Chapter 51 – The Waves Retreat
In the snap of a finger, the waves on the shoreline expressed their anger at the reefs and their attachment to the gravel; they sounded like thunder, their shape was like snow, and they retreated without dipping their coats, leaving another piece of peace and quiet, half an eye on the blue sea and half an eye on the blue sky.
Fan Xian heard her words clearly, and could not help but laugh faintly, “If I were a woman, I would have had a much happier life than I do now.”
He knew that there was too much unwillingness, too much reluctance in the little emperor’s heart. As a Nanqing native, Fan Xian did not have much opportunity to savor the young emperor’s imperial mind and power tactics, but all these years of private exchanges and dealings had made it very clear to him that although the Emperor of Beiqi was even younger than he was, his heart and mind were extraordinarily mature, and he acted in an unusually cold and ruthless manner.
Perhaps the dragon chair was indeed an incubator capable of turning people into freaks?
Beside this female emperor, since the beginning of birth, will be treated as a man to raise, she grew up in the process, is a completely deformed process, to this day, she did not become a pervert, but became a slightly cold, the heart of the ambition, extraordinarily disobedient to the fate of the emperor, it should be said that the empress dowager of Beiqi, it is really a very remarkable character.
Associated with that year, he thought that there was a great problem between the empire, and wanted to use it to wedge into the dynasty of Northern Qi, but in the end, it was for the mother and son of this pair of cover, removed Shen Chong, and subdued the Shangsugi Tiger, Fan Xian’s heart will feel a little bit bad, the admiration for the mother and son of this pair of admiration, is also more and more intense.
“Woman?” The Emperor of Beiqi had his hands behind his back, facing the infinite sea in front of him, a hint of sarcasm spreading from the corner of his lips, “In this world, women are the appendages of men, and will always be in a position of domination, and if you really become a woman, I’m only afraid that you will be crying more than a little bit under the covers night after night.”
After Fan Xian was silent for a long time, he suddenly opened his mouth and said, “Are you disgusted with your status as a woman?”
“Not bad.” The Emperor of Beiqi spoke indifferently, “If my body wasn’t a woman, I wouldn’t have been threatened by you.”
Fan Xian laughed and did not say anything, secretly thinking that the heart of this female emperor was indeed somewhat like that of a heartless man, everything was only based on the idea of power, family and country, and there was much less of the soft and beautiful feeling that he had guessed.
Two people fell into silence at the same time, standing side by side like this, looking at the sea with their hands folded. Not far away from them, wearing a light yellow dress, Si Li Li, with a small paper umbrella in one hand, slightly crouched down, was picking up shells on the seashore, and did not know whether the attention had stayed on the two of them.
Fan Xian’s eyebrows raised slightly, thinking that three years ago on the seashore of Tanyu State, he had once stood with the Emperor’s old man on a wooden plank looking at the sea, when the white waves rose from beneath his feet. Today, he was again looking at the sea side by side with the Emperor of Northern Qi. Not to mention the shift of time, the passage of time, just these two times to see the sea, already enough to explain too much. Struggle in this second life for a long time, he finally in the north qi south qing this two big countries, have the influence of the next person may not have.
Beiqi Emperor’s face was cold, those straight sword eyebrows looked extraordinarily bland today, his clear eyes had a feeling of being uninviting, and his not-so-long eyelashes were calmly resting on top of the curtains of his eyes.
“The envoys have already arrived at Dong Yi City, so I will be going back.” She suddenly looked ahead and opened her mouth, “I must admit that this time I ventured south and did not gain any benefits, it is really disappointing to me.”
“What’s there to be disappointed about, at least you didn’t kill me, and the world is not yet in chaos.”
Fan Xian looked at her expression, and for some reason, a faint few moments of pity arose in his heart, just as it had in that crazy night when he had seen her frantically crying. Knowing that this emperor with a daughter’s body and a man’s heart hadn’t had a very fast life, he said softly, “Even though you’re the monarch of Beiqi, there’s no way you can change what’s already doomed.”
The Northern Qi Emperor’s voice was slightly sharp, and he said in a mean, sour and cold tone, “For example, I’m a woman?”
Fan Xian laughed bitterly, thinking how he had turned to this again, and shook his head, “It is very difficult for one person to change the entire world, and this has nothing to do with men and women.”
Emperor Beiqi said in a cold voice, “But I observe that the world’s most sensational losers and the most amazing losers in the past thirty years happen to be two women who are unwilling to accept fate’s arrangement and bravely stand up for themselves, how do you explain that?”
How do you explain? Fan Xian was completely unable to explain, because one of those two women was his own mother and the other was his mother-in-law, and as a son, he could be nostalgic, sentimental, and hold a grudge, but he couldn’t explain it.
He opened his mouth and said, “My mother’s failure lies in her being overly merciful, and the eldest princess’ failure lies in her being overly sentimental.”
The Emperor of Northern Qi quietly looked at him, opened his mouth and said with a smile, “In fact, the reason is simpler than what you said, only that you don’t dare to say it.”
Yes, the Eldest Princess and not to talk about her, the reason why that dreadful Mistress of the Ye Family failed back then, wasn’t it also because of that man?
Fan Xian naturally will not continue this topic in front of her, said softly, “Today, His Majesty left, looking at the country to clean up the dynasty and support the people’s livelihood, as for the other things, it’s better not to act rashly.”
“Before you become the Emperor of Southern Qing, never expect me to count on you for anything.” Emperor Beiqi said, “This has nothing to do with trust, it only has to do with the power of speech……. On that day, the Four Gu Swords took you and me all over the city of Dongyi, for what, you should know in your heart.”
Fan Xian sighed, “He took me to talk about the past, talk about the future, see Dongyi, and deepen my feelings for this.”
“Dongyi City is not my Daqi, nor is it your Nanqing, this city is too special, if the Four Gu Swords wish to still preserve the qualities of Dongyi City after their deaths ……,” the young emperor turned his head and looked at him, “then they can only hope that you to become the Emperor of Southern Qing.”
Fan Xian scoffed to himself, “Do you think that’s possible?”
“That’s exactly what I despise about you, two heads, two rats, a dilemma, not knowing what you’re actually going to do.”
The Emperor of Northern Qi turned his head and sneered, “If you are truly a sage like Zhuang Da Zhan, unwilling to have the people of the world caught in the middle of a war, you can’t do nothing like you are doing now. Now you do your best to repair and patch up, but there is no fundamental reversal of the general situation, in the end, you can only end up in the end, the end of the miserable, no need for me to say, you yourself should also be clear.”
Instead, Fan Xian smiled and said, “It seems that you, Your Majesty, finally believe that I have the potential of a saint.”
After a long silence, the Emperor of Beiqi slowly said, “Because other than being forced to believe that you’re a saint, I can’t think of any other reason why you would do these things.”
If Fan Xian only saw himself as a vassal of the Southern Qing and was bent on unifying the world for the Southern Qing, now that Dongyi City had been subdued and he held the biggest secret of the Northern Qi imperial family, there were so many things he could have utilized, so many strong hands he could have exerted.
But he had done nothing but to wearily sew and mend as the young emperor had described, forcing every possible mischief into the darkness of the Supervisory Court.
“I don’t want to be a saint, nor do I have that ability to be a saint.” Fan Xian lowered his head somewhat wearily and said, “I’ve just become a lot braver than I was before, and am willing to change things I don’t want to see in this life as I see fit.”
The Emperor of Northern Qi looked at him and smiled, saying, “Even at the cost of your life?”
“No.” Fan Xian said very directly, “It is most important for myself to live, second most important for my loved ones to live, and third most important for the innocent people to live. If it really comes to that day, I don’t think the only person in this world who has the ability to kill me will be able to kill me.”
“Why? Because he is your father? Or because he knows that you have the temple behind you?” The young emperor’s eyes flashed with a strange aura as he slowly asked.
Fan Xian smiled and said, “Your Majesty does not have the slightest fear of the temple.” Then he stopped talking, not explaining anything more; why should the emperor’s old man’s scorn for Uncle Wuzhu be known to these Northern Qi people?
“I have questions about that statement of yours earlier.” The sea breeze blew on the Beiqi Emperor’s resolute face, not blowing the non-existent bangs, nor did it give her a few moments of timidity, “You think that it is most important for you to live, then I’ll ask you, if the one who is doing the comparing is the Chen County Lord, do you still think that it is most important for you to live?”
Fan Xian was silent, the tablecloths of the Qing Temple, the paintings, the ancient myths, the girl in white hiding under the table and chewing on a chicken leg, the snow on the Cangshan Mountain, the medicine at the time of the first marriage, the crying in the carriage, the usual silence, suddenly a strong feeling of apology welled up in his heart, and he raised his head and said earnestly, “Of course her life is more important than mine.”
“Fan Shangshu?”
“Yes.”
“Your children?”
“Not sure.”
“The Fan family’s youngest sister-in-law?”
“Yes.”
“Chen Pingping?”
There was a long silence, and Fan Xian gently nodded. The Emperor of Beiqi laughed, looking at him and saying, “You are truly an eccentric person, being so protective back to an old cripple, yet not having the courage to lay down your life for your own children.”
“They are still young.” The look in Fan Xian’s eyes was somewhat empty, “Something like feelings, aside from bloodline, there’s also a matter of time to cultivate them.”
The Emperor of Beiqi was silent for a long time before saying, “In that case, it seems that even if I were to have a child with you, it would be impossible for me to completely control you.”
Fan Xian pondered for a moment before saying, “In fact, the two of us are very similar people, cold-blooded and ruthless, only you are a woman and I am a man.”
“Ruthless? Earlier, your words nearly made me think that you are a saint with a heart for the people of the world.”
“Didn’t the Four Gu Swords say that saints are heartless?”
“He did not say that.”
“I don’t want to argue about this.”
After the little emperor suddenly glanced at him, he said, “You are my first man and my last man, although I don’t really like that feeling, I don’t mind having a child for you.”
“I don’t mind either.” Fan Xian smiled somewhat mysteriously, “One of my three great wishes in this life is to have many, many children.”
He suddenly changed his tone and said, “But as for what last man, don’t say such nonsense, you’re a bit of an emperor, so to speak, and I’ll bet that in the future, when you’ve grown up and are firmly in control of the Beiqi court, there will be a lot of drug dregs in the harem in the Upper Capital City.”
The Emperor of Beiqi did not understand the joke, but he did understand the meaning, his face turned slightly white, the color of anger appeared and disappeared, and he said coldly, “You think I am a lecher like you?”
Fan Xian shrugged his shoulders and said, “Who knows? There is no one who would dislike the joy of a man and a woman. As for the matter of having a child, that summer in the ancient temple, you didn’t get pregnant, and you probably won’t get pregnant this time either.”
“I don’t like men.” The little emperor stared at him.
Right at this moment, Si Li Li, who had been silent at the side treading the sea, walked over and stood beside the two men, her eyebrows soft and smooth, not saying a word.
The little emperor wrapped his arm around Si Li Li’s waist, looked at Fan Xian and said, “I like women, and this is my woman.”
“This kind of thing doesn’t scare me, your majesty doesn’t know that the two men I admired the most back then, one with the surname Zhang and one with the surname Cai, they both liked men.”
Fan Xian shrugged his shoulders, looking at the two women beside him with completely different temperament and appearance, suddenly his heart moved slightly, his hand lifted up, extremely fast and incomparably skimmed over the jaws of the two people, slightly moistening his fingertips, and said softly:
“You are both my women. That will do.”
The little emperor frowned, seems to be extremely uncomfortable with the lightness of the seashore at this time, said with slight anger: “Take it easy. I ……”
“What me what me? Could it be that you think I will believe you when you say you don’t like men in front of me?” Fan Xian looked at her quietly and said, “After twenty years of acting, you’ve had a hard time, so stop acting in front of me.”
“I don’t like men.” The young emperor looked at him quietly, “I chose you only because you were born beautiful, more beautiful than a woman.”
With these words, Fan Xian was defeated, defeated woefully.
The Emperor of Beiqi smiled slightly and said, “Of course, in addition to being as beautiful as a flower, you also have some side benefits …… I once said that I picked you back then because of what, Duo Duo must have thanked you for the boudoir’s biography, but …… “She frowned, said:” I have not been able to understand, you exactly how to find out my secret.”
Si Li Li snuggled up to the side of the Emperor of Northern Qi, opening those large, as if talking eyes, and looked at Fan Xian, thinking that her heart must also be filled with great curiosity about this matter.
“There was the aroma of golden laurel in that ancient temple, and I later learned from the Great Princess that this golden laurel was only planted on the mountain behind the Palace in Shangjing, and that only His Majesty would use this kind of incense in the entire world.” Fan Xian softly told this story.
The Emperor of Northern Qi, however, frowned a little tighter, she could hardly believe no matter what that it was this faint scent that had exposed her secret.
“Of course, Your Majesty is a little too enthusiastic about the Stone Book.” Fan Xian said with a slight curl of his lips, “Bao Dai’s story is one of the best tools for distinguishing gender.”
“I still don’t believe it.” The Emperor of Beiqi said indifferently, “What kind of secret is this, would you not think in that direction just based on these two points? I admit that you are the first and other intelligent person in the world, but ……”
These words have not finished, Fan Xian has understood her meaning, any exploration of the secret, always need a lead, and no one has ever dared to think of things, naturally no one to suspect, the little emperor always do not understand, Fan Xian is how to dare to put in that direction to think of.
He stood on the seashore and laughed extremely fastidiously, the sound of his laughter traveling along the waves of the sea far, far away.
“Do you guys know who Zhu Yingtai was? Shakespeare’s lover? Mu Wanqing? The prince’s coffee shop? The pregnant bishopess? Fancy young boys and girls?” Fan Xian looked at the two perplexed women beside him and exclaimed, “That’s Bei Maki, my favorite!”
After some loud laughter ended, Fan Xian stood on the seashore and felt a sense of relief.
His talent in martial arts was not as good as Haitang and Thirteen, he couldn’t catch up with the Emperor’s old man even if he beat his horse in power tactics, he wasn’t as good at cultivating disciples as his father-in-law, he was too far away from Chen Pingping in terms of intrigue and scheming, and he was even too far away from Yan Bingyun, he wasn’t as good as his father’s lordship in being able to tolerate and give up, he wasn’t as hard-hearted as Bitter Lotus, he wasn’t as good as the little Emperor in knowing what he wanted clearly, and he wasn’t as good as the Four Guards Sword in being able to see all things as if they were ants! ……
There are too many excellent people in this world, Fan Xian is nothing, the only thing he can rely on is his own diligence. However, in this second life, he had made such a good living and stood in the position he was in now, precisely because his old mother had come to this world in advance, and he was likewise so, and also possessed the insights of the world that people in this world did not have in the first world.
This was the very source of his courage, the root of his confidence.
Wolf Peach stood on a large green tree by the sea, his toes stepping on the treetops, gently rising and floating with the sea breeze, the two curved swords at his side, emitting a tinkling sound. He narrowed his eyes and quietly watched the sea shore, not hearing clearly what His Majesty and Fan Xian actually said, but hearing clearly that last burst of Fan Xian’s wild and even somewhat arrogant laughter.
Those three people on the seashore knew that not only Wolf Peach, but perhaps some powerful figures, such as those in the Sword Lodge, were secretly watching this conversation, only they weren’t worried much, as they faced the sea, which was empty above them.
Fan Xian’s hand held the Beiqi Emperor’s hand, and grabbed Si Li Li’s hand over, and calmly said, “No matter which one of you is pregnant, don’t forget to tell me, the father, about it.”
At these words, the Bei Qi Emperor’s face sank as he glanced at Si Li Li. Si Li Li’s face floated in fear, but in her heart, she was not afraid. At this time if you look from the back, Si Li Li is leaning on the side of the Bei Qi Emperor, while Fan Xian is standing on the other side, the three figures in the background of the blue sea, does not look small, but has a little warm feeling.
At night, a heavily guarded but unmarked procession left Dong Yi City. Other than those in the upper echelons, no one knew that this procession contained His Majesty, the Emperor of Northern Qi, and Noble Consort Li.
The young Emperor of Beiqi had bravely come to Dongyi City with the determination to break the boat, trying to find the last chance of victory for his own kingdom, yet in the end, he returned depressed, and apart from reaping the rewards of those salty words from Fan Xian, he had actually gained nothing.
Of course, for a woman – even if this woman claimed to like women – in this absurd and dangerous imperial career, to be able to have that kind of night, that kind of beautiful side of the beach, perhaps this will surely become the rest of her life can’t fade away the story.
Having this, in fact, is already enough, is not it? When the Beiqi emperor from the carriage window looking back at the twilight of the city of Dongyi, the heart is actually thinking about the future of Beiqi, or that man?
Beiqi’s delegation still remained in Dongyi City, but they had all given up hope, because although the Dongyi City side was still treating them with courtesy, everyone could see clearly that the other side had already begun negotiations with the Southern Qing people.
The details of the negotiations were released from some unknown channel, and the conditions offered by the Southern Qing were not harsh, and were even completely unexpected and lenient for the merchants and people of Dongyi City. Other than those vassal states that would be sending out their hostages into the capital falling into a cloud of sadness, the reaction of the common people was fairly normal.
Of course there would be sadness and loss, just like Yun Zhilan, but there wasn’t anything too drastic against it.
Negotiations were still underway, and the matter was so involved that even if it took a whole year to talk about, it was still completely necessary. So the secret message from the palace in Kyoto was not too pushy, Emperor Qing instead told Fan Xian not to be in a hurry, and there were many words of encouragement in his statement.
Fan Xian was not in a hurry, when that beautiful city in the south, enough to talk about several years, not to mention today’s situation. He was just strolling around in Dongyi city, meditating on the beach, occasionally drinking tea with Wang Thirteen Lang, repairing the emotions between each other, and the whole person’s performance was not at all like a powerful minister of the Southern Qing Dynasty, but rather like a Dongyi city idler who had nothing to do.
Time passed in a flash, and it had been almost a month since Fan Xian came to Dongyi City, and he finally stepped into the Sword Lodge once again to see that great master who had been injured by the shadow to the point where he was bedridden and unable to get up.