A chill in his heart

"Who wrote this Blue Satchel Poem?"

Prince Qi actually leaned toward believing the rumor: the previous dynasty's emperor had feared several consorts who had risen from within his own harem, so he had laid a trap and fanned the flames, making them fight among themselves before seizing the chance to condemn them.

"Yet despite the previous dynasty's emperor killing so many consorts, 'Snow lay three feet deep within the palace; servants and concubines won the realm.' In the end, our Ji clan still won the realm."

"The so-called 'servants and concubines' merely pointed to the character Ji."

A complicated expression crossed Prince Qi's face. He felt both the sense of Heaven's Mandate that came with his own lineage winning the realm and the realization that even an emperor was insignificant before it.

"The Blue Satchel Poem caused a sensation in its day, for its prophecies struck subtly home in a few casual words. At first, people from the Daoist Sect claimed credit for bringing the poem into the world. Then the emperor flew into a rage, unleashing bloody winds and crimson rain. Many Daoists died, and he even sent guards to investigate its origins in secret. At once, no one dared claim it."

"But it was still someone surnamed Ji who destroyed the Wei Dynasty. Judging by that, this surviving prophecy does possess something supernatural. The rumor that its author attained the Heavenly Immortal Dao Fruit and could foresee three hundred years can hardly be dismissed as groundless."

"Yet the prophecy concerning our Great Zheng is scarcely better than Former Wei's."

"Within the seas, harmony heralds a golden age; rising with destiny, its aura is yellow. One dragon falls and another soars; a withered tree meets spring, and a True King appears."

This prophecy pierced the heart most cruelly. It