Just as Ying Xu said, when Xie Jingchen was young he indeed was not very favored by people — by people of high rank and great power, in fact here it can directly refer to his imperial father and Ying Xu’s father, General Ying, the two, especially the former emperor’s favor.
Xie Jingchen was of low birth, his biological mother was merely a little palace maid who had once been favored by the former emperor by accident, if not because of Ying Xu, the former emperor would completely not remember having had such a person, much less this cheap imperial son born in the Cold Palace.
So before meeting Ying Xu, Xie Jingchen had suffered many hardships in the Cold Palace, a place like the Cold Palace was originally not a place for people to stay, even the most normal person after staying there for a period of time would become abnormal.
— What the imperial palace lacks the least is stepping on the low when meeting the high. And the eunuchs that everyone knows, many because of their own incompleteness have some perversion, so a place like the Cold Palace where no noble person will come to visit becomes the place for these eunuchs who are usually bullied, scolded, and looked down upon to vent and feel proud.
Everyone in the Cold Palace can be treated as a punching bag, a plaything for others, this is basically a tacit unspoken rule in the palace.
Although rarely known, it indeed truly exists.
And Xie Jingchen at that time in the Cold Palace was young, so without a doubt he suffered no little bullying, eating cold leftovers and even going hungry were completely everyday matters, verbal abuse and even beatings were also not lacking — after all, compared to those eunuchs who usually had to suffer oppression from their masters, he, this “little eunuch” who somehow had been sent to the Cold Palace, was an even weaker existence.
However, Xie Jingchen was not born with a temperament of submissively accepting everything, after being beaten once or twice, after feeling pain, he also naturally learned to fight back, even though he was small at that time, his stature was small, and he could not beat those people, but he had a kind of desperate ruthlessness in him, shocking those people who bullied him.
But this ruthlessness was a double-edged sword, for a time those people were frightened by him, but afterward they harbored resentment and joined together to viciously beat Xie Jingchen, and it was that time that Xie Jingchen was almost beaten to death, leaving only the last breath — but actually those people thought he had already been beaten to death, and only then did they turn and leave, but Xie Jingchen did not die, he merely fainted.
After waking up, relying on a tenacious will to survive, and a hatred determined to retaliate against those people, Xie Jingchen stubbornly, step by step, crawled out of the Cold Palace using his hands.
Then… just when he was about to die, Xie Jingchen saw the most beautiful, and also the most wonderful little girl in the world.
Yongyuan fifteenth year, this year Ying Xu was seven years old.
The little girl, doted on in every way, did not know how she gave birth to strange and curious thoughts, and suddenly said she wanted to go to the rumored Cold Palace to take a look at what it was like.
Ying Xu had always been favored, before this she had even made the request to raise flowers in front of His Majesty’s Mingguang Palace gate and plant a small flower garden, and it had been agreed to, so the matter of wanting to go to the Cold Palace naturally would not be refused.
But that place ultimately was not a good place, filthy and gloomy things were many, in order not to pollute the little girl’s eyes, the emperor naturally gave orders in advance, letting people conduct a “clearing” of the Cold Palace side beforehand.
But perhaps it was just such a coincidence, although the emperor had already let people handle all the strange things in the Cold Palace in advance, absolutely not allowing them to appear before Ying Xu, originally Xie Jingchen also should have been like those people who were cleared away.
But at that time, because Xie Jingchen had just been retaliated against and beaten nearly to death by a group of small-minded eunuchs, he was unconscious in the Cold Palace, not “moving about” in the Cold Palace, so by coincidence he escaped this “clearing” calamity.
And when Xie Jingchen woke up, because he did not want to die, he struggled to leave the Cold Palace to survive, and it was exactly during this process that he was seen at the Cold Palace gate by Ying Xu, who did not know human suffering and was loved by ten thousand.
“Eh? Why is there an injured little eunuch here?”
That was when Xie Jingchen, who had just with great difficulty crawled out of the Cold Palace, first met eyes with those beautiful phoenix eyes, at that time Xie Jingchen originally wanted to stretch out his blood-stained hand to pull the little girl’s bright and gorgeous skirt hem, wanting to threaten her, this carefree “princess” who at a glance knew nothing — at that time he thought that Ying Xu, dressed so magnificently, must be a princess who could find someone to treat him.
But just before he stretched out his hand, he saw the exquisitely pretty little girl’s dark eyes look at him for a moment, then slightly squat down, extend her clean and soft little hand and gently poke his bruised face, blinking her eyes, somewhat curiously saying, “Eh, can you still talk?”
So exhausted that he did not have any strength left, Xie Jingchen did not want to pay attention to Ying Xu’s kind of nutritionally empty question at all, and even to this he was too lazy to even move his eyes, because he did not want to waste his remaining strength on this kind of boring and unnecessary matter.
So Ying Xu’s question only obtained the young boy’s endless silence, “……”
But not long after he chose silence, he then saw Ying Xu poke his cheek again, and this time it was deliberately aimed at the injured spot, her tone carrying a kind of innocent cruelty as she said, “Is he dead? But your eyes aren’t closed, is this what the book says about dying with eyes unclosed?”
The little girl in gorgeous clothes stood up, in an instant the silver ornaments she wore specially to pray for children’s safety jingled, looking at the half-dead “little eunuch” on the ground, with a crisp and pleasant voice she said, “Since you look quite good-looking, I’ll let people come collect your corpse.”
As soon as this sentence fell, Ying Xu was about to turn her head.
And hearing Ying Xu say this, Xie Jingchen, who originally did not want to bother with the little girl’s nutritionally empty questions, also could not hold back and spoke, “…I’m not dead.”
“Wow!” The little girl was startled by this sudden voice, then squatted down again, looking at Xie Jingchen on the ground who was like a cloth doll — still a cloth doll cut into pieces that could not move, and said in shock, “Why don’t your eyes move at all?”
In those beautiful phoenix eyes was pure curiosity, just like discovering some novel and interesting toy.
And precisely because of such a curiosity, immediately afterward Ying Xu turned her head and in a sweet and soft voice called toward behind, “Imperial Uncle, let people bring the imperial physician over!”
“……”
So she was not alone. Fortunately he had not frightened her, otherwise he really would have been dead.
At this time, the still young Xie Jingchen’s heart held only pure relief.
And Ying Xu to him was nothing more than some noble little princess in the palace who did not know human suffering, other than that there was nothing special. If one had to say something special, it was that she looked like she was somewhat easy to deceive.
…Xie Jingchen could use Ying Xu to leave the Cold Palace, this broken place. Afterward, retaliate against that group of dead eunuchs.
At that time Ying Xu had been pampered for seven years, usually had done all kinds of spoiled, willful, unreasonable things — she had not spared even hitting the emperor, naturally, to an adult man, a little girl hitting people also did not have much strength.
Whenever anyone provoked her even a little and she was unhappy, she would throw a fit, making everyone uncomfortable. She was not some gentle, kind, obedient little girl whom everyone liked from the heart.
If one calculated, in the little girl’s first seven years of life, after seeing Xie Jingchen in the Cold Palace and having the emperor call the imperial physician to save his life was truly the only good deed the spoiled little girl had done.
Naturally, the purpose of this only good deed itself was also not because Ying Xu wanted to do good, but because she thought Xie Jingchen might be fun.
The two’s first meeting, one treated the other as a somewhat novel toy, the other treated the other as a tool to climb upward.
Ying Xu and Xie Jingchen met under such dramatic circumstances.
However, such circumstances did not last long. Or more accurately speaking, Xie Jingchen’s mentality of wanting to use Ying Xu as a tool to leave the Cold Palace did not last long.
Ying Xu had once treated Xie Jingchen as a novel toy, and people always cherish their rare things, Ying Xu was like this.
From the initial period after picking up Xie Jingchen, because he made the little girl feel novel, Ying Xu naturally treated Xie Jingchen very, very well.
Bringing him out of the Cold Palace, finding people to treat his injuries naturally need not be mentioned, afterward during Xie Jingchen’s recovery period, she even threw everything good she had onto him in one go.
Delicacies, cloth, jewelry, during that period, whatever Ying Xu had, she would definitely prepare a share for Xie Jingchen as well, dressing the young man with a good foundation beautifully, like a human doll.
Later, after she had arranged things, Ying Xu also personally taught him to read and recognize characters. Even the name Xie Jingchen was also given by the little girl.
And Xie Jingchen, without a doubt, thus sank into Ying Xu’s patience toward him.
From the initial scheming, harboring little intentions, deliberately being obedient and very cooperative with Ying Xu, whatever Ying Xu asked him to do, he would do, intentionally coaxing the high-status little girl to be happy, wanting to climb upward through this and retaliate against those who had bullied him, to later listening to Ying Xu, simply wanting to listen to Ying Xu, simply wanting her to be happy.
And this kind of process changed, Xie Jingchen actually only spent less than half a month.
Xie Jingchen would forever remember that day, Ying Xu as usual was teaching him to read.
Only what was somewhat unusual was that the former emperor’s side sent someone to the little girl’s palace, telling Ying Xu that Xie Jingchen was actually the former emperor’s bloodline, and by rights should also count as an imperial prince.