Troubles in the Court

Craassshh~

Tables and chairs toppled to the ground.

Panicked footsteps rumbled throughout the building.

Li Mu's thoughts were concentrated on the chaos that was going on in that building.

Hearing so much screaming coming from the building was very exciting.

He went to another nighttime rowdy place, and once again he lit and threw another string of firecrackers.

Boom~ Boom~

A deafening rumble could be heard yet again.

The booming of the firecrackers traveled far and wide in the silent night.

A lot of people came out of their rooms.

Some of them even came outside wrapped in their blankets.

However, more simply headed outside wearing very few clothes.

"It's quite a pity that it's now winter. Things would sure look a lot more interesting if it was summer."

The cold obviously got in the way.

All these rich, esteemed people wouldn't have bothered getting dressed when they heard the booming if it hadn't been winter.

He lit and threw all 12 strings of firecrackers.

A few of them were duds.

The entire brothel complex was filled with the rumbling of firecrackers and became very, very noisy.

A lot of people even began showing up in the neighboring streets to see what the heck was going on with all this noise and action.

Li Mu had already gotten to the city walls to check in at that moment.

"Congratulations to the host for successfully checking in at the city walls. Sun Tzu's "Art of War" rewarded.

Wait, what?

He'd never expected the reward to be a book about war tactics and strategies. Worse still, it was in conventional book form.

I came all the way here for nothing.

All the joy that he felt from bombing the brothel went straight out of the window.

He passed by the brothel area as he was returning to the palace.

He saw countless armed warriors surrounding the place. There were also a good number of police officers coming in and out of the place.

"Why are they still around here?"

A girl was seen standing alone in a compound behind the place.

She looked lost and confused.

The girl was the same one who had been kidnapped before, the one he had rescued from the dungeon.

"Why are you still here?" Li Mu appeared right in front of the girl.

"Were you the one who saved me?"

"Yeah." Li Mu nodded.

"Where else am I going to go in the dead of night?"

"Your folks?"

"I've been inside a brothel. I can't bring myself to go and see my parents now."

"If you can't go back to your folks, where else can you go then?"

Thump~

The girl got down on her knees before Li Mu. "I beg you, take me in."

"Umm…I'm not in a situation where I can take someone in."

Hey, I'm a eunuch after all.

"Please, I beg you. I could dump your waste, I could warm your bed. If you're unwilling to take me in... I'll be dead if I were to go home."

The girl just kept kowtowing to him.

What Li Mu really wanted was to dump this girl where she was, very, very badly.

He had seen how feisty the girl could be after all.

Well, how about I take her back to the palace and have her keep the concubine company for a while then?

I can send her elsewhere when I find a place for her.

No one bothers to come to Jingning Palace anyway, so no one could possibly find out.

At the very least, he could be rid of all his current troubles with a court lady around.

"Umm, well, are you willing to go to a royal palace then?"

…...

He returned to Concubine Jing's bedchamber and added some wood to the fire bucket.

He then checked to make sure there was ventilation from the roof.

He eventually dropped the girl at the Ninth Prince's place, giving him some pointers while he was at it.

It turned out that it was impractical taking the girl into the palace after all, and, worst of all, he could risk having his cover blown.

Dropping her at the Ninth Prince's place meant that no one would know who he actually was.

He heard a great many notable eunuchs talking about the explosions out in the city last night when he went back through the royal palace the very next morning.

The brothel had been shut down due to the explosions.

He found that to be good news.

However, the rumors that were circulating throughout the crowd ruined his mood. He didn't feel like fooling around any longer.

"The current emperor is brutal and callous, and thus thunder was sent from the heavens to smite the city. Many heard the rumbles the other night."

"Yeah. Any guy who ascends to the throne by killing all his brothers, the heavens should have smote the guy a long time ago."

...…

The rumors got increasingly fierce.

The emperor threw a tantrum during the court meeting.

"D*mn it, if I catch the one behind all of this, I'll kill their entire family."

Li Mu's days quieted down for a bit after that.

He was unable to get any decent rewards with his check-ins, and his training lagged.

The trees in the compound were all devoid of their leaves, which meant that he could not even kill time by sweeping up the leaves.

He would quickly go back to sitting around with the concubine during such times.

His days stayed pretty much like this until one day a girl who looked as if she had been chiseled out of jade came to the Jingning Palace.

The little girl was about two years old and pleasingly chubby, waddling about as if she had just learned how to walk.

The eyes of both Li Mu and Concubine Jing lit up as soon as they saw the little girl.

The "cold" palace had finally received another outsider.

Furthermore, this outsider was a cute one.

"Here, come to aunty."

The little girl was not afraid of strangers at all, and she waddled over to the concubine.

Laughter was heard from the place before long.

It took quite a while before some court ladies came to Jingning Palace and took the little girl away.

They didn't see the little girl for the next two days.

"That little girl is actually a princess. Well, isn't that a surprise."

Li Mu snooped around and found out that the little girl was actually the emperor's daughter.

She wasn't a legitimate child.

The little girl was a bastard child who the Third Prince had conceived outside the palace.

Concubine Jing looked outside the window at the back of the palace.

It seemed as if she was waiting for something.

Li Mu knew that she was waiting for the little girl to show up again.

Concubine Zhen was not of high status and was ostracized.

Yet, she was nonetheless of noble status.

That meant that she was of far higher status than Concubine Jing from a "cold" palace.

"My lady, I have a flute and a guqin with me. I'm sure the little girl would like to hear the sound of music."

Li Mu had an idea.

He had picked up all manner of bits and bobs whenever he had checked in outside the royal palace lately.

These odd trinkets included a flute, a guqin, drums, and even an erhu.

"Oh?"

Concubine Jing's eyes lit up.

The sound of music could be heard from Jingning Palace from then on.

It didn't take long for the chubby little girl to show up at Jingning Palace yet again.

The seasons passed.

The little girl grew up.

She would sneak into Jingning Palace every now and then.

All sorts of weird noises from these instruments could be heard from the palace during these times.

The music sounded awful.

Yet the laughter that was often heard during these times sounded beautiful.

Things were peaceful inside the palace, yet a storm was brewing outside.

Back in the court...

"Your majesty, the people right now are all slaves of the noble clans, and they are lamenting their sufferings constantly, as we speak. Yet, the noble clans spend all their time amassing power and have no intention of servicing the regime. Your majesty, I'd like to hereby request stripping the clans of their privileges."

That was Dugu Xin.

The emperor's uncle from his mother's side.

He was also the representative of Clan Dugu in court, and, at the same time, a grand chancellor of the State of Great Xia.

His words carried a lot of weight in the regime.

"I concur. The noble clans have monopolized the warrior examination, and a lot of palaces have practically become states of their own. If we continue to sit on our hands any longer, Your Majesty, our country will be doomed."

"I second that!"

...…

The court became extremely rowdy.

A great many ministers lay prostrate on the ground.

They were paying no actual heed to the emperor, who was fuming.

"Your Majesty, we cannot do this. We lack the strength at this time for carrying out such an enormous undertaking. It would be best if we took on the clans one at a time. If we were to strike at them all at once, they would definitely join hands…," the left chancellor said at that moment.

He'd been against the proposal right from the beginning.

The eyes of the young man sitting on the throne were almost popping out by then.

"Shut up! All of you, shut your traps! You are dismissed!" The young emperor rose and left the room as soon as he'd said that.

He went straight to his harem as soon as he'd left the court.

"Great Friend, find somewhere quiet for me to think."

"At once, Your Majesty," the old eunuch who was always by his side bowed and answered.

Soon, the emperor was taking a stroll on a path in the Imperial Gardens.

A wind blew up.

His hair was all messed up by the gust of wind.

Silver hair could be seen among the jet-black ones.

The emperor was still in his 20s.

He was still in his prime.

The old eunuch who followed behind him took a look at the dejected young man, and his gaze narrowed.

"Great Friend, tell me what people are thinking right now, would you? Dugu Xin is asking me to get rid of the noble clans, and I'm sure he's thinking of having me fight against the clans with my own people, so that Clan Dugu will be around to pick up all the spoils. If there were to be one clan that I needed to get rid of the most, it would be Clan Dugu."