The long winter had already passed several months ago.
Although the peaceful days here in the Aorong Kingdom could hardly compare to the stability of the Central Plains, for this desolate land, this should have normally been a period that could barely be considered stable… However, the Aorong Kingdom was currently boiling over, and the flames of gossip were burning wildly.
“Oh my lord, I heard the Prince pulled Yuchi Xiu right into his arms and kissed him directly…”
“How on earth does this kid Yuchi Xiu dare to deal with that living judge of hell…”
“Can Young Master Yuchi’s thin arms and legs possibly handle that?”
“To be honest… facing a tyrant who might drag someone off for execution at any moment, how can anyone bring themselves to…”
“My aunt works in the Prince’s estate, and this is first-hand internal news straight from there. Apparently, they’ve been carrying on a clandestine affair ever since Yuchi Xiu first started working as a counselor…”
“Now that you mention it, Officer Zhang on night patrol saw it too the Prince toward his counselor…”
All of this centered around the explosive scandals surrounding the terrifying Prince of Aorong, Tuoba Lin, and his newly appointed counselor, Yuchi Xiu.
Although Yuchi Xiu had long guessed things would turn out this way…
He truly never expected that these ancients’ capacity for spreading gossip could reach such preposterous heights.
The moment Yuchi Xiu spotted people discussing him, he bolted in a panic to hide behind a rockery, letting out a heavy sigh.
Back when he had been left behind in the corridor by his older brother, surrounded by maidservants and guards who outwardly pretended to sweep the floor while perking up their ears to eavesdrop on the brothers’ conversation, he had already anticipated being swallowed by waves of idle chatter.
Yet the speed and destructive force of this gossip far exceeded Yuchi Xiu’s imagination.
No matter where he walked, he could hear rumors of a cut-sleeve romance between himself and the Prince. What’s more, these rumors kept iterating and upgrading in bizarre ways. Over the past three days, everyone he encountered would cast a sympathetic gaze that said, “I understand completely; serving the ruler is like sleeping with a tiger,” patting him on the shoulder and leaving behind a parting, “Take good care of yourself,” before walking away.
This preposterous gossip even reached the dining table of General Yuchi’s residence, driving his old father, Yuchi Yuan, to wail loudly and beat his chest, lamenting that it was all his fault for sending Little Xiu off to serve as a counselor and pushing him into a fiery pit. Even Grand Commander Yuchi and Vice Commander Yuchi, stationed year-round in the military camp, threatened to lead troops to storm the execution grounds and rescue him.
Witnessing the entire Aorong Kingdom down to stray dogs by the roadside enthusiastically indulging in juicy gossip, Yuchi Xiu currently just wanted to summon everyone to the city gate tower and hold an immediate clarification assembly.
The problem, however, was…
He couldn’t exactly tell everyone that because he had made a wish to a black cat, the Prince had turned into a cat, and therefore the cat-fied Prince had merely performed a feline-exclusive “scent marking” action. That explanation could never be spoken aloud; he would be accused of demonic possession and burned at the stake…
To refute the rumors, he would have to spill the truth, yet this exact truth was a treasonous secret punishable by decapitation.
Ever since the Prince contracted feline habits, Yuchi Xiu had indeed considered whether he should share this earth-shattering crisis with his elder brother or second sister so they could put their heads together and brainstorm a countermeasure.
Yet he couldn’t do that.
Because hidden within the Aorong Kingdom was a spy from the Central Plains court attempting to assassinate and subvert Tuoba Lin, the Prince of Aorong.
In this succession-centric web novel titled Records of Courtly Winds and Clouds, the Aorong Kingdom located at the northern edge of the Central Plains was, frankly speaking, nothing more than a fringe NPC faction courted and guarded against by various princes.
In truth, this location didn’t hold much narrative weight in the main plotline, yet every single time it appeared on stage, nothing good ever followed it served as a textbook scapegoat…
To the north, man-eating demons raided the borders every single day; to the south, a bunch of court old foxes obsessed with palace intrigue stirred up endless trouble. Not only did they have to fight tooth and nail against man-eating demons charging south to consume humans and pillage at whim, but they also had to deal with the thankless mess of being squeezed from both sides—those princes deliberately withheld rations and sabotaged them simply because Tuoba Lin refused to pledge allegiance to either faction.
Things escalated to the point where, later on, just as the Aorong Kingdom was desperately fighting off a man-eating demon surge far exceeding previous scales in magnitude, a prince harboring a grudge over Tuoba Lin’s neutrality stabbed them in the back by cutting off their reinforcements…
Consequently, during that catastrophe, countless soldiers including the parents of the current Prince of Aorong, namely the old Prince and Princess of Aorong shed their blood across the battlefield, pushing the soldiers and civilians of Aorong into a desperate corner where they had no path of retreat left, forcing them to abandon the city they had fought to the death to protect and flee from the tsunami-like advance of the man-eating demons.
Calling this a “hellish start” would be an understatement. Just as the Aorong people sank into utter despair, it was the young feudal lord Tuoba Lin who had just inherited the princely title who forcefully re-gathred these demoralized, shattered remnants of troops and citizens.
Tuoba Lin, the ruthless, cold-blooded, iron-fisted Prince of Aorong, led these disillusioned Aorong soldiers on a bloody counterattack all the way back beyond the passes, successfully reclaiming lost territory while embarking on a frenzy of infrastructure reconstruction to rebuild cities crushed into ruins by the man-eating demons.
Amidst this process, Tuoba Lin rose to fame as the “Supreme War God of the Great Yan Dynasty” and the “Imperial Bulwark Defending Aorong”… Not only did he command immense prestige and peerless martial might, but he also held the hearts of the common people alongside hundreds of thousands of armored cavalrymen. With such a protagonist-level configuration, how could those princes obsessed with imperial succession ever let him go?
Although the Prince only wished for peace of mind in farming and building infrastructure while refusing to participate in the capital’s dirty games, he was ultimately manipulated by imperial scheming and once again dragged unwillingly into the vortex of the nine-princes succession struggle.
Then, during that massive melee, everyone suffered heavy casualties and losses, failing to spare even the protagonist group a complete bloodbath of a bad ending.
While all of this represented main plot developments occurring several years down the line…
Whether it was the earlier invasion and fall of the Aorong Kingdom or the future “imperial succession battle” the Prince would be forced into, Central Plains factions were pulling the strings behind the scenes every single time, utilizing the exact same tactic: exploiting moles planted deep within Aorong to orchestrate conspiracies.
If he knew the identity of this mole, things would be easy… The trouble was that Yuchi Xiu had read Records of Courtly Winds and Clouds from cover to cover, and nowhere in the book was the mole’s actual name mentioned.
Who told the Aorong Kingdom’s segments to be mere background dressing… Plot points concerning Aorong were essentially glossed over in a few strokes during secret deliberations among the capital bigwigs. Without even front-facing descriptions, heaven only knew what the mole planted here looked like.
Under such a setup of enemies on all sides, how could he dare carelessly blurt out treasonous remarks like “Our Prince is actually a cat”?
If word reached the ears of that mole, those conspirators willing to stop at nothing for the imperial throne would pounce like starving wolves catching the scent of blood.
Thinking of all the inhuman atrocities committed by the plotters in Records of Courtly Winds and Clouds for the sake of seizing power, Yuchi Xiu sighed heavily with worry.
When all was said and done, this mess was entirely self-inflicted by his own loose mouth; he couldn’t possibly drag the man into a cat state only to let him fall prey to political adversaries.
Therefore, facing the flying rumors of a cut-sleeve romance, the sole clarification Yuchi Xiu could offer was reduced to a pale, feeble, “The Prince and I truly aren’t that kind of relationship…”
Yet most of these old veterans in Aorong had watched “Yuchi Xiu” grow up wearing split-crotch pants, long since viewing him as their own family’s nephew. Combined with the fact that these gossip-hungry crowds were currently obsessed with the “cut-sleeve secret history of that eternal bachelor iron-fisted feudal lord,” how could they possibly listen to Yuchi Xiu’s literal explanations?
With his thoroughly unconvincing denials directly misconstrued as “refusing to admit it out of fear of the Prince’s retaliation,” Yuchi Xiu completely sympathized with the unfortunate scapegoat of the ancient deer-pointing-as-a-horse fable.
He was clearly speaking nothing but absolute truth, yet not a single person among them believed a single word.
Life had truly become unbearable.
So he really should have blocked his older brother that easy-to-manipulate soft persimmon in the bud before the rumors spread…
Yet crying over spilled milk was useless now, and no cure for regret could be bought anywhere.
The sole thing offering him a shred of solace was perhaps the golden rule of gossip: as long as a juicier new piece of gossip emerged, these ancients would instantly shift their battlegrounds.
Although mere mortals stood powerless to stop a cat’s impulsive urge for head-rubbing, as long as they exercised slight caution in public, the gossip wouldn’t get embellished further. Once the limelight passed, this rumor would naturally be replaced by fresh gossip and gradually forgotten. Such remained Yuchi Xiu’s sole psychological comfort at present.
The problem, however, was…
Much like a certain black cat Yuchi Xiu knew that only knew how to stir up trouble without ever resolving it, this Prince similarly possessed maxed-out proficiency in the talent: “Though unaware of what he’s doing, he always manages to escalate matters.”
Ever since leaving his own scent mark firmly stamped upon his counselor.
The Prince had spent these past few days feeling remarkably refreshed and spirited.
Though the military camp and the Prince’s estate seemed inexplicably a bit noisy recently… to a Prince who had consistently cared nothing for whatever idle chatter subordinates engaged in, this hardly counted as an issue.
Every single time the counselor hovered nearby handling official documents, catching the unique fragrance mingling with ink emanating from his person, the Prince would contentedly half-squint his emerald-green eyes.
He had already considered this kid’s scent quite pleasant…
Now that his own scent was blended together with the boy’s, it smelled utterly intoxicating to a fault.
Previously, the Prince could never comprehend why lower-class felines insisted on mixing their scents with other living creatures; now he finally understood this was what they called a cat’s exclusive “clan scent.”
All along, the Prince had regarded those beneath him merely as incidental fixtures within his territory; protecting them was just a matter of convenience, and he had never esteemed them highly. Yet if it came to this counselor who was utterly devoted to him and served him wholeheartedly, absorbing him into his own “clan” seemed like a rather decent option.
Watching this frail counselor who lacked even the strength to truss a chicken—strolling everywhere draped in the feline scent of “I am a man under the protection of the Prince of Aorong,” the Prince felt immensely gratified.
The sense of security brought by “My territory contains things belonging exclusively to me.” To a cat born with perpetually taut nerves and an extreme yearning for stability, this sensation was utterly addictive.
Come to think of it, that kid also seemed to treat this lord as one of his own.
For reasons unknown, starting at some point, every time they met during nighttime patrols, the counselor would specially prepare a few blocks of top-quality braised beef to feed the black cat.
As a solitary top-tier predator, being willing to share one’s prey with another was the ultimate expression of feline goodwill, signifying that the cat viewed you as family.
Though the Prince inwardly muttered, “You weak, frail skinny twig, you’d better eat more yourself,” he didn’t refuse either this could also be considered an aloof bestowal of grace from the Prince.
Then again, this lord couldn’t just keep free-loading off that weakling’s beef forever…
As the master, the Prince felt he ought to fetch some decent rewards back for his underling.
Unlike that counselor who could only scrounge up a bit of braised beef, the Prince was a supreme war god capable of casually bringing back extremely astonishing battle trophies. When the time came, the counselor having witnessed how majestic his master was would surely feel even more secure and burst with joy.
At the mere thought of the counselor expressing tearful gratitude and worshipful adoration, the Prince’s throat involuntarily emitted a pleasurable rumbling purr.
So… exactly what sort of prey should he catch and gift him…
As he pondered this, an inspiration suddenly struck the Prince.
Scene shifting, Yuchi Xiu stood frozen in sheer bewilderment, staring fixedly at the bloody, severed head of a man-eating demon tossed right before his feet.