On the twenty-eighth day of the twelfth month, Jinghe Year Fifteen, heavy snow fell.
Snowflakes broad as mats sealed the city and buried its lanes.
Yet though snow filled the city, the roads remained open.
In a scarlet robe and black cloak, Wei Nisheng walked through the snow to the Palace.
Snow filled the steps, and footprints followed one another.
He neither brushed the snow from his clothes nor paused for the talk beneath the corridors, but entered with his head held high.
Many clerks of the various bureaus stepped aside. Once clear of his path, they turned to look back, their whispers seething.
Fang Qi had died, and Shen Duan had fallen ill. The Grand Secretariat stood half empty, and the court was like a leaking vessel.
Officials throughout the city cast sidelong looks at the Ministry of Personnel and fixed their eyes on the Selection Office.
And the one they watched was none other than this young vice director, who still stood firm among the ranks at court after Chancellor Shen had fallen ill.
The Old Book of Tang recorded that after Fang Xuanling died and Du Ruhui fell ill, Emperor Taizong once sighed, "Fang and Du have fallen one after another. It is as though I have lost my right and left hands."
Now Fang Qi and Shen Duan had fallen in succession, and Great Zhou's Grand Secretariat was in much the same state.
Yet after Emperor Taizong lost Fang and Du, he still had Wei Zheng and Ma Zhou to take their places.
After Emperor Jing lost Feng and Shen, whatever hope remained might rest upon Wei Nisheng alone.
The snow fell harder, and Heaven and Earth grew whiter. Wei Zi alone, clad in scarlet,
walked through that boundless whiteness, neither avoiding the snow nor brushing