Chapter 3
Chapter 3
In my dreams, Chen Xiang was a treacherous official.
When the Rong State invaded, he sold his country for personal gain, handing over our beautiful land on a silver platter.
He had no talent for civil governance to stabilize the country, nor military prowess to defend it. He didn’t even possess a shred of human integrity. How could such a man rise to the position of Chancellor?
I didn’t understand it.
Mother Empress said, “Your Father Emperor chose Chen Xiang; he must have some extraordinary qualities.”
I thought about it over and over and concluded that Chen Xiang’s only extraordinary quality was likely having a good sister who entered the palace as a consort and early on gave birth to the eldest son born to a concubine, Li Chun.
Meanwhile, my Mother Empress had produced no other offspring besides me, a princess.
I didn’t care what became of Li Chun or whether he would become Emperor, but it was best if Chen Xiang stopped being the Chancellor.
A nursery rhyme slowly began to circulate in the capital: “Yinghuo shines bright, the Ear-East Chang prospers. The crystal spark glows red, for desires are hard to sate.”
“Ear” and “East” combined to form the character for “Chen.”
This rhyme pointed directly at Chancellor Chen Chang, suggesting his bottomless greed had invited the disaster of Yinghuo.
In my dream, when Mars guarding the Heart occurred, Chen Xiang immediately submitted a memorial to Father Emperor, urging him to issue an Edict of Self-Reproach and offer sacrifices to Heaven, blaming the disaster on Father Emperor’s failure to govern with benevolence.
Thinking back now, who’s to say he wasn’t trying to ruin Father Emperor’s reputation to pave the way for Li Chun?
This time, I would make him reap what he sowed, ensuring he never had another chance to frame Father Emperor.
The rhyme spread through the capital with lightning speed.
Chen Xiang ordered a thorough investigation and vehemently denied that a disaster of Yinghuo would occur.
But as fate would have it, ten days later, a star fell from the sky, and Yinghuo hung high within the Heart Constellation.
Mars guarding the Heart had truly happened!
Father Emperor was kind-hearted and did not truly blame the celestial omen on Chen Xiang. However, the rhyme was so powerful that he had to treat the matter with caution to appease the public’s resentment.
He immediately bestowed meat upon Chen Xiang.
When the Son of Heaven bestows wine, it is seen as a command to commit suicide; when he bestows meat, it is a signal for the official to retire and return to their hometown.
Knowing that public opinion was reaching a boiling point, Chen Xiang had no choice but to accept the meat and resign his post to express his gratitude.
I heard that he left the capital with a light carriage and few attendants. After passing through the city gates, he bowed three times toward the palace from afar, shedding tears on the spot and saying, “In the next life, we shall again fulfill the bond of sovereign and subject.”
Such a display of loyalty and affection made Father Emperor feel quite guilty.
Consort Chen threw tantrums in the palace for three days, giving Father Emperor a massive headache.
He held high hopes for Li Chun and felt that Chen Xiang had been wronged, so he found it difficult to punish Consort Chen.
But just then, someone placed evidence of Chen Xiang’s embezzlement on Father Emperor’s desk.
As Father Emperor looked at the ledgers taken from Chen Xiang’s manor, his hands shook with rage.
According to the records, the wealth in Chen Xiang’s manor was equivalent to a year’s worth of the national treasury.
Father Emperor immediately ordered a search. Carriage after carriage of gold, silver, and jewels were hauled out of Chen Xiang’s residence-many of the jade pieces and jewels were even finer than those in the palace.
From this, it was clear that Chen Xiang’s power had long since reached the heavens. It had become an unspoken rule that upon entering the capital, one visited the Chancellor before the Emperor.
Enraged, Father Emperor ordered men to pursue Chen Xiang.
When they caught up, they discovered that Chen Xiang hadn’t returned to his hometown at all. Instead, he was indulging in pleasure at his private villa in the suburbs…
This time, Father Emperor cut the Gordian knot and directly bestowed wine upon Chen Xiang.
A powerful Chancellor of a generation fell just like that.
Consort Chen finally became quiet in the inner palace.
I quietly breathed a sigh of relief. The way things developed had exceeded my expectations.
I had originally anticipated that the best outcome would be forcing Chen Xiang to leave the capital. I never imagined that, thanks to that piece of evidence, Chen Xiang would lose his life entirely.
This was truly for the best.
However, who was the person who handed over the evidence of Chen Xiang’s crimes?
The timing was just too perfect…