Dongfang Mo gently patted the little girl’s head to calm her.
“Guards! Take everyone from Zhi Lan Pavilion to the Inner Court Office and question them one by one.”
An hour later, a servant came to report. “Your Majesty, someone has confessed.”
“Bring him in.”
A palace servant was led forward under guard.
“Your Majesty, earlier that day I was watering the flowers and trees in Zhi Lan Pavilion. I saw Lan Zhi herself place this clay jar into a hidden compartment.”
“And then I heard them whispering something about… the Soul-Devouring Gu.”
Lan Zhi, Consort Qi’s personal maid, turned pale at the mention of the name. She rushed forward and grabbed the servant by the collar. “You lying cur! Who sent you to make up such slander and frame my mistress?!”
She was dragged away by force, still shouting her innocence.
“I am not lying!” the servant insisted. “There is also a painting in Consort Qi’s chambers it shows a woman from the Southern Tribes!”
Before long, attendants brought the painting into the hall.
It depicted a single woman.
She wore a pleated skirt of deep green embroidered with crimson patterns, tiny silver bells hanging from the hem, and a sash of indigo wax-dyed cloth tied around her waist. Her features were gentle, her eyes warm and smiling. There was no mistaking her origins she was indeed from the Southern Tribes.
“Daddy, look here there is writing.” Yi Yi was also studying the painting closely. Spotting lines of characters in the lower right corner, she pointed them out to Dongfang Mo.
Dongfang Mo leaned in to read the words carefully:
“Through mist and miasma I met my beloved;
With one promise I gave my whole life.
Who knew beneath armor lay treachery and deceit;
My devotion was repaid with glory and conquest.
My spirit broke where the mountains weep in blood;
While you returned home to claim your honor and rank.”
“Your Majesty, let me explain this poem for you,” Consort Qi spoke, rising shakily to her feet.
“More than a decade ago, there lived in the Southern Tribes a priestess of unmatched beauty and grace. She fell in love with a man from a foreign land, and together they had a daughter.”
“When the girl turned four, her father returned with a great army and launched a massive invasion of the Southern Tribes. Right before his daughter’s eyes… he struck down and killed her own mother.”
“Later, the little girl was taken back to her father’s home, where he married another woman. But no stepmother could replace a true mother. She was neglected and mistreated in her own household, suffering every hardship. At sixteen, she was sent away and forced into this cold, gloomy palace.”
Her voice turned rough and hoarse as she spoke the last line.
Though she did not say it plainly, everyone in the hall understood immediately.
Consort Qi’s father was Commander Xue, once hailed as the great hero who had conquered the Southern Tribes. No one had ever guessed such a tragedy lay hidden behind his victory.
Even those who acted cruelly often carried their own sorrows.
But as Consort Qi met the looks of sympathy around her, she suddenly burst into wild, bitter laughter. “Ha! You self-righteous people of Great Xia you all deserve to die!”
“Dongfang Mo! You were supposed to be dead from the Gu poison! How did you survive? It is all because of that cursed man from the Divine Medicine Valley!”
She had thought her plan had cut off all hope, yet still she had fallen just short of success.
The Soul-Devouring Gu was an extremely vicious and overpowering poison. Those struck by it suffered agony beyond bearing. And raising such a creature demanded a terrible price years of feeding it with one’s own flesh and blood, day after day.
Now that her Gu had been destroyed, she herself suffered the backlash of its power. She had only days left to live.
If that was how things stood…
Consort Qi’s gaze turned sharp and fierce, as if a sudden burst of energy had returned to her.
Whoosh
A faint sound split the air, almost too quiet to hear.
Both Consort Qi and Lan Zhi raised their arms at once, and dozens of thin silver needles shot out from their sleeves.
“Protect the Emperor! Guards!”
The clash of steel and shouts of alarm filled the Purple Star Palace, throwing it into chaos.
Several needles flew straight toward Dongfang Mo and Yi Yi.
Yi Yi’s eyes lit up instantly.
Delicious little bugs!
The needles were as fine as hairs, and each one carried a tiny Gu worm stuck to its tip.
They smelled wonderful.
She wanted to eat them so badly.
Restrained in Dongfang Mo’s one-armed hold, she wriggled restlessly, reaching out to grab them but her father moved even faster.
Dongfang Mo narrowed his eyes, twisting his body to dodge the needles while his left hand shot out like lightning, catching the flying needles precisely between his fingers.
“Go ahead,” he said, holding them out to her.
The sound of her eager swallowing was louder than he expected…
Yi Yi did not hear his silent complaint. She opened her mouth and breathed in deeply, and the Gu worms instantly dissolved into fine ash.
She smacked her lips, looking slightly disappointed. These were too small to make a proper meal.
Crash!
Amid the confusion, the clay jar shattered on the floor. Brightly colored snakes, centipedes, spiders, and other venomous creatures began to crawl out.
They scattered in every direction, sending chills down everyone’s spines.
A single bite from any of them meant instant death. Already several guards had fallen, their bodies still twitching.
Consort Qi spat out a mouthful of blood. “The Emperor of Great Xia no better than any other fool.”
She closed her eyes and began to chant a spell, commanding the creatures to turn their venom toward Dongfang Mo.
The insects and snakes, which had been attacking the guards, abruptly changed direction and surged toward the Emperor.
They moved with terrifying speed, closing the distance in seconds.
Several guards braced themselves to shield their ruler with their lives only to see Yi Yi slip free from her father’s arms and step forward, reaching out her hand as if to touch the lead snake.
“Your Highness!” the guards cried out in horror.
It was over…
Many in the room turned their faces away, unable to bear the sight of such a gruesome end.
That snake was deadly beyond measure surely the princess would be…
One second, two seconds, three seconds…
The expected bite never came. Instead, everyone watched in disbelief as the large snake lay motionless, “obediently” curling itself into Yi Yi’s grasp.
What was more, all the remaining venomous creatures stopped in their tracks right at her feet, making no move to attack.
Consort Qi stared in shock, chanting the spell over and over again in a desperate attempt to regain control.
But to her horror, she could no longer sense them at all. The link between her and the Gu worms was gone.
With her power broken, Consort Qi and Lan Zhi were quickly seized and restrained.
After a long silence, Consort Qi looked at Yi Yi in utter disbelief. “So it was you… I never imagined I would lose in the end to a child barely two years old.”
She screamed, her eyes bulging with rage. “It was not Bai Ningbing who broke the curse it was you!”
Realizing she had been defeated by such an unexpected opponent, she collapsed back onto the floor, her spirit broken. She coughed up more blood, and with her body already weakened and her time running out, she finally breathed her last.
Consort Qi and Lan Zhi were carried away.
Dongfang Mo sent for several empty clay jars as Yi Yi had asked, then carried her out of the hall.
He called for Eunuch Li and gave his orders. “The stench and poison are heavy here. Have the place thoroughly cleaned and disinfected. And not a word of what happened today shall leave this room.”
Eunuch Li, who had been pale and shaken, snapped back into his professional mode. He immediately sent servants to wash and scrub every corner.
Yi Yi sat happily on a stool, admiring her new collection.
Dongfang Mo had given her five jars.
One by one, she took the snakes, centipedes, and spiders from the large broken pot and arranged them in neat lines.
“Little snake goes in one jar.”
“Little piggy goes in another.”
“Little legs go in this one.”
…
She carefully placed each creature into its own container, even giving them cute names though she knew all too well they would eventually become her dinner.
Dongfang Mo watched, his eyelids twitching uncontrollably.
Help me what am I to do with a daughter who loves eating bugs?
Outside the city.
In a guest chamber at the courier station, two figures sat in quiet conversation.
A man with strikingly handsome, almost exotic features twirled a thin bamboo stick, stirring something inside a jade bowl.
Across the table, a woman sipped wine slowly.
Suddenly, the man clicked his tongue and frowned, muttering, “It’s dead.”
Inside the bowl lay several Gu worms. One of them had turned completely gray and lifeless.
The woman leaned forward to look, surprised. “Isn’t that the one you spent years raising and hiding in the palace? Who could possibly have destroyed it?”
A faint smile touched the man’s lips, as if he had just remembered something interesting. “It seems the Imperial Palace has produced its own natural enemy of the Gu.”
“How intriguing,” the woman said. “I take it you already have a plan in mind?”