[Rebirth on a Winter Night]
Heavy winter snow blanketed the palace, mounding atop crimson walls and sweeping across tiled roofs. Inside, the stillness was shattered by panic; frantic voices echoed through the corridors as Imperial Guards surged toward a remote, forgotten hall hidden deep within the grounds.
The structure stood desolate, choked by overgrown weeds and years of neglect. The guards moved with lethal speed, storming the courtyard to form a rigid, solemn perimeter around a lone man standing motionless in the falling snow.
Behind the guards, heavy palace robes swept across the ground as Consort Dowager Ning entered with poise and luxury. She covered her nose and mouth with a jade handkerchief, condescending to step into this barren place. She looked at the man in the snow with a face full of loathing. The thick snow could not hide her opulence, but as she looked down at him with disdain, there was not a shred of affection in her eyes—only the cold nobility of her high status.
The man in the snow wore only plain, thin clothes. His face was as pale as the snow, devoid of color. Not a single charcoal fire had been lit in the hall; the air was biting and frigid.
He looked like a ghost imprisoned in this realm, lacking any spark of life. His eyes were bottomless pits, his gaunt face was ridden with illness, and a hideous scar ran down the side of his face.
However, his eyes looked straight past the snow-covered palace walls. Hearing the bells tolling in the distance, his lips twitched, and he burst into loud laughter as if he had heard the world’s greatest joke.
Hearing this brazen laughter, Consort Dowager Ning’s expression darkened further. She cast a cold glance at her subordinates. A man stepped forward; with a splash of fresh blood, a head fell to the ground with a thud. Even in death, the decapitated man bore an anxious expression, as if he had been desperate to convey a message but was silenced before he could speak.
The man looked down, his eyes meeting the severed head of the person he had grown up with. There was no emotion in his gaze.
“A loyal dog you had there; even in death, he wanted to save you,” Consort Dowager Ning said with a chuckle. “But I suppose I forgot—the Prince is currently of unsound mind. You’ve likely long forgotten this eunuch you released from the palace. What a pity. You let him go, yet he thought only of saving his master, privately contacting rebels to come back for you.”
As the blood from the head seeped into the snow, Ying Fusheng locked eyes with those that refused to close in death. His brain, long ravaged by poisons, seemed to finally recover a sliver of clarity. He smiled. “It seems my dear Imperial Brother is getting anxious. It’s understandable; ascending the throne through illegitimate means must make for some wakeful nights filled with nightmares.”
At the mention of the new Emperor, Consort Dowager Ning gnashed her teeth, and the guards behind her leveled their blades at him. The swiftest urgent report had reached the palace only fifteen minutes ago: the new Emperor was purging all dissenters, and all rebels had been sentenced to the ultimate penalty. This man, imprisoned in the Cold Palace, was the last one left. No one had expected that such a man, within a palace sealed off from information, could conspire with the northern regional prince to turn the entire court upside down.
The most widespread rumor was that the new Emperor’s identity was fraudulent—that he was not the biological son of Empress Dowager Xu.
A eunuch began to read the decree of guilt in a high-pitched voice: “The criminal official Ying Fusheng has deceived the sovereign and conspired with rebels. The evidence is conclusive… He is granted one cup of poisoned wine to end his own life.”
“For the sake of our past as mother and son, do you have any last words?” Consort Dowager Ning asked.
“Why is the Consort Dowager in such a hurry? He was just a eunuch; there was no need for you to act personally.” Ying Fusheng reached out and closed the eunuch’s eyes. His tone was as calm as a peaceful breeze, yet his words were pure rebellion: “The Xu family isn’t even panicking yet, but you are so desperate to legitimize the new Emperor. One might think he was actually your biological son. But Mother, if I am a rebel, do you think the new Emperor will simply let you and the Ning family off the hook? Today the Ning family are heroes; tomorrow they can be traitors. Between leaving a potential threat and pulling the weed out by its roots, which one do you think gives the Emperor more peace of mind?”
“This madman… Send the Prince on his way!” she hissed through gritted teeth.
The guards stepped forward.
Behind Consort Dowager Ning, an attendant carrying a tray followed with small steps. A few flakes of snow drifted into the cup and melted; the poisoned wine trembled within.
The Head Eunuch said nothing, holding the wine out to Ying Fusheng. “Your Highness, please.”
Faced with a cup of poison, Ying Fusheng looked out at the desolate courtyard. This was likely the first time so many people had set foot in this wasteland; his brother had actually been willing to deploy so many guards for him. He laughed loudly, the sound echoing through the hall with a chilling, eerie quality that made the guards tensed and wary.
“No need to trouble yourselves.” Ying Fusheng’s entire body was shaking; even without this cup of wine, he wouldn’t have survived the winter. He reached out and grasped the cup, his own face reflected dimly in the dark liquid. He murmured, “Fine wine before me and no time to celebrate… then I shall wish my brother endless sleepless nights and a throne that never feels secure…”
With that, he drained the cup in one gulp. The poison scorched his throat, yet it brought a sense of joy he hadn’t felt in years.
So what if he was a Prince? Without power or influence, one can never scale those red walls.
It took Ying Fusheng many years to understand this truth. Between Consort Dowager Ning’s manipulation and the secrets of the inner court, his absurd life had ended in total betrayal.
Ying Fusheng’s peripheral vision drifted past the wind and snow toward a higher place.
His vision gradually dimmed. He could not close his eyes; his gaze toward the heights of the palace was filled with nothing but resentment.
Within moments of the wine hitting his throat, his breath stopped.
‘If there is a next life…’
……
With a splash, a sense of suffocation rushed toward him. Water flooded his nasal passages, and Ying Fusheng began to sink into the icy depths.
“Oh no! His Highness has fallen into the water!”
“Someone, come quickly!”
*Glug, glug.* It felt as though his ears were muffled by a layer of water. He felt his body being moved, and the sound of ragged breathing drifted from nearby.
As Ying Fusheng heard the cacophony around him, the thundering sound of water in his ears receded. The first thing he felt was a searing fever in his body; his throat felt as though it were being burned, and breathing became an arduous task. He struggled to break through the predicament of impending death, and when a breath of air finally rushed into his throat, he jolted awake from a convulsion.
‘Falling into water? What are these people talking about?’
Fragmented words poured into his ears as he forced his eyes open.
What met his gaze was a brightly lit inner chamber. On both sides of the bed, the curtains were of a luxurious hue, adorned with lustrous pearls and swaying tassels. The light was so piercingly bright he could barely keep his eyes open; having been imprisoned in the deep palace for years, he had long grown accustomed to damp, cold places. Yet now, he was surrounded by warmth so intense it made him feel breathless and dizzy, leaving his head throbbing with a spliting pain.
‘Am I not dead?’
As the surrounding voices grew louder, his face turned two shades paler. Before he could figure out the situation, an excited cry suddenly erupted from beside him: “Your Highness!”
At this sound, everyone present stopped wailing and looked at the person on the bed as if they had seen a ghost. As his five senses returned, Ying Fusheng felt a wave of panic ripple through the room.
“Go tell Her Highness quickly—His Highness is awake!”
Distant memories flooded back with that shout. Ying Fusheng’s entire body tensed; his throat still seemed to hold the pungent, burning sting of his final moments. In his mind’s eye, the cold face of the new Emperor in the grand hall seemed to flicker, and the noisy voices around him were laced with the malice of others… finally, the hallucinations dissolved into the bedchamber before him.
A young eunuch was kneeling before him, his eyes brimming with tears, overwhelmed with excitement upon seeing Ying Fusheng open his eyes.
Ying Fusheng, still in a daze, spoke: “Song An?”
The eunuch Song An was the attendant who had served him since childhood. The image of the severed head with eyes that wouldn’t close in the snow was still fresh in his mind, now overlapping with this youthful, innocent face.
‘Didn’t he die with me? Who is this person in front of me?’
‘Had I truly gone mad in the end?’ Ravaged by residual poison, he was seeing such a vivid hallucination before death.
“I told you to leave the palace. Why have you come back?” he murmured.
“Your Highness, what are you saying?” Song An was stunned for a moment. Hearing Ying Fusheng speak nonsense, he grew even more anxious, tears falling. “You accidentally fell into the water and have been unconscious for half a day. Even the Imperial Physicians said you might not pull through.”
Unable to see outside clearly, Ying Fusheng felt the room was astonishingly warm. ‘Who decided to use so much charcoal? Don’t they know it must be used sparingly?’
Ying Fusheng stared at the illusory scene before him and then at the young, thin-limbed Song An.
The images overlapped, and the grip on his hand grew heavier. ‘A dream? A hallucination? Or something else?’
‘It is too real.’ With a pale face, he asked: “Fallen into water? When did I fall? Has the new Emperor ascended the throne yet?”
Upon hearing this, the people around him were scared witless. They hurried forward. The Great Yuan Dynasty was currently at the peak of its national strength, and the Emperor was in his prime—had His Highness been burned so delirious that he would say such things!
Finally, seeing the “seen-a-ghost” expressions on the faces of those around him, Ying Fusheng realized something: “What year is it?”
“It is the sixteenth year of Taiyuan,” the palace servants replied, seeing the Sixth Prince’s dazed state.
‘The sixteenth year of Taiyuan…? Fifteen years ago?!’
A shiver ran through Ying Fusheng. He looked around in a daze, finally fixing his eyes on his own thin arms. His skin bore the bluish-purple marks left by years of injections, and clear veins stood out beneath his overly pale skin. Most importantly, this was the pair of hands… belonging to a child. He looked at the scene in shock, his mind reeling as he saw the people around him through his flickering vision.
The familiar decorations of the hall were completely different from the Cold Palace where he had been imprisoned for years. The charcoal stove was warm, the cold wind was kept out—distant memories surged with this sight. This was actually the Weiyang Palace where he lived as a child.
‘Weiyang Palace? Have I gone mad, or is this a hallucination?’
“Consort Ning has arrived—” A voice came from the outer hall, pulling Ying Fusheng’s muddled thoughts back.
Almost instinctively following the sound, he looked toward the outer room. He saw the hanging curtain lifted as a beautiful woman in palace robes walked in.
“Your Highness! His Highness is awake!”
Ying Fusheng’s gaze, following the commotion, landed on the beautiful woman behind the servants.
In a trance, perhaps not long ago, he had seen this woman walk toward him. Her magnificent palace robes swept across the thick snow at the gates of the Cold Palace, and the servants followed respectfully behind her, their flattering voices calling her “Consort Dowager.”
In the shimmering light, the young Consort Ning walked toward him. This favored consort’s eyes held not a shred of concern, but rather a bottomless coldness. The two figures overlapped. The face before him did not have the aged elegance of the future; it was as young and beautiful as in his memories—the luxurious earrings, the magnificent robes, even the scent of rouge on her body were all imperial gifts.
Ying Fusheng’s pupils constricted. This was Consort Ning, his so-called “biological” mother.
The pungency of the poisoned wine turned into a phantom memory. Perhaps because the conditions in Weiyang Palace were too real, seeing her young appearance again reminded him of his youth when he was a puppet at her mercy.
He had been born prematurely. His mother had narrowly escaped death to give birth to him, losing half her life in the process. From childhood, Ying Fusheng was not loved by his mother. He never complained, knowing his birth was ill-timed and had nearly cost her life. He was respectful and filial to Consort Ning; even though he suffered neglect and disregard, he never disobeyed her.
So later, when his consort mother asked him for a small favor, he agreed without a second thought, never imagining it would be the start of his framing. That “small favor” involved military accounts; the moment he touched them, it was like a mountain collapsing. It directly incensed his Imperial Father, and he was confined deep within the palace. Before being locked away, he even worried whether his mistake would implicate his mother. As it turned out, he had overthought everything—not only was his mother unharmed, but she and the Ning family behind her seized the opportunity to become part of the Crown Prince’s faction.
He was a discarded pawn pushed to the front, a stepping stone for the Ning family to show their loyalty and climb the ranks.
It wasn’t until he had been imprisoned for two years that he learned from an old wet nurse—who had survived being poisoned mute—that he was not Consort Ning’s biological son. He had been swapped at birth. His true biological mother was Empress Xu. At that time, the Ning family was declining and there was no heir in the Eastern Palace. Since the Empress was deeply trusted and loved by the Emperor, Consort Ning bribed the Empress’s personal maid, took labor-inducing drugs, and during the simultaneous births, carried out a world-shaking scheme to swap the princes.
In the end, the new Emperor ascended, the Ning family rose to power, and they became the heroes of the new dynasty.
Meanwhile, he was granted death by a cup of poisoned wine—only to open his eyes and find himself here.
“Consort Ning!” the palace servants saluted.
Ying Fusheng was pulled back to reality by the servant’s voice, only to find his hands hidden beneath the quilt were trembling. A bone-deep hatred welled up in his heart. He clenched his fingers and surveyed his surroundings; the overlapping memories vanished, and people and objects stood clearly before him.
The Sixth Prince had been unconscious with a high fever for a day after falling into the water, and Weiyang Palace had been in a state of high tension. Imperial physicians had been in and out several times. Now that he was suddenly awake, Consort Ning arrived with a physician in tow. The physician took Ying Fusheng’s pulse; amidst his panic, a look of joy surfaced. After a careful examination, he said, “It is good that His Highness has awakened. It is very good.”
“Your Highness, His Highness has pulled through!” someone added.
Consort Ning looked haggard, her eyes slightly red. Upon hearing this, her face lit up with joy. As she approached Ying Fusheng, she pulled him by the arm into her embrace, saying in an agitated tone, “Sheng’er, do you feel better? You were always a playful child, but how could you wander off to such a place?”
“Thankfully, the physicians were skilled enough to save you. If something happened to you, what would Mother do!”
The scent of rouge filled his nostrils, and the rushing sound of water in Ying Fusheng’s ears receded. He looked down at Consort Ning’s hands, which were gripping him with excessive force. The sting from the friction of the fabric pulled his thoughts back; she didn’t seem to care at all that such force would affect a feverish child. In just a few sentences, while seemingly offering a gentle explanation, she was actually condemning him for causing trouble by falling into the water and blaming him for being willful.
After she finished, seeing the small figure in her arms remain silent, she asked, “You child, why aren’t you speaking?”
“Your Highness, His Highness has just woken up; he must be treated with care,” the physician interjected tactfully. “But that he woke at all is a true blessing!”
Only then did Consort Ning seem to realize, hurriedly asking the physician what precautions were needed, acting exactly like a flustered mother.
Seeing this, the surrounding physicians and servants consoled her, saying the Prince was blessed by the heavens.
Listening to this fake performance and seeing the softened gazes of the physicians, Ying Fusheng finally remembered when this was. This was a winter night during his childhood when he fell into the water and nearly didn’t make it. The physicians had treated him through the night to pull him back from the gates of death. That fall left him weak and chronically ill, yet Consort Ning suppressed the incident, telling the outside world the Prince was simply willful and playful, all while maintaining her reputation as a virtuous and loving mother.
“Your Highness, do you feel any discomfort?”
After a while, the physician finally sensed something was wrong.
Despite several remarks, the Sixth Prince had no reaction and had barely moved.
They had always heard that Consort Ning and the Sixth Prince shared a deep bond and that she had stayed by his side all night, yet now it seemed the Prince and Her Highness were quite distant. Earlier, he had responded to the little eunuch, but he hadn’t said a single word to Consort Ning.
In the past, Ying Fusheng would have agreed immediately to such words, but for some reason today, he didn’t react for a long time. As the physician looked over, Consort Ning gritted her teeth slightly and called out softly, her hand pinching Ying Fusheng’s arm to force a reaction out of him.
The child sitting on the bed remained motionless in her embrace. Due to the fever, his lips were a frighteningly deep red. Through his scattered hair, his dark eyes stared at Consort Ning, suddenly giving off the chilling aura of a vengeful spirit seeking a life. The servants noticed and, remembering his delirious talk upon waking, couldn’t help but feel a chill.
Finally, just as the physician was about to approach, the Sixth Prince spoke: “Thirsty.”
“Bring the medicine,” the physician ordered.
The eunuch Song An immediately got up to fetch the medicine for Ying Fusheng.
When it was brought over, Consort Ning took it. She carefully moved it toward Ying Fusheng’s mouth. “Come, Sheng’er, be careful, it’s hot.”
Before she could finish, the Sixth Prince’s body trembled uncontrollably. As he moved forward slightly, he bumped into the hand Consort Ning was using to hold the medicine. Caught completely off guard, the warm medicine splashed all over her. Her magnificent palace robes were instantly stained. For a split second, she lost control of her expression; the heat made her jump up, nearly screaming out loud.
The people around them turned pale and rushed over. Ying Fusheng watched her, and after a moment, as if only just realizing what happened, he looked at her with concern. “Mother?”
Consort Ning met his gaze and managed to suppress her expression. “It’s nothing. Sheng’er, you weren’t burned, were you?”
The servants hurried to clean up the mess. Consort Ning’s hand was scalded red; she gritted her teeth and forced a smile, unable to even go change her clothes yet. “Physician, how is Sheng’er?”
After the chaos settled and the physician saw the Sixth Prince had calmed down, he asked a few questions. Seeing that Ying Fusheng responded to everything, he stepped aside and said to Consort Ning, “His Highness fell into water and the cold has entered his body. It is good that he woke, but great care must be taken over the next few days.”
“It is currently the eve of the palace banquet. Sheng’er’s illness is stable for now; if word gets out, it wouldn’t be good to cause the Empress Dowager excessive worry,” Consort Ning said, looking haggard. As she spoke, she kept glancing at the Sixth Prince on the bed with a worried expression. “I shall trouble you for the next few days.”
“I understand,” the physician replied with a grateful bow. He knew that if a Prince fell seriously ill, the Imperial Medical Academy was often the first to be blamed.
Having finally seen off the physician, Consort Ning’s face returned to a calm state. She looked at Ying Fusheng on the bed, her disgust barely hidden. All emotion vanished, and the look she gave him was that of a stranger looking at an ordinary patient—no heartache, no pity, as if she were just going through the motions.
Seeing that Ying Fusheng didn’t have much of a reaction, she thought to herself: ‘Why didn’t this wretched thing just burn into an idiot?’
A maid brought a fresh bowl of medicine. “Your Highness, Her Highness brewed this medicine herself and watched over it for more than an hour.”
Consort Ning’s patience was nearing its end. Mindful of the servants nearby, she put on a rare face of concern, and her voice softened. “The Empress Dowager’s birthday is approaching, and the palace is busy. I have been tasked with the banquet arrangements, and your Imperial Father is still at the front lines and hasn’t returned. Do not be willful at a time like this.”
Her throat was dry from talking, and her stained robes made her extremely uncomfortable.
Finally, just as she was about to lose her temper, Ying Fusheng began to drink the medicine.
As he drank, the tension in Consort Ning’s brow finally relaxed. Seeing that he had finished nearly half the bowl and was looking drowsy, she set the bowl aside. She instructed the other maids to watch him closely, stating that the Prince needed quiet rest, then stood up and left.
As soon as Consort Ning left, the other palace servants in the hall watched the Sixth Prince lying there motionless. When his eyes swept across them, a faint chill ran down their spines.
Hearing the head maid say that the Prince required quiet rest, several servants scrambled to follow her out.
The moment everyone else was gone, Ying Fusheng suddenly clawed at his throat. A wave of nausea surged within him.
He retched the medicinal liquid all back out, frightening Song An, who immediately moved to call for a physician: “Someone—”
But Ying Fusheng reached out and stopped him. Only after he was certain he had expelled every drop of the medicine did he allow himself to lean back, his body still trembling with nausea. The violent heaving of his chest made his emotions highly unstable. It took a long while for the nightmares of the past to dissipate before he slowly looked down at the dark medicinal stains splattered on the floor.
This medicine could not be drunk. In his youth, he was physically frail; it was said his foundation had been depleted due to his premature birth. Even if he were to grow up smoothly, he was destined to be plagued by sickness and misfortune.
Back then, Consort Ning seemed very devoted, constantly ordering people to find restorative tonics to build up his strength. It was because of this that Ying Fusheng once believed his mother loved him, just in a reserved way. But later, when he was imprisoned deep in the palace with no one to rely on, an elderly, kind-hearted female official diagnosed him. Only then did he learn he had been deeply poisoned by a secret palace drug.
It was a concoction left over from the previous dynasty. The female official told him that even if an imperial physician examined him, they would only conclude his body was “depleted.” Unless one was intimately familiar with the drug’s properties, it was almost impossible to detect. Over time, however, it would corrode the internal organs and affect the mind, leading most victims to either go mad or die of illness.
Ying Fusheng stared at the blackened stains on the floor. What looked like life-saving nourishment was actually a force pushing him toward a dead end. He averted his gaze, surveying the luxurious and warm bedchamber. For a moment, it seemed to morph into that gloomy, lightless Cold Palace, the whistling wind threatening to tear through his mind.
“Your fever hasn’t even broken yet. I’ll go find Sister Bi Zhu and ask her to have another batch brewed.” Bi Zhu was Consort Ning’s personal maid. Song An turned to leave as soon as he finished speaking.
But he had only taken a few steps when he was suddenly pulled back by his master. He stopped abruptly, afraid of startling the Prince, only to turn and find Ying Fusheng looking at him with pitch-black eyes. Those eyes were clear, yet they seemed bottomless, giving Song An a start.
“Song An, come closer,” Ying Fusheng said.
Song An approached blankly. As soon as he was near, the Prince’s warm hand brushed against his neck. The sudden heat of the Prince’s touch surprised him. His master seemed to be feeling for something non-existent on his neck, remaining silent for a long time.
“Your Highness?”
Ying Fusheng felt the vibrant pulse beneath the skin. The head that had died with eyes open in the snow was now filled with a vitality he hadn’t felt before. The thrumming of blood pulled his thoughts back to the present. He hid his strange expression and spoke after a moment: “It’s nothing. You may go.”
Song An felt a lingering sense of worry, but seeing that his master wanted to rest, he had no choice but to withdraw.
Because of Consort Ning’s instructions, no one entered the outer hall. Once Song An left, it became exceptionally quiet. This kind of silence, however, was what Ying Fusheng was most familiar with; for many years, he had lived in exactly this kind of soul-crushing isolation.
Ying Fusheng draped a robe over his shoulders and stood up. He picked up the medicine bowl and sniffed it, then poured the remainder into the charcoal stove. The “restorative” tonic that Consort Ning had supposedly labored over was instantly consumed by the flames, evaporating into nothingness. He walked over to a bronze mirror nearby and saw his current self. His youthful face bore little resemblance to the man he would become; his gaunt face was full of sickness, and his downcast eyes held a hint of fragility. Although he was ten years old, he looked like a child of seven or eight. His small frame appeared weak and easy to bully—tender and cowardly—but he did not yet have the hideous scar from the blade.
Though Ying Fusheng was burning with fever, his heart grew cold, inch by inch. This was a face that did not resemble his mother at all. If there was any similarity, it was perhaps in his brows and eyes, which favored his Imperial Father. He bore none of the Ning family’s characteristic features of broad brows and large eyes.
He had not died.
He had returned to his childhood, to a time before everything had begun.