The Empress Dowager also felt he had gone too far.
"Why quarrel with His Majesty today, Retired Emperor?"
Making things difficult for Wu Junji was simply showing Emperor Zhou his displeasure.
The Retired Emperor snorted. "A vile spawn. How much do you think he'll ever amount to?"
"The emperor has lost his head too. Lately, he hasn't even been visiting the harem. He spends every day fooling around with male favorites!"
"Does he want to produce another vile spawn?!"
"Does he think this vile spawn can shoulder Great Zhou's future?"
"Zheng has a noble, pure bloodline and the bearing of a young dragon. When the General Summoning comes, he'll surely stun everyone with his first cry!"
The Empress Dowager muttered softly, "Didn't we agree not to discuss this anymore?"
"You agreed when the Crown Prince was appointed."
"I did agree! But look at him. All he does is eat and sleep, sleep and eat. Does he look like an heir to the throne?"
"Zheng at least knows to come pay his respects every few days. At his age, Zheng already knows how to wield a wooden sword!"
"I've felt that vile spawn's bones and sinews too. Once he grows up, he'll be so stiff he could serve as a coffin himself! Utterly useless!"
The Empress Dowager understood perfectly. The Retired Emperor despised Emperor Zhou's malformed body, yet did not want the reputation of having ended his family line, so he had simply raised Emperor Zhou as an ordinary boy.
When Emperor Zhou was thirteen, he had begun selecting women for him. In the Retired Emperor's eyes, this son, neither fully male nor female, had only one purpose: to carry on the family line. He had pinned all his hopes of obtaining a physically whole descendant on Emperor Zhou.
But the Retired Emperor's idea of whole was someone like Wu Junzheng, not someone born the way Wu Junji had been.
Emperor Zhou and Wu Junji were both aberrations in the Retired Emperor's eyes. Only Wu Junzheng was Great Zhou's perfect successor.
A remark from Abbot Tianxuan had shaken the Retired Emperor back then. A year later, his old affliction had returned. His own attitude had kept the Crown Prince from growing close to him, yet he insisted the fault lay with the Crown Prince.
And so, the more he looked at Wu Junji, the less he liked him.
If the Crown Prince wanted to secure his footing, he had to convince everyone at the General Summoning.
Of the Yuntai Twenty-Eight Generals, one set of seven made a snake, two sets a python, three sets a false flood dragon, and four sets a flood dragon.
The Retired Emperor had summoned twenty-one in his day.
Emperor Zhou had also summoned twenty-one. Only then had the Retired Emperor acknowledged him as his son.
Otherwise, Emperor Zhou might not even have lived past three.
However dissatisfied the Empress Dowager felt, until Emperor Zhou truly controlled the court and removed the Retired Emperor's old ministers, she would continue to serve as the lubricant between them.
"Rest easy, Retired Emperor. Two consorts in the palace are still expecting. The imperial physicians examined them and said there was an eighty percent chance they were boys. Next year, the palace will welcome two more princes."
"His Majesty only summoned male favorites for a little novelty. He won't forget your painstaking intentions. He will surely spread Great Zhou's branches and leaves."
The Retired Emperor considered it. With two more little princes, Great Zhou would have three princes in this generation. Thinking of the number of children in his own generation, and the two generations before that, he was satisfied for the moment.
The Retired Emperor was satisfied. Emperor Zhou was not.
I went to all that trouble to appoint an Imperial Noble Consort. You don't feel sorry for me? Fine. You don't congratulate me? Fine. But you bully my son while I'm too busy to be in two places at once?!
Emperor Zhou stormed over from Taiji Palace and went straight to the Jade-Tooth Warm Pavilion.
"Wu Junji!"
The old man's booming voice exploded so suddenly that Wu Junji nearly thought someone had set off firecrackers.
He had barely poked his head out before he was scooped up by the armpits.
"Tell me! Has someone been making things difficult for you?!" Spittle sprayed all over Wu Junji's face. His cheeks bulged perfectly round with the dried scallop he was chewing, and it took him a few breaths to catch up.
"Not really."
Wasn't it just the cold bench? Once Granddad can't move anymore, I'll treat him to the tiger bench.
Wu Junji believed that a gentleman could wait ten years for revenge.
But Emperor Zhou fought for revenge morning and night.
"I knew it!"
Emperor Zhou's brows bristled, his gaze icy. "Does he really think I'm afraid of him?!"
"Just you wait!"
He put Wu Junji down and strode off, seething.
Wu Junji stuffed another mouthful of dried scallop into his mouth and chewed and chewed, looking as though he had encountered some great unsolvable mystery.
"System, what's he planning to do?"
The old man had left Wu Junji utterly baffled. Emperor Zhou ten years later had been unfathomable; Emperor Zhou now followed a logic no one else could understand, often making one wonder: was he even human?
A son confronting his father head-on would only leave both sides wounded.
Wasn't that common sense?
88 hugged an enormous piece of digital dried scallop, gnawing and chewing away.
"Going to get justice for you, obviously."
Wu Junji answered with a dry heave.
But then he remembered their conversation on the way back from the Chen Residence that night and asked doubtfully,
"Could the dopamine in the old man's brain really have started producing hallucinogens?"
88 slowly scratched out a question mark.
It was not speaking up for Emperor Zhou. It was merely curious.
"Wasn't this exactly what you wanted when you ran away from home a few days ago?"
"Standing up for you shows he cares about you. Doesn't that prove your last attempt at running away was a great success?"
Wu Junji knew his own situation very well.
"He isn't going to see the Retired Emperor for my sake. In the imperial family, affection is allotted according to status. The Retired Emperor treated me coldly in front of Wu Junzheng because he disapproves of Emperor Zhou appointing me Crown Prince."
"Ninety percent of Father's anger is about defending his own authority."
"Only the remaining ten percent is affection at work."
Wu Junji sat on the couch, fiddling with a wooden horse puzzle. Late autumn was cold, and charcoal was already burning in the room, with a kettle suspended above it to humidify the air.
The scent of incense and candles burning at the two Daoist establishments drifted in with autumn's golden hues through the mica window patterned with plum blossoms and cracked ice, and the light illuminated half of Wu Junji's face.
It was like the yin and yang sides of his personality.
One side was black; the other was blacker.
The eunuchs and maids in the warm pavilion stood as silent as rooted timber.
Eunuch Qian and Nanny Wang were capable workers. Their only shortcoming was that they were not his people.
Just as the court's civil and military officials were not his father's people.
Wu Junji was still young and did not think much of it. Emperor Zhou was a different matter.
The Mao-Sun Style puzzle in his hands was difficult to assemble. One wrong piece meant starting everything over, and he accidentally pricked his hand on a splinter.
He drew a soft breath. Eunuch Qian leaned closer to look and hurriedly took out a handkerchief to wipe away the blood.
Eunuch Qian checked the craftsman's name carved beneath the wooden horse.
"This man is far too careless. How could a toy made for Your Highness have splinters? This servant will dismiss him at once."
Wu Junji said, "No need. It's quite fun. Have him make a few other things. I want a horse that can run."
Eunuch Qian assented.
Wu Junji continued fiddling with it while chatting with 88.
"Father has been on the throne so long, yet hardly any of the Retired Emperor's old ministers have stepped down. With Father's temperament, he should have run out of patience long ago. Why hasn't he made a move?"
"What is he waiting for?"
Artificial intelligence was only artificial intelligence. It could never fathom how many times human thoughts could change in a single breath.
The clock beside him chimed, its ringing stirring Wu Junji's thoughts, and suddenly he caught that glimmer of insight.
"Zhou Wu Year Three..."
"Chen Yang died in Zhou Wu Year Three."
"The Grand Commandant... requested retirement in Zhou Wu Year Three..."
"The Commandant of the Sili, Zhou Wu Year Three... retired."
"The Merit Officer, the Administrative Aide, three of the Nine Ministers, all retired."
"More than half the Palace Forecourt Guards and Capital Guards were replaced..."
88 listened as Wu Junji picked out the key entries from the "Register of Officials Who Retired During the Twenty Years of Zhou Wu," which he had browsed in his previous life, piecing them together until they revealed this world's greatest secret.
"General Summoning."
Wu Junji carefully pondered those words.
Too many central officials had left office in Zhou Wu Year Three. In his previous life, Wu Junji had merely assumed these were the three fires a new emperor lit upon taking office.
Now that he thought about it again, hadn't this fire taken far too long to burn?
Three years before it caught.
And then it had burned in such a concentrated burst.
Something must have happened in Zhou Wu Year Three.
-If you amount to nothing at three, I'll depose you.
-Go, go, go. Appoint him, appoint him, appoint him. I'll only judge him by his General Summoning at three.
Emperor Zhou's and the Retired Emperor's words echoed in his ears.
Wu Junji kept feeling that the group of people who had stepped down in Zhou Wu Year Three in his previous life were connected to the General Summoning.
This General Summoning might even have an enormous effect on his position as Crown Prince.
But in his previous life, he had known nothing about the General Summoning.
With one building block missing, he could not construct the way out of the maze.
Wu Junji tossed aside the half-assembled wooden horse.
He took a piece of dried scallop from his pouch and gulped it down in one bite.
"88, will the old man still kill the Chen Family?"
88 said, "Meow???"
88 had no idea what its host had thought of this time. Sometimes, it felt Wu Junji was far too frightening.
He was the first host whom 88 could not view as a child.
Wu Junji tipped out his dried scallops and counted them. Eight pieces remained.
"There are two possibilities. The old man still wants to kill the Chen Family, and marrying Chen Jin is meant to make them lower their guard."
Who would expect me to marry your sister this year and stab you next year, on New Year's Eve, no less?
Wu Junji chewed four pieces at once. Their savory fragrance made him narrow his eyes in satisfaction, his little feet lifting with delight at the delicious taste.
"The second possibility: the old man doesn't want to kill the Chen Family. His brain has gone wrong, and he wants to cultivate a maternal family for me."
88 exclaimed in shock, "How did you know?!"
"The old man brought me back from the Temporary Palace to the Imperial City, but detoured to the Chen Residence halfway."
Wu Junji had failed to eavesdrop that night, but after thinking it over carefully, did he even need to eavesdrop?
"What matter was so important that he couldn't discuss it during the day or in private, and had to discuss it while bringing me back to the palace?"
"He even let Chen Yang see me. Would you let a powerful minister you're deeply wary of see your illegitimate son?"
Wu Junji sighed. "Honestly, I find it very hard to accept. I hate Chen Yu so much that even seeing the character 'Chen' disgusts me. It took half a year of agonizing before I finally worked through it and let it go."
88 went cross-eyed. "You said you spent half a year agonizing?"
How had it not known its host had spent half a year agonizing?!
Wu Junji had spent those six months living like a pig, eating and sleeping, sleeping and eating. Whenever asked, he said he was fattening up.
Now he was telling it he had spent half a year agonizing.
88 clutched its head and spun in circles with its entire system. The next instant, Wu Junji's tone suddenly turned dark and eerie.
"88, you know."
"I haven't... forgotten something because you tampered with my memories, have I?"
Even 88's whiskers bristled. Wu the Flayer never gave the slightest warning before going mad!
88 clamped its mouth shut and said nothing.
Wu Junji had not expected an answer anyway. His chilling voice dropped another thunderclap.
"Number Two was reborn too."
88 clutched its central board, unable to breathe!
Who could have expected an even bigger explosion to follow?
"Do you have any drugs? Flaying so many brothers is exhausting, and it would make their mothers sad too. That's quite a sin."
"Better to solve the problem at its root."
88 said, "?!!!"
Wu Junji was serious. In the future, he would have eight younger brothers and two younger sisters.
The sisters were fine. Quite well-behaved.
The brothers were not. Whenever he recalled those past events, viciousness surged in Wu Junji's heart. He had originally wanted to kill the old man too, but the scene he had witnessed at birth had dispelled that murderous intent.
He could kill a father who had never raised him without a burden on his conscience.
Not a mother.
"I remember that in Zhou Wu Year One, a meteorite fell from the heavens in Shanxi, bearing the words 'May the dragon's fortune flourish forever.' The stone was presented to the palace. It should be in... Yinglu Pavilion?"
"Meteorites emit radiation, which can kill sperm. Carve it into a belt and have Father wear it."
With a few casual words, Wu Junji circumscribed the future of the old man's remaining offspring.
88 said, "..."
What a sin!!!
This was its host after most of his memories had been sealed and most of them altered. It simply could not imagine how insane he would have been if the host from his previous life had been born with everything intact!
88 looked him over. Its two-year-old host was as adorable as a Long-tailed Tit on Changbai Mountain, his plump cheeks round and chirpy, his brocade robes and silver cap like snow on the sacred mountain.
Yet his heart was black beyond measure!
Possessing inhuman intelligence while knowing how to restrain oneself and uphold righteousness-that was what it meant to be noble and upright!
Calling Wu Junji both righteous and wicked would already be a compliment!
88 sighed and drowned its sorrow in drink.
It had, in fact, already accompanied Wu Junji through one lifetime.
The tragedy of Wu Junji's previous life was entirely Emperor Zhou's fault. Had he not brought Wu Junji back to Chang'an, Wu Junji could have lived perfectly well among the common folk, bluffing and swindling his way through life.
A Long-tailed Tit from Changbai Mountain had been trained into a canary in Chang'an City, but a canary had no dignity, so it struggled to transform into a swift in a raging storm.
But the flames of tyranny had burned his wings, and the blades in the wind and rain had scraped his bones raw. The untamed swift had gone mad, becoming a crow that lured others into leaping off cliffs.
88 naturally favored its own host without reservation. It had bonded with four hosts and thought it had seen plenty of grand spectacles, but never in its wildest dreams had it expected to encounter an oddity like Wu Junji.
Wu Junji's madness left 88 helpless.
Who would believe that this ruthless man had skinned six brothers alive, and even on the brink of death, regretted not having peeled off Emperor Zhou's skin?
88 did not mind its host killing his kin, but it could not accept its host killing people by such means.
This went beyond the understanding of morality and the world it had formed with its previous hosts.
Yet it discovered, to its sorrow, that it had no right to stand on high and condemn its host for anything.
Anyone else in his place would not have done any better than Wu Junji.
Even skinning his enemies and stuffing their hides with straw could not heal the wounds he had suffered.
Had it not begged him, Wu Junji would not have cared in the slightest for a chance to start over. He would rather remain in pain, sickened and mad, than stop entangling himself with those people. He could not let go!
88 could no longer tell which of the two, father or son, was right or wrong. All it could say was-back then, you and I each had our own hardships.
Before you continue