Chapter 285: Dispersing
The inside and outside of Hanliang Palace were a cacophony of noise.
“The Imperial Cavalry protects His Majesty——”
“The rebels are executed——”
As shouts rang out, and more and more soldiers poured in, the Li family’s private soldiers who had been disguised as Imperial Guards within the hall were captured, offering almost no resistance. Firstly, their numbers were not great, and secondly, they were caught off guard. They had victory in their grasp, so how could it suddenly vanish into thin air? It was like a dream.
Indeed, her monstrous younger sister was best at making people dream, creating illusions that people would lose themselves in.
Impossible to guard against.
It could have been guarded against.
Bai Ying lowered her head and looked at her waist. The Three Purities Bell that Xuanyangzi had given her was originally intended to break illusions. Before, Bai Li had been unable to approach her successfully. The last time, the Three Purities Bell had been thrown out and broken by her, and she hadn’t gone back to Xuanyangzi to ask for a new one, so…
The breaking of the Three Purities Bell was Bai Li’s doing, all for this day.
Bai Ying raised her head.
Soldiers had already surged forward, surrounding her, their cold weapons pointed at her.
Bai Ying looked past the soldiers’ weapons at Bai Li.
Bai Li stood not far in front of her.
It seemed that no one in the hall could see her, the surrounding noise seemingly irrelevant to her. She just quietly held the child, looking at Bai Ying.
“You!” Bai Ying gritted her teeth and shouted, “Everything just now was you——”
Bai Li said calmly, “What about me? If you didn’t have it within you, how could I bring it forth?”
“A’ying! Bai Ying!” The Emperor’s shouts came from the side.
Bai Ying slowly turned her head. Even with Li Yu supporting him, the Emperor had collapsed on the ground, just as in the previous dream, constantly vomiting blood.
It seems that in this world, it is people who can deceive, not things.
While other people and events had changed, the effect of the poison had not changed at all.
Bai Ying couldn’t help but laugh.
The Emperor had been looking at Bai Ying, and seeing her laugh, his expression became even more sorrowful and indignant. He was unable to speak, gasping for breath.
“The Imperial Physician is here, the Imperial Physician is here.”
Minister Lu also rushed back at this time, bringing several Imperial Physicians with him. He was panting, his clothes disheveled, his hat had fallen off. He threw himself down in front of the Emperor, some applying acupuncture needles, some checking his pulse, some feeding him medicine pills.
After a flurry of activity, although the Emperor’s face was still pale, the vomiting of blood had stopped.
“Your subject deserves ten thousand deaths. I only guarded against Consort Bai hiding soldiers, but I never thought she would actually poison Your Majesty.”
Li Yu knelt in front of the Emperor, kowtowing and sobbing.
“Your subject deserves ten thousand deaths, ten thousand deaths.”
The Emperor looked at him, his lips trembling, and then looked at Bai Ying again.
“A’ying, I don’t believe it, I don’t believe it——” He gasped urgently.
The Imperial Physicians beside him hurriedly advised, “Your Majesty, you must not be angered, Your Majesty, do not be agitated.” “You must not let anger and fire attack your heart, otherwise, if the poison enters your heart and lungs, it will——”
Hearing this, Bai Ying shouted, “Your Majesty! I didn’t! It was Bai Li, it was my younger sister, Bai Li.”
She took a step forward, but the soldiers surrounding her did not give way in the slightest. Bai Ying stopped in front of the blades, looking at the Emperor with tears in her eyes.
“Your Majesty, I said before, my younger sister is a demon, a monster, she did all of this.”
“Your Majesty, don’t be fooled by her!”
“Your Majesty, I am Bai Ying, I am the one who has accompanied you for so many years.”
The Emperor looked at her, his lips trembling.
At this moment, other sounds rang out in the hall.
“Your Majesty, we have captured two Imperial Physicians hiding in the side room——”
As the words were spoken, two trembling Imperial Physicians were pushed forward by the soldiers of the Imperial Cavalry. Both of them fell to their knees with a thud, paralyzed with fear and unable to speak.
“I did not summon any Imperial Physicians.” The Emperor murmured. In this Hanliang Palace, there was only one other person who could have done so. He looked at Bai Ying.
Bai Ying looked at him, pressing her hand to her chest, her expression aggrieved. “Your Majesty, this subject’s hand was injured, I couldn’t sleep well, and was troubled by nightmares, so I summoned the Imperial Physicians to attend to me.”
“Your Majesty, Zhang Ze has been brought in.” Someone shouted from outside.
The soldiers surrounding the palace doors parted, and several soldiers dragged Zhang Ze inside.
Zhang Ze’s body was wet, but there were no signs of injury. He just hung his head, and whether he was being dragged or thrown to the ground, he did not wake up.
Someone in the hall dropped a knife on the ground. The clang rang out, exceptionally clear, piercing everyone’s eardrums. Everyone in the hall couldn’t help but shudder, and at the same time, Zhang Ze’s body, lying on the ground, also twitched.
“Zhang Ze!” Li Yu shouted. “Wake up at once!”
Along with his shout, Zhang Ze slowly opened his eyes, his gaze somewhat blank, as if he didn’t know where he was or what time it was.
“Guo Shun.” He first saw Guo Shun standing beside him, and murmured, “Didn’t I kill you?”
Guo Shun ignored him. Zhang Ze’s gaze immediately fell on Bai Ying, who was surrounded by soldiers. A glint of light flashed in his blank eyes, and he let out a “haha” laugh.
“Bai Ying, you’ve reached the end of the road!”
The next moment, he saw the Emperor lying on the ground. Zhang Ze’s laughter stopped abruptly, his eyes filled with astonishment and change. His gaze landed on Li Yu.
“Zhang Ze.” Li Yu looked at him and slowly said, “Tell us everything about your collusion with Bai Ying from beginning to end. Do not deceive His Majesty any longer.”
Zhang Ze looked around the hall. Although the scene was somewhat chaotic, it was similar to the scene he had just experienced.
Was this the illusion, or was the previous one the illusion?
Zhang Ze was once again bewildered.
But no matter which one it was, one thing was certain: Bai Ying’s power was gone, Prince of Chu Li Yu had achieved great success, which meant that what Her Ladyship wanted to do was unstoppable.
He looked at the Emperor, and without any further hesitation, he prostrated himself on the ground and kowtowed heavily.
“Your subject deserves ten thousand deaths for colluding with Bai Ying.”
“It all started when Your Majesty first ascended the throne.”
“At that time, Consort Bai was involved in the marriage bestowed by Empress Jiang. Fearing that she would fall out of favor with Your Majesty, she decided to simply own up to the crime, have her family executed, sever Your Majesty’s taboo, and seek survival through death.”
“So she took out the letters exchanged with Empress Jiang, framing it as her father colluding with Empress Jiang. Your subject used this to investigate Bai Xun for a capital crime, executing his entire family and punishing three clans.”
Hearing this, the officials in the hall were in an uproar.
Even the Emperor, lying on the ground, was shocked and disbelieving.
“A’ying, A’ying, you…”
This time, he didn’t even know what to ask.
Bai Ying, surrounded by soldiers, no longer had an aggrieved expression. When Zhang Ze was dragged in, seemingly unharmed, and woke up, she had become expressionless.
Now, hearing the Emperor’s question, she sneered, “What about me? Wasn’t it all forced by you, you useless thing? You’re a good-for-nothing yourself, you were lucky enough to become Emperor, and you know yourself that you’re not worthy of it. You’re timid as a mouse, afraid of this and afraid of that, even afraid of a dead woman, even afraid of me, the woman who has accompanied you for more than ten years. What could I do? I wasn’t born with good fortune, I could only fight for my own survival. It’s all you, it’s all your fault, you killed my family! You useless thing, you’re even worthy of being Emperor! I could do a better job as Emperor than you!”
The Emperor looked at Bai Ying and couldn’t say a word.
“Silence!”
“Vile woman!”
✿✿✿
“Don’t you dare speak such nonsense!”
The officials in the hall all berated her.
The Emperor stared blankly at Bai Ying, neither questioning nor scolding, only lowering his head in dejection. “Take Bai… Ying away, to await trial.”
Hearing these words, the surrounding soldiers urged Bai Ying to move.
Bai Ying shouted again, “Liulang!”
The Emperor subconsciously raised his head to look at her and saw a gentle smile on Bai Ying’s face, just like before, so tender and affectionate. He couldn’t help but be stunned.
Bai Ying looked at him and smiled. “I’ll be waiting for you on the road to the Yellow Springs.”
As the words left her mouth, she suddenly lunged forward. With a thud, she crashed into a long saber held by one of the surrounding soldiers.
The Emperor let out a cry of alarm, and there were also low gasps and commotion in the hall. Everyone’s eyes were fixed on Bai Ying’s chest as blood seeped out, blooming into a patch of blood on her summer dress.
“A’ying!” The Emperor cried out, then immediately spat out a mouthful of blood and fainted.
The hall immediately descended into chaos, and no one paid any attention to Bai Ying, who had committed suicide.
The soldiers placed Bai Ying on the ground. Bai Li slowly walked over and looked at Bai Ying in the pool of blood.
Bai Ying was not yet dead, her eyes beginning to glaze over, but she could recognize Bai Li.
“Heh.” She let out a breath. “Are you… satisfied now? I was really unlucky to have a younger sister like you. You… this… evil ghost, demon, you were born into our family and finally killed us all.”
Bai Li knelt down and gently stroked her messy hair.
“Yes, I was born into your family, became your younger sister, you were unlucky.” She said. “Otherwise, you would have achieved your heart’s desire and your dreams would have come true, becoming the most noble person in the world.”
Speaking of this, she smiled again.
“But for the Bai family, and for many other people, having me was their good fortune. They were able to avenge their grievances, find relief, and die with their eyes closed.”
Bai Ying looked at her, her chest heaving violently. She wanted to say something but couldn’t. After a moment, her eyes glazed over, but the next moment, a hint of joy appeared on her face.
“Mother——” She mumbled, her lips moving.
Bai Ying suddenly got up from the ground and ran towards the outside of the hall. As she ran out, the world became vast, and the face of the person standing in front of her became clearer.
It was Mother!
It was Mother!
Bai Ying suddenly rushed forward, and the person in front of her reached out and embraced her.
“Mother.” Bai Ying nestled in her arms and looked up.
The woman above looked down at her, her face full of smiles, gently stroking her face.
“Mother, I rode a big horse with my brother yesterday.” She said happily. “It was so much fun.”
The woman smiled and nodded. “Good, A’ying is so capable.”
She smiled. “Mother, why are you calling me A’ying? You always call me Second Miss.”
She said, jumping out of her mother’s arms, standing up straight, and putting her hands on her hips.
“I am the Second Miss of the family, I can help manage the household.”
The little girl’s small figure was projected on the ground, the two buns on her head swaying.
“Good, Second Miss is the most capable.” The woman praised with a smile.
She rushed over again, snuggling into her mother’s arms and rubbing against her. Suddenly, she thought of something and looked up.
“Mother.” Her voice carried a hint of fear. “You’re not allowed to give birth to Third Miss!”
The woman looked down at her and slowly nodded. “Okay, I won’t give birth to Third Miss.”
She seemed to have a weight lifted from her shoulders and snuggled back into her mother’s arms. “Mother, I want to eat the cold noodles you make.”
The woman’s smiling voice fell. “Okay.”
“I want to buy two white rabbits at the market!”
“Okay, we’ll buy them.”
“Mother, I also want to watch the Hu dance!”
“Okay, Mother will go with you.”
She felt nothing but joy, running away with a smile, holding a pinwheel in her hand, spinning whirringly.
“Let’s go watch the Hu dance——”
“Let’s go watch the Hu dance——”
She quickly ran far away, stopping in the distance and looking back.
“Mother, hurry up——”
The woman looked at the little girl holding the pinwheel and responded with a smile. “Okay, Mother is coming.”
As she spoke, the little girl in front of her started running again, running and running, and then vanished like a bubble between heaven and earth.
The woman stood there, as if a gust of wind had passed by, a layer of illusion falling away.
At the same time, a shadow emerged from her shoulder.
“It’s a pity. You let her see the mother she wanted to see the most, but you couldn’t see her.”
Bai Li looked down at her hand. In other people’s dreams, she could present the person they wanted to see the most. The person Bai Ying wanted to see the most was naturally her mother. However, she had become the mother, and she couldn’t see her own appearance.
She had never seen her mother’s appearance.
Now that Bai Ying was also dead, there was no one left in the world who would dream of her mother.
She would never see her again.
The shadow swayed and floated in front of her.
“I watched from the side for you just now.” She said with a smile. “Your mother has round eyes, a slightly thin face, and a small black mole on the corner of her mouth.”
It was a pity that this was still Bai Li’s dream. Bai Li couldn’t imagine the person herself, so although she saw her, she couldn’t present her on her own face.
So she gestured with her hands, describing her, and finally summed it up in one sentence.
“She’s very beautiful, more like you than your older sister.”
More like her? Bai Li looked at her and nodded with a smile. “Thank you.”
