She Is Such A Jerk, And Yet She’s The One Crying! - Chapter 51.2

The young man in front of her began to cough again, looking as if he were about to cough up his very organs. Tears fell incessantly from the corners of his eyes.

Lin Dongruan gently patted his back, finally helping him catch his breath.

“This is the fifth year of Zhen’s reign.” The Emperor covered his chest and asked her, “After being Emperor for many years, Teacher must be very disappointed in Zhen. Unfortunately, Zhen is my Father’s only son and had to continue to hold up this world for him. But Zhen’s life… should not have been trapped in this palace. Zhen also wanted to go out of the palace to see the mountains, lakes, and seas of my dynasty, to be a carefree and unrestrained fisherman, instead of being like my Father—calculating against ministers all day, a life of treacherous schemes, never obtaining sincerity even until death.”

Lin Dongruan replied beside him, “Your Majesty was lenient and did things wrongly.”

“Zhen was actually intentional.” The Emperor, who was in his prime, suddenly began to laugh eerily. He grinned and looked at Lin Dongruan, saying, “Because Zhen was thinking, if Zhen committed such a great wrong, would Teacher’s heart soften and would you return to the capital to correct Zhen’s mistakes?”

“Your Majesty, how can you be so flippant? A monarch’s actions are great matters concerning the world. Do you know that once you are wrong, it concerns the lives and deaths of countless people?” Lin Dongruan never expected this answer and nearly fainted with anger. She stood up, her gaze stern: “Mistake after mistake, without repentance. Has Your Majesty forgotten the oath you made before the ancestors back then?”

“Mistake after mistake. From the first mistake, things could no longer be turned back. Zhen truly should not have been this Emperor, provoking heaven’s wrath and people’s resentment.” The Emperor clutched the couch beneath him tightly, in agony. “It was just a small matter of ceding land and paying indemnities; who would have thought it would bring natural disasters? Furthermore, I could not have anticipated that those officials were all incompetent sycophants, every one of them deceiving me about the great matters of the disasters until they could no longer be hidden. Only then did they group together to tell Zhen. Zhen already had no way out… Teacher, you also know, Zhen loathes carrying these distressing matters alone.”

Lin Dongruan was pained: “Your Majesty, you are the Son of Heaven—”

“So what if Zhen is the Son of Heaven?” The Emperor spread his hands, talking to himself. “Did I get what I wanted?”

He only wanted to roam the mortal world, go to an ordinary family, be an unremarkable and mediocre person, and live a plain and free life.

But was that up to him?

Did anyone ask for his thoughts?

“Zhen did not wish to be the Crown Prince, did not wish to sit on this throne. It was you, Teacher—you promised before my Father that you would personally watch over me, watch over this land, and assist me in ascending.” The Emperor clenched his palms, his whole body trembling. “At that time, I thought you would accompany me for a lifetime. I didn’t expect that after I ascended, you would want to turn and leave.”

“I followed the promise to support Your Majesty’s ascension. On the day the court was settled, I should have withdrawn.” Lin Dongruan had not violated her promise.

“Do you know how afraid Zhen was? When you said you were leaving, Zhen could not sleep for whole nights.” The young man let out a long sigh. “So after daybreak, Zhen went to beg you to be Zhen’s Empress, giving you the most noble status in the world, thinking that would keep you. But you still heartlessly left, letting go and leaving Zhen alone in the palace to live this kind of bleak life.”

Lin Dongruan answered him: “Being the Empress is an act of disloyalty and unkindness. You and I are teacher and student on different paths; we cannot be forcibly bound.”

“Father was suspicious; no minister in the court could escape his calculations. Even Zhen, as his only son, could not escape those harsh requirements and suspicions. Zhen still remembers when I was very small, Father called Zhen to the study to check my lessons. Zhen was very afraid. It was you, Teacher, who sorted out all the answers for Zhen; only then was Zhen not so afraid.” The gravely ill Emperor began to reminisce about the past, shedding tears again. “Zhen often thought that as long as Teacher was by my side, no matter how great the matter, there was no need for fear. Teacher also said that after Zhen ascended, you would take Zhen to the lower Yangtze to see the boundless lakes and seas of our dynasty… Teacher, in the years after you left, have you seen them for me?”

“I went northwest and did not see water.” Lin Dongruan felt some guilt. She looked into his eyes, only to see that the other’s eyes had lost their light. She was startled and asked softly, “Prince, the rain has stopped outside. Let the palace attendants pull open the light-blocking curtains.”

The Emperor complied: “It’s good that the rain has stopped. I will do as Teacher says.”

Lin Dongruan looked outside—the rain was still pouring down violently; it had not stopped at all.

The person in front of her could no longer see anything.

“Your Majesty.” Lin Dongruan stood up and approached. “Your Majesty, can you still hear my voice?”

“I cannot hear very clearly; it is only faint.” Seeing that she knew the truth, the Emperor no longer hid it from her. “The five senses and six perceptions are gradually fading. Is this… the ending my Father chose for Teacher?”

Lin Dongruan: “Your Majesty took that antidote?”

The young man nodded: “Father sent someone to leave an antidote for me, instructing that if I ascended the throne one day, I should give this antidote to you, the Imperial Preceptor, to neutralize the poison in your body.”

So… this was not an antidote; it was a lethal poison to burn bridges.

“Father truly understood Zhen, knowing that Zhen’s nature is weak and would inevitably continue to rely on the Imperial Preceptor, so he left the poison.” The Emperor lying on the sickbed forced a smile, while at the same time crying incessantly. “He probably didn’t expect it either. Zhen couldn’t bear for the Imperial Preceptor to leave, so I used the antidote as a threat, hoping you would still return.”

Lin Dongruan lowered her head, seemingly having guessed something. Her voice lost its calm: “Why did you take that antidote? It was not for you.”

“The son of Jiang Weilan in Sanqi Commandery.” The Emperor coughed a few times; his lips were covered with scattered bloodstains. “Father used the same method twice. What Zhen received were two bottles of antidote. After Jiang Weilan’s only son took the antidote, he died despite treatment. Then Zhen knew that this was not an antidote at all, but a poison that hastens death.”

“But then Zhen thought, what if this bottle is not poison but the real antidote? Zhen doesn’t think Father is that kind of person—giving the Imperial Preceptor the heavy responsibility of a guardian on one hand, while wanting the Imperial Preceptor’s life on the other.”

“Zhen even dared not let the imperial physicians take a single look at this antidote. Zhen was afraid that among them were also Father’s spies. Once the opportunity was missed, Teacher, you would have no medicine to take.”

Lin Dongruan could not express the complexity in her heart; she could only sit by the couch and watch with her own eyes as the Emperor gradually lost his five senses and six perceptions.

The blood he coughed up became more and more frequent. The handkerchief was not enough; the bloodstains stained his lapel, looking like a blood-red flower blooming at his heart.

“Teacher, it is very cold.”

Lin Dongruan pulled up the quilt for him, covering the bloodstains on his chest: “When the rain stops, it will not be cold anymore.”

“Teacher, I am afraid. On the road to the underworld, must I go alone?” The young man, whose life was in peril, could no longer hear Lin Dongruan’s words. He opened his hollow eyes, nervously trying to grasp something. At this moment, he was no longer the Emperor above ten thousand people, but instead looked like the little Crown Prince who didn’t dare to walk the night road back then.

Lin Dongruan knew the other person wanted to pull her hand, but she did not let him have his wish. She cruelly moved back a distance, her expression full of pity and sorrow: “A-Man, in the next life, do not come to the palace again.”

One without the destiny of an Emperor suffers the bitterness of imprisonment for a lifetime.

The Emperor did not catch her hand, and his last hope was shattered. He lay sorrowfully on the couch in silence for a long time, and finally, he waved his hand and knocked over the medicine bowl beside him.

“Teacher, the road to the underworld is hard to walk. You were unwilling to accompany me in life; in the future, it is better to come and accompany me in death for the final half of the journey.”

The medicine bowl hit the ground, and the porcelain pieces shattered, making a considerable noise—

Like a signal, the palace attendants waiting outside quickly pushed the door and entered, each holding a long white silk sash in their hands.

“Imperial Preceptor, before His Majesty departs, we trouble you to lead the way.”