Reborn Nine Times, the Tyrant Always Wants to Imprison Me - Chapter 7

“Your Majesty… you’re drunk…” Her voice trembled. She tried to back away, but her path was blocked by a rockery.

Zhou Ling let out a low chuckle, his nose nearly brushing against hers. “Can’t you divine it? Or is it that…” His lips, suddenly close to the shell of her ear, were shockingly hot. “All those prophecies of yours are nothing but nonsense you made up?”

“Your Majesty is wise. Didn’t the River Administration Office already…” Before she could finish, Zhou Ling suddenly smashed the wine flask against a rock. Shards of porcelain flew up, grazing the hem of her skirt.

“You can only see fortunes and misfortunes within a six-month span.” When Zhou Ling sneered, his teeth flashed a stark white. “I’d like to see just how long you can keep up this charlatan act when the refugees from the broken dikes flood the capital.”

At his words, a flicker of anger flashed in Fangru’s eyes. “Does Your Majesty truly believe you see everything with perfect clarity? Gu Zhou was framed and thrown into prison, suffering endless torture in the Supreme Court, and his injuries have yet to heal!”

“Framed?” A sinister glint flashed in Zhou Ling’s eyes. He abruptly seized Fangru’s wrist. “Gu Zhou colluded with rebels; the evidence is irrefutable! Who are you, a woman who plays at gods and ghosts, to presume to comment on court affairs?”

Fangru winced in pain but defiantly lifted her chin. “Your Majesty’s so-called evidence is nothing more than a confession extracted through torture by the Supreme Court! Gu Zhou is an honest official who cares for the people. How could he possibly rebel?”

“Cares for the people?” Zhou Ling sneered, his other hand gripping her chin. “Then does he know what my people need? They need stability and obedience, not to be led astray by some prophecy-spouting charlatan!”

The moon was suddenly obscured by clouds, plunging half his face into shadow. His hawk-like eyes locked onto Fangru, as suffocating as a blade pressed to her throat.

“If Your Majesty does not believe me, you are free to dismiss me from my position as State Perceptor.” Fangru gritted her teeth against the pain in her wrist, but her voice was like a candle flame flickering in the wind. “I have given Your Majesty enough prophecies. I can say I have a clear conscience.”

“You want to leave?” Zhou Ling sneered, his fingers abruptly tightening, pulling her closer. In the moonlight, a dangerous glint shone in his eyes. “Since when does my State Perceptor get to make her own decisions?”

“I don’t want to be your State Perceptor!” Fangru suddenly looked up, trying to pull her hand back, but he only gripped it tighter. In the struggle, she stumbled, nearly crashing into Zhou Ling’s arms.

Zhou Ling stared down at the person in his embrace, his Adam’s apple bobbing. “It’s not up to you. From the first time you looked me in the eye at the Xuanji Banquet, you should have known…”

His last words were lost in their mingled breaths.

As Fangru struggled, her hairpins fell out, and her dark hair cascaded down like a waterfall. A few strands clung to the golden dragon embroidered on Zhou Ling’s collar.

He forced her chin up, his thumb pressing heavily against her bitten lip. “Everything under Heaven is mine, to say nothing of a single person like you.”

Fangru shoved Zhou Ling away, stumbling back several steps. A searing pain lingered on her lips, and a buzzing filled her ears.

“This servant is already betrothed to Gu Zhou.” She raised a hand to straighten her disheveled collar, her voice soft but each word clear. “I ask that Your Majesty… show some self-respect.”

The last sentence was spoken with extreme softness, yet it was like a sharp blade, shattering the charged atmosphere between them.

The hurried footsteps of palace attendants could be heard in the distance, but they tactfully stopped around the corner.

“Get out,” Zhou Ling said, turning his back. His voice had reverted to the cold indifference of an emperor. “Remember your place, Shen Fangru. I can let Gu Zhou live, and I can also have him killed.”

Fangru all but fled the imperial palace.

The night wind brushed against her burning cheeks but couldn’t blow away the lingering sensation on her lips. She raised a hand and scrubbed at her mouth until she tasted blood.

The lanterns of the Shen Residence swayed in the night.

Fangru hurried through the corridors, heading straight for the west wing where Gu Zhou was recuperating.

It was strange; Gu Zhou had been recovering for over half a year, yet his injuries never seemed to improve much.

She pushed open the door, and the bitter scent of medicinal herbs washed over her.

Gu Zhou was half-reclined on the bed, reading a book. Hearing the noise, he looked up, and a look of pleasant surprise appeared on his pale face. “Fangru? Why have you come so late?”

“We have to leave the capital,” Fangru said urgently. “Tonight.”

Gu Zhou set down his book, his brow furrowed. “What happened?”

Fangru knelt by his bed and took his well-defined hand. The hand that once wielded a brush with fluid grace was now covered in scars.

“His Majesty is determined to attack the Northern Di. He’s going to drag the entire Great Xia into the flames of war! He also…” She bit her lip, skipping over the forced kiss. “He’ll kill us sooner or later. Gu Zhou, let’s leave this place while we still can.”

Gu Zhou watched her quietly, his gaze complex. After a long moment, he gently withdrew his hand. “I can’t leave.”

“Why?” Fangru nearly shouted, then quickly lowered her voice. “You almost died in the imperial prison! His Majesty is paranoid and cruel. If we stay, we’re walking into a dead end!”

“It is for that very reason that I cannot leave.” Gu Zhou coughed a few times, forcing himself to sit up straighter. “Fangru, you have the ability to foresee disasters. It’s a gift from the heavens. If we just run away, how many common people will die when the war breaks out?”

Fangru looked at his pale face, a hundred emotions churning within her.

This benevolence of Gu Zhou’s was precisely what had made her fall for him in the first place. But now, that same kindness could destroy their future.

Fangru abruptly stood up, her sleeve knocking over a teacup on the table. The tea snaked across the tabletop, just like the turmoil in her heart.

“My foresight is limited to events within the next six months, and His Majesty has already noticed this limitation.” Her voice was tight, her fingertips unconsciously stroking the Buddhist prayer beads on her wrist. “This time is different, Gu Zhou. We have to go.”

Over the past six months, she had wanted to resign and flee more than once. But every time she saw Gu Zhou’s pale face, saw him forcing his sick body to review case files, the words would die on her lips. Now, she couldn’t wait any longer.

Gu Zhou pushed himself up from the edge of the bed. His injured leg forced him to lean on the table for support. He reached out and took Fangru’s trembling fingertips. “Fangru, look at me.”

His voice was very soft, yet firm. “I understand your fear, because I am afraid too. But if we only think of saving our own skins, what’s the difference between us and those petty men who forsake righteousness for profit?”

Fangru snatched her hand back, a wounded look in her eyes. “You’re always like this, always putting the people of the world first.” Her voice choked with emotion. “But who will protect you? Who will protect me?”

Gu Zhou tried to step forward but stumbled on his injured leg. “Fangru…”

“Enough!” She took two steps back, tears streaming from her eyes, then turned and rushed out of the room.

That night, Fangru tossed and turned, unable to sleep.

The next day, just as the sky began to lighten, Fangru was already up and dressed.

She gathered her messy hair, about to go find Gu Zhou to discuss the matter further, when she heard a clamor from outside the window, as if thousands of people were shouting in unison.

Pushing open the carved wooden window, she saw that the long street, shrouded in the thin morning mist, was already packed with a dark mass of people.

They held wooden signs that read “Stop the War” and chanted slogans of “Cease hostilities,” the sound rising in waves.

Only then did she remember that the news of the Emperor’s plan to send troops to the Northern Di, announced in court yesterday, had already spread throughout the capital.

Although the soldiers of Xia were brave, the iron cavalry of the Northern Di were just as fierce. After so many years of hard-won peace, which of the common people wanted to experience the ravages of war again?

“The Northern Di’s iron cavalry is ferocious! This war will surely be a loss for both sides!”

“I had three sons, and two are already buried on the border!”

“Your Majesty, please reconsider!”

Fangru’s gaze swept over the surging crowd and suddenly froze on a figure at the very front.

Su Wanqing, dressed in a plain white silk dress, her dark hair loosely held by a single wooden pin, stood in the most conspicuous spot. Her unpainted face looked somewhat sickly, but her back was ramrod straight.

“Stop the war! Cease hostilities!” Her clear voice pierced through the noisy crowd. On the white hemp cloth in her hand, the four ink characters for “Better a dog in times of peace” were written with forceful strokes.

Several young men who looked like scholars were protecting her, but then she suddenly mounted a stone step and raised a stack of yellowed papers with her fair hand.

“This is a petition signed in blood by thirty-five courtesans of the Drunken Immortal Pavilion!” Su Wanqing held the papers high, and the morning wind made them rustle. “Though we may live in the demimonde, we too understand our duty to our country!”

A wave of murmurs instantly swept through the crowd.

Fangru saw the patrolling yamen officers grip the hilts of their sabers, but they didn’t dare make a move because of the sheer number of onlookers.

Even more shocking, Su Wanqing took a pair of scissors from her sleeve and, in front of everyone, cut off a lock of her hair. “If this war cannot be stopped today, I will shave my head and become a nun, never to return to that Drunken Immortal Pavilion!”

Before her words had even faded, the snip-snip of scissors echoed through the ranks as a dozen other courtesans followed her example.

The locks of dark hair drifting down in the sunlight were like black snow, landing on the blood-signed petition.

Fangru suddenly remembered last year’s Mid-Autumn Festival, when Su Wanqing, holding a pipa on a painted barge, had sung “A courtesan knows not the grief of a fallen nation,” a flicker of mockery in her eyes.

It turned out this woman of the demimonde had such fire in her bones.

Fangru didn’t have time to think. She lifted her skirts and rushed downstairs.

She pushed her way through the dense crowd, grabbed Su Wanqing’s slender wrist, and pulled her to a street corner. “Are you mad? Don’t you know His Majesty’s temperament? This is something the entire court of nobles dares not speak on, and you, a…” She was so anxious her voice trembled as her eyes swept over the blood petition in Su Wanqing’s hand.

A bitter smile touched Su Wanqing’s lips. “When the late Emperor founded the dynasty, he spoke of ‘sheathing swords and putting warhorses to pasture,’ which brought us more than a decade of peace. Now, the new Emperor has been on the throne for barely three years, and he wants to start another war and raise taxes…” She looked at the sallow-faced children by the roadside, her voice as soft as a sigh. “Truly, in this world, whether a dynasty rises or falls, it is the common people who suffer.”

As she spoke, the neat footsteps of the Imperial Guard echoed from a distance.

Su Wanqing turned to rejoin the procession.

Fangru held tightly to her sleeve, only to hear the usually delicate woman say softly, “Let go, Miss Shen. We girls of the Drunken Immortal Pavilion have always lived with our heads on the line.”

Her words struck Fangru’s heart like a heavy hammer. Looking at the faces of the ordinary people in the procession, she suddenly understood Gu Zhou’s persistence.

When she returned to the residence, Gu Zhou was pacing in the courtyard. He immediately came forward when he saw her enter.

Their eyes met, and Fangru said softly, “I’m staying.”

She paused, a flicker of determination in her eyes. “And I’m going to find a way to stop this war.”

She searched through the memories of her past life and finally found something.

Back then, hiding behind a screen in the imperial study, she had personally heard Zhou Ling plotting with his confidants. Every word was about those few seemingly insignificant mines in the northern borderlands.

“What Zhou Ling truly wants has never been about expanding territory.”

Gu Zhou looked at her, puzzled.

Fangru softly revealed the key. “It’s the mines. The mines in the north that everyone has overlooked.”

At the grand court assembly the next day, Fangru stood in the hall, dressed in her crimson official robes.

“This servant has a memorial to present.” She curtsied gracefully. Her voice wasn’t loud, but it silenced the entire Golden Throne Hall.

As she looked up, her eyes met the unfathomable gaze of Zhou Ling on the throne.

“These few mines in the northern borderlands are more valuable than that barren land.” Her voice was clear and crisp as her fingertip lightly tapped that region on the map. “This servant has a plan to obtain them without losing a single soldier.”

Zhou Ling’s fingertips tapped lightly on the armrest of the dragon throne. “Speak.”

Fangru drew closer. A strand of hair slipped from her temple, brushing almost imperceptibly against the back of Zhou Ling’s hand as he held his brush. “The people of the Northern Di are nomads who follow water and grass; how would they know the value of stone and ore? We need only…” She suddenly lowered her voice, so only the two of them could hear.

When she reached the crucial point, her slender fingers traced a roundabout route on the map. The dangling ornaments on her hairpins didn’t move an inch, a clear sign of her meticulous planning.

Zhou Ling suddenly leaned in, the scent of dragon’s saliva incense enveloping her. “My dear minister, getting this close… aren’t you afraid I’ll…” His last words became a warm breath that caressed her earlobe.

Fangru’s expression didn’t change as she took half a step back. “If Your Majesty does not wish to hear it, this servant will take her leave.”

“Continue,” Zhou Ling said, leaning back into his throne, the interest in his eyes deepening.

For seven consecutive days, Fangru remained on duty in the Ministry of War’s office.

Late at night, Zhou Ling would often arrive unannounced.

This night, he pushed the door open to see Fangru under the candlelight, wearily rubbing her brow. Her collar was slightly open, revealing a section of her jade-like neck.

“Your Majesty…” She scrambled to her feet but was pressed back into her seat by Zhou Ling.

His long fingers brushed over her shoulder as he draped a dragon-patterned cloak, still warm with his body heat, over her. “My dear minister has worked so hard for the nation. I am greatly pleased.”

That night, the candlelight flickered. Fangru was hunched over her desk, writing swiftly, her vermilion brush outlining new clauses on the silk scroll.

Suddenly, she felt warmth approaching from behind, and a familiar scent of dragon’s saliva incense surrounded her.

Zhou Ling’s arm reached over her shoulder, his chest nearly pressing against her back.

“For my dear minister to concede so much…” His lips were almost touching the shell of her ear. “Could it be that you have other intentions?”

The hand Fangru held the brush with trembled slightly. “Your Majesty is wise,” she said, turning her head, her red lips almost grazing his jaw. “To take, one must first give. That is the best strategy.”

The color in Zhou Ling’s eyes deepened. He suddenly trapped her against the desk.

He picked up a stray strand of her hair and wound it around his finger. “If this matter fails…”

Fangru met his gaze, a faint smile on her lips. “This servant will naturally accept the punishment.” As she spoke, her sleeve unintentionally swept across the desk, and the brush holder toppled over.

The moment the cinnabar ink splattered, Zhou Ling subconsciously raised a hand to block it.

Dots of crimson ink landed on his black, dragon-patterned sleeve. Juxtaposed with the mottled red stains on Fangru’s plain white sleeve, they looked like red plum blossoms blooming in the snow.

“Clumsy,” Zhou Ling frowned, yet he reached out and picked up a speck of cinnabar from her sleeve, rubbing it between his thumb and forefinger.

The vivid red color stained his long fingers, creating a strangely seductive effect.

Fangru hastily took half a step back, but she unexpectedly stepped on the brush that had just fallen, and her body swayed.

With quick eyes and nimble hands, Zhou Ling caught her wrist, steadying her. As their eyes met, she saw a flicker of a smile in the emperor’s eyes.

“It seems my dear minister is eager for me to… deal with you?” He deliberately slowed his tone, his thumb rubbing gently against her wrist.

Fangru felt the skin he touched burn. She quickly pulled her hand back. “This servant… This servant will go prepare the documents for tomorrow’s negotiations.” With that, she hastily bowed and excused herself, the tips of her ears flushing the same color as the cinnabar.

…

On the day the final agreement was reached, a downpour had just ceased.

Fangru stood under the eaves, gazing at the rainbow just beginning to appear in the sky.

The cheers of the common people could be heard in the distance. The streets and alleys were all buzzing with tales of the wisdom of their “State Perceptor Shen.”

She gently stroked the Buddhist prayer beads on her wrist, a faint smile on her lips.

“Lady Shen.”

A woman’s voice came from behind her. Fangru’s body stiffened slightly.

She had heard that Zhou Ling was going to reward her for her merits. She had already made up her mind to ask for a boon: to marry Gu Zhou and leave the court’s conflicts behind forever.

Fangru straightened her robes, a proper smile still on her lips as she turned. “Thank you for announcing me, miss…”

Her words died in her throat.

Lin Yueyao stood at the bottom of the stone steps in a plain dress, a cold glint flashing in her hand.

A sharp coldness suddenly pierced her abdomen. Fangru’s whole body trembled.

She staggered backward. A thick, warm liquid had already soaked through her clothes, gushing out from between her fingers.

“Yueyao…” A trembling call caught in her throat.

The familiar face before her was twisted into an almost unrecognizable mask. The once-bright almond eyes roiled with madness and hatred.

“You can obviously foresee everything…” The dagger in Lin Yueyao’s hand dripped with blood, her voice trembling violently. “You can save millions of Great Xia’s soldiers, so why… why wouldn’t you warn me that Xu Ziqian was a monster?”

Fangru suddenly recalled hearing that something had happened to the Xu family while she was busy mediating the war for the past two months. But she never imagined…

“He used my Lin family’s inheritance to support his mistress!” Lin Yueyao suddenly burst into hysterical laughter. “By the time I found out, that bitch was already pregnant, and I… he aborted my child with his own hands!”

Fangru gasped, the movement pulling at her wound, and the pain made her vision go black. She hadn’t known Lin Yueyao had suffered such inhuman torment.

What was even more terrifying was that among the antiques and paintings Xu Ziqian had used to curry favor with Lin Yueyao, someone had mixed in a few forbidden items secretly gifted by envoys from the northern tribes.

When the case of treason came to light, these items became irrefutable evidence, implicating the entire Lin family as co-conspirators.

“Yesterday… the Ministry of Justice raided the Lin family…” Lin Yueyao raised the dagger again, its blade glinting coldly in the morning light. “My parents couldn’t bear the humiliation and killed themselves in prison. All of this… you could have prevented it with just a single word!”

The second stab came down hard. Fangru no longer had the strength to dodge.

She slid down the stone steps and sat on the ground, her vision starting to blur.

In a daze, she saw the corner of a black, dragon-patterned robe flash before her eyes and heard Zhou Ling’s near-roar of “Summon the imperial physicians!”

Her last conscious thought was of that arrogant emperor trembling as he pulled her into his arms, a hot liquid falling on her face—she couldn’t tell if it was rain or tears.