Deposed? I couldn't be happier! I wouldn't even be a dog to the crown prince.

The city of Chang'an has been eerily quiet these past two days.

The feeling was like a low-pressure area where the air had been sucked away before a storm, weighing heavily on everyone's heart. The noise in the market subsided, and even the idle men who usually loved to discuss national affairs in the streets and alleys fell silent, their eyes revealing a sense of fear.

Everyone knows that if there's no news from the north, that's the worst news.

Late at night, in the Eastern Palace.

There weren't many lights in Lizheng Hall; only a few dim candles flickered in the wind, casting long and short shadows that looked like menacing ghosts.

Li Chengqian didn't lie on the rocking chair and sleep carefree as usual. He sat cross-legged on the soft couch by the window, holding a crystal-clear black and white chess piece in his hand, staring at the map of the northern border in front of him, which was already covered with red circles, for a long time without making a move.

"It's been two days."

He murmured softly, his voice echoing in the empty hall, sounding particularly cold and desolate.

"Given that old man's boastful nature, if he had won, he would have sent the news far and wide, wanting every rat in the world to know that he had won."

"It's so quiet now, it seems they've really gotten themselves into trouble."

Standing in the shadows, Xu Xiao didn't reply, but silently added a piece of charcoal to the bronze stove. He knew that although his young master was sarcastic, he hadn't slept well these past two days, and the dark circles under his eyes were heavier than anyone else's.

Just then.

"Bang--!"

A dull thud suddenly broke the deathly silence of the night.

Something slammed violently against the window frame, so hard that it cracked the windowpane covered with expensive Korean paper. Immediately afterward, a blood-stained white feather rolled in through the hole, fluttered twice on the carpet, and then lay still.

That was a carrier pigeon.

A carrier pigeon, its feathers almost soaked in blood and its wings broken, still desperately flew back.

The Azure Dragon, who had been standing like a statue in the shadows, suddenly appeared beside the carrier pigeon. He knelt on one knee, carefully picked up the lifeless creature, and ran his fingers along the metal tube on its leg.

Without the slightest hesitation, Qinglong quickly took down the secret letter and unfolded it by the candlelight.

With just one glance, the once unfazed commander of the Embroidered Uniform Guard, whose face was usually as cold as an iceberg, instantly lost all color.

His hand trembled slightly, and the thin strip of paper seemed to weigh a ton.

"Your Highness..."

Qinglong's voice was terribly hoarse, as if it had been rubbing against sandpaper, "It's done."

Li Chengqian's hand gripping the chess piece tightened suddenly, his fingertips turning white from the force. He slowly turned his head, looking at Qinglong's ugly face, and his heart skipped a beat.

"explain."

"Your Majesty... has fallen into a trap."

Qinglong took a deep breath, his tone as heavy as if he were reading an obituary, "Jieli set up an ambush in the Longmen Valley, using 20,000 old, weak, sick and disabled to lure the enemy deep into the trap. After Your Majesty's 3,000 Xuanjia soldiers were all caught in the trap, 300,000 troops... surrounded them."

"The two ends of Longmen Valley have been completely blocked by rolling stones and logs. Our scouts risked their lives to send the message out."

At this point, Qinglong paused, his eyes slightly reddening, and gritted his teeth as he continued:

"By the time the carrier pigeon was sent, His Majesty had been trapped... for a whole day."

"Food supplies have been cut off, and water sources have been shut down."

"The secret report says... in order to conserve strength for a breakout, and also to give the remaining soldiers the strength to wield their swords, His Majesty..."

Qinglong lowered his head, not daring to look Li Chengqian in the eye, and spoke in a voice so low it was almost inaudible.

"His Majesty has ordered that horses be killed to feed the hungry."

"They killed...the warhorses of the Xuanjia Army."

"Click."

The black chess piece in Li Chengqian's hand turned to dust in that instant.

Black dust trickled down through his fingers, sprinkling onto the map covered in red circles, like a black snowfall.

Kill the horse.

What did this mean for Li Shimin, who valued his warhorses as much as his own and could even name each one?

This means that the proud General Tian Ce has been driven to a dead end and has no choice but to drink poison to quench his thirst!

Those are the legs of the Xuanjia Army, their lifeblood!

Killing the horses turned the cavalry into infantry, making them lambs to the slaughter within the encirclement of 300,000 Turkic troops, their last hope of escape dashed.

Li Chengqian closed his eyes.

He pictured his cheap father, who always loved to brag in front of him, steal chicken wings, and stubbornly refuse to back down for the sake of saving face.

At this moment, he might be sitting in a valley strewn with corpses, holding a piece of bloody horse meat in his hands, swallowing it while forcing back tears, watching his brothers who had followed him through thick and thin fall one by one.

despair.

helpless.

remorse.

These emotions were like invisible hands, gripping Li Chengqian's heart tightly, making it hard for him to breathe.

"Oh……"

After a long while, a soft laugh rang out in the darkness.

But there was no joy in that laughter, only a chilling cold that sent shivers down your spine.

"What a brilliant move by Jieli! What a clever way to lure the enemy deep into our territory!"

Li Chengqian slowly opened his eyes. His eyes, which usually carried a hint of laziness and cynicism, now resembled two bottomless dry wells, burning with eerie blue ghost flames.

He originally just wanted to teach his father a lesson by making him suffer a little.

He wanted to let that easily arrogant middle-aged man know that the Tang Dynasty couldn't function without his son.

But he never considered letting his father die.

That's his father.

He was the only father in both his lives who would use the imperial seal to crack walnuts for him, who would bang on the table with ministers for him, and who would secretly come to cover him with a blanket in the middle of the night...

"I can be angry with, cheat, and even deceive my father, Li Chengqian's father."

Li Chengqian stood up from the soft couch, his movements slow and deliberate, yet carrying a chilling sense of oppression.

He walked to the window and pushed open the tightly closed window.

The biting night wind howled into the hall, making his robes flutter and ruffling the stray hairs on his forehead.

He looked at the pitch-black night sky to the north, which seemed to devour everything, and a cruel smile slowly crept onto his lips.

"but."

"If any outsider dares to lay a finger on him..."

Li Chengqian reached out and gently grasped at the air, as if he had seized fate by the throat.

"Jiali, oh Jieli."

"I originally just wanted to beat you into submission and leave you to herd sheep on the grasslands, to be a horse herder for the Tang Dynasty."

"But you shouldn't have, you absolutely shouldn't have, touched my family."

"Your move has paved the way for your future..."

"The path is too narrow."