Dan Qing suddenly realized she seemed to have fallen into a mistake of pure habit.
Back in the modern world, her original purpose in drawing plans had been to buy loose parts herself and assemble whatever she wanted, and the reason she’d needed to reproduce things at exact scale was, first, because it made designing easier, and second, because modern building blocks came with many identically shaped pieces, and buying them required knowing the precise dimensions.
But now, the plans she was drawing for this wooden ship were only meant to help her put it back together afterward, so as Yinzhen had pointed out, there was really no need to draw it in such fine detail at all. As long as it could be told apart from other pieces, that would be enough.
Dan Qing flipped back through the several drawings she’d already completed and felt as though her brain had gotten squeezed somewhere along the way during her transmigration, making her thoroughly foolish.
Seeing Dan Qing fall silent, Yinzhen assumed he’d said something wrong and upset her, and hurried to apologize. “Fourth sister, I’m sorry, I was just talking nonsense, actually your drawing is really good, it’s almost exactly the same.”
Dan Qing sighed, and pressed the pen into Yinzhen’s hand. “Then why don’t you help me draw one.”
Yinzhen wasn’t used to this pen, so he had a palace maid fetch a writing brush instead, and it was then that Dan Qing witnessed with her own eyes the sheer gap between people—
Why was it that with barely half a year’s difference in age, Yinzhen could already handle a writing brush this steadily, while she couldn’t even hold a hard-tipped pen without the lines wobbling all over the place!
Yinzhen didn’t draw the way Dan Qing did, tracing things like a rubbing, he simply sketched the shape as he saw it, and with just a few simple strokes, the rudder Dan Qing had asked him to draw sprang to life on the page. Just as he’d said, it wasn’t an exact reproduction, but anyone could tell at a glance exactly what it was.
Dan Qing looked at her own detailed part drawings, then at Yinzhen’s simple, expressive sketch, and suddenly understood what Kangxi had meant that day about drawing being about capturing the essence.
No wonder Kangxi had looked at her with such a speechless expression that day, it turned out that, in the eyes of people who actually knew how to paint, drawing plans was an art form, not the kind of rigid, forced copying she’d been doing.
Dan Qing felt thoroughly embarrassed, and slumped back in her chair in frustration, saying, “Fourth brother, why don’t you just draw the rest for me.”
Yinzhen was just about to agree when Yinreng walked in from outside.
“Dan Qing, you took on this task yourself, and now you want to slack off and make Yinzhen do it for you, aren’t you embarrassed?”
Yinreng walked over with a smile, steadying Yinzhen, who had moved to greet him properly, and said, “Fourth brother, don’t let her fool you, she just loves ordering people around.”
Dan Qing pouted, displeased. “I do not! It’s just that fourth brother draws better than me!”
Yinreng raised an eyebrow. “Plenty of people draw better than you, but whatever task you take on yourself, you ought to finish it yourself.”
Yinzhen looked back and forth between them carefully, then said softly, “I don’t mind helping fourth sister draw.”
“Don’t spoil her, if you have spare time, better spend it reading. Let her draw on her own for fun,”
Yinreng said, patting Yinzhen’s head. “No one’s rushing her to finish it anyway, it’s just a way for her to pass the time and practice her finger strength a little.”
His words sounded perfectly reasonable and proper, but even as he spoke, he’d already picked up the rudder Yinzhen had just drawn and inserted it right back into place.
Dan Qing understood at once, Yinreng simply didn’t want anyone else touching his wooden ship.
Fair enough, he really was still just a child after all, guarding his own things this way was only natural.
“I get it, second brother, don’t worry, I’ll definitely draw it myself,”
Dan Qing went along with Yinreng’s line, then changed the subject. “You just came from outside, do you know how things are going at Jingren Palace?”
Yinzhen, worried about Imperial Noble Consort Tongiya, was instantly distracted by this. Yinreng didn’t actually know much either, and only offered a few casual words of comfort, telling him not to worry too much.
At that very moment, inside Jingren Palace, Imperial Noble Consort Tongiya had already run out of strength.
“Your Majesty, Your Majesty—”
Imperial Noble Consort Tongiya lay collapsed on the bed, drenched in cold sweat, her breath faint and thin, only a soft, weak call escaping her lips, “Cousin—”
“My mistress, you must push! If you don’t push, how can the little prince ever come out?”
The midwife, too, was drenched in sweat from anxiety.
There was an old saying, a seven-month birth lives, an eight-month birth doesn’t, and for the Imperial Noble Consort to go into premature labor at eight months was already an ill omen in itself. And to make matters worse, the child in her belly was larger than expected, making it simply impossible to deliver.
With the amniotic fluid nearly drained away, if the child couldn’t be born soon, it risked suffocating inside her.
Attending a consort’s delivery, if all went smoothly, could earn a midwife a substantial reward, but if anything went wrong, it was a matter of life and death.
The midwives who had once attended the benevolent and filial Empress had all been implicated and punished, and that had been a birth that had at least safely produced the Crown Prince. If this Imperial Noble Consort and the imperial heir in her belly were both lost, their entire families would be doomed to share the same fate!
“This won’t do, go quickly and ask His Majesty whether we should prioritize the Imperial Noble Consort or the little prince, a decision must be made now!”
The midwife rushed out of the birthing room and said urgently to the young eunuch waiting at the door.
The young eunuch didn’t dare delay, running at once to the main hall to relay the message.
Kangxi, who had been reviewing memorials, paused his brush at the news and said, “Have the imperial physicians and the midwife focus on protecting the Imperial Noble Consort. There must be no harm to her, none at all.”
Liang Jiugong, hearing this, went along to pass on the order, and once the imperial physicians and midwife heard it, they understood at once what needed to be done, the physician immediately handed in the medicinal decoction that had been prepared in advance.
This medicine had been brewed according to custom the moment Imperial Noble Consort Tongiya’s labor had begun, though it was never to be used lightly.
Back when the benevolent and filial Empress had suffered a difficult labor, an identical medicine had also been prepared, though in the end it had never been used, her life had been sacrificed outright to secure the safety of her legitimate son.
Now, faced with the Imperial Noble Consort’s equally difficult labor, His Majesty had actually given the order to use it, the deeper meaning behind this made the imperial physician’s heart tremble with fear, and he could only pray that things would turn out as His Majesty wished, and that no blame would ever fall upon them.
Imperial Noble Consort Tongiya, of course, had no idea what this medicine truly was, the midwife only told her it was meant to induce labor, and had her drink it down.
The medicine’s effect was extremely powerful, and before long, Imperial Noble Consort Tongiya felt a wave of contractions in her belly, and her strength suddenly returned. The midwife hurried to take advantage of the moment, massaging her belly to help her along, and after another half hour or so, she felt a sudden release below, and then heard the midwife cry out loudly:
“She’s given birth, she’s given birth! Congratulations, Imperial Noble Consort, it’s a little princess!”
Only then did Imperial Noble Consort Tongiya let out a long breath, and before she even had the chance to look at her newborn daughter, she fainted dead away.
“Your Majesty, the Imperial Noble Consort has just given you a little princess, and the mistress herself is unharmed, this servant offers Your Majesty congratulations!”
Liang Jiugong, having received the news, hurried in to report, though he didn’t dare let a single trace of a smile show on his face.
Kangxi set down the memorial in his hand and asked, his expression giving nothing away, “How is the little princess?”
Liang Jiugong answered carefully, “From what this servant can see, she’s rather small in size, the imperial physicians say she’ll need very careful nurturing.”
This, in other words, meant she’d been born frail and underdeveloped, and there was real doubt whether she could survive at all.
Kangxi closed his eyes for a moment, and simply said, flatly, “What a pity,” before rising to his feet and walking out.
Once out in the courtyard, he paused, turning to look in the direction of the birthing room, and spoke once more. “Take good care of the Imperial Noble Consort. Don’t tell her anything about the little princess, let her focus on recovering her health in peace.”
…
That evening, having spent the whole day learning to draw with Yinzhen and feeling quite pleased with what she’d accomplished, Dan Qing set off alone toward the Grand Empress Dowager’s quarters, carrying her freshly finished drawing.
He Miao had been sent off to fetch a change of clothes for Yinzhen for the next day, and for some reason, Cining Palace was unusually quiet, with no one about, a little too quiet, in fact.
Dan Qing found it a bit unsettling, and quickened her pace toward the Grand Empress Dowager’s bedchamber.
The door to the Grand Empress Dowager’s chamber was left slightly ajar. Dan Qing peered through the gap, and there she saw Kangxi’s back, kneeling on the floor, for a moment, she wasn’t sure whether she should go in.
“Grandmother, it’s a princess, not a prince,”
Kangxi’s voice carried a note of dampness. “If I’d known, I never should have—”
The Grand Empress Dowager cut him off. “Would you have dared to gamble either way?”
Kangxi closed his eyes, tears rolling down his face. “Your grandson wouldn’t have dared, and that’s exactly why the little princess was born so weak, and likely won’t survive.”
“If you truly cared, you shouldn’t have let fear guide your hand in the first place. Since it’s already done, who exactly are you putting on this pitiful, remorseful act for now?”
The Grand Empress Dowager rebuked him. “I told you long ago, if you couldn’t bear it with an easy conscience, you shouldn’t have let her carry a child at all. The Imperial Medical Institute has plenty of secret remedies that could have ended any chance of her conceiving. But you, you couldn’t bring yourself to do it, too soft-hearted, and let her try anyway!”
“Once she was pregnant, so be it, worst case, you could simply let her remain Imperial Noble Consort forever, and no one would ever dare press her or wrong her for it, nor would there be any need to fear a new legitimate son stirring unrest at court. But no, you had to insist on making her Empress as well. Xuanye, don’t you see the contradiction in your own actions?”
Kangxi lowered his head. “Your grandson knows he shouldn’t want everything at once, but I always held on to a sliver of hope, thinking that if she really did have a little princess, that too would count as getting what I wished for, and making her Empress on those grounds wouldn’t shake the foundation of the state.”
“I never objected to you thinking that way, did I?”
The Grand Empress Dowager sighed. “But the moment someone remarked that the Imperial Noble Consort’s belly was carrying pointed, your suspicions flared up again. Why do you think her pregnancy went unstable, why do you think she suddenly went into premature labor, do you really think I’m blind and deaf, that I can’t see through it?”
Kangxi’s tears fell like rain, but he said nothing, unclear even to himself whether he felt regret or not.
Outside the door, Dan Qing, hearing all this, had already gone completely still, holding her breath, not daring to make the slightest sound.
She understood it all now. Kangxi had wanted to make Imperial Noble Consort Tongiya Empress, but feared she might bear a legitimate son who would threaten Yinreng’s position, and so he had resorted to some scheme to destabilize her pregnancy and force it early.
Now that a little princess had been born instead, he was consumed by regret and heartache, and had come sneaking to Cining Palace in the dead of night to confess it all to the Grand Empress Dowager.
Dan Qing had no idea how Imperial Noble Consort Tongiya would react if she ever learned the truth behind all this, but right now, all she felt was fear.
So this was the Forbidden City?
That even between a couple so deeply, tenderly devoted to one another, such deep-laid schemes could still lie buried beneath it all, was this truly the heart of an emperor, better to strike down the innocent than let one threat slip past?
But that child had been his own flesh and blood!
Just as the Grand Empress Dowager had said, if he’d truly feared such a threat, why had he let her conceive in the first place?
And once she was already pregnant, why would he then resort to such ruthless measures to destroy the child over something that was, in the end, nothing but a baseless suspicion?
This was simply, too terrifying.
Dan Qing didn’t dare listen any further, clenching her jaw and quietly slipping away, even deliberately circling back and returning by another route entirely.
Yinzhen was still reading when she got back, and asked where she’d gone.
Dan Qing forced herself to stay calm, only saying she’d thought she saw a butterfly outside and had gone to look, only to find it had just been her eyes playing tricks on her.
“If you like butterflies, I’ll go catch a few in the Imperial Garden for you to keep and play with,”
Yinzhen, suspecting nothing at all, said. “It’s convenient too, since I’m going back tomorrow to see Mother and little sister, I can bring back a net along the way.”
Dan Qing thought back to the conversation she’d just overheard between Kangxi and the Grand Empress Dowager, and reasoned that the newborn little princess likely wouldn’t survive much longer, so she said, “Then I’ll come with you, I’d like to see little sister too.”