Guide to the Rebirth of the Evil Woman in the Immortal Realm - Chapter 31

The palace was silent, leaving only the rustling of leaves outside the window as the wind shook the trees.

Chu Huaizhuang seemed to be considering where to begin. She paused for a moment and then said softly, “Taiyin began with that river, the one legend says was blessed by the drops of the Moon Goddess’s blood, and it will surely end with that river. I do not know when it started; was it thousands of years ago, or perhaps even longer? Regardless, the change has already begun.”

She continued, “Whether the Moon Goddess exists is unknown, but the river that can make people pregnant is real.”

The story starts with this river that flows through the entirety of Taiyin.

Its branches reach every corner of the land, from the streams of the common folk to the royal courts. It has surged tirelessly for tens of thousands of years, bringing countless female infants to Taiyin. There are no cultivators in Taiyin who can peer into the heavens or ascend to immortality, but in a sense, having drunk the waters for generations, the women whose constitutions have long been altered are all cultivators.

In Taiyin, a single woman who is ready can conceive after drinking the river water mixed with a drop of her own blood for thirty days. Two women in love can also conceive after drinking water mixed with drops of blood from both parties. A child born of the water is always a girl, whereas a child fathered by a man has a small chance of being a boy.

Perhaps truly blessed by the Moon Goddess, the people rooted in this land, regardless of height or build, are extraordinarily healthy. They experience no discomfort or pain during pregnancy and childbirth; the number of deaths due to obstructed labor has been zero since ancient times. Because of this, the current ruler of Taiyin, Emperor Ruwen, was still holding court just one day before her delivery.

“Wait,” Shen Fuxin interrupted her narrative. “If everyone born from the river water is a daughter, where did the men come from?”

Chu Huaizhuang scooped a spoonful of eight-treasure rice, shaking her head with a sigh. “Men are like cockroaches. Once you find one in the house, every dark corner is bound to be occupied by them. It is said that thirty thousand years ago, people resisted, but that era advocated for benevolent rule. Several successive emperors did not exterminate them, stating only that women entering Taiyin could be registered as residents, but if any males came from outside, they were strictly forbidden from residency. This included male infants, who were given no household registration and were required to perform ten years of hard labor before they could be attached to a female household.”

“That was the final concession,” Chu Huaizhuang said. “The imperial power of Taiyin has always been held by women. However, through the changing dynasties, there have been occasional, muddled-headed heirs who wanted to seek human rights for these cockroaches who invaded Taiyin and lived in the shadows. Take, for instance, my Imperial Mother’s younger sister, the then-heir, King Shaoli. As the future sovereign of Taiyin, she married a man and even wanted to overhaul the court regulations to allow men to serve as officials.”

Shen Fuxin asked, “And then?”

Chu Huaizhuang set down her spoon and looked toward the distant vermillion palace walls, saying nonchalantly, “King Shaoli’s end, of course, was death.”

Years ago, it was right here, on this palace path by the crimson walls that looked like cinnabar, where that heir’s blood splattered three feet high. Her elder sister stood on high ground watching. This was a place she and her sister had once walked hand-in-hand; the stone placed by the palace wall was one they had picked up together. Now, she had walked past it, but her younger sister had fallen there, never to rise again.

The younger sister died, the elder sister was established as the heir, and eventually ascended the throne to become Emperor Ruwen of Taiyin. The Emperor killed everyone associated with her sister but spared her sister’s only child. It was a baby boy. Emperor Ruwen named him Chu Tian. They never hired a teacher for him; he was simply kept in the palace, raised like a dog that comes when whistled for and leaves when waved away.

“Chu Tian will die; he is dying,” Chu Huaizhuang said, resting her chin on her hand. “He will die on the day the Crown Prince is officially invested. Everyone knows it, except him.”

When King Shaoli died, she was at the height of her influence and quite popular. Rumors even circulated among the people for a time that Emperor Ruwen had slaughtered her own kin. Consequently, the new Emperor kept the baby boy and even took him in as the Fourth Prince to demonstrate her benevolence and mercy to the world. Chu Tian lived within the four square walls of the palace, and even on the rare occasions he went out, he never went beyond the capital.

Only those involved cannot see clearly; he thinks that by currying favor with his royal sisters, he can ensure a lifetime of peace and wealth. But Chu Tian does not understand that he is destined to die soon in a carefully prepared accident.

Once the royal play of mercy is over, every drop of blood in his body will be drained and dyed into the red carpet that the heir will tread upon when ascending the high platform.

“Is it a case of hating the house and its crows?” Shen Fuxin recalled Chu Tian’s face, which shared no resemblance with the two sisters, Chu Huaizhuang and Chu Huailing. “Because she hates the errant King Shaoli so much, she wants Chu Tian to die in the most tragic way?”

“As expected of an immortal, you do not understand the love and hate of the mortal world,” Chu Huaizhuang shook her head, pulling her gaze back from the red palace walls. “It is because she loved too much that she cannot let go.”

Shen Fuxin truly did not understand. No one had ever taught her how to love, yet during her seven hundred years in the Immortal Realm, she had long ago learned what hate tasted like.

Ji Ting listened for a long while. Seeing Chu Huaizhuang begin to pour herself tea, she seemed to be finished. However, this story was incomplete and served only as a prelude, so Ji Ting said, “Chu Tian wants to live, Emperor Ruwen wants him dead, and your two sisters are perhaps at odds due to differing political views. What about you? What do you want?”

Chu Huaizhuang said slowly, “I want the truth about Taiyin’s history.”

She stood up and walked slowly to the shrine enshrined in this side hall. She looked up at the statue of the War God standing side-by-side with the Moon Goddess. “The historical records say that the Taiyin water running through the country lost two branches starting thirty thousand years ago. It was during those few years when the river flow decreased that men began to invade Taiyin. From thirty thousand years ago to the present, the Taiyin river water has gradually diminished. Now, even during the flood season, it never reaches the balanced water levels of a thousand years ago, and men are becoming more and more numerous.”

The Second Prince of Taiyin suddenly reached out and tore down the statue of the sword-wielding, smiling War God from the shrine.

With a crashing sound, the statue shattered on the ground.

The broken, smiling face splashed before their feet: half of a pair of curved eyes. Without the lower half of the face, Shen Fuxin felt he looked more and more like Ji Ting; they were practically carved from the same mold. Because the resemblance was so striking, at first glance, there was indeed an eerie horror to it.

Chu Huaizhuang looked down at it, then looked up at Shen Fuxin and the others, smiling bitterly. “I have been dreaming lately. The imperial physicians all say that if I continue like this, I might fall into a state of hysteria. However, I always feel that a War God born of Taiyin should not be a man. She should be a woman.”

“You say Chu Huailing brought back several immortals?”

In a study burning with sandalwood incense, someone stopped grinding ink and looked up at the palace servant who had come to deliver the message. She lowered her sleeves and sat back in her chair; years of high pressure had carved a natural coldness and exhaustion into this young person’s brow.

Crown Prince Chu Huaijing rubbed her temples and sighed, calling it nonsense. Seeing her poor complexion, the servant felt helpless as there was more to report. Peering at her expression, the servant said, “Your Highness, something has happened regarding the Fourth Prince. He is currently crying and clamoring to leave the Teaching Palace, saying he begs for an audience with you.”

“What has he done now?” A flash of loathing crossed Chu Huaijing’s eyes, hidden well, but she still asked, “Is it a major or minor matter this time?”

The messenger servant replied, “The Fourth Prince behaved improperly in front of the immortals brought back by the Third Princess and was sent to the Teaching Palace by her.”

“Lock him up for half a day before releasing him,” Chu Huaijing said. “Huailing is truly something. He is, after all, a sibling of the same blood. Our Imperial Mother’s birthday is less than three days away; it would not look good if he were truly maimed.”

Having received the verbal order, the servant bowed and retreated, returning to the Teaching Palace to relay the message to Chu Tian.

Chu Huaijing watched her close the study door. She leaned her head on her hand and stared at the words in her book for a while. Those words gradually twisted, turning into Chu Huailing’s face in her eyes. Chu Huaijing closed her eyes, still unable to understand why the Huailing who used to follow her and cry for her elder sister to save her after being teased by Chu Huaizhuang had become like this.

Currently, Chu Huaijing was twenty-three, Chu Huaizhuang was twenty, and the youngest of the three sisters, Huailing, was eighteen. Their Imperial Mother, the current Emperor Ruwen, like many previous emperors of Taiyin, had chosen to give birth as a single parent. Even at fifty, she showed no signs of aging; discussions regarding the Crown Prince’s succession would likely not take place for another ten or twenty years.

Did Huailing want the position of Crown Prince?

Ever since the Imperial Mother personally killed King Shaoli years ago, she could no longer stand to see siblings harming one another.

For this reason, she had appointed the Crown Prince early on. Fortunately, Huaizhuang had an unreliable, leisurely temperament and could get along with anyone, keeping the sisterly relations harmonious. However, as Huailing grew older, her political views gradually diverged from Huaijing’s, and she no longer came to her palace to drink tea or play as she had in the past.

Chu Huaijing had a headache.

She knew Huailing had hated Chu Tian since childhood; when they were young, Huailing had filled entire pages with ways to execute him. As Huailing grew older, she gradually learned how to maintain appearances before Chu Tian and the common people. Yet, Chu Huaijing sensed her sister’s alienation. Compared to the refined and elegant Chu Huailing, she missed the little hedgehog who used to roll around in her arms saying she wanted to kill the Fourth Prince.

Chu Huaijing upheld the Doctrine of the Mean. Today’s peace was not easily won, and she was unwilling to change the regulations and court standards of the ancestral emperors. But Chu Huailing wanted to exterminate every single man in Taiyin.

This was by no means an easy task. Chu Huaijing remembered her sister’s eyes, and her headache worsened. Even the War God in the shrine of the hall seemed unpleasant to look at. He stood high and looked far, taking in all of Chu Huaijing’s pent-up frustration over the years; sometimes she even suspected the merciful smile on his lips was a form of mockery.

Unwilling to think further, she called someone into the room to remove the statue of the War God from the shrine and put it elsewhere. She wanted it out of her sight.

Holding the statue of the War God, the servant asked in surprise, “Your Highness, where should this be placed?”

“Anywhere,” Chu Huaijing rubbed her temples, not even looking at the War God named Jie Fanyin. “Place him somewhere I cannot see him.”

Watching the servant’s retreating back, she suddenly remembered the question Huailing had asked while lying beside her years ago. She had said, “Sister, why is the Moon Goddess a woman, and we are women, but the War God is a man?”

Chu Huaijing had no way to answer her then, and even now, she remained speechless.

Thinking of this, she suddenly called out to the servant holding the statue: “The immortals Huailing brought back today, are they female or male?”

“Reporting to Your Highness, all three are women and are from foreign lands,” the servant replied with downcast eyes. “Does Your Highness wish to summon them?”

Chu Huaijing was silent for a moment. Suddenly, she seemed to lose all her strength and sighed in resignation.

“Forget it,” she said. “There is no need to display the statue. Just smash him and find a place to bury him.”