Chapter 69
Chapter 69
Su Yiwan’s surprise was only the beginning.
The empress asked whether Zhu Yin had eaten breakfast. Zhu Yin said she had.
Then, as casually as could be, the empress suggested, “Why don’t I show you around Qingzheng Hall?”
Su Yiwan: ??? Show her around what?
Was the empress’s residence somewhere people could tour at will?
She watched the two women numbly and heard Lady Yu ask, “There’s no hurry. We’ll have plenty of chances later. Have you eaten breakfast?”
The empress said she had just been eating.
Lady Yu pulled her back into her seat, told her not to speak again, and said they would talk once she finished her meal.
The empress actually agreed obediently and sat down to continue eating.
Su Yiwan: “…”
In a daze, she thought, I must have woken too early and started hallucinating.
The empress was actually obeying an imperial consort so meekly.
Unless this consort was the emperor in disguise, how could anyone explain it?
While the empress ate, Zhu Yin had nothing to do. Her gaze landed on the female lead standing nearby.
“Attendant Su,” she called.
Her rank was higher than the female lead’s, and for some inexplicable reason, she also seemed to hold great standing with the empress. Su Yiwan did not hesitate and walked meekly over.
Su Yiwan had not been close to Lady Yu in her previous life. She remembered only that Lady Yu had been highly favored, flamboyant, and rather guileless.
She had originally intended to engineer a connection with her.
Zhu Yin studied her. “I know a little medicine. Women with blood and vitality as abundant as yours are exceedingly rare. Do you follow some special health regimen?”
Su Yiwan’s heart tightened. She hurriedly said, “I am unworthy of your praise, My Lady. I have been healthy since childhood and have never followed any special regimen.”
“Oh, what a pity,” Zhu Yin said ruefully. “Her Majesty is frail. If you had a remedy, you could relieve some of her burdens.”
Of course Su Yiwan had considered it. Everyone knew His Majesty cherished the empress. If Su Yiwan cured her weakness, that achievement alone would be enough to guarantee a lifetime of wealth and rank.
But after considering the matter repeatedly, she abandoned the idea.
Her background was extremely easy to investigate. She was a sheltered young lady who had never studied medicine. Under what pretext could she present a miraculous medicine?
She did not dare take even the slightest risk.
Zhu Yin gave no indication of what she thought of the answer. She asked instead, “Why were you staring at me earlier, Attendant Su?”
Su Yiwan lowered her gaze submissively. “I was merely astonished by Lady Yu’s beauty and admired you in my heart.”
A lie. I was only jealous of you and wondering how to draw closer, so you could become my stepping-stone upward.
She did not notice the corners of Zhu Yin’s lips lift slightly.
Consorts began arriving one after another.
Thus, like Su Yiwan, the other imperial consorts witnessed the empress’s extraordinary favor toward Lady Yu.
Her Majesty actually had a trusted senior maid bring over a chair and seat Lady Yu beside her. Faced with everyone’s questioning gazes, she made no attempt to conceal it. “Lady Yu and I felt like old friends at first sight. I am very fond of her.”
The current emperor did not place great importance on beauty. Among this newly selected group, Lady was already the highest rank granted.
Of the four women who had served him in his princely residence, aside from the empress, the Pure Consort had borne his eldest son, Dignified Consort Jiang had borne his second princess, and Noble Lady Meng had no children.
In other words, only those three women in the current harem ranked above Zhu Yin’s body.
All three had served the emperor in his princely residence. As their favor waned, they were unwilling to offend a newly favored consort without good reason. Seeing the empress treat her so generously, they went along with the situation and excused her from greeting them.
Zhu Yin silently gave the empress a thumbs-up. Now this was leadership. Like a spring breeze and gentle rain, she achieved her objective with ease.
The empress dowager followed Daoism and disliked disturbance. She had long ago issued a decree forbidding casual visits.
After paying their respects to the empress, the consorts gradually departed.
Unsurprisingly, the empress asked Lady Yu to stay.
Everyone bowed and withdrew, privately making fresh calculations.
Once Qingzheng Hall grew quiet, the empress dismissed the attendants, then solemnly rose and performed a full formal salute to Zhu Yin.
Zhu Yin caught her before she could bend.
The empress smiled. “Everything happened so suddenly. I hope you will forgive my offense.”
Keeping her expression stern, Zhu Yin nodded mildly. “You have done very well.”
The empress said, “Two hundred years have passed in an instant. Qingzheng Hall has been renovated many times and is utterly different from before. Would you like to look around?”
Zhu Yin gladly agreed.
The two walked hand in hand while Barbara rapidly retrieved information on Qingzheng Hall, allowing its host to memorize it and invent stories.
Zhu Yin was highly practiced at this. Whenever they reached certain places, she would remark on one or two differences between past and present. Some of the details she mentioned were unknown even to the empress.
Naturally, a detailed record of her conversation with the empress also appeared on the emperor’s desk.
The emperor stared at the record in silence for a long time.
He knew very well that if Zhu Yin could reveal the existence of the Black-Robed Guard, she must know the empress was also protected by hidden guards.
Weren’t these words intended for him through those guards?
She knew Qingzheng Hall so intimately. If she had not lived there for years, how could she name so many details?
Could she truly be an ancestor from two hundred years ago returned from the dead?
The emperor was excited, yet also uneasy.
His excitement came from meeting a legendary founding empress from more than two centuries earlier with his own eyes. Such an encounter was not granted to just anyone.
His unease was even more natural. He was an emperor who wielded supreme power and was accustomed to standing above all others. Now a woman had arrived whose identity placed her above him, and who had likewise controlled power for decades.
Moreover, he remembered the unfathomable and devastating lightning from the previous night.
He could not help feeling threatened.
That evening, the imperial procession arrived at Chengyi Hall once more.
The attendants of Chengyi Hall walked with their heads high. When the mistress they served was favored, they too gained face whenever they went out.
As if she had expected him, Zhu Yin waited inside the hall.
The emperor sat down. Beside his hand was a cup of tea at precisely the right temperature.
“Regarding your identity…” The emperor decided to speak directly. “What do you intend to do?”
Zhu Yin smiled faintly. “What do you hope I intend? What are you afraid of?”
Her gaze was neither aggressive nor intimidating, but peaceful and calm. Yet the emperor felt an invisible pressure. Those clear, piercing eyes seemed capable of exposing every secret thought he possessed.
Since ascending the throne, he had not felt this discomfited in a very long time.
He heard the person in the seat of honor laugh softly.
“You need not worry. I want nothing.”
She said mildly, “What I told you last night was true. I labored for Great Yong my entire life and wanted only eternal peace. I did not choose to wake here.”
“I am an old thing who should have died long ago. Why should I occupy another person’s young, living body?”
The emperor sprang to his feet in shock and hurriedly said, “Please, you must not think that way. Your awakening after two hundred years is Heaven’s favor. As for Lady Yu–”
He considered it. “I will compensate her family.”
At those words, Zhu Yin searched for memories of Lady Yu’s family and found none.
That made sense. Her role in the plot was merely that of a background tool and stepping-stone for the female lead. Her identity as the daughter of the Marquis of Hanyang had probably been filled in casually during her introduction.
Her family and parents never received a single mention in the entire story.
As for Zhu Yin’s arrival in her body, it resulted from an agreement between the World-Hopping Bureau and the original owner.
After learning her fate in this life, the original owner had willingly contributed her body for a Bureau employee to borrow and complete the mission more effectively. In exchange, the Bureau would choose a peaceful, stable world for her reincarnation and guarantee her health and prosperity in her next life.
Zhu Yin had learned this the first time she borrowed a native’s body. She had wondered whether borrowing someone’s body meant she needed to fulfill that person’s wishes.
Barbara reassured her. “We aren’t the Wish Fulfillment Division, so we aren’t responsible for that. As for borrowing the body, that’s an agreement between the Bureau and the original owner. The Bureau pays the price. We only need to complete our own part of the mission and don’t have to worry about anything else.”
Zhu Yin affirmed once again: the World-Hopping Bureau truly offered excellent employee benefits.