The Gilded Cage

Xiao Yu's erratic footsteps suddenly stopped.

The dazzling sunlight shining on his face made him shrink back. After the dizziness passed, he opened his eyes again and looked in the direction of the towering Tai Chi Palace.

That's where he grew up. From Tai Chi Palace to East Palace, every brick and tile inside is very familiar.

By now, he has become a prisoner, but the person who is waiting to see him is the former wife.

He couldn't tell exactly what he was feeling in his heart. He only felt that the changes in personnel were unpredictable. After a trance, a twist of resentment flashed across his withered face.

After all, there are still unwillingnesses, and there are still things that have not been clarified. It is also time to ask carefully.

"Let's go." He tried his best to stand up straight, straightened out the rough-clothed prison clothes on his body, and pursed his lips toward the Tai Chi Palace.

...

In the Ganlu Temple, Chu Ning sat in front of the makeup in the inner room, staring at her calm face in the bronze mirror in a daze.

Cuihe turned out the newly made hairpin ring jewelry and laid them on the case one by one: "His Royal Highness, look, which set do you want to use?"

These are all set according to the queen's specifications, inlaid with gold and jade, exquisite and dazzling.

Chu Ning came back to his senses, looking at the golden jade, couldn't help but smile: "What do you do with these? Don't have to be so troublesome."

Cuihe bit her lip, rarely stubborn: "His Royal Highness is now a queen, so it should be..."

Chu Ning knew that she was upset, and deliberately wanted to show her the most luxurious side when facing Xiao Yu.

"Just wear this one." She didn't push it all the way, picking out a golden step and inserting it into her hair. "We are doing well, it's not based on these words."

Cuihe looked at her with a much less restrained and depressed face than when she was in the East Palace, and slowly settled down and nodded: "Your Majesty said it well, but the slave and maid had thought about it a lot."

After a while, the servant outside said: "Your Majesty, the person has been brought here."

Chu Ning paused with the teacup in his hand, slowly raised his head, looked at himself in the glasses, got up and sat down on the outside couch, and said, "Let him come in."

With a squeak, the heavy palace door was pushed open from the outside, a thin and weak figure appeared outside the door, and sunlight came in, casting a thick shadow on the ground.

"Meet your Royal Highness the Queen, why don't you hurry up and salute?" Seeing Xiao Yu standing expressionlessly at the gate of the palace, the imperial servant waiting on both sides couldn't help but shouted.

"Huh, Queen." Xiao Yu's expression was a little distorted, and he didn't even look at the waiter, but just stared at Chu Ning who was sitting on the main seat, and walked to the bottom step by step, without the intention of saluting at all. I promised you the position of queen. You always don't care much. I thought that you don't care about your name outside. It turned out to be nothing more than that."

In the face of the sudden change in status, the edges and corners that he had been smoothed in the past half month suddenly became clear again. Even if he had become a prisoner, he did not want to show the slightest timidity when facing a woman who had surrendered to him in the past.

Chu Ning didn't get angry because of his words. On the contrary, the more he murmured at each other, the calmer her heart became.

"If you are your queen, I really don't care." She smiled at him, and spoke out her heart lightly.

"You!" Xiao Yu stagnated, and anger gradually surged in his staring eyes, and couldn't help but ask what had been pressing in his heart for many days, "You and him, when on earth did you say I treated you badly," Can someone like him treat you well?"

Chu Ning knew what he was asking. She thought about it many times before, and now he will see what will happen when he discovers the truth.

"On the day and night you left Chang'an and headed to Huazhou, I came to the Temple of Ganlu."

Xiao Yu was startled, completely unexpected that the two of them had secretly communicated the song at that time, and suddenly felt that their hearts were congested, and there was a burst of uncontrollable anger, and even their eyes were red.

"You have no shame! It's no wonder that you can be ashamed of him! I only hate me for thinking that you are different from that Zhao Erniang, you are actually the same!"

He was so angry that his chest was rising and falling, and he was breathing heavily, and his legs, which had little strength, also shook, almost unable to support it.

I thought that she had to leave the East Palace because she was forced by him later, so she felt resentful and entered the Taiji Palace. Who knows so early that these two people had done such an unconventional thing under his nose.

Chu Ning felt a little embarrassed and ashamed after hearing his accusation.

In her upbringing, women really shouldn't do anything to betray her husband, especially if they have fornication with others, they should be cast aside for the world. In this regard, she was wrong anyway.

But this is not her intention.

She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, looked up at him, and said: "This is indeed my fault, I will not deny it. But if there is a choice, I will choose to leave you without hesitation."

Mo said that he is a prince, or an ordinary man. As a woman, she has no right to choose to leave. The so-called "harmony" is also the initiative of men to let go.

She said this to show that she had meant to separate from him a long time ago.

"You have lied to me for so long, are you still unwilling to tell the truth?"

Xiao Yuhu stared at her: "What are you...what are you talking about?"

She did not speak, but took out the prepared envelope on the side and handed it to him.

Here, what pretended to be the letter written before Fang Bo was completely crazy.

Xiao Yu took his breath, took out the letter under her calm gaze, and quickly scanned it. The more she looked at it, the more frightened she became.

"Sure enough you know."

He suddenly laughed, only to feel that all the injustice and anger had been calmed down for the most part, and the secret he had kept for three years was revealed, even giving him a kind of inexplicable relief.

"You killed my father, insulted my elder brother, and trapped me in the East Palace. You deceived me for so long. You said, I shouldn't hate you, shouldn't I leave you?" Chu Ning put aside his expression and looked at him coldly. , Trying to restrain his emotions, "In the past few years, you have been wary of me in every possible way, and eliminated the remaining relatives or servants in my family one by one. My two cousins, if not because of their young age, do nothing. I don't know, how can I survive?"

In the face of her vocal statements and questions, he subconsciously wanted to avoid him, and he hardly dared to look her eyes directly.

"I-Aning, do you think I would like to be such a person?" He recalled the past and couldn't help shaking his head in pain, "Who doesn't want to be clean? But I, as a prince, as a prince The prince, I have never had a peaceful day. My father is weak and treats me far less than his younger brother. The queen mother doesn’t like me either. They oppose me everywhere. For so many years, I have never had a peaceful day. Otherwise, how can I live to this day?!"

Chu Ning looked at him as he was still making excuses for his actions, and couldn't help but directly pierce them: "You don't have to deceive yourself anymore. Your situation is not good. It is not an excuse for you to do so many evil things. You are the prince. , But never pointed the finger at the evil villains in the center, but in order to win people's hearts, indulge them to do evil, to enrich their own pockets, and even in the affairs of the family, they never consider the life and death of the people. Look at the past and present, there is a Mingjun who will Betray your own people and collude with foreign enemies?"

Even the Qi family, who has been acting for so many years, has never done such unfaithfulness.

Under her rebuttal, Xiao Yu felt more and more at a loss, but she kept shaking her head, trying to deny all this.

"Now that I'm down, every one of them scolds me for incompetence, weakness, and unrighteousness. You are not me. How do you know the pain in my heart?"

"I really don't know." Chu Ningjing looked at him quietly, with a moment of wetness in his eyes, "If I didn't meet your Majesty, I'm afraid I would also find many excuses for you-after all, you also have difficulties, and have faced many. Last resort. But look at your Majesty. Is his past better than you? You are still a well-known protagonist. Since childhood, he has been carefully nurtured and taken care of, and he is extremely honorable. He was forced to travel far away from the border when he was a teenager, uninhibited. Self-fate, but you know respect, responsibility and courage, you can distinguish right from wrong, and you can stick to the bottom line. In this way, do you still feel that what you do is justified?"

Xiao Yu was blocked by her sharp rebuttal and couldn't speak anymore. He stepped back and gritted his teeth and said: "Yes, he is the emperor, he is good in everything, I am worthless, everything is wrong... So, satisfied? When you saw me today, you wanted to see my embarrassment. What a shame, right?"

Chu Ning lowered his eyes, waved away the complex emotions in his heart, and motioned to the waiter who was waiting to bring up the prepared case.

"I see you today, just want you to take the initiative to confess the incident that framed my father, and give him an innocent name behind him."

This is her biggest wish in the past three years, and she should do it herself.

Xiao Yu glared at her, with a twist on her face: "Why should I listen to you? You betrayed me. Do you think I will justify your father? Things have passed so long that you have long been unable to find it. Is the proof?"

She was silent for a moment and whispered: "Yes, no evidence is found. But don't forget, besides you, Xu Rong also participated in this matter."

"Student!" His eyes shrank, and he subconsciously denied, "He won't betray me!"

"Of course he won't, but the more so, the more punishment he will have. He has worked hard for you for so many years, and now he is old and weak, but he has to endure the torture in prison for you, without liberation. Isn't there in your heart? Can't bear it at all?"

"I……"

He weakened his legs and took two steps back again, swaying from side to side almost unable to stand.

Xu Rong has served as a student in the East Palace since he was a child. For so many years, the relationship between the two has been close to both the emperor and the minister, as well as father and son. He has lived for more than 20 years in this life, and Xu Rong is the only one who stands on his side sincerely, working hard to remove all obstacles and pave the way for him.

He trembled and took a deep breath, closed his eyes in silence, and drooped his shoulders. He slowly knelt down before the case, lifted the pen and wrote down the original thing.

The vermilion inkpad was placed on the side of the table. He stretched out his trembling hand and pressed it. When he saw that it was about to fall on the snow-white paper, he stopped again, hoarsely saying: "When I finish painting, I will give all of them. Wait and see."

Xu Rong is stubborn and stubborn. Even if someone tells him that everything has been found out, he will never open his mouth and say one more word. Only if he sees this confession letter with his own eyes can he save him from having to suffer because he refuses to speak. The suffering of prison.

"it is good."

Chu Ning looked away and didn't look at him. This was about the only time in his life when he was truly willing to think about others.

The red fingerprints fell between the white paper and the black letters, and he stood up laboriously, without saying a word, stumbled away from the Temple of Ganlu like a walking dead.

The outside of the temple is still scorching, and everything is wilted from the sun, and it is lifeless.

He lost consciousness and walked unconsciously, finally unable to withstand the heat, and fell to the hard and hot ground.

The fine gravel was embedded in the flesh of his palms and arms, leaving shocking bloodstains.

He was lying weakly on the ground, looking up at the scorching sun above his head, and couldn't help but spit out a mouthful of blood.

In his entire life, he was truly defeated completely.