After having sex with a fake eunuch, I became the queen

"Father, you are really trying to please me. I don't need your consent to what you said. As long as you say a word, I will go through fire and water without hesitation." When Ji Ning heard that he didn't have to lose his head, his eyes lit up with excitement and he agreed in a flattering manner.

The emperor Ji Ning raised one corner of his mouth slightly, revealing a smile, as if he was very satisfied with his son's answer. Then, he walked straight to the small dining table, sat on the small stool beside the table without saying a word, and waved to Ji Ning, "Come on, come on, let's sit down and talk!"

When Ji Ning heard the call, he didn't dare to be negligent and happily sat back in his previous seat. At this time, the person sitting opposite him was no longer the jailer Qi San, but his father, the emperor.

"Is the food here okay? Is the accommodation comfortable?" Ji Ying glanced at the uneaten food on the table and asked with concern.

"Your Majesty, it's great. I eat well, sleep well, and live more comfortably than at home." Seeing that the emperor asked about being in prison as if it was like staying in a hotel, he had no choice but to pretend to be a guest in the hotel and talk seriously about his feelings.

However, this friendly question made Ji Ning's heart beat again: The emperor neither held him accountable for the poisoning nor for calling him a tyrant, but pretended to be indifferent. Could he be planning something bad?

Would he have allowed himself to agree to something far more horrible than a slap, a tongue cut out, a head chopped off?
Thinking of this, Ji Ning was frightened. All kinds of torture scenes that he had heard of flashed through his mind like a kaleidoscope, such as frying people in oil pans, boiling people in boiling water, steaming people in steamers, and so on.

"That's good. I have specially instructed people to arrange it for you!" Ji Yin continued to look amiable.

"Thank you, father, for your kindness." Ji Ning cleared his mind of all the thoughts that were on his mind, and kowtowed with his chest hunched, "But... I don't know what your father wants me to agree to?"

He wanted to find out quickly what kind of cooking method was going to be used on him.
After hearing this, Ji Yin did not answer immediately, but began to ponder, as if he was thinking about something.

This made Ji Ning even more nervous, and he slid off the bench again. This time, he didn't sit on his butt, but knelt down again.

"Father, I am innocent! I have never poisoned Prince Qi Xin. Please look carefully, I am really innocent!" Ji Ning felt that if he did not seize the opportunity to protest his innocence, he might really be thrown into the frying pan.

"Well... Father came here in person to tell you about this... That... Yue'er is fine, there's no need for you to be like this." Ji Yin helped Ji Ning up across the small table and made him sit back on the small stool.

"What? Father is saying that Yue'er has woken up, right? Is that true?" Ji Ning was so excited that his voice changed.

"It's true, Yue'er is really fine, Ning'er don't worry!"

"Wuwuwu!" After hearing the emperor's confirmation, Ji Ning suddenly burst into tears, "Father, do you know how worried I am about Yue'er? Wuwuwu, I have no appetite, no food, and can't sleep at night... Wuwuwu!"

Ji Yu didn't answer, but just muttered in his heart: Didn't you just say "eat well and sleep well"? How come it changed all of a sudden?
"Wuwuwu..." Seeing that the emperor didn't say anything, Ji Ning quickly raised his crying voice a few more degrees.

"Well... no wonder I saw that Ning'er had lost weight and made the emperor worried!" Ji Yin looked at the few leftovers on the small dining table and Ji Ning's fatter waist, suppressed the upturned corners of his mouth, and replied.

"Also, it was really not me who poisoned you, father. Please understand my words! I have never done anything to let you down, father, mother, and Yue'er. If I tell even a single lie, I will be struck by lightning! Woo woo woo!" After Ji Ning made the poisonous oath, he continued to cry loudly.

Seeing that he was crying and snotting, Ji Ying quickly took out a silk handkerchief from his sleeve pocket and wiped his tears: "Okay, okay, stop crying. You are so old, a man, why are you still crying?"

The more people tried to comfort her, the harder Ji Ning cried. All the worries and grievances that had accumulated over the past few days came flooding back.

"Don't cry, my son. Your Majesty knows that you have been wronged, and he also knows that it was not you who poisoned you." Ji Yin continued to comfort him.

Hearing this, Ji Ning stopped crying instantly: "What?! You know it wasn't my fault. So, Father, you mean the case has been investigated, right?"

"Well... Yue'er... he... was not actually poisoned... it's just that someone wanted to poison him... everything you heard... is a lie." Ji Yin squeezed out a sentence from between his teeth.

"What? Not poisoned? Illusion? This...what is going on?" Ji Ning asked with his eyes wide open, looking surprised.

"That day, after Yue'er ate the maltose you gave her, she had loose stools when she returned to the palace. Originally, according to the meal arrangement, Yue'er was supposed to have a bowl of fruit juice that night. The Queen was worried that the fruit juice would make her loose stools worse, so she didn't let Yue'er eat it. Your mother didn't eat it either, and took the fruit juice away. Ning'er, you also know that the Queen is thrifty and hates waste the most. The daily supply of meals in the palace is carefully calculated, so the meals that are taken away are usually given to the servants. Unexpectedly, a palace servant fell into a coma after drinking that bowl of fruit juice, and his life was in danger..."

"Ah? Could it be that the bowl of fruit juice is poisonous? Then..." Hearing this, Ji Ning was so nervous that he clenched his fists and interrupted unconsciously. But halfway through his words, he realized that this was inappropriate: How could he interrupt the emperor? So he quickly stopped talking and didn't dare to continue.

Ji Ying didn't care, just nodded slightly and said, "After the imperial physician's examination and diagnosis, it was indeed caused by drinking that bowl of fruit juice, because the fruit juice was added with highly toxic Lihua grass, and the dosage was enough to kill a person."

"What! It was a close call. Fortunately, Yue'er and the Queen Mother didn't drink that bowl of fruit juice. It was really too dangerous!" Ji Ning seemed to have heard a thrilling story, with "fear" and "worry" written all over his face. "Then father, have you found out who did it? If you don't find out clearly, even if Yue'er and the Queen Mother are lucky enough to escape this time, they will still be in danger in the future!"

"Ning'er, you only care about asking about Yue'er's condition. Why don't you ask why your father put an innocent man like you in jail?" Ji Yin smiled slightly and answered the question irrelevantly.

"Oh... so... father knew that I was innocent?" When Ji Ning heard the emperor personally confirm his innocence, he relaxed completely - he first breathed a long sigh of relief, and then looked at the emperor eagerly, wanting to hear his explanation.

"The management of the Imperial Kitchen is very strict. If something like this happens, it must be that there is a loophole somewhere, and the bad guys took advantage of it. It is not difficult to find out who poisoned the food..."

"Have they found out who poisoned him?" Ji Ning couldn't help but interrupt the emperor again, because as a child, he really wanted to know the ending of the story.

"But various signs indicate that this matter was organized and premeditated. So, if we investigate in the conventional way, we can only find the person who acted on stage." Ji Yin was not in a hurry to reveal the answer, as if he was keeping people in suspense.

"Father, do you want to find out who is behind this?"

"Of course, since they dared to poison my family, I must completely wipe out the entire 'opera troupe' to vent my hatred, so I planned it this way. Ning'er, you have helped me, the emperor, a lot."

"But... this, I don't quite understand. What strategy did my father use to put me in prison? A self-torture strategy?" Ji Ning felt that although he did not suffer any physical pain, imagining that he would be cooked, fried, and boiled all day long had already caused great trauma to his heart.

"No, it was a delaying tactic. In order not to alert the enemy, I first stabilized the person who poisoned and the mastermind behind the scenes, and decided to find a 'scapegoat' to take the blame. It just so happened that you, my son, fed Yue'er a piece of maltose that day, and your former identity... well... really made you suitable to be the suspect. So I put you in prison and created all kinds of illusions to make people who didn't know the inside story think that I had determined that you, my son, were the murderer. Under all kinds of illusions, the real murderers in front of and behind the scenes were kept in the dark, thinking that I had made a wrong judgment, so they relaxed their vigilance and did not rush to kill or flee for fear of crime, but stayed where they were and waited and watched. In the end, I took advantage of the opportunity for these people to catch their breath and caught them by surprise."

"Wow, so that's how it is! Father is really smart!" Ji Ning heard this and clapped his hands excitedly, "Then who was responsible for the poisoning?"

"It was done by a gang led by Xu Baichuan, the governor of Yunxi Prefecture. When the Queen was providing disaster relief in the local area, she discovered that there were many discrepancies in the accounts of the relief funds in the government office. After reporting to me, the accounts were sealed and investigated, which offended many corrupt officials. Xu Baichuan was the leader of this gang of corrupt officials. Because he was in a border area, the emperor was far away and he was fearless in the face of imperial power. Before I could figure out how to deal with him, he had already planned to poison me, in an attempt to harm my Yue'er and the Queen." Ji Yin replied angrily.

"Father is truly wise!" Ji Ning clapped his hands again.

Seeing Ji Ning applauding, Ji Wei quickly struck while the iron was hot and put on a friendly smile: "But, because of this matter, your mother has always blamed me, saying that I let you, Ning'er, be imprisoned without knowing it, and did not take into account the feelings of the emperor. Therefore, my father came here to apologize to you, Ning'er."

"Oh... I see... So what did Your Majesty want me to agree to just now refer to..." Ji Ning sensed the connection and asked.

"Of course, I want you, Ning'er, to say a few good words for me in front of the Queen Mother and tell her that I have accepted your father's sincere apology." Ji Ying still maintained a pleasant smile.

The emperor had humbled himself and apologized. Most people would have been flattered to accept it. However, Ji Ning was not an ordinary person. After all, he was a child of an emperor. He was courageous, knowledgeable, and had a temper. After listening to the emperor's words, he did not nod obediently. Instead, he began to cry loudly again, "Wuwuwu, why didn't your father explain to me? I am suffering in prison. I have no appetite and can't sleep every night. It's really worse than death. Wuwuwu."

"Alas... why are you crying again?" Ji Yin had no choice but to help wipe her tears. "Because the matter was urgent and needed to be kept highly confidential, father did not explain it to me. Now I have come to apologize to Ning'er in person, right?"

"My malt sugar saved Yue'er, but you said I poisoned her. It's so unfair! If I had known this would happen, I would never have agreed to what my father said, wuwuwu!" Ji Ning relied on the fact that he was a meritorious minister and started to act like a spoiled child. He cried harder and harder, and it was obvious that he wanted to go back on his word and was not prepared to accept an apology.

Ji Yin waited quietly for a while, waiting for his son to finally become a mere blunder without any action, so he suppressed his expression of wanting to laugh and pretended to be serious: "Ning'er, you just called me a tyrant! Shall we discuss how to punish him for this matter?"

Upon hearing this, Ji Ning stopped howling instantly, restrained his "rebellious" behavior, and immediately realized: from the beginning, the emperor had been nagging about the "tyrant" issue, which was actually a trap for him. (Original version first published on Jinjiang)

(End of this chapter)