In the instant lightning tore open the night sky, it seemed to bring dawn to the world as well.
Sadly, it faded again in an instant.
Lightning could never bring true Dawn.
Jiang Wang stood stunned for a moment. "Born of the same mother?"
Jiang Wuyou said, "In Yuanfeng twenty-nine, Crown Prince Jiang Wuliang was deposed. I was five that year, and our mother was cast into the Cold Palace. I was given to Consort Ning to raise, and from then on, I called her Mother. No one, inside or outside the palace, was permitted to mention this matter. Violators were executed without exception."
She paused. "In Yuanfeng thirty, my mother in the Cold Palace died in melancholy."
Yuanfeng twenty-nine—Dao Calendar 3893—was an extraordinarily significant year in Qi State's history.
That year, the East Palace faction represented by Jiang Wuliang suffered a complete rout, both at court and beyond it. Countless people were implicated by the Deposed Crown Prince. The most famous among them was Wither-Bloom Monastery, the Buddhist Sect's third sacred land, whose temples blanketed East State. It was razed to the ground overnight. The Chongxuan Clan, one of Great Qi's foremost noble houses, was also left in dire straits because of Chongxuan Mingtu's ties to the Crown Prince.
Yet the seeds of disaster had actually been planted five years earlier. In Dao Calendar 3888, the year Jiang Wuyou was born, the Crown Prince was confined by the Son of Heaven for insisting on peace, while Chongxuan Futu was thrown into the Heavenly Prison for refusing to lead troops... That year, the Son of Heaven personally went on campaign, and the grand, earth-shaking First Qi-Xia War officially began.
Emperor Xia Xiang Si Yuan, a mighty sovereign of his generation, faced Emperor of Qi Jiang Shu head-on upon the battlefield.