Chapter 2015
The Prodigal Son 9
The emperor fell ill, and all the concubines in the harem came to the emperor's palace to show their concern.
The Empress found the crowd too noisy and disruptive to the Emperor's rest, so she left only Consort Li, the Emperor's favorite concubine, to take care of him.
Li Jieyu was secretly delighted, but on the surface she appeared worried and sad.
The emperor hesitated for a moment when he saw her expression, wondering if he had misunderstood Consort Li.
But the emperor quickly put that idea out of his mind and grew even more disgusted with Consort Li.
This woman is such a good actress; no wonder she came from a brothel.
With the emperor gone, the palace and the court were thrown into chaos.
The Prince of Liyang was overjoyed!
opportunity finally arises!
On the seventh night after the emperor's death, the Prince of Liyang finally took action.
He led a group of men into the palace and first took control of the court officials.
The court officials were summoned to the palace by Consort Li under the false pretense of an imperial edict, in order to gather them together and control them.
Lu Zhiyuan and Liu's father were among them. Unaware of the emperor's plan, they were very worried about Empress Liu and Liu Yu'er.
Before long, palace servants came to invite the two of them.
"My lords, His Majesty requests your presence."
Lord Liu and Lu Zhiyuan exchanged a glance and silently followed the palace servant.
Several armed guards walked behind them to prevent them from escaping.
The two men knew that it was definitely not the emperor who had come looking for them; they were afraid that the emperor had already met with misfortune.
The two arrived at the emperor's bedroom and found that Empress Liu and Liu Yu'er were also there.
Besides them, there was also Consort Li, the emperor's most favored concubine.
Lu Zhiyuan was stunned when he saw Li Jieyu's face.
“Xinyi…”
Lu Zhiyuan called out the name that he had always kept in his heart.
Li Jieyu smiled at Lu Zhiyuan and said, "Long time no see."
"You, you..." Lu Zhiyuan had many questions he wanted to ask, but the words wouldn't come out.
Consort Li: "You want to ask me how I became the emperor's woman?"
Lu Zhiyuan nodded.
Li Jieyu's face was full of hatred: "That's all thanks to you."
Lu Zhiyuan: "I, I..."
He wanted to express his grievances, but when he thought of Wen Xinyi being kicked out of Beijing by his mother, he couldn't say anything.
Li Jieyu felt extremely pleased that she had avenged her great grudge and had the urge to tell her story.
Liu Dong lay on the roof, cracking sunflower seeds as she listened to Li Jieyu recount her ordeal.
This girl is indeed quite pitiful.
Li Jieyu is Wen Xinyi, who fell in love with Lu Zhiyuan.
When everyone saw her having a secret rendezvous with Lu Zhiyuan, Wen Xinyi thought that Lu Zhiyuan would marry her.
In fact, this secret meeting was all her scheme, just as she had planned to meet Lu Zhiyuan and to make him fall in love with her.
Wen Xinyi is an illegitimate daughter in her family, and she knows very well that she is not popular in the marriage market because of her status.
Wen Xinyi is determined to marry into a wealthy family and has a young and promising husband.
Lu Zhiyuan and Wen Xinyi's elder brother were classmates, and he was the best husband candidate Wen Xinyi could find.
Wen Xinyi learned about Lu Zhiyuan from her elder brother and "coincidentally" met Lu Zhiyuan.
Everything she did was designed to please Lu Zhiyuan, which naturally attracted him. That secret meeting was Wen Xinyi's way of confirming her relationship with Lu Zhiyuan in front of everyone, thus paving the way for her marriage into the Duke of Cheng's mansion.
Wen Xinyi had long known that those young men would go upstairs to spy on the young ladies, and the place where she and Lu Zhiyuan met secretly was one she had chosen beforehand, knowing that people upstairs could see them.
As they expected, their secret rendezvous was discovered and escalated into a major incident.
But the final result was beyond her expectations.
The Duchess of Cheng refused to let her into the Duke's mansion and even pressured the Wen family to drive her out of the capital.
The Wen family members are spineless; they didn't stand up for her and actually did as the Duchess of Cheng had said, driving her out of the capital.
They found a businessman and married Wen Xinyi to him.
It's less a marriage and more a sale.
The Wen family received a considerable dowry from the merchant, but did not give it to Wen Xinyi.
At first, the businessman treated Wen Xinyi quite well.
After all, Wen Xinyi was beautiful and the daughter of an official, but she looked down on her businessman husband and treated him coldly.
The businessman husband was furious and stopped responding to Wen Xinyi.
He's rich, so it's easy for him to find beautiful women.
The number of concubines and mistresses in the backyard increased, and those women looked down on Wen Xinyi, who was not favored by her husband, and dared to challenge the authority of Wen Xinyi, the legal wife.
Without her husband's support, Wen Xinyi had no way to deal with these women.
She thought her life would continue like this, but she never imagined that the worst was yet to come.
Princess Shuya has taken a liking to Lu Zhiyuan, and naturally she will not let go of Wen Xinyi, Lu Zhiyuan's sweetheart, even though Wen Xinyi is already married.
Princess Shuya could send people to humiliate Liu Yuer, who was engaged to Lu Zhiyuan, and she could also let Wen Xinyi have an easy time.
She had Wen Xinyi sold into a brothel.
Wen Xinyi suffered a lot in the brothel, but was eventually trained by the madam and became the most popular courtesan in the brothel.
Later, she was noticed by the Prince of Liyang's men, who bought her, trained her, and sent her to the palace, where she became the current Consort Li.
Consort Li clapped her hands, and the Duchess of Cheng was pushed in, falling to the ground.
Lu Zhiyuan and Liu Yuer rushed forward to help the Duchess of Chengguo up.
Lady Cheng was taken directly from the manor and was not mistreated, only slightly disheveled.
After that, another person was pushed in; it was none other than Princess Shuya.
Wen Xinyi smiled and said, "Now that everyone's here, we can settle the accounts properly."
Wen Xinyi first walked up to Princess Shuya and kicked her hard.
Princess Shuya cried out in pain. She was a fiery woman, and after being kicked, she ignored everything and lunged at Wen Xinyi, wanting to hit her.
She forgot that apart from them, the prisoners, everyone in the palace belonged to Wen Xinyi.
Princess Shuya was shoved to the ground, and the pain was even worse than when Wen Xinyi kicked her earlier.
Wen Xinyi kicked Princess Shuya again.
"What a graceful princess! What a shrew. No wonder your first husband didn't want you, and the Duchess of Cheng would rather Lu Zhiyuan marry someone else than you."
Princess Shuya spat at Wen Xinyi: "Who do you think you are? How dare you mock me?"
Wen Xinyi: "I wasn't mocking you, I was just telling the truth."
Wen Xinyi: "So what if you're a princess? No man likes you, right? Oh, wait, I heard you were with four men before. Looks like you do have some charm."
Princess Shuya was enraged when Wen Xinyi reopened her wounds, yelling, "I'm going to kill you! Kill you!"
Wen Xinyi laughed: "You want to kill me, but I don't want to kill you. See how kind I am?"
She smiled and ordered her men, "Slash her face, cut off her tongue, and throw her into the beggars."
Wen Xinyi said to Princess Shuya, "Look how good I am to you! I didn't send you to a brothel!" (End of Chapter)