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Chapter 289. Chang Yingxue (3)

The emperor's dependence became increasingly distorted.

As the young emperor grew up, he was no longer the child who could be soothed with gentle stories and delicate snacks.

The high walls of the palace, the omnipresent eyes and ears of the Eastern Depot, and the undisguised awe in the eyes of the court officials when they looked at Chang Yingxue all stimulated his sensitive and fragile imperial nerves.

He fell silent, gazing at his childhood friend with a complex and unreadable expression.

In those eyes, there was a growing fear, and even more so, a long-suppressed resentment and coldness belonging to imperial power.

Chang Yingxue keenly observed all of this.

She tried to respond with tighter control.

The palace servants around the young emperor changed batch after batch, but in the end, they were all carefully selected and absolutely loyal spies from the Eastern Depot.

Any courtier or member of the royal family who attempted to bypass her and reach the emperor would be met with swift and brutal retaliation.

The imperial prison was never short of new "traitors," and the bloodstains at Caishikou dried and then became wet again.

She used fear to extinguish any possible sparks of resistance.

However, people's hearts are like flowing water; it's better to guide than to block.

The greater the oppression, the stronger the backlash.

A secret alliance, formed by former high-ranking officials and their protégés who had been brought down by Chang Yingxue, disillusioned members of the imperial family, and some upright officials who upheld "orthodoxy" and could no longer tolerate the interference of eunuchs in politics, was quietly operating in the darkness like a fire in the ground.

They learned from all previous failed resistance efforts, operating with extreme secrecy and employing roundabout methods of communication.

Even more fatally, they seem to have caught a clue to the biggest secret about the Ninth Prince—the deeply buried, shocking truth about her true gender.

The source of the clues is unclear, like a rumor quietly seeping from the darkest corner of the palace, yet it carries an unsettling direction.

Chang Yingxue intensified the surveillance and suppression by the Eastern Depot. The agents pounced on people like mad dogs, arresting, torturing, and fabricating charges against them.

Everyone in the imperial court was on edge and remained silent.

But Jiang Jianxin knew that the fear was transforming into a deeper, more repressed hatred, and her violence and suspicion were pushing her toward a desperate situation of utter isolation.

The final collapse came both suddenly and inevitably.

The trigger was not some earth-shattering event, but merely a minor breach of etiquette in front of the emperor.

During a court audience, a court official, due to excessive nervousness, accidentally dropped his official tablet, which made a crisp sound.

This was originally a matter that could be considered a big or small matter, but the people in the court seized the opportunity to exaggerate it and jointly submitted a memorial, pointing out that it was clear evidence that "the Nine Thousand Years Old's power and influence surpassed that of the Emperor, causing the court officials to be terrified and lose their composure, and the moral order to be lost." The words were strong and urgent.

This memorial was like a spark thrown into boiling oil, instantly igniting all the pent-up resentment.

The emperor sat on the dragon throne, his face grim. For the first time, he did not immediately look to Chang Yingxue for advice, but listened silently to the increasingly raging accusations in the court.

More detailed memorials poured into the emperor's desk, listing Chang Yingxue's numerous crimes, including forming cliques for personal gain, abusing his power, embezzling state funds, and framing loyal officials.

There was also a secret memorial that shocked the world and accused her of the "heinous crimes" of being a woman, forging her identity, deceiving the late emperor and the current emperor, defiling the palace, and disgracing ancestral rules.

The imperial court was in complete uproar—doubt, shock, fear, ecstasy… a mix of emotions clashed and intertwined.

The emperor suddenly stood up, his face ashen, his fingers trembling as he pointed at the secret memorial, his gaze, for the first time, unabashedly fixed on Chang Yingxue.

It contained utter shock, anger at being deceived, and a hint of... the chilling satisfaction of finally getting the chance to kill someone using someone else.

"Your Excellency...do you have anything to say?"

The emperor's voice trembled with suppressed emotion.

Chang Yingxue stood beneath the imperial steps, her python robe on her body, yet it seemed as if all support had been instantly stripped away.

Jiang Jianxin could feel the earth-shattering tremor deep within her soul. But she maintained her composure, her voice hoarse as she denied it, calling it "nonsense" and "a vicious frame-up."

However, when a wall falls, everyone pushes it down.

Those who had once sided with her, eager to distance themselves, turned against her and rushed to expose her "crimes." Even her former confidants, under torture by the Eastern Depot, revealed a wealth of details.

Ultimately, a confession written by Chang Jingzhong during his past torment of conscience, which came from his former residence, was presented to the emperor.

The above details how the girl was rescued and how she was disguised as a eunuch and sent to the palace. The handwriting and seal have been verified.

This final straw completely broke Chang Yingxue's back and definitively confirmed her "crime of deceiving the emperor".

She stood there, listening to the people she had personally promoted attacking her with the most vicious words, looking at the emperor's undisguised hatred and murderous intent, and feeling the tide of hatred in the entire court that almost swallowed her whole.

"Take it!"

The emperor's voice was icy cold.

The deepest part of the imperial prison is a darkness so profound that even the moonlight is reluctant to shine upon it.

The damp, putrid air stagnated like glue, pressing heavily on my chest.

In the distance, faint groans and the grating sound of chains scraping against the stone floor could be heard, making the deathly silence of this tiny prison even more terrifying.

On the eve of her execution, perhaps as a final, distorted tribute to her former power, Chang Yingxue was allowed to change into a dark red palace dress.

The color was as rich as blood, which made her pale, paper-white face appear even more ghostly.

The guards had a complex look in their eyes, a mixture of awe and disgust, as they escorted her to a slightly cleaner cell.

There was a heavy iron window, outside which was the deep inner river of the palace, a branch of the Prayer River, its waters gleaming darkly in the pale moonlight.

Chang Yingxue stroked the cold, rough wall, her fingertips tracing the marks left by those who had never seen it before.

A lifetime of images flashed wildly through my mind—the bone-chilling cold of the muddy river, the despair of having my long hair forcibly cut off, the bloodstains permeating the Eastern Depot's torture chambers, the awe-inspiring prostrations of officials in the Golden Hall, the shocking red ink annotations on memorials… Pleasure, humiliation, fear, the extreme coldness of the pinnacle of power… all ultimately dissipated into a void of clamor, and then returned to deathly silence.

"Born of water, and returning to water... in the end, dust to dust, ashes to ashes."

She murmured softly, her eyes gazing blankly at the window.

In the darkest hour before dawn, a cold wind blew in through the cracks in the window.

She did not turn back to look at the dome of the Forbidden City, which represented endless wealth and power.

He calmly used some remaining skill, perhaps a trick secretly taught to him by Chang Jingzhong in his early years, to push open the heavy iron window that had not been locked due to the guard's "negligence".

A cold wind rushed in instantly, scattering her hair.

Chang Yingxue straightened the lapel of her magnificent palace dress, which resembled a shroud for burial. Her face was expressionless, her eyes empty, as if she had seen through all the vanity and clamor of this world.

He took a step forward and leaped down.

The icy river water instantly enveloped her, and the shouts of shock and anger, the sounds of weapons being drawn, and the running sounds from the bank were muffled and distant by the thick river water.

"Gulu gulu..."

Ultimately, it dissipates into a deep, buzzing hum, followed by the complete stripping away of all senses, returning to eternal, absolute silence.

This should have been the end of everything, but Jiang Jianxin, suspended in the river, saw time flying by, and the Qiyu River brought her remains to the bottom of Tingyu Pool.

The dark shadows enveloped Tingyu Tan, and they also enveloped her.

One day, a thousand years later, amidst thick black pollution, Chang Yingxue, soaking wet, emerged from the bottom of the pool.

Jiang Jian covered his mouth in shock, only to see the words suddenly appear on the face of the omniscient one who had been silent for so long.

Thus, the first historical fool, Chang Yingxue (the Nine Thousand Year Old), was born in Tingyu Tan.