Chapter 634 - 412: Borrowing a Nest to Lay Eggs

Chapter 634: Chapter 412: Borrowing a Nest to Lay Eggs

Although Song Yunzhao didn’t get involved, news kept flowing in. The spies at Yaohua Palace were highly effective; under Zhang Maoquan’s tutelage, they had a real knack for gathering information.

Song Yunzhao hadn’t expected the Empress Dowager to still clash so head-on with the Emperor at a time like this. ’Tsk. The ones to suffer in the end will definitely be An Xiaoyi and the Gu’en Houfu.’ The Emperor couldn’t very well take his anger out on his own mother, but An Shutong had the misfortune of being present.

Soon, more news arrived. The Emperor had asked Honorable Lady Xu to clearly explain what happened when she paid her respects to the Empress Dowager the day before. ’This is shaping up to be a major confrontation,’ Song Yunzhao mused.

Consort Shu had just punished An Xiaoyi, who had fainted from the cold. The Empress Dowager knew to demand justice for An Xiaoyi, but what about justice for Xu Mingying?

If the Empress Dowager wanted to punish Consort Shu, the Emperor would use Xu Mingying’s case as leverage to keep her in check.

Besides, the Empress Dowager was in the wrong to begin with for punishing someone. Song Yunzhao knew how this would end. Even if the Empress Dowager threw a fit and relied on her status to be unreasonable, Feng Yi would certainly not back down this time as he had in the past.

’Otherwise, given the Empress Dowager’s temperament, if the Emperor were to back down again, she would surely do something even more outrageous in the future.’

Song Yunzhao felt a little tired. ’Feng Yi will probably be busy for a while longer,’ she thought. ’And he didn’t say he would return before he left, so he’ll likely go straight to Taixi Hall.’ So, she simply went to sleep.

Yaohua Palace gradually fell silent, but over at Zhaoyang Palace, the lamps were still burning bright.

Xu Mingying was brought out for the confrontation. Her face, already flushed from a high fever, now looked even more frail. She couldn’t even stand steady with someone supporting her, let alone stand to speak. Feng Yi granted her a seat and told her to speak while sitting.

After thanking him, Xu Mingying carefully recounted being summoned by the Empress Dowager and going to Shouci Palace. She coughed every few words, her breathing shallow, looking as if she might faint at any moment.

Her condition, in stark contrast to the Empress Dowager’s twisting of reason, made Xu Mingying seem all the more pitiful and helpless.

Once Xu Mingying finished speaking, Feng Yi had her helped into an inner chamber. Then he turned to the Empress Dowager and said, "You have seen Noble Lady Xu’s condition. Has the Empress Dowager forgotten how Highly Noble Princess Consort treated you all those years ago?"

The Empress Dowager’s expression stiffened. "What do you mean by that?"

Feng Yi shot to his feet. "If the Empress Dowager is so uncomfortable in the palace, then perhaps it would be best to return to the traveling palace."

Without waiting to see the Empress Dowager’s reaction, Feng Yi turned with a flick of his sleeves and stormed out.

’She is my own mother. I can’t hit her or curse her, but I can send her away!’

’As long as the Empress Dowager doesn’t learn to restrain herself, I will not back down.’

Seething with anger and seeing how late it was, Feng Yi decided against going to Yaohua Palace and disturbing Yun Zhao, returning directly to Taixi Hall instead.

Back in his hall, he spent a sleepless night. The more he thought about it, the angrier he became. ’The Empress Dowager’s audacity must be related to the instigation from the Gu’en Houfu.’

’Last time, with the Tao Family incident, the Gu’en Houfu was unaffected because the Tao Family took full responsibility. But that doesn’t mean I don’t know who the real mastermind was.’

’It seems the Gu’en Houfu thinks I spared them last time because of the Empress Dowager. That’s why this time, far from reining themselves in, they’ve become even more audacious.’

The next day, after the morning court session, an imperial edict was sent directly to the Gu’en Houfu. It harshly reprimanded Duchess Gu En for failing to properly raise her daughter, placing the blame for An Shutong’s actions squarely on the Gu’en Houfu’s dereliction of duty. Noble Lady Xu had nearly lost her life; An Shutong bore undeniable responsibility, and the Gu’en Houfu could not escape culpability for their poor upbringing.

Marquis Gu’en was demoted to Elder Guen, and in the palace, An Xiaoyi was placed under confinement.

The Gu’en... now Elder Guen’s, mansion was thrown into utter chaos. Elder Guen’s wife sent a formal request for an audience with the Empress Dowager but was denied entry at the palace gates. It was only then that she began to feel afraid.

In the palace, the Empress Dowager fell ill from her anger at the Emperor, cursing him for being unfilial.

Feng Yi turned a deaf ear, merely ordering the Palace Attendants of Shouci Palace to serve the Empress Dowager diligently. He warned that if anything were to happen to her, everyone in Shouci Palace would be buried alive with her. Having delivered this harsh threat, Feng Yi did not visit the Empress Dowager, thus making his stance perfectly clear.

The Empress Dowager threw a tantrum, but seeing it had no effect, she truly fell ill this time.

Xu Mingying, however, received a blessing in disguise. She was promoted to the Standard Sixth Rank, becoming the newly minted Xu Ji, a piece of news that brought a bit of warmth to the cold winter.

Xu Mingying had truly suffered this time and was confined to her bed for half a month. The promotion was a good thing; at least her ordeal had not been for naught. When she thought of the Empress Dowager and An Shutong, she seethed with hatred.

The exposure to the cold had damaged her health, and she would have to recuperate carefully for a year or so, otherwise she feared it would leave her with a chronic ailment that would make every winter unbearable.

She was a young woman in the prime of her life, yet from now on she couldn’t even use ice basins or eat cold food in the summer. The thought of how unbearable the next summer would be made her mood sink even lower.

Moreover, her family had done nothing to help her. If they had been willing to lend a hand, she wouldn’t have suffered so much. She knew she shouldn’t think such things, but she couldn’t help it. After suffering so terribly, she couldn’t help but misplace her anger.

Marchioness Wu Xin sent a formal request to visit her in the palace, but Xu Mingying refused. She had no desire to see her family right now.

Xu Mingying had a miserable winter, plagued by a persistent, nagging cough. The medicinal brews in Mingguang Palace never ceased.

Song Yunzhao was no longer paying much attention to the affair. After the Empress Dowager fell ill, Consort Shu invited her and Princess Consort Wan to pay a visit. The Empress Dowager’s dislike for Song Yunzhao was obvious, and she tried to make her stay behind to attend to her.

But Song Yunzhao was no pushover. Before she even had to make a scene, Meng Jiuchang arrived to summon her away. She followed him with a smile, paying no mind to the expression on the Empress Dowager’s face.

They say wisdom comes with age, but Song Yunzhao could see no such wisdom accumulated in the Empress Dowager. It couldn’t help but bring to mind a saying from a later era: ’It’s not that people turn bad when they get old; it’s that bad people simply get old.’

’So, there was a reason the late Emperor disliked the Empress Dowager.’

Naturally, Consort Shu and Princess Consort Wan did not stay to attend to her either, using Meng Jiuchang’s arrival as a convenient excuse to leave. After that day, the three concubines no longer went to pay their respects.

In the blink of an eye, the twelfth lunar month was approaching. Just before it began, Beiming conducted several small-scale raids on the border, and the Emperor ordered troops dispatched to "clean them up."

Sure enough, the matter of military provisions was raised again in court, and Song Nanzhen was once again pushed into the eye of the storm.

Song Yunzhao wasn’t worried this time, as she was already prepared. Sure enough, the grain reserves in the National Treasury were far from sufficient to support the army’s expedition. The court was thrown into endless debate, during which Song Nanzhen endured considerable ridicule and attacks from his rivals.

But he was well-prepared and thus unafraid. He proposed a policy of borrowing grain from merchants, to be offset by future tax payments.

Grain merchants had to pay taxes. Giving grain to the court to offset the next year’s taxes was undoubtedly an excellent method. Of course, the court would also reward the merchants for their noble contribution, offering them certain tax benefits.

The courtiers: ...

They knew Song Nanzhen had a quick mind. They’d heard of getting something for nothing, but this was like borrowing a hen to lay your eggs, wasn’t it?

’Say what you will, if it could actually be done, it would solve the court’s most urgent crisis.’