Selling wife for fame? Kick out the scumbag and marry the new emperor to enjoy the harem of favors

Chapter 278

Chen Meiren never expected things to collapse so quickly. She collapsed to the ground, completely dazed, her blood rushing to her head, her vision blurring.

But then she remembered that she still had a child, and the Sixth Prince was still alive. As long as her child was alive, she would have a future. She couldn't die!

With this thought in mind, Consort Chen immediately ran back into the house and tightly gripped the secret letter written by the Empress, which Princess Zhaoqing had given her.

If things really come to a head, she will naturally prioritize saving her own life.

This time, things quickly started to look promising.

In fact, if those in power really want to find out the truth, such petty tricks are not enough.

The palace maid who was by Consort Liang’s side, who claimed that Xie Jiu had instructed her to harm people, confessed after being tortured further. She said that someone had bribed her to give the Fifth Prince a handkerchief that had been used by a sick person, and then frame Consort Jin when the Fifth Prince fell ill.

Then there was the matter of identifying the person who bribed her. Consort Chen was cautious, and there were two intermediaries involved before the case was finally passed to Coral, the head palace maid of Consort Chen.

Seeing that her scheme was about to be exposed, and terrified by the torture instruments, Coral confessed everything.

Fortunately, she didn't say that it was all Consort Chen's idea. Considering the long-standing relationship between mistress and servant, Coral said that the Empress used the lives of the Chen family as leverage to force Consort Chen to kill the Fifth Prince and then frame Consort Jin.

In this way, with Consort Jin's downfall, the Empress can make a comeback, and the palace will have one less prince.

Zhao Xingjin was furious. After sending Xie Jiu back to Jingming Palace, he issued an edict to order Consort Chen to be executed.

As for the Empress, he would go there in person.

When Consort Chen saw Yang Zhian approaching, she felt a chill in her heart. Without hesitation, she handed over the evidence she held in her hand, which showed that the Empress had instructed her, and pleaded that she was innocent.

The sixth prince was mentioned again.

But the imperial decree had already been issued, and Yang Zhian naturally wouldn't listen to her sophistry.

If she were truly a good person, she wouldn't have harmed the innocent Fifth Prince. Instead, she should have taken the evidence of the Empress threatening her to harm others and reported it to the Emperor long ago.

The Fifth Prince is so young, just a year old, and he is so adorable. Now he has a high fever, is having convulsions, is unconscious, and his life is in danger. How innocent he is!

If it weren't for the fact that she gave birth to the sixth prince, all of Consort Chen's exiled family members would have been executed for what she did.

Despite her struggles, Chen Meiren was eventually forced to drink the poisoned wine and died shortly afterward.

She never saw the Sixth Prince before she died.

That's fine too. It's like she's not his birth mother. The sixth prince will be raised by the Empress Dowager's side in the future, which will actually make things more stable for him.

As for the Empress.

When Zhao Xingjin took the secret letter that Yang Zhian had found from Consort Chen, along with the testimonies obtained from interrogating Zhang Liquan, Tingyun, and others when Xie Jiu was assassinated, to Weiyang Palace, the Empress was surprisingly calm.

"As expected, it won't work." The Empress chuckled, her eyes filled with self-mockery and resentment. "Heaven is determined to destroy my Great Jing! A married woman has bewitched Your Majesty so badly. Today, I've lost my position as Empress, and tomorrow, I fear the Emperor's throne will fall into the hands of the Xie family. Hahahaha!"

The Empress laughed so hard she bent over, tears streaming down her face. She leaned on the table, slowly lowering herself until she collapsed onto the ground.

“Your Majesty, she is the eldest daughter of the Xie family, a renowned scholarly family whose reputation is known throughout the land. Her father, Xie Mingshen, was the Grand Secretary of two dynasties. If Your Majesty had not led your troops into the capital and seized this empire, the world would probably belong to the Xie family now. Your Majesty cut off her family’s path to wealth and killed her father. Can she really still love and be loyal to Your Majesty?”

Looking up at Zhao Xingjin, the Empress's eyes were full of mockery.

"Even if the Xie family can't sit on the dragon throne, she still has children. In the future, half of the Zhao family's empire will belong to the Xie family. Your Majesty, are you happy? Don't forget how the old prince was forced to his death by that dog emperor of the previous dynasty. The Xie family must have played a significant role in that!"

At this point, the Empress knew she was completely finished, so she had no more scruples. It was only pitiful for her daughters, Zhaoqing and Lingyi; if she were deposed, her daughters would inevitably be affected, and all of this was Xie Jiu's fault.

If Xie Jiu hadn't wanted to enter the palace to compete for the emperor's favor and try to overshadow her, things wouldn't have turned out this way!

So even if the Empress dies, she will still smear Xie Jiu in front of Zhao Xingjin. Besides, what she said is the truth, isn't it?

Faced with her madness, Zhao Xingjin simply asked her a question in return.

"Do you know that the Fifth Prince is young and could die if he contracts that disease?"

"Of course I know." The Empress finally seemed a little guilty and breathless at this moment, but she quickly retorted with her neck stiff, "But it was not me who harmed him, it was the Emperor. If the Emperor had not favored Consort Jin and forced me to take this path, the Fifth Prince would not have lost his life!"

Zhao Xingjin listened to her twisted logic with a complicated expression, and ultimately decided not to say anything more to her.

"You'd better hope that the Fifth Prince is safe and sound. Three days from now, I will send you out of the palace to the National Temple. From now on, you will stay there and pray for the country."

"No, I won't leave! I am the Empress, and I will live in Weiyang Palace! No one can take my place, no one can!"

The Empress shouted angrily at Zhao Xingjin's retreating figure, staggered as she tried to rush over and grab his clothes, but was quickly stopped by several palace servants who locked the gate tightly.

After leaving Weiyang Palace, Zhao Xingjin went to see the Fifth Prince.

The child's condition is very bad.

The high fever wouldn't go down, and she couldn't take any medicine. She looked incredibly weak, her whole body burning hot, her little face and mouth flushed red. She just kept her eyes closed and cried like a kitten, but because the fever was so high, she didn't shed many tears, only wetting her eyelashes, making her look even more pitiful.

Liang Meiren held the child tightly in her arms, wiping him down to lower his temperature again and again, and trying to give him medicine repeatedly.

But it seems that nothing has worked.

The child is too young, just a few days shy of his first birthday, and his illness is sudden and severe.

Zhao Xingjin's heart sank to the bottom. He took the Fifth Prince from Consort Liang's arms, hugged him, stroked the child's head, gently wiped away the tears from the corners of the child's eyes, and then held the Fifth Prince's little hand, his eyes full of expectation.

Never before had he hoped so much that his so-called true dragon fortune would bless his descendants and protect his children from disaster and illness.

But in the end, it was all in vain.

The fifth prince was gone. The next day, just as dawn was breaking, the poor child breathed his last in the arms of the beautiful lady.

Consort Liang cried until she fainted. Upon hearing the news, Zhao Xingjin also canceled the morning court session that day.

This was the second child he had lost. The first was the one he had miscarried in Consort Zhang's residence when he was still a prince. Compared to that unborn child, the Fifth Prince had lived in this world for a year, had interacted with him, and was even maliciously murdered. Therefore, Zhao Xingjin felt even more pained.

He thought of Xie Jiu, the child in Xie Jiu's womb, and the other imperial heirs in the palace; nothing could be allowed to happen to them.

But the one who suffered the most was Liang Meiren, the mother.

After Liang Meiren woke up from her coma, she remained silent, neither eating nor drinking. When Zhao Xingjin came to see her, she did not get off the bed to greet him.

It wasn't until she learned that it was Consort Chen, under the Empress's orders, who had killed her fifth prince, and that the Empress was to be sent to the State Temple the next morning and not allowed to return to the palace without being summoned, that Consort Liang seemed to suddenly come back to her senses, and her eyes suddenly lit up.

The next morning, on the way out of the palace, Consort Liang was already waiting there and stopped the servants escorting the Empress.

"I hope you gentlemen will do me a favor. I have a few words to say to Her Majesty the Empress." Consort Liang handed over a pair of gold bracelets.