The Gilded Cage

During the observation, Chu Ning had just showered, rubbing his semi-damp hair, and gently fanning it with a fan.

The hot water vapor evacuated from the white skin, adding a hazy, soft luster to her. The thin summer gauze skirt was not long after being put on, and it was already wet and half stuck to the body.

Upon seeing this, Cuihe took the napkin in her hand, repeatedly dried her long and dense black hair, wiped it with sweet-scented osmanthus oil, and tied it up with a tasseled rope.

The slender neck and thin back were finally relieved, and the heat radiated in the air, slowly cooling down.

The fragrance of the flowers blowing into the house quietly penetrated into the tip of the nose, making people feel happy.

Chu Ning couldn't help but hummed a melodious little tune, got up and changed into dry clothes again.

Seeing that it was not early, Cuihe got up and went out and opened the courtyard door, but inadvertently heard the outside discussion.

"It seems to be coming here, so late, I don't know what to do."

"The Guanzhong are all women's crowns, what else can I do? 80% of them are related to the lady."

"The female crown here...is it Lady Chu?"

...

Cuihe was stunned, couldn't help but walked a few steps outside, poked his head out, and saw the figures of people not far away.

She turned her head back hurriedly, and said to Chu Ning: "Lady, the saint is coming up-I've seen it all."

Chu Ning was a little surprised, and couldn't help but follow her out of the yard and wait outside the door.

On the ramp, the emperor was coming here on his imperial guard, and the attendants who followed on both sides held the lights, and they didn't look like they had been covering them before.

She was shocked, her heart seemed to be throbbing slightly, carrying the lamp, walked two steps closer, stood by the door, and smiled softly at Xiao Kezhi, who was getting closer and closer.

"Your Majesty."

Step by step fell steadily on the side of the road, and the two servants were separated on both sides, Xiao Kezhi stepped down from the step, step by step, and stopped in front of her.

The breeze came slowly, mixed with the slight drunkenness he brought from the wedding banquet.

"Yes, Aning, I am here."

There were a lot of palace people who passed by and couldn't help but stop and watch, and the younger maids in the Guizhen Temple also quietly poked their heads out curiously.

Chu Ning bowed his knees, stepped back to the door, and calmly said: "Your Majesty, please come in."

A narrow door opened wide with a creak, and then quickly closed, covering the otherwise invisible situation.

The outside was quiet for a while, and soon it was like a pot exploded in the dark night, and there were countless surprises.

It really is Lady Chu!

Tonight is the newly married prince, the emperor, as the uncle of the prince, entered the courtyard of the former prince concubine grandly!

...

In the main hall of Donggongli, the sound of ritual music and laughter are constantly intertwined.

Xiao Yu was holding the wine glass and the hip flask, constantly moving among the crowd, drinking a cup of sake, making his pale cheeks an abnormal blush.

After drinking with the guests, he was a little dizzy and unsteady.

But today, no one by his side brought him warm food and soup, and no one wiped the sweat from his face with a veil, and ordered someone to help him back to the sleeping hall to rest.

His face sank, and he beckoned to call two servants, holding himself in the direction of the sleeping hall.

The sleeping hall was decorated as a new house tonight, and there were several maids waiting on both sides. When he saw him approaching, they greeted him with a hurried smile, opening the door and eagerly saying: "The Prince is down!"

When Zhao Yu'e in the room heard the movement, she followed out and saluted him. When she glanced over his flushed cheeks and weak body, her carefully traced brows wrinkled insignificantly.

"His Royal Highness is drunk, please help him to rest." She instructed the maids beside her, but she didn't mean to do it herself. She just stood by and watched, not knowing that she remembered his intentional neglect when she greeted him. , Or just nature.

The maid of the East Palace stood on the periphery. The few around her were all married from Zhao’s family today. Two of them walked forward after hearing the words, one held Xiao Yu, and the other reached out to untie the jade belt hook on his waist. .

After Xiao Yu was drunk, he couldn't stand still, and the supporting maid was weak. So when the waiter next to him let go, he staggered to the side and walked out two steps messily before barely stabilizing.

The maid, who was kneeling to loosen his belt, didn't hold her hand, and pulled his waist and twisted.

"Get out!" He lowered his head with a sullen face, and shouted angrily at the maid, his thin lips pressed tightly, and his narrowed eyes were full of gloom.

The maid didn't understand his temperament, she was taken aback for a moment, and after leaning over to admit her mistake, she stretched out her hand to continue.

The anger in Xiao Yu's heart was ignited, and he immediately raised his foot and kicked.

Although he is a little weak and drunk, he is still an adult man, and his strength when angry is not small. At this moment, he kicked the maid's heart, knocked her out of half a meter, and held her upright. My heart curled up on the ground and couldn't whisper.

"Get out!" He panted and supported the shelf on the side, his tone was full of impatience, he stretched out his hand to untie his belt, and took off his robe and set it aside.

The waiters in the East Palace were busy withdrawing, and there were a few people from Zhao's family. I don't know why he was suddenly so angry and trembling, but he didn't dare to go straight down. Instead, he looked aside Zhao Yu'e.

Zhao Yu'e glanced at him with a frown, and waved at several maids: "Fine, you go down." With that, she walked to Xiao Yu's side, helped him into the bed and sat down on the bed in the inner room, and said coldly, "Since your Royal Highness is like this. I can't look down on Yu Niang's maid, so Yu Niang has to serve Her Royal Highness herself."

Xiao Yu rubbed her forehead, trying to tell her to get out, but took a deep breath, and finally held it back for a while, letting her reach out and take off the crown of her head.

Someone brought in sober soup and warm water. Zhao Yu'e first held a cup to make him rinse his mouth, and then personally wiped him with a wringed towel.

It was obviously the same thing as in the past, but he felt extraordinarily uncomfortable when he changed the individual.

The woman in front of her is naturally beautiful, mature, plump, charming, and gorgeous. Although her movements are not as gentle as water, they are also light.

But apart from the waves of irritability and unhappiness in his heart, there were no other fluctuations in his heart.

Everything today is not what he wants.

"Well, you go down too."

He leaned on the head of the bed for a moment, and finally couldn't help taking the towel over and wiping it indiscriminately.

Zhao Yu'e watched his movements coldly, and the smile on his face sank.

"Newly married tonight, has your Highness forgotten why you want to marry Yu Niang?"

Xiao Yu didn't speak, and the hand that fell to his side slowly gripped the flat cloth on the side.

Zhao Yu'e looked away, got up and walked to the makeup side, carefully removed the hairpin from her hair, removed the makeup from her face, turned her back, took off the complicated clothes, put on loose bedding, and whispered: "But for the past few days, please bear with me, your Highness."

With that, she extinguished the lamp post in the room, walked slowly to the bed, and lay down quietly beside him.

Outside the main hall of Lizheng, there are still drunk guests who have not yet returned, sitting crookedly at the food table, laughing presumptuously and enjoying the last song and dance.

In the far-away hall, the newlyweds slept on the same couch, but each had their own thoughts, and they were very strange and indifferent.

...

In the Guizhen view, Chu Ning was leaning against Xiao Kezhi's arms, and it was rare for him to actively embrace his neck with his arms.

When it was over, she was not at all sleepy, as if she felt something was going to happen.

Xiao Kezhi was also a little uneasy. He stretched out his hand and stroked her long silky hair for a moment, took a deep breath, and slowly said, "Aning, I haven't told you about my mother, have I?"

Chu Ning nodded slightly, knowing that he had something to say, so he raised his head, lay in his arms, and looked at him seriously.

Naturally, she had heard of his mother's back then, but it was only heard from other people's mouths, and what he wanted to say must be what he saw himself.

"My mother was originally the most ordinary handyman in Yeting Palace. She was of ordinary origin, and she should be considered the lowest rank among most of the court ladies who came from the family of petty officials, but she never complained."

Wei Shi always felt very lucky. Most of the poor-born girls who came to the palace with her were the ones whose parents died and were sold into the palace by other elders, or those who had brothers in the family to support and were sold in by their parents, they were always abandoned by their relatives. .

But she was different. Her parents were afraid that she, a twelve or thirteen-year-old girl who was growing up, would not be able to eat a full bite under the famine in Yanzhou. They heard that the court in Chang'an was full of sesame seeds, so they moved and sent her Thoughts.

She thought, she was the one loved.

Until later, when she was on duty at night, she met the drunk emperor and became pregnant by accident. Although she was named a talented person, she was neither to be seen by other concubines nor loved by the emperor, and she still did not complain about herself.

She said to Xiao Kezhi: "Liu Lang, you see, when my mother used to be in Yanzhou, she couldn't even eat wheat and rice, but now she thinks this bowl of mutton is too much. Such days are already very content. Mother has no other expectations, but hopes that Rokuro will live in peace."

She was born with beautiful eyes and grace, graceful and graceful, she is not beautiful, but she is not inferior in the overwhelming court of beauties. Although she is often neglected and ridiculed by people, she never cares about it and still lives with peace of mind.

But such a gentle, beautiful, kind and sincere woman has never received any love from her husband.

"I once asked my mother whether she resented her for being so cold and cold. I thought that during those years of hardship, no matter how open-minded and generous, there would always be some resentment. But she could only see it in her eyes. Lost and unfamiliar. For so many years, my father’s intimacy with her was only about the day before I was born. Later, he was still the supreme son of the emperor. The mother’s look up to him was the same as when he was a slave in Yeting Palace. There is no difference."

He held her on the couch by the window, opened the half-covered window, looked up at the stars dotted in the black night, his eyes were not melancholy, only a little bit of emotion.

She knelt down beside him, couldn't help reaching out and touching his eyebrows. The slender fingertips slid over the thick eyebrows, and he grasped them, and played with them carefully.

"Later, I saw many other people who were trapped in the harem, living on the breath of their father alone. Sometimes they would jump for joy because of their father, but joy is always short-lived, and more often they are all I felt sad and at a loss. At first I didn’t understand why it was so, but later I gradually realized that it was all because of my father, who trapped them. In this gorgeous palace, they lived a life of rich clothes and food. But it's already numb."

They forgot what they were like, and gradually they could only accommodate the emperor in their eyes.

But the emperor never stayed by anyone's side for too long.

If his mother hadn't devoted all her thoughts to his son because of her gentle and peaceful nature, she would probably be like other concubines, sometimes fighting in secret, sometimes complaining about herself, and finally passing away in depression.

Chu Ning could hear her, and she couldn't help but think of her past self. At the beginning, she was in the East Palace, and she was not much different from the concubines trapped in the palace.

"In the Feishuang Palace that night, your majesty asked Aning if he thought about it for himself, and didn't you want Aning to become like them?"

Looking back at this moment, many of his words and actions seemed to be deliberately awakening and pulling her back from the edge of numbness.

"Yes. At that time, I knew that my father was not someone worthy of any woman to rely on, and I also told myself that I would never become that kind of person." He touched her knees and sat on his knees face to face with his hands solemnly. Putting it on her shoulders, "After meeting you, I think again, I will never let you become a mother or the women I have seen in the past."

Chu Ning's breathing stopped, she stared at his burning eyes blankly, and heard his low and convincing voice ringing in her ears.

"Aning, today, he has already married another, you don't have to worry about etiquette, morals, and you are willing to believe me, leave here with me and go to Ganlu Palace?"

She opened her mouth, her eyes were slightly sour, and a layer of mist gradually exuded, blocking her vision. The mist quickly condensed into a ball, hung around the eye sockets, plummeting.

She had always wondered before, why he was so different and why he treated her so well, even if she later moved her heart and understood his goodness, the deepest doubts and doubts in her heart had not been completely eliminated.

Today Fang understands that his intentions are not entirely unfounded. His past was so rough and his father treated so harshly, but there was never the slightest bit of resentment and gloom in his body.

Compared with him, she has already got too much in this life, but after a little setback, why should she look forward and backward, and carefully hide herself?

The moment the teardrops fell from her eyes, she smiled and whispered: "Thank you, your majesty for your love, and An would rather leave here with your majesty--it’s the truth, just for the truth of her own."

"it is good."

His tense expression stayed for a while when he heard her answer, and then suddenly relaxed, and then, unstoppable joy emerged from his usual majestic countenance.

"Liu Kang!"

He picked her up and walked straight out of the hospital, no longer having to hide her appearance, and even his tone of voice was filled with joy.

"What's your order?" Liu Kang has been waiting patiently. Seeing him in such a high mood, he also became happy-in the future, I don't have to be busy trying to hide secrets for the emperor!

"Be prepared, go back to the Temple of Ganlu, and send someone to clean up the things here tomorrow."

The footsteps were quickly brought up, and the palace ladies, the servants, and even the crown ladies who served the nobles in the Guizhen Temple all poked their heads to observe the situation here, as if they were going to confirm the previous guesses. Endless.

Seven or eight servants carried lights, illuminating the square inch like daylight, so that everyone could see clearly.

Under the gaze of everyone, Xiao Kezhi strode up and took Chu Ning, who was also wearing a robes and a yellow crown, to board the imperial court and set off.