Watching the little Crown Prince eagerly serve food to Shen Ying—his hands steady despite his small size—Attendant Liu was terrified to the point of breaking into a cold sweat. He wanted to step forward and assist, but a sharp glare from the little Crown Prince sent him retreating right back.
Attendant Liu shifted his gaze toward Selectee Shen, thinking she ought to understand basic etiquette. As a mere Selectee, how could she possibly dare let His Highness the Crown Prince wait on her?
Yet after glaring until his eyes grew sore, Selectee Shen showed no reaction whatsoever. Only then did Attendant Liu arrive at a horrifying conclusion: this Selectee Shen truly possessed the audacity to let the Crown Prince serve her dinner.
Attendant Liu’s knees knocked together in dread, feeling as though his head might part from his shoulders at any moment.
How could the little Crown Prince know what Attendant Liu was feeling? He was practically glowing with delight right now. Whenever he noticed Shen Ying’s eyes lingering on a dish for a moment longer, he immediately signaled the servants beside him to push the plate right in front of her.
Shen Ying did not focus solely on herself either. Picking up a second pair of chopsticks, she frequently fed bites to the little Crown Prince. Judging by the way his eyes squeezed shut in happy crescents whenever he chewed, he enjoyed the food just as much.
Goldie sighed in its space, *”Ah, such a picture of maternal love and filial devotion.”*
Shen Ying paid no mind to the sudden corpse-like resurrection of Goldie. When she needed it, it ignored her; when she didn’t, it popped right out. Expecting her to turn around and beg it for answers was a complete illusion—she would do no such thing.
Having eaten and drunk her fill, Shen Ying watched the servants clear the dishes away. She raised a teacup, blew softly on the liquid, and took slow, lingering sips.
The little Crown Prince’s meals were indeed vastly superior to hers. At the very least, she had no freedom to choose what she ate; whatever was delivered for the three daily meals was what the Selectees at Mingxiu Palace had to eat.
The tyrant would not go so far as to force them to fend for themselves—if a group of noble ladies had to make a living in the inner palace on their own, they would probably end up starving to death.
Those meals were enough to fill one’s stomach, but they could hardly be called fine dining.
Even if someone tried to bribe the palace maids and inner attendants with money to get better food, none of them would dare accept it. After all, the imperial decree came directly from the Emperor himself—who would dare defy a royal command?
Finishing her tea, Shen Ying took the little Crown Prince—who was equally full—out into the courtyard for a leisurely stroll to digest their food.
The Eastern Palace was immense, with two flamboyant royal poinciana trees blooming brilliant red within the courtyard.
Tucked beneath the shade of the trees was a wooden swing.
Feeling that she had walked long enough for her stomach to settle, Shen Ying sat down on the swing together with the little Crown Prince, gently rocking back and forth.
“Who planted these trees?” Shen Ying asked.
“My father,” the little Crown Prince replied in a muffled voice, seemingly not very fond of his father.
Shen Ying failed to pick up on his mood as her mind drifted into thinking about who his father was. Having just eaten her fill, her brain was a bit foggy, taking a moment to piece it together.
Placing the little Crown Prince into her mental hierarchy and tracing it upward, she finally realized that his father was none other than the tyrant Goldie kept going on about.
Right, this little Crown Prince was the future tyrant himself.
While Shen Ying was lost in thought, the little Crown Prince suddenly looked up and pointed toward a sealed corner gate not far away. “Actually, this place wasn’t originally the Eastern Palace. Through that door is where the Crown Princes of past generations resided. When Father made me Crown Prince, he moved my residence over here instead.”
Looking at the little Crown Prince’s displeased expression—his lips pouted and his chubby face growing even cuter, brows furrowed tightly as if letting everyone know he was angry—Shen Ying nodded along. “Your dad… ah no, your father really goes too far.”
“Exactly! He goes way too far,” the little Crown Prince chimed in.
As he spoke, he turned his head to look at her, a faint spark of anticipation shining in his eyes. “Do you know my name?”
Shen Ying froze. She didn’t.
However, a certain cat definitely did.
*”Goldie, what is the little Crown Prince’s name?”*
Goldie lay flat inside its space, lazily flicking its tail without uttering a single word.
She waited a moment, but no answer came.
Shen Ying genuinely felt like dragging Goldie out and giving it a beating.
Seeing Shen Ying’s blank expression, the little Crown Prince immediately knew she did not know his name. His small hand reached out to grasp hers. “We’ve known each other for so long, yet you’ve never asked for my name. Did you really not want to know what I’m called?”
A stroke of inspiration struck Shen Ying, and she smoothly went along with the cue, “Then what is your name?”
Grasping her wrist, the little Crown Prince looked up at her with sparkling eyes, his tone filled with intense pride. “I am called Pei Yun. It was the name Mother gave me! I heard that while I was still in her belly, she wrote down several names on slips of paper. Then during my one-month draw ceremony, she let me pick one myself, and I grabbed the name Pei Yun right away.”
As he spoke, he held Shen Ying’s palm, carefully tracing the characters of his name onto her skin with his finger.
*Pei Yun.*
Looking at his face, Shen Ying could not resist reaching out to pinch his cheeks twice more.
Soft, chubby, and undeniably adorable—Shen Ying looked at the little Crown Prince carefully. He was truly a handsome child; looking like this at such a young age, he would undoubtedly grow up to be extraordinarily striking.
It was truly hard to believe that such a sweet child would grow into a tyrant in the future.
*”Goldie, you aren’t lying to me, are you? This child becomes a tyrant in the future?”*
Even with her poor knowledge of history, Shen Ying knew “tyrant” was hardly a complimentary term, implying he would commit plenty of cruel deeds. Yet looking at the sweet little boy before her, what could he possibly do?
At most… at most, he kept a snake whose fangs had been pulled out.
At the thought of the snake, goosebumps erupted across Shen Ying’s skin. She suddenly remembered that this was the Eastern Palace—did that mean the snake was kept right here?
“What’s wrong?” the little Crown Prince asked, holding her hand. “Are you feeling unwell?”
He reached out his small hand, attempting to feel her forehead.
“N-No, I’m fine. Um… Your Highness, where is your snake?” Shen Ying asked cautiously.
“Do you want to see Little Black?”
“No, no, no! Absolutely not!”
The little Crown Prince let out a soft “oh” before explaining, “Earlier, when I saw you were scared, I had servants take Little Black away. He’s not here anymore.”
Shen Ying nodded, though anxiety lingered. “You only kept that one snake, right? You don’t keep any other bizarre creatures, do you?”
Keeping snakes wasn’t entirely unheard of; Shen Ying knew some of her friends enjoyed keeping snakes and lizards as pets back home.
She didn’t keep exotic pets herself, though her family did own a dog.
As her mind wandered, the little Crown Prince tugged on her sleeve, pulling her back to reality.
He was quite a talkative child, asking what clothes she liked and what foods she enjoyed. Shen Ying shared what she could, omitting things that would make no sense to a child.
She could hardly tell him that she preferred high-end custom attire from specific designer brands and flew out every year to watch fashion shows—or that she and her friends would occasionally shed their polite facades and turn into fake sisters to fight over limited-edition items.
Speaking of which, Shen Ying actually missed them quite a bit now. She wondered what they were up to. Even though Goldie said it could send her back eventually, Shen Ying didn’t know if those people ever thought of her while she was gone.
Shen Ying stayed at the Eastern Palace until night fell. Just as she prepared to return, she remembered that the place where she stayed didn’t even have a proper bathing area, causing her to let out another sigh.
Although the ice sent by the little Crown Prince had brought brief relief, going without a shower still felt unbearable, giving her the persistent sensation of being dirty.
“Why are you unhappy? If something is bothering you, just tell me and I’ll help you,” the little Crown Prince said valiantly, clutching her sleeve with one hand and patting his own chest with the other.
Shen Ying casually explained the reason behind her sigh, making the little Crown Prince gap slightly as he looked at her. “You were sighing just because you wanted to take a bath?”
“Of course! You have no idea how awful it feels not being able to bathe. Especially in hot weather like this—if you sweat, you’ll definitely end up smelling bad.”
Saying this, Shen Ying pulled her sleeve up to take a whiff. Detecting a faint trace of sweat, her expression grew even more dismayed.
Watching Shen Ying pat her sleeve in disgust, the little Crown Prince grabbed her hand. “Follow me.”
He led Shen Ying toward a room and pushed the door open. The scene inside left Shen Ying completely stunned.
“T-This is…?”
Shen Ying rubbed her eyes forcefully, opening and closing them multiple times to ensure she wasn’t hallucinating.
A faucet—she was actually looking at a water faucet! And next to it was a showerhead!
*”Goldie! Goldie, do you see this? Look! There’s a faucet and a showerhead in here!”*
Goldie let out an exhausted yawn. *”I see it.”*
Shen Ying asked in confusion, *”Did you conjure this up?”*
*”Of course not,”* Goldie denied decisively.
*”Then why is this here?”*
Goldie hummed twice. *”Who knows?”*
Looking at Goldie’s indifferent stance, Shen Ying felt something was off, as if the cat was hiding something from her.
Just as she was about to demand an explanation, the little Crown Prince led her forward by the hand, earnestly demonstrating how to use the fixtures—turning it one way for hot water and the other for cold.
“You must be careful when using it. Turning it toward cold water is fine, but if hot water comes out, it will scald you. You mustn’t let yourself get burned.”
Watching the little Crown Prince’s eager instructions, Shen Ying felt as though she were the child instead.
Shen Ying nodded. The bathrooms in her family home were all smart temperature-controlled systems; while she had seen manual knobs before, she had rarely used them herself.
Still, no matter how poor her history was, she knew such modern conveniences shouldn’t exist in an ancient setting.
Pondering it briefly, Shen Ying thought to herself, *Could it be because this is a novel world, and these non-historical items appeared simply due to the author’s setting? Goldie, is that it?*
Covering its ears, Goldie collapsed inside its space, muttering weakly, *”I don’t know, don’t ask me.”*
After finishing his explanation, the little Crown Prince led Shen Ying over to another side. “If you need to relieve yourself, it’s over here.”
“Relieve myself? Can I leave the palace?” Although Shen Ying rarely watched period dramas, she knew that once a emperor’s concubine entered the imperial palace, leaving was nearly impossible.
“Of course you can,” the little Crown Prince replied as if it were the most natural thing in the world.