Cuddling with the Cold Female Protagonist – Chapter 116

Volume 4: The Perils of the Jianghu

The Truth

In an instant, more than half the men in the Huachen and Dongli Kingdoms were dead.

The streets were littered with corpses, and wails of anguish shook the heavens from every household.

After a thorough investigation by the spies Ji Qingchi had planted in both countries, it was discovered that all the deceased men shared a common trait: their wives had given birth to many children.

In this era, there was no one-child policy. Women in both kingdoms gave birth whenever they became pregnant, and their husbands supported them precisely for this purpose.

As a result, every household had at least three children.

Some wealthier men, who kept several concubines, had more than a dozen children.

Originally, it was the women who endured the agony of childbirth alone. But now, due to the Phoenix Power, that pain was shared with their husbands. The Phoenix was perfectly fair; even men whose children had been born long ago were treated the same, forced to taste the suffering their wives had once endured.

One child meant one bout of pain; several children meant the pain was multiplied.

Even if a man had no living children, he was included if he had ever caused a woman to become pregnant.

How could men, who had never experienced such agony, withstand it? The sudden onslaught of labor pains caught them completely off guard. They were simply unable to endure such torment, and their lives ended in agonized screams.

Those whose wives had suffered difficult births, such as an amniotic fluid embolism, died on the spot.

The royal family of the Huachen Kingdom had sixteen princes. All but one, an infant still in swaddling clothes, had perished. The Dongli Kingdom was in an even worse state. Yue Ling’s father had thirty sons; aside from three who had not yet come of age, none survived.

Receiving this intelligence, Yue Ling had mixed feelings. When she saw that her own thirteen-year-old royal brother had also died from this, she no longer knew what expression to wear.

“These people brought it on themselves,” Ji Qingchi scoffed, her voice laced with disdain as she read the continuous reports from her Shadow Guards.

With so many dead in the two kingdoms, the soldiers defending the borders were almost completely wiped out. When the scouts from the Yanxue Kingdom discovered this, they reported it to their general. The general stationed at the border was overjoyed and sent a large army driving straight into their territory. In a flash, they occupied sixteen of the Dongli Kingdom’s cities and captured ten from the Huachen Kingdom.

One couldn’t blame them for taking advantage of the situation. When those men had slaughtered Yanxue’s soldiers and citizens, had they ever considered showing mercy?

Having spent time in the Yanxue military camps, Yue Ling knew what their lives were like. She understood that there was no room for sentiment on the battlefield, so she held no grudge against them.

“With no princes left, those old fools in the court who only knew how to prattle on about benevolence and morality are all dead and gone, too.” Xue Zhining had the bodies in the palace cleared away. She smiled at Yue Ling and said, “Fourth Princess, you can begin your journey. The next time I see you, I suppose I’ll have to call you Empress.”

Yue Ling bowed to Ji Qingchi and Su Yi. “Ninth Highness, Miss Su, take care.”

Su Yi gave her a thumbs-up. “I believe in you, Fourth Princess.”

Ji Qingchi said, “This Palace has never been one for mercy. This Palace will not be returning the sixteen cities we seized. If you have the skill, you can take them back from This Palace’s hands.”

Yue Ling shook her head. “War drains the people and the treasury. I’ve long grown tired of fighting. When I return, I only wish to let my people rest and recuperate. In time, our three kingdoms can trade and supply each other’s needs. Wouldn’t it be wonderful for everyone to live and work in peace?”

Ji Qingchi gazed at her for a moment before a slow smile bloomed on her face. “Yes, that does sound rather wonderful. In that case, This Palace looks forward to that day.”

Escorted by two of Ji Qingchi’s Shadow Guards, Yue Ling returned to her country in secret.

With lightning speed, Xue Zhining seized control of the Huachen imperial palace. Instead of installing the Twelfth Princess—the Crown Prince’s full-blooded sister—as the new ruler, she chose the daughter of a forgotten concubine from the Cold Palace to be the new Empress.

When asked why, she sighed and said, “The Twelfth Princess was close to me only because she thought I would one day be her sister-in-law.”

The entire royal family in the palace was dead, along with numerous priests, including the High Priest. When she stepped forward, many accused her of using dark arts to murder them all.

The moment the Twelfth Princess cried out, “Give me back my imperial brother, you murderer!” the throne was lost to Xue Zhining forever.

Ji Qingchi didn’t care who became the ruler of Huachen. Xue Zhining had no intention of reclaiming the occupied cities either. Like Yue Ling, she believed that trade between the three kingdoms was far more important than territory. Besides, what did it matter where the common people lived? She believed the Empress of Yanxue was benevolent enough that life under her rule would be a great improvement over life in Huachen.

Confirming that Huachen posed no further threat, Ji Qingchi left with Su Yi.

Along the road, they saw many women of Huachen. Many were dressed as unmarried maidens, bustling about as they ran businesses in the streets. Even the soldiers guarding the city gates were women.

Su Yi lifted the carriage curtain and remarked with a sigh, “It seems that before long, both the Huachen and Dongli Kingdoms will be places where women are revered.”

Ji Qingchi, who had been resting against the carriage wall with her eyes closed, opened them and smiled. “And would that be so bad?”

“Of course not. It’s great!” Su Yi nodded with a grin. “No more wars. Everyone can just focus on making money. That’s a good thing!”

They hadn’t traveled far before they met the party sent to escort them.

Surprisingly, the person leading them was the Fifth Princess.

She rode at the front of a column of soldiers, alongside a woman dressed as a city guard commander.

Her eyes were red-rimmed and she seemed drained of spirit. When she saw Ji Qingchi, she gave a rare, faint nod instead of her usual sharp retort, then fell silent.

The vice-commander beside her quickly spoke up. “Ninth Highness, Her Majesty sent this general and the Fifth Highness to welcome you back to the palace.”

“You have my thanks.” Ji Qingchi glanced at the Fifth Princess before nodding to the vice-commander. “Let’s be on our way.”

As the vice-commander led their convoy back toward the capital of Yanxue, Su Yi secretly lifted the carriage curtain again. Seeing the Fifth Princess’s dejected figure, she poked Ji Qingchi curiously. “The Fifth Highness… why isn’t she glaring daggers at you today?”

Ji Qingchi was reading a book. Hearing this, she closed it with a smile. “You have to pay silver to buy things. If you want to get information out of me, shouldn’t you give me something in return?”

Su Yi threw up her hands. “Your Highness knows my pockets are cleaner than my face right now.”

“This Palace never said anything about your silver.”

Su Yi thought for a moment, then, muttering and grumbling, planted a kiss on her cheek. “There, that should be enough, right? One shouldn’t take an inch and ask for a mile.”

Ji Qingchi laughed and pulled Su Yi into her lap. “Of course it’s not enough. But I’ll tell you the reason first. You can make up the rest later.”

Before Su Yi could protest, Ji Qingchi began warming her hands while explaining why the Fifth Princess was so distraught.

Before Ji Qingchi had rushed off to find Su Yi, the Empress had summoned both her and the Fifth Princess to the imperial study.

The two confronted each other face to face. The Empress had her Shadow Guards bring in numerous witnesses, and in the end, the truth was proven: the Emperor Consort had been murdered, and the deaths of Ji Qingchi’s father and sister could not be blamed on the Fifth Princess.

“My Father Consort¹ and sister drowned that year,” Ji Qingchi recounted, resting her chin on Su Yi’s shoulder. “At the time, the Emperor Consort had just passed away. Mother Empress was young, and her methods weren’t yet firm. She was busy handling state affairs and the funeral, so the palace was in chaos. My Father Consort took my seven-year-old sister to play in the Imperial Garden. I was in the South Study with my tutors, learning characters. I had just finished reciting the Classic of Filial Piety² when my father’s personal attendant ran in, flustered, to tell me they had both fallen into the water. By the time I reached the lake in the Imperial Garden, I saw the Fifth Princess standing stone-faced on the shore, next to the lifeless bodies of my sister and Father Consort.”

Her father was the son of a night-watchman. Besides a handsome face, he had no qualities anyone would covet. He was a dutiful man who never dared to ask for anything more. He was gentle and considerate, diligently learned needlework and cooking, and endured endless ridicule without ever talking back. He certainly never meddled to gain advantages for his own parents. He would quietly brew tea and make soup for the Empress when she was vexed, and after having his daughters, he devoted himself to raising them, never participating in the jealous squabbles of the other consorts. In an ordinary farming family, he would have been a kind, understanding, and virtuous husband.

“My Father Consort was a bit timid, but he was a good man. He didn’t fight for Mother Empress’s favor like the others; he poured his entire heart into my sister and me. He made all our clothes when we were little and prepared all our meals. When he learned I was being sent away to practice martial arts, he cried until his eyes were swollen for days. And my sister… she loved to laugh and always wanted me to take her kite-flying. On days when martial arts and my studies were exhausting, just thinking of her made everything better.”

To lose a father who doted on her and a sister she adored in a single moment—Su Yi could now understand Ji Qingchi’s pain.

She turned to say something, but Ji Qingchi saw her expression and smiled. “Don’t worry, I’m not that fragile. Besides, it’s been so long. I’m not the Fifth Princess; I haven’t dwelled on it.”

“The Fifth Princess had just lost her father and was incredibly gloomy. After my Father Consort entered the palace, he was greatly favored by Mother Empress, and rumors spread that he and the Emperor Consort didn’t get along. When the Emperor Consort died, some even speculated that my father did it. The Fifth Princess once slapped my Father Consort several times over this, cursing him for being shameless.”

She had been there at the time. Unable to bear seeing her family slandered, she had stepped forward to argue but was pulled back by her Father Consort, who told her that her older sister was grieving her father’s death and that they shouldn’t quarrel with her.

She remembered this and had always tolerated her. But seeing the Fifth Princess standing next to the bodies of her dead father and sister, her fury erupted. She instantly lunged forward and began fighting with the Fifth Princess, eventually using her martial skill to kick her into the lake.

The Fifth Princess, who had always seen herself as the superior legitimate daughter, couldn’t bear the humiliation. She cursed Ji Qingchi for her lowly birth. Ji Qingchi, in her rage, spat back without thinking that her father deserved to die.

One thing piled on top of another, and the two became sworn enemies. Later, it was discovered that the Emperor Consort had indeed been murdered; poison was found in his chambers. And her Father Consort and sister hadn’t slipped and fallen—someone had deliberately pushed them.

The Fifth Princess suspected it was her Father Consort who had poisoned the Emperor Consort. She suspected it was the Fifth Princess who had pushed her Father Consort. For all these years, they had suspected one another, trading open attacks and hidden schemes, their hatred for each other growing deeper until they both wished the other dead.

Su Yi listened to the story and slowly asked, “Then how did the Emperor Consort and your father really die? Who was the mastermind?”

Ji Qingchi held her tighter. “It was the Marquis of Ding’an.”

“But isn’t she the Emperor Consort’s father’s…”

“She was in contact with the priests of the Huachen Kingdom.”

The Marquis of Ding’an’s origins were even humbler than Xiao Quan’s. She was originally the daughter of a courtesan in Huachen, where she learned to steal, rob, and swindle from a young age.

When she was seven, she was caught stealing and ran into the sedan chair of a Huachen priest. The priest saw that her features foretold a wealthy destiny and was intrigued. After divining her fortune, he gave her some silver and sent people to bring her to the Yanxue Kingdom.

By chance, a childless farming couple adopted her.

She fought her way up through education and became the Chancellor. In secret, however, she maintained contact with the Huachen priest. She was smarter than Xiao Quan and knew how to hide her tracks, behaving herself during her time as Chancellor. Only after becoming the Marquis of Ding’an did she begin to plot her grand scheme.

The Huachen priest was her benefactor, and her birth mother was from Huachen, so her loyalties naturally lay with them. The Empress was extremely wary of Huachen, which had suffered several defeats in wars against Yanxue. So, the Marquis decided to kill the Empress and put the Fifth Princess on the throne.

Unfortunately, the poison she intended for the Empress was accidentally drunk by her own grandson. To cover it up, she had no choice but to send someone to frame Ji Qingchi’s father. Then, to gain leverage over the Fifth Princess, she had another person push Ji Qingchi’s father and sister into the lake and led the Fifth Princess to the scene.

“It sounds like the Marquis of Ding’an’s plan wasn’t very well-constructed. How did none of you discover it for so long?”

“In the affairs of the imperial family, what is true and what is false? Who would dare to investigate seriously? Even if you knew the truth, you’d have to pretend you didn’t,” Ji Qingchi sneered. “When Mother Empress ascended the throne, her foundation was unstable, and she had to rely on the Marquis of Ding’an. She wouldn’t have moved against her without a very good reason.”

Only recently, after purging Xiao Quan and her faction, had the Empress consolidated most of the power into her own hands and felt secure enough to finally investigate these matters.

“Mother Empress also said that letting us sisters be at each other’s throats all these years was to forge us.”

Ji Qingchi smiled faintly. “Mother Empress truly is an emperor, to think of forging her own flesh and blood like swords.”

Two swords, tempered against each other. The sharpest one that emerged would become the next emperor.

And if one happened to break midway through, at least there would be one usable sword left.

Such were the machinations of a monarch.

Hearing this, Su Yi knew who the Empress had chosen as the Crown Princess.

She turned around. “The Empress made you the Crown Princess?”

“Yes.”

“Were there any conditions?”

“Yes.” Ji Qingchi sighed, feigning distress. “She said… you cannot enter the rear palace.”

“Huh?” Su Yi knew it. The Empress would surely disapprove of her and Ji Qingchi being together. “Then what do we do?”

Seeing Su Yi’s little face scrunch up in worry made Ji Qingchi happy. So she does have me in her heart, she thought. No longer teasing her, she smiled and said, “Mother Empress said she will make you the Marquis of Pingyang, to guard the nation of Yanxue alongside me.”

Good heavens, Ji Qingchi was already such a drama queen at her age. Would it kill her to finish a sentence in one breath?

Su Yi moved angrily to pinch her arm, but Ji Qingchi dodged her demonic claws in time, laughing as she tackled her onto the carriage cushions. “Alright, I’ve told you the whole story. Now, you have to give me my payment for the information.”

Su Yi, “!”

She quickly threw her hands up to block her. “Ji Qingchi, are you crazy?! This is a carriage! There are people outside!”

“Don’t worry, no one dares to come close.”

A light laugh drowned out her faint struggles, eventually turning into a melody played by two, leaking from a small gap in the carriage curtains.

As a martial artist, Ji Qingxuan’s hearing was sharp. Even from several meters away, she could hear the commotion from the carriage behind her.

She had her people move further away from the carriage, giving the two inside plenty of space. With one hand on the reins, she used the other to stroke the hand warmer³ in her robes.

It was something her late Father Consort had left behind when he was still alive. Ji Qingchi had secretly retrieved it from the Ding’an Marquis’s manor. After they reconciled, she had someone deliver it to her.

She caressed the hand warmer, recalling the times her late father had taught her. The image of her gentle and refined father’s smiling face filled her mind.

As the memories swirled, an unexpected person suddenly broke into her recollections of her father.

A young woman in a white dress, her face devoid of color and her skin alarmingly pale, yet her smile was incredibly warm. Whether composing poetry or conducting business, she always had an air of confidence.

Gentle and refined.

It was the phrase most often used to describe her father. And it could, in fact, also be used to describe her.

Ji Qingxuan stroked the hand warmer in her robes, letting the horse lead the way as she slowly guided the procession forward. She looked up and saw a patch of sky.

A few clouds drifted across it.

They floated and swayed, like the hem of a beautiful maiden’s skirt.

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The author has something to say:

The next chapter will be an extra about the plot of the original book.

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LP: This isn’t the end of the main text! Next 4 chapters are extras and then the final chapter of the main text and the novel itself… Weird placement but okay

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