In an instant.
Several people who had just been admiring the beauty lowered their heads.
Cui Zhao'an, who had lost all desire to select consorts, suddenly called a halt.
"Stop!"
"I suddenly feel like inviting everyone to watch some acrobatics first. Let us change the program."
Below the dais, Chu Wenjing was filled with mixed feelings.
Although he did not know where that voice had come from, it was not the ten thousand certainties one feared, but the one chance in ten thousand.
If the woman performing really threw herself into his imperial father's arms, how could he ever show his face in the palace again?
"That sounds excellent."
The emperor nodded, his expression equally conflicted.
Today's events were far too uncanny. He no longer had much appetite for song and dance.
He wanted to speak to the imperial preceptor afterward and find out whether he had heard a voice from the heavens or had fallen ill.
[Huh? Why are they changing the program out of nowhere again?]
[Still, I have to say, Fusheng really is a heavenly beauty among mortals. Chu Wenzong, are you sure you won't consider her?]
[Even keeping her in the Imperial Palace as decoration would be easy on the eyes.]
[But acrobatics are fine too. I'm ready~]
Jiang Wanrong felt inexplicably uneasy. Perhaps she should not have let her younger sister come after all.
Zhao Yi only wanted to cover his ears. This little menace was far too bold; there was truly nothing she did not dare think.
As for Qing Qianxue.
He was probably the calmest of them all.
The very reason he had come to the Imperial Palace for the empress's birthday banquet today was to hear more of this little girl's inner thoughts.
She seemed to know many hidden secrets. He wondered how much she knew about the Flourishing Kingdom.
Before long.
The acrobats took the stage.
During the performance, Jiang Yourning spotted Chu Haoze sitting inconspicuously in a corner, and her eyes flickered.
[Oh, that bastard's huddled pretty far away in the corner. I wonder which unlucky woman with no sense whatsoever rescued him. How did he get sent back to the Imperial Palace so quickly?]
[Just wait. I've already prepared a grand gift for you. I'll deliver it any moment now.]
At those words, everyone except Jiang Wanrong frowned.
Who was the bastard she was cursing this time?
The fire-breathing and plate-tossing acts were quite entertaining and drew everyone's attention.
At one particular moment.
Seeing her target make a move, Jiang Yourning produced a tiny button.
When the woman was closest to her, Jiang Yourning flicked the little button from her hand, and it stuck to the woman.
Next, a miniature remote control appeared in Jiang Yourning's hand, hidden inside her sleeve.
When the woman performed a somersault high in the air, landed, and began spinning toward a certain noble personage, the empress remembered what that voice had said as she was leaving Perching Phoenix Palace, and her heart leaped into her throat.
In that direction sat the crown prince she had raised with her own hands.
But then.
The woman suddenly spun and spun like a top, whirling past the crown prince and then the third prince before plunging straight into Chu Haoze's arms in the corner.
The beauty's flowing black hair instantly came loose, transforming her into a lovely maiden.
Chu Haoze tried to push her away, only to discover that he could not budge her.
"Get up!"
A vicious look crept onto Chu Haoze's face.
Not knowing why she had been unable to stop spinning, and finding that the person before her was now the seventh prince, the woman panicked and tried to get up.
Yet somehow, her body seemed to have been coated in glue. No matter what she did, she could not pull herself free of the man before her.
"What kind of behavior is this!"
Seeing his son tangled up with a young woman for so long in full view of everyone, Chu Wenzong's expression darkened.
This was the empress's birthday, and he had done everything he could to make her happy.
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