As soon as those three words were spoken, both father and son fell silent.
Wu Junji was astonished.
Emperor Zhou felt guilty.
Emperor Zhou cleared his throat lightly to cover it up: “You little rascal, you take a few steps and then raise your arms begging to be carried. You’ll embarrass me if you do that outside.”
“Junzheng is strong and sturdy, better and stronger than you, and he can walk on his own.”
Wu Junji pretended not to understand:
“Zheng-di is also Father Emperor’s son. If you ask Noble Consort Dong to send Zheng-di over just because I’m bored, won’t they be unhappy?”
Emperor Zhou pulled his son onto his lap, wrapping one arm around him while sipping tea with the other to quench his thirst.
“Such a young age, yet so heavy-hearted.”
“Just answer: do you want it or not?”
“Hmm…” Wu Junji said, “I want something else.”
Emperor Zhou’s palm immediately itched.
“Speak.”
Wu Junji abandoned his cloth tiger, circled his hands in the air exaggeratedly, and declared:
“A super—big palace!”
Emperor Zhou laughed heartily, waving his sleeve to erase the “super-big palace” his son had drawn in the air, mimicking his tone:
“No—way!”
This little troublemaker was his own flesh and blood, of course he had to keep him under his own watch and raise him personally. Did he know what “raising personally” meant? Eating, dressing, living, and moving—all together!
To Emperor Zhou, Wu Junji’s request for a separate palace sounded no different from splitting the family.
“Has someone in the palace been whispering nonsense in your ear?”
“The servants? Your imperial grandfather and grandmother? Or someone from the rear palace?”
Emperor Zhou sneered twice: “It couldn’t be those outsiders repairing bricks and replacing tiles, could it?”
“The repairs and tile replacements outside aren’t for the Imperial Noble Consort. I ordered them because I thought the place looked dilapidated.”
“I won’t make you give up your palace for her. On the day of the investiture, the Imperial Noble Consort will move into the rear side hall of Taiji Palace. You stay put and don’t let your mind wander!”
He pinched Wu Junji’s ear: “Do you hear me?”
Recently, some officials at court had argued that it was against ritual propriety to move the Crown Prince out of the main hall to welcome the Imperial Noble Consort.
Emperor Zhou dismissed all their words as nonsense.
One was his own flesh and blood, the other a woman he had never even met—which was more important? Was there even a choice?
Making the Crown Prince give up his palace for the Imperial Noble Consort? Get lost!
Sometimes, Wu Junji marveled at the wonders of heaven and earth for producing someone like Emperor Zhou.
“It’s my own wish to have a palace. It has nothing to do with the Imperial Noble Consort.”
Emperor Zhou glanced at him.
“I don’t think so.”
A two-year-old child was at the age of clinging to others. Why would he suddenly want a palace for no reason?
Someone must have been stirring up trouble!
Wu Junji: “…”
“Then, does Father Emperor think it’s appropriate to have the Imperial Noble Consort move into the rear side hall?”
With ancestral rules in place, Emperor Zhou insisted on not letting the Imperial Noble Consort enter the main palace, instead placing her in the rear side hall. If the ritual officials asked why, what would he say?
Because the Crown Prince was living in Taiji Palace, and the Imperial Noble Consort had to make way for him.
Utterly absurd.
Emperor Zhou plopped his son from his lap onto the carpet like planting a radish, looking down at the little radish from his height advantage.
“What’s inappropriate about it? Am I the one marrying her, or are you?”
“Not even grown up, yet worrying about so many things.”
“What? When I bow to heaven and earth during the ceremony, should I bow to you too?”
Wu Junji twisted his little face and retorted:
“If Father Emperor is willing to bow, I’ll accept it.”
Emperor Zhou kicked his butt with his foot.
“Utterly lawless!”
“I’m bestowing an honor upon Chen Jin’s family by investing her! Since it’s an honor, what right does she have to pick and choose?”
“I decide which room she enters, and she’ll enter that room!”
“The matter of the palace is not up for discussion.”
He spared the Chen family for the sake of that little troublemaker, which was already giving them immense face.
Emperor Zhou operated by a set of rules no one else could interfere with.
Only Emperor Zhou himself considered these rules reasonable.
Wu Junji pondered for a few breaths before softly asking:
“Is Father afraid of being scolded?”
“Let them scold all they want—what does it have to do with me?”
“I’m afraid.”
“What are you afraid of? With me here, who dares lay a finger on you? Whoever scolds you, I’ll have their head!”
“If one day, Father no longer likes me, will you still protect me?”
Emperor Zhou scoffed: “I don’t like you much now either.”
“Stubborn, weak, short and stubby, petty-minded—what is there about you worth liking?”
Wu Junji: “…”
Neither soft nor hard tactics worked; he was impervious to persuasion.
When Wu Junji was serious, the other didn’t believe him.
When he reasoned, the other wouldn’t listen.
When he expressed emotion, the other undermined him.
Since that was the case, Wu Junji stopped reasoning too. He tilted his head back and shouted:
“I don’t care, I want a palace! If you don’t give me one, I’ll run away from home!”
Emperor Zhou was even more disdainful: “Go ahead if you have the guts. If you can make it out of Taiji Palace, I’ll take your surname! You little thing.”
The short turnip on the carpet flared up like an angry calf, charging forward and chomping down on the old man’s thigh with an “aowu!” Emperor Zhou, startled and furious, hissed in pain and immediately slapped the little troublemaker’s bottom, but Wu Junji slipped away like an eel.
Qian Deli hurried over: “Your Majesty, let this servant check your leg!”
Emperor Zhou kicked him to the ground, roaring: “Check what?!”
Like a tiger emerging from the forest, he stormed out to retrieve the cub.
“You little brat! How dare you bite your father! I’m going to whip him to death with a belt today!”
Some clever soul shouted: “Stop the Crown Prince!”
Guards and eunuchs outside Taiji Palace swarmed over like leeches, surrounding the Crown Prince.
This scene infuriated Emperor Zhou. He tore the jade pendant from his waist and hurled it.
“I’ll fuck your ancestors! Who dares?!”
The shattering of jade shook the entire palace.
Only that audacious little troublemaker still dared to sprint away wildly.
Emperor Zhou strode swiftly as a dragon through clouds, scooped up the little troublemaker, and tucked him under his arm.
To the servants who had just surrounded the Crown Prince, he delivered heart-piercing kicks one by one.
“Did I tell you to move?!”
“How many dog guts do you have to dare surround the Crown Prince?!”
“Who shouted just now?! I’ll have him flayed!”
“Qian Deli! If there’s a next time, I’ll kill you!”
Qian Deli knelt on the ground, kowtowing: “This servant will certainly give Your Majesty an explanation!”
Without even entering the palace hall, Emperor Zhou immediately served the disobedient son a meal of “palm-fried meat.”
“How dare you bite your father! You’ve rebelled!”
“You little thing, full of defiance—your father will teach you the rules between father and son today!”
Wu Junji thrashed his limbs like a dog paddling, howling and wailing.
“Help—someone’s being beaten to death!”
“Wuwuwu!!”
Wu Junji cried out miserably, but Emperor Zhou didn’t believe a word of it. He was using hollow palm strikes—how painful could they be?!
The little troublemaker was deliberately playing pitiful!
Once provoked, Emperor Zhou would latch onto his target and not let go until the other yielded.
“I ask you! Do you admit your mistake?”
Wu Junji shouted loudly: “Everyone else has a palace—why can’t I?!”
“I want a palace!”
“I let you live in Taiji Palace because I value you! Others want to live here, and I won’t allow it—yet you’re still picking and choosing?!”
“Not knowing when you’re well-off—I think you’re just bored with nothing better to do!”
Wu Junji pouted, wiping away tears, and took a step back, sniffling.
“I don’t want a palace anymore. I’ll move to the rear side hall.”
Emperor Zhou roared, “I’ve already said that my marriage to the Imperial Noble Consort has nothing to do with you! I’ll marry whomever I please! Who are you to decide for me?”
88, listening nearby, felt utterly exhausted. Emperor Zhou refused to grant a palace and wouldn’t let Wu Junji move out.
No matter what the Crown Prince said, Emperor Zhou believed he was causing trouble over the Imperial Noble Consort.
The reality was that Emperor Zhou refused to provide the palace the Crown Prince should have received upon his investiture, and he wouldn’t allow the Imperial Noble Consort to enter the main hall of Taiji Palace.
Yet he insisted he had every reason and remained stubbornly convinced.
Emperor Zhou: “Since you refuse to admit your mistake, you won’t eat today!”
Wu Junji hated nothing more than being threatened with starvation.
Not only because of his sixteen years as a beggar, but also because he had nearly been starved to death in prison by the old man.
Hunger, to Wu Junji, was hell.
He burst into loud sobs: “Waaah—! I hate you!”
“I hate you!”
“Slap—!” An unexpected blow struck his face.
Wu Junji’s ears rang, and his crying stopped abruptly. Dazed, he looked up at Emperor Zhou.
The palace servants were stunned by the slap.
In the past, father and son had quarreled, but never had it come to this!
Emperor Zhou’s hand trembled uncontrollably. Though Wu Junji was the one struck, it was Emperor Zhou who seemed most heartbroken and distressed. He fled in disarray, leaving behind a command:
“Keep an eye on him!”
The servants in Taiji Palace reacted with fear, silence, or distance…
As Emperor Zhou departed, the entire Taiji Palace fell into silence.
Wu Junji raised a hand to touch his face—it hurt terribly.
His ears were still ringing. His lips quivered, and tears fell in rapid drops. He didn’t care about his face; he feared going deaf.
In his previous life, he had lost hearing in one ear. If he went deaf again in this life…
Dark thoughts flashed through his mind. He kept tugging at his earlobes until the ringing gradually faded, and only then did he begin to calm down.
He and Emperor Zhou were separated by a lifetime.
Neither knew the other’s pain points, yet in their arguments, they struck each other’s vital spots with precision and ruthlessness.
88 took a moment from its revelry to glance over: “Did things go too far?”
Wu Junji remained silent, his half-lowered eyes filled with too many incomprehensible emotions.
As time passed, his slightly protruding stomach flattened and growled.
He was hungry.
Wu Junji looked up at the sky outside. In his previous life, Chen Yu had reminisced before him about his childhood—how the Chen family would gather for dinner every day at you hour.
He stood up, tossed the cloth tiger onto the carpet, and stretched his numb legs. The small mole at the corner of his eye, reddened from crying, held a hint of danger.
“Leave the palace. Find Chen Yu.”
When he returned from outside the palace, the old man would have come to his senses, the palace issue would be resolved, Chen Yu would be displeased, and he would be happy.
One move for four gains—a total win!