Grand Tutor Peng leaped into the Empress Dowager's Imperial Bedchamber.
The moment he entered, the smell of years-old mildew assailed his nose, mingled with the bitterness of medicinal decoctions. Then he heard an old woman's low, hoarse sobbing.
Grand Tutor Peng's heart jolted. He hurried out of the inner room and saw an old woman slumped on the floor, crying with vacant eyes.
A foul stench and a heavy medicinal odor emanated from her. Her body was as thin as dry kindling, her sunken cheeks bore bright red slap marks, and even her silver hair was tangled and disheveled. Never mind calling the woman before him the Empress Dowager-if someone said she was an elderly beggar wandering the streets, people would surely believe it.
A sharp pain pierced Grand Tutor Peng's heart. He hurried over and reached out to help the Empress Dowager up.
The Empress Dowager came to her senses and spoke in a harsh, rasping voice. "You... are..."
"Your Majesty, this old subject is Peng Lai. How... how did you end up like this?" Grand Tutor Peng's voice was choked with emotion.
Upon hearing that he was Grand Tutor Peng, the Empress Dowager dug her fingertips deep into his arm, her expression twisting hideously. "It was him... who did this to me..."
"Who?" Grand Tutor Peng already had a guess.
His fury knew no bounds. Staring at the Empress Dowager's sunken eyes, his own reddened in an instant.
The Empress Dowager indistinctly forced out the words, "The... Sovereign..."
Grand Tutor Peng's hand abruptly clenched.
He had thought the Sovereign truly was so filial, keeping the Empress Dowager well cared for in the palace.
So behind that splendid, imposing monarch lay such depravity. The Empress Dowager was his own mother!
Twenty whole years. No one had seen the Empress