, it’s like drowning them. If the Emperor doesn’t teach his children well, it will hurt the people. You’re stupid and blinded by the father-son relationship. You can’t see the people of Ji County and the corpses all over the ground. Now, the people’s anger is hard to calm down, all because of Sixth Brother, but you are still so stubborn that you only imprisoned him in the palace. Do you want to wait for Sixth Brother’s men to lead troops into the palace? Father, it’s time to wake up. “

“He is your brother!” Emperor Chong’an was extremely heartbroken. He looked at his son, who suddenly seemed to have become a stranger, and said sadly: “Although he was born of a different mother, he is still your brother. Since he hurt the people, his punishment is waiting for him. Why do you kill him!”

After hearing this, Zhu Xi lowered his head and laughed lightly: “Brother? Father, why don’t you tell me which brother in this world would cause his brother to lose his legs and be unable to walk for the rest of his life.”

Zhu Xi said sarcastically: “They said that fathers love their youngest sons the most and are always partial. I didn’t believe it at first. But when Sixth Brother’s men broke my knee and pushed me into the cold lake, I finally understood that this was true. Father’s foundation was unstable then, and he wanted to keep things quiet because of the powerful family behind Sixth Brother’s mother. So I accompanied you to pretend to be stupid. But hate is still hate, and over the years, my hate has grown more every day.”

Zhu Xi loosened his hand, threw Zhu Ming’s head to the ground, watched the head roll on the ground for several circles coldly, and said slowly: “After my mother died because of my leg injury, I was held like a b*by by the eunuchs and urinated without dignity. I once swore that only one of us could live this life.”

Emperor Chong’an bent down and held up Zhu Ming’s severed head, stroking the scar on his neck: “Your sixth brother accompanied me on the bloody battlefield and saved me three times with his life. How can I not be partial? If you hate me…”

“I don’t hate you.”Zhu Xi interrupted, looking down at his legs: “It’s just that I have been sitting in this wheelchair for too long, and I have forgotten that I could have accompanied you on the battlefield. I would rather die on the battlefield like my third and fourth brothers than live like this.”

Emperor Chong’an looked at his son, who seemed to have become a stranger in one day and growled: “If you hate him, you can just break his legs. Why kill him!”

“Why don’t you wake up? What Sixth Brother has done over the years has already ar*used the people’s resentment towards the Zhu family. He must die! If he doesn’t die, the world’s heroes will rise. How can the country be safe?”

When Zhu Xi said this, he suddenly coughed a few times, blood seeped out of his chest, and a bleak blood color appeared on his pale face. He breathed and continued, “Now that the public anger has subsided, the Emperor can explain to the people. If the Emperor thinks that the Sixth Brother should not die and hates me for killing him, then you can kill me. I don’t want to live such a miserable life where I had to be served for eating, walking, and even changing clothes.”

After speaking, he turned the wheel and headed out of the hall. The iron and wooden wheel rolled over the cold and hard stone surface, making a dull sound.

Behind him, Emperor Chong’an took off his dragon robe to cover Zhu Ming’s severed head and slowly sat down in the hall with his head down. At this moment, he seemed like an ordinary father who lost his son in old age. He closed his eyes and cried for a long time without saying a word.