Xiao Qianyu made himself calm down. It wasn't as if becoming a father the moment he crossed over was a new experience. He'd even been someone else's grandfather—and their ancestor!
Keep calm. Keep calm!
But how could Shumo and Qinxin have failed to remind him of something so important? Could the children all be dead?
Still, judging by Qinxin's tone, it didn't sound as if something had happened to the Crown Princess. At least she'd been able to take the Eastern Palace's belongings with her.
Could it be that only the Crown Princess had survived, and she'd gone back to her family?
Xiao Qianyu kept his cool, inscrutable expression and asked as if it were an idle question, "How is the Crown Princess?"
Qinxin and Shumo both fell silent.
Qinxin's face twisted through a maze of emotions: awkwardness, distress, hesitation, worry. His honest, simple face was so creased it looked as if he could wring a cup of bitter juice from it.
Shumo, meanwhile, looked stifled, indignant, disgusted, and hateful—he was practically grinding his teeth.
Xiao Qianyu watched their utterly different expressions with interest, then made his voice a little heavier. "Hmm? Is there something I can't know?"
With two thuds, they both dropped to their knees.
Qinxin was timid, and Xiao Qianyu had frightened him into tears. Snot and tears ran down his face as he choked out, "Your Highness, the Crown Princess isn't worthy of you. She, she's already..."
Waaah, he couldn't go on.
Hatred blazed in Shumo's little eyes. His face twisted as he said, "What Crown Princess? She hasn't been one for ages. Your Highness, you treated that woman so well, and not only was she ungrateful, she repaid your kindness with treachery and put you in danger. Don't keep thinking about her. A slut like that deserves to be punished with a vengeance." His face darkened as he volunteered, "Your Highness, leave it to this servant. I guarantee I'll make her wish she were dead and regret ever betraying you."
Clearly, he detested the Crown Princess of Xiao Qianyu's original body to the utmost.
Xiao Qianyu's phoenix eyes narrowed. He looked half amused, half mocking. "Did I ask all that? I want to know how she is."
His expression darkened, and a commanding aura radiated from him, pressing down on them until they could hardly breathe.
Qinxin lowered his head in fear.
Shumo, on the other hand, had excitement shimmering in his pupils. He gazed up at Xiao Qianyu with near intoxication.
In his eyes, the Crown Prince could do no wrong. Before, he'd been gentle and kind, like a heavenly being; now, his forcefulness made him even more captivating.
Shumo licked his lips and said with scorn and disdain, "That woman remarried three days after returning to her family. Now she's already pregnant."
His Highness was good in every way except for his taste. He'd gone and fallen for that pure, shameless slut of a Crown Princess. What a miserable fate.
Xiao Qianyu was startled, then found the whole thing absurd. "She remarried?"
Qinxin lowered his head even further.
Shumo, however, stole a worried glance at Xiao Qianyu and kept urging him to do something wicked. "That's right. You treated her so well. If not for you, she'd have been strung up with a white silk cord by the Marquis Jingyuan's Estate, a laughingstock—or at the very least, cast out and left to wander the streets. You gave her the position of Crown Princess, so she could live in finery, pampered and honored. And yet she turned around and bit you, giving false testimony that you were secretly in close contact with Prince Jiujiang's Heir's Consort.
"She couldn't wait to remarry, as if she were afraid you'd touch her. Who knows, maybe she'd been sneaking around with that bastard man behind your back for ages. That child in her belly might be the result of an affair, for all we know." Shumo's malicious speculation nearly amounted to accusing the Former Crown Princess of having cuckolded Xiao Qianyu.
"How could someone as shameless and vile as her have the nerve to take the Eastern Palace Private Treasury? Your Highness, you should take it all back, then expose her ugly deeds for the whole world to see, so she'll be too ashamed to go on living."
A dull ache throbbed in Xiao Qianyu's temple. Missing memories were such a pain. He'd listened for ages and still didn't understand a thing.
He mentally tortured the system to death another thousand times.
Still, he'd at least figured out that his original body probably didn't have any children.
But it was certainly interesting that the Former Crown Princess of a False Crown Prince could take the Eastern Palace Private Treasury with her.
Even if his original body was a lovesick fool willing to hand over his possessions, would Emperor Yongchang and the Empress really allow it? A Crown Prince's private treasury wasn't some small sum. It was worth a fortune.
And she remarried just three days after returning home, then got pregnant soon after? Why did this sound like the start of a melodramatic scandal?
Xiao Qianyu also caught one important detail: the Former Crown Princess had betrayed his original body and informed on him, and Shumo had mentioned the "Prince Jiujiang's Heir's Consort."
His thoughts shifted, and he murmured, "Prince Jiujiang's Heir's Consort."
What did this woman have to do with the True and False Crown Prince Case?
Shumo answered honestly, "That's right. Everyone used to say Prince Jiujiang's Heir's Consort was devious and vicious. To make her son pass as the Empress's legitimate child and one day take the throne, she supposedly conspired to make the Empress give birth prematurely, then switched the babies. After that, she cruelly plotted to kill the real Imperial Prince, even going so far as to murder him to cover it up. And to keep Prince Jiujiang's Estate from discovering her secret, she stole one of a concubine's sons and raised him as her own, tearing a mother and child apart. Anyway, she was so wicked she had sores on her head and pus on her feet—everyone cursed her."
But then he asked in confusion, "Your Highness, you're the True Crown Prince. Even Heaven sent down a miracle to prove it. So did Prince Jiujiang's Heir's Consort actually do anything wrong?"
Before you continue