r said coldly as he looked at his son and Wu Zhu beside him. Slowly, he raised a sleeve to wipe away the blood at the corner of his mouth. “I just feel that... It seems like I am about to die.”

Defeat and death were two different things. Defeat implied victory and loss, while life and death often belonged to fate. A ruler’s defeat would certainly cause his death, but a ruler’s death may not be because of his defeat.

Perhaps, the Emperor was surrounded by the aura of death, but he was not defeated. His death today had been fated a long time ago.

There was no true Way of the Emperor in the world. The Emperor’s body had not found a moment of rest during these years because of the ruthless zhenqi. During this past year, many things had made the zhenqi find ways to injure his body, quickly breaking his life force and accelerating his aging process.

The Emperor’s slightly sunken eyes looked at Fan Xian coldly and did not lightly speak of these truths that would shock the other party. “Even if I die, I will kill you, traitor.”

The Emperor coughed a few times and slightly bent at the waist. There was a faint sense of dissatisfaction in the coughing. “The territory of the Li family is destined to unite the world. As long as you die, no matter which of my two sons take the throne, the world of the future will still belong to the Qing Kingdom.”

The raging fires of the wall beneath Nanjing were just a spark to force Fan Xian to show himself. Otherwise, after Fan Xian returned from the Temple and hid from the world, where would the Qing Emperor go to find him? If Fan Xian did not die, the Qing Kingdom’s ambition to last a thousand generations could not be realized. Even if the Qing Emperor knew that his body was failing, how could he rest?

The situation now was nothing more than a ruler killing a subject, a father killing a son. Who would have thought that the situation would change and in the isolated palace it would be the Emperor alone facing all of the enmity?

The Emperor felt tired. He looked quietly at Fan Xian and suddenly realized that his desire to kill this son was not as powerful as he imagined. Why was this? Perhaps the origin of the Emperor’s desire to kill was only because of the anger he felt at Fan Xian’s betrayal and had nothing to do with the future of the Qing Kingdom.

Once a heartless and emotionless person became angry because of disappointment, once their emotions were moved, they were nothing more than a mortal.

The Emperor suddenly felt that if he died like this, he would be very lonely. What kind of cold gaze would his family under the Yellow Springs, Chengqian, Chengzi, the empress, look at him with? How was his mother in the netherworld? Would that woman’s soul after she died still use that seemingly warm but actually very distant gaze to look at him?

A sense of loneliness and desolation took over the old Emperor’s body. He suddenly found that in the last battle of his life, he was still faced with her gun, her servant, and her son. After squandering a lifetime, in the end, he was still fighting against her. Thinking of this, a sorrowful smile appeared on the Emperor’s face. Was he destined to fall at her hands?

The bright yellow figure trembled slightly. The gun in Fan Ruoruo’s hands was caught by his good hand from the air. His finger’s exerted a little strength. The Tyrannical zhenqi in his body flowed out like rivers and oceans. With a light sound, a section of the barrel of the gun bent over.

The Emperor’s zhenqi was activated, making his injuries grew more serious. However, he only narrowed his eyes and looked coldly at the hunk of useless metal thrown at his feet like he was interrogating that woman. He did not speak for a long time.

“How wonderful it would be if Lao Wu never again took a step into the mortal realm.” The Emperor lowered his head and suddenly let out a quiet sigh. Slowly, he raised his head and looked at Wu Zhu sitting on the ground and leaning by Fan Xian’s leg and shook his head with great difficulty.

“Uncle can no longer remember many things,” Fan Xian said.

“What has happened has happened. He would have eventually remembered something of the past and learned something from it. He would have eventually come to kill me.” The pale-faced Emperor stared in a daze at the dumb and mute Wu Zhu, who was trying to stand up like a child but always not managing to stand. Suddenly, he said, “Lao Wu, you forgot some things again. That’s truly fortunate.”

When a powerful person becomes so chatty, did it mean he was truly old? Or, was it a dying flash? Fan Xian stared in a daze at the Emperor with a severed arm and suddenly felt an emptiness in his chest. He felt that everything that had happened today was too strange and completely unlike reality.

The light in the Emperor’s sunken eyes gradually dissipated. Looking at Fan Xian, he said in a quiet voice, “Not you. In the end, it was your mother who won.”

He looked mockingly at Fan Xian, without any sense of being disheartened. On the contrary, he was very much like the incomparably powerful ruler of the past. With a mocking smile, he said, “The kid of the little Emperor of the Zhan family is yours. You know what kind of person the Third Prince is. No matter what you do, this world will eventually be the Li’s.”

“You once said that after you die, even if the world floods, I will have no choice but to think of you.” The Emperor looked at Fan Xian. The smile growing at the corners of his mouth filled with more and more mockery. “You mother only tried to change the progress of history, but you arrogantly want to stop the progress of history. What an arrogant and na?ve thought.”

Fan Xian was silent for a long time. He then suddenly said, “Actually, you and I are both unremarkable ripples in history.”

“No, I will have a page in history.” A cold and proud light flashed through the Emperor’s eyes.

Fan Xian didn’t say anything more. It was only now that he realized he had still underestimated this Emperor. It turned out that he couldn’t hide anything he said and did. He even knew about Hong Duofan in Northern Qi.

The current scene was filled with blood. Fan Xian didn’t move. He didn’t dare to move because his sister was still under the Emperor’s control. He didn’t even know how to resolve the situation at hand. He didn’t know if the Emperor’s weakness was a kind of illusion or if one could truly see through some matters when one was near death.

When it came to the Emperor, Fan Xian had a natural fear and respect, even now. He didn’t know if the Imperial Army outside would break through the backup he had prepared and once again open the palace doors by force. He also didn’t know how the Shadow and Ye Zhong were doing or why Eunuch Yao and the others had still not appeared.

What chilled him the most was whether the Emperor’s counterattack before his death could take Uncle Wu Zhu, his sister, and himself to the grave with him. Until now, he still believed that the old Emperor had such strength.

...

...

The Emperor raised his head with difficulty and narrowed his eyes as he looked into the blue sky in the east across the palace wall. It was as if he realized that something marvelous could happen in that direction.

As he looked at the sky, the lines by the corners of his eyes trembled slightly like he had thought of something. The right hand extended out of the dragon robe twitched a little, as if it wanted to grasp something. The dissipating light in his eyes gradually gathered together, as if he wanted to see something more clearly. Countless images rose in his mind, as if he wanted to remember something.

No one knew better than the Emperor about the condition of his body. Perhaps from the wind and snow of Jan. 8 he had already foreseen the arrival of such a day. This was not a repayment of debt. This was karma. But, why was there still such a powerful sense of discontent in his heart? It was powerful enough that he furrowed his brows like he had a question he asked endlessly as he faced the unusually clear blue sky after the rain.

In his childhood, he endured humiliation in a rundown manor. In his youth, he traveled the world with his friends and expanded his horizons. In his prime, he rode in the northeast on the sunset plains, leading countless men in conquering a vast territory. His sword pointed at the world to create a larger territory for the sake of a thousand generations and leave his name in history.

Now, all of this was going to come to an end. How could he be content? There were still many things he had not done.

If the Emperor knew that these people laying across the river of his life, such as Ye Qingmei, Wu Zhu, and Fan Xian, were not actually people of this world, would he have the sense that this was heaven wanting him dead rather than his warmongering ways?

He was just thinking.

If there wasn’t that woman, then there wouldn’t be Lao Wu who followed her into the world and there wouldn’t be An Zhi. There may also not be the palace treasury and many other things. But, could I not have conquered this territory by myself?

No, I would certainly have been able to, even if it was just a bit later. So what if there wasn’t the Unnamed martial method? Such things as Great Grandmasters that dared to challenge me shouldn’t even exist! Wasn’t that right?

Only if there was no if. If there was no Ye Qingmei, perhaps I would never have had that truly happy period of my life?

The Emperor’s brows furrowed together, forgetting the outward flow of his lifeblood as he sank into this question. Fan Xian had once raised this question in the little tower. It was not until now that the Emperor truly asked it of himself. Perhaps it was because in these decades, he had not dared to ask himself this question.

He drew back his gaze and recovered his calm. A ruler faced with death still possessed supreme might and willpower. He coldly looked at Fan Xian and Wu Zhu in front of him. It was as if, at any moment, he could use the last moments of his life to burn away the other’s life.

A long silence settled in.

Once again, Fan Xian wiped away the blood at the corners of his mouth as he nervously watched each of the Emperor’s movements. Even he didn’t realize that not only were his thin lips very similar to the Emperor’s, this movement of wiping away blood was also very similar to the Emperor.

The Emperor suddenly smiled. The corners of his lips twitching strangely. He then gradually withdrew his smile and coldly said, “Today, I learned what was in the chest, but there is still something I am very curious about.” He narrowed his eyes at Wu Zhu. “I would very much like to know what exactly is hidden behind this black cloth.”

For his final target, the most powerful ruler in the world chose Wu Zhu rather than Fan Xian. Perhaps it was because Fan Xian was his flesh and blood. Perhaps it was because he thought that Wu Zhu, this irritating emissary of the Temple, needed to die. Perhaps it was because the Qing Emperor had always believed that matters of the world should be resolved by people of the world and should not be interfered in by some bullsh*t god.

Perhaps it was because the Qing Emperor, in his last moments, realized that some of Fan Xian’s expressions and actions were very much like his own. In any case, his lightning-like hand cut through the air and headed for Wu Zhu’s face, letting Fan Xian go.

Fan Xian survived. In front of the Emperor’s final attack, his hand was shaken off like a fallen leaf, completely unable to stop it. He could only watch as the Emperor’s palm, containing within it the final vestiges of the zhenqi in his life, reached ruthlessly for Wu Zhu’s face.

The Qing Emperor reached. Wu Zhu’s vertebra abruptly bent as he leaned back. The black cloth fell and time seemed to freeze in this moment.

The black cloth slowly floated down in the gentle breeze.

A piece of black cloth covered the glass window in the Overwatch Council, it was used to block out the Royal Palace’s dazzling light. A piece of black cloth covered Wu Zhu’s face, it was used to block out the sky.

Who knows how long this piece of black cloth had been worn? It seemed that there was never a day it would be untied. For centuries, millennia, tens of millennia, it has always been like so.

Now, this piece of black cloth fell down. Beneath the black cloth was a rainbow.

A rainbow surged out between Wu Zhu’s young and delicate brows, from that pair of clear and spirited but perplexed eyes. In an instant, it illuminated the square inside the Royal Palace and shone through the bright yellow figure.

The rainbow flowed through the Qing Emperor’s body and illuminated his disbelieving expression brightly. Then, it fell heavily on Taiji Palace, dissolved into a fiery dragon, and instantly set the entire palatial hall on fire.

It was just an instant, but the Emperor’s expression abruptly became calm. Amidst this fire, he proudly straightened his body. Although he only had one arm, he stood straight. In the moment before he went, a disdainful thought floated through his mind. So, it was like this. It was nothing more than this. It was still like this.

Even at the moment of death, powerful people still leave behind a very powerful figure. Amidst this warm rainbow, this figure appeared particularly cold, silent, bleak, and lonely but also unusually proud.

Ash flew through the air and gradually fell down. Firecracker fragments used as offering for the impermanence of the mortal world settled in the bloody puddles in the square in front of the Royal Palace.

At the same time, over the palace wall to the east, where it seemed that something marvelous was going to happen, a rainbow finally appeared after the rain and looked down at the entire world.

...

...

By night, the blazing fire of Taiji Palace had been extinguished. Fortunately, it had rained. Otherwise, the fire might have burned the entire Qing Royal Palace into a pile of rubble.

Not long after the strange appearance of the rainbow, the closed front gates of the Royal Palace were forcibly opened by the military. No one could hide the news of the Emperor’s assassination and death. Although, until now, the mournful and angry people still had not been able to find the Emperor’s remains.

The person who had assassinated the Emperor was not a Northern Qi assassin. It was the most unforgivable traitor and bastard in Qing history, Fan Xian. The court confirmed this at the first instant. If it were not for Hu the Scholar and the heavily injured, but still not dead, Ye Zhong, forcefully suppressing the mournful emotions of the entire Jingdou City, perhaps in this night, the Fan manor and many homes in the Duke’s Alley would have been burned to the ground, along with the people inside.

Other than Scholar Hu and Ye Zhong, the person who truly took control of the situation was the Third Prince, Li Chengping, who took the throne as danger faced the nation. Under this Qing Emperor’s powerful control, the situation in Jingdou did not spin out of control.

Of course, no one knew what effect the old Overwatch Council and those factions hidden in the darkness had in this matter.

The criminal Fan Xian, who was once again under pursuit by the court and had a bounty so high that it struck people dumb, unexpectedly appeared at a place no one would have thought of.

He was still in the Royal Palace. Under the cover of darkness, he drew back his gaze from the direction of Taiji Palace and walked by the little tower that was even more isolated than the Cold Palace. Taiji Palace had been destroyed in the fire, and the little tower had long been burned into a pile of ash. He walked in the knee-high grass with his head slightly lowered, thinking about something. Or, perhaps he was just here to narrate everything that had happened to Ye Qingmei.

Fan Xian’s pupils narrowed as he looked at the person who appeared beside the ruins of the little tower. He tilted his head slightly as if not expecting this.

The person who appeared was Eunuch Yao. Expressionlessly, he approached Fan Xian and handed him a small box. In a raspy and low voice, he said, “The Emperor left you this.”

Fan Xian accepted the box woodenly and watched as Eunuch Yao disappeared into the dark night. He was not worried that he would summon aces to surround and attack him. It was one world outside the Palace and one world inside the Palace. In the world inside the palace, presumably, there was no one right now who wished him harm. Even if there was, it could not be at this time.

What had the Emperor left him? Why did he leave it? Did he know ahead of time that he wouldn’t be able to survive what happened today? Fan Xian stared in a daze at the box in his hand. Only now did he understand why Eunuch Yao had not been by the Emperor’s side earlier was because the Emperor had given him a strange task.

Opening the box, there was a white handkerchief and a thin letter inside. Fan Xian’s body froze slightly. He immediately recognized what it was.

This was one of the three items he had seen under the empress dowager’s phoenix bed when he explored the Royal Palace at night that year. Among them, there was a key he had long replicated and successfully used to open the chest. The white handkerchief and letter were the other two items.

During the Eldest Princess’s rebellion in Jingdou four years ago, Fan Xian had tried again to find these two objects but discovered they were no longer in Hanguang Palace. Thinking of it now, the Emperor must have put them elsewhere.

Naturally, the Emperor later knew that the key was in his hands, so he only left this letter and white handkerchief to him.

Fan Xian used the tip of his finger to rub against the surface of the white handkerchief to center himself. He then opened the unsealed letter and carefully read it. Gradually, his brows furrowed together and then loosened again.

This was a letter Ye Qingmei had written to the Qing Emperor. From the contents of the letter, he learned what the white handkerchief was. This was the white scarf the empress dowager had granted to the witch Ye Qingmei to use to commit suicide. After Ye Qingmei received the edict in Taiping Courtyard, she returned the white scarf back to the palace to the empress dowager’s bedside.

Presumably, only Uncle Wu Zhu was able to do such a thing. And, presumably, the empress dowager received quite a fright that day so she kept this white scarf to deepen her hatred of the witch Ye Qingmei.

Other than relating this matter in a mischievous tone to express her powerful discontent, there was nothing else in Ye Qingmei’s letter worthy of attention. The rest of the letter was domestic matters, about how Wu Zhu was doing, and how Fan Jian was doing in the brothel. Combined with the clumsy and forced handwriting, it did not bear reading.

Fortunately, it was only two thin pages. Fan Xian still did not understand why the Emperor treasured this letter so much and had even left it to him. Was he wrong in his thinking earlier? Had the Emperor hidden the white scarf, key, and letter in Hanguang Palace and not the empress dowager?

He shook his head and refused to think further on this question, which was destined to remain submerged in memory, that no one knew the answer to. Immediately after, he noticed the writing on the back of the second piece of paper.

This handwriting was robust but controlled in emotion. It was writing particularly centered and ordered. It was very clearly the Emperor’s handwriting.

Fan Xian looked at it closely. After looking at it for a long time, he sighed gently. His hands tightened. He unconsciously wanted to destroy his letter. Afterward, he carefully put the letter back in the envelope and tucked it into his clothing.

“I was not wrong.”

These were the last words the Emperor left on the back of the letter. It seemed like an unusually powerful and proud announcement, but it was an announcement on a letter to an already dead woman. In reality, it was only a faint self-reflection.

However, no one could resolve this question other than history. Even the confident history books probably could not judge the Emperor’s achievements and failures in his life.

Because of Ye Qingmei and Chen Pingping, he only felt hatred toward the Emperor. However, the relationship between him and the Emperor was not as simple as blood. His soul within could deny their blood connection, but he could not shake off the interactions of these years. Such emotion was complicated to the point that it could not be expressed through words.

The Emperor was dead. Even until now, he still felt a numbness from his body to his heart and was unable to believe this reality. He always felt that man was the most powerful and undefeatable man in the world. How could he have died? He seemed to be relieved, but there was no joy of having achieved revenge. He seemed to be mournful, but he could not cry. He was just numbly standing in this freezing wind.

From the letter, he knew that there was no such thing as a true Way of the Emperor in the world. The Emperor’s body had been deteriorating. Even if each person were to become their own king as Ye Qingmei had said, that is still not the Way of the Emperor. Fan Xian, and the ideal he supported, was even further from that.

Just as she said to the Emperor that windy and snowy night, he just wanted peace of heart, a resolution of a private grievance. It did not implicate the larger question of whether it was right or wrong. He had to know that humankind was not a creature that sought correctness. Correctness was not justice because there was always a side in justice.

He suddenly remembered Ye Qingmei’s memorials and letters that King Jing collected. In the past, Ye Qingmei’s letters to the Emperor always discussed the world and people of the world. There was only one letter in as casual a tone as the one he read now. Perhaps it was because of this reason that the Emperor particularly treasured it.

Thinking of this, his lips rose involuntarily in a bitter smile. Without a doubt, the Emperor and Ye Qingmei were both distinguished and accomplished people in the world with incomparable talent, but their meeting was truly not a happy matter. For the Emperor to meet someone like Ye Qingmei, was it not a kind of pain? For Ye Qingmei to meet the Emperor, it was a difficult to speak of sorrow.

Fan Xian stood woodenly in the palace, in the long grass, looking at the remnants of the little tower in a daze. Until now, he still didn’t know where Ye Qingmei was buried. He now knew that his father, Fan Jian’s words, in the past had only been a kind of consolation. The woman in the yellow robe in the painting in the little tower had already turned into ash and gone with the wind. The Emperor had also dissolved into ash and gone with the wind. Perhaps in some corner of the world they would bump into each other again.

He stood silently for a long time. He used the cover of darkness to head toward Taiji Palace to leave the Royal Palace. He saw the lights of the Royal Palace amidst the night, heard the clear voice in the royal study, and saw the seemingly sorrowful but actually calculating officials who had been newly promoted and could not help but feel affected to some extent.