Killer Queen: Tyrant, prepare to die!

Chapter 26 The little eunuch is dying? One dose of medicine and I'll make him kneel down and call me master!

It was the early morning of the 27th day of the twelfth lunar month.

Shen Qingci woke up before dawn.

I didn't wake up naturally; I was awakened by a series of suppressed, intermittent groans.

The sound was very faint and came from outside the yard.

Before her breakthrough, she wouldn't have been able to hear anything. But now, with her senses enhanced by the second level of the Everlasting Spring Technique, she can hear whispers from fifty feet away, let alone painful groans right next to her.

Shen Qingci opened her eyes and sat up silently.

Jinshu was still fast asleep in the outer room.

She put on the tattered cotton-padded coat, tiptoed to the window, and looked out through the gap in the torn window paper.

The courtyard was empty, with only the snow reflecting the pale moonlight.

But the sound came from outside the courtyard wall.

It's right to the right of the Cold Palace gate, behind that tangled thicket of bushes.

Shen Qingci listened intently—

"...It hurts...it hurts so much..."

It was a boy's voice, very young, with a sob in it.

"...Mother...I want to go home..."

The sound grew weaker and weaker.

Shen Qingci frowned.

She recognized the voice—it was the little eunuch who often brought her meals, I think his name was Xiao Luzi.

She looked to be only thirteen or fourteen years old, as thin as a bamboo pole, and always kept her head down when she came, not daring to say much.

How come he's outside the Cold Palace? And in so much pain?

Shen Qingci hesitated for a moment.

Meddling in other people's business is a major taboo for assassins.

but……

The child's voice was so heartbreaking.

Moreover, he often brought them meals. Although he didn't help them much, at least he didn't bully them like Wang Fu did.

Sometimes the food delivered is even a spoonful more than others—though it may be unintentional.

Shen Qingci gritted her teeth.

Forget it.

Consider it an act of good karma.

She turned around and pulled out a small packet of powder from a hidden compartment in the bed frame—it was leftover from when she prepared antidiarrheal medicine for Jinshu.

He took a few more slices of dried ginger and tucked them into his pocket.

Then she pushed open the broken wooden door and went outside.

A cold wind swept over me, scraping my face like a knife.

Shen Qingci tightened her cotton-padded coat and quickly walked to the courtyard wall. The wall of the Cold Palace wasn't too high; she used her inner strength and easily leaped over it.

It made almost no sound when it landed.

Behind the bushes, a small figure was huddled there.

It really is Xiao Luzi.

He was wearing a thin eunuch's robe, his face was blue from the cold, he was curled up in a ball, his hands were tightly covering his stomach, and his body was trembling incessantly.

My forehead was covered in cold sweat, and my lips were bitten until they bled.

"Little Luzi?" Shen Qingci squatted down and called softly.

Xiao Luzi suddenly opened his eyes, saw it was her, and trembled with fright: "Mother, Your Majesty?! You, how could you..."

He tried to get up to bow, but a sharp pain in his stomach made him curl up again, gasping for breath in pain.

Shen Qingci pressed him down: "Don't move. Tell me, where does it hurt?"

"My stomach... my stomach..." Xiao Luzi cried, tears welling up in his eyes. "It's been hurting for two days... I've had watery diarrhea... and I have a fever..."

Dysentery.

Shen Qingci immediately figured it out.

In this kind of weather, wearing thin clothes and eating spoiled and cold food, it's perfectly normal to get dysentery.

Without timely treatment, it will lead to dehydration and death.

"How long have you been here?" she asked.

"Last...last night..." Xiao Luzi's voice was weak, "Eunuch Wang thought I was bad luck and wouldn't let me go back to my residence, saying I should just die out there..."

Shen Qingci's eyes turned cold.

Wang Fu.

It's that old eunuch again.

"Can you stand up?" she asked.

Xiao Luzi tried, then shook his head: "I...I don't have the strength..."

Without saying a word, Shen Qingci bent down and picked him up in one swift motion.

Xiao Luzi was so frightened he almost cried out, "Mother, Your Majesty! You mustn't! This servant is dirty..."

"Shut up." Shen Qingci hissed, picked him up and quickly walked to the courtyard wall. He then used his inner strength again to easily flip over.

The whole process took less than three breaths.

Xiao Luzi was completely dumbfounded.

The deposed empress... knows martial arts?

Is he that good?

Shen Qingci carried him into the house and placed him on Jinshu's small bed.

Jinshu had already been awakened and was startled when she saw Xiaoluzi.

"Your Majesty, this is..."

"Go fetch a basin of hot water," Shen Qingci ordered. "Also, take out the rice I dried yesterday and cook some porridge."

Jinshu hurried off.

Shen Qingci took out a medicine packet and dried ginger from his pocket: "Xiao Luzi, this medicine is for stopping diarrhea, it may be a little bitter."

"Keep this dried ginger in your mouth; it will warm your stomach. Take your medicine first, and then have some hot porridge later."

Xiao Luzi looked at the packet of medicine, tears streaming down his face: "Mother, Your Majesty... this servant... this servant has no money..."

"It's free," Shen Qingci interrupted him. "Let's get the illness treated first."

She poured the medicine powder into a bowl, added some warm water, and brought it to his lips.

Xiao Luzi took it with trembling hands and drank it down in one gulp.

The medicine was very bitter, and his whole face scrunched up, but he stubbornly refused to spit it out.

Shen Qingci then made him suck on a slice of dried ginger.

After a while, the medicine took effect.

Xiao Luzi felt the cramps in her stomach gradually subside; although it still hurt, at least she could bear it.

Jinshu brought over hot water, and Shen Qingci wrung out a hot towel to wipe the cold sweat and dirt off his face.

Xiao Luzi stood frozen, not daring to move.

The Empress... personally wiped his face?

How... how is this possible?

He had been in the palace for three years, starting as the lowest-ranking eunuch, enduring daily beatings and scoldings, eating leftovers, and sleeping in a drafty shared bed.

Which of his masters ever gave him a second glance?

But now...

"Thank you so much, Your Majesty..." His voice choked with emotion. "This servant's lowly life is not worth Your Majesty's trouble..."

"Life has no inherent value," Shen Qingci said calmly. "It's only a matter of whether you want to live. Do you want to live?"

Xiao Luzi nodded vigorously: "Yes!"

"Then take your medicine and rest well." Shen Qingci handed the towel to Jinshu. "Tell me, how did you get like this?"

Xiao Luzi lowered his head and spoke softly.

He came from the north, fleeing famine.

Three years ago, his hometown suffered a severe drought, resulting in a complete crop failure. In order to save his life, his parents sold him to a human trafficker.

The slave trader sent him to the palace, castrated him, and made him a eunuch.

In the palace, a lowly eunuch like him, with no background and no money, was at the very bottom of society.

The chief eunuch could beat and scold at will, and the masters could order them around as they pleased.

He has to get up before dawn every day to sweep the yard and empty the night soil, and he works until late at night.

They ate leftovers and slept in a shared dormitory with twenty other people.

There were no warm clothes in winter and no cool mats in summer.

The day before yesterday, Wang Fu asked him to empty the chamber pot. He accidentally spilled a little, so Wang Fu made him kneel in the snow for two hours.

That evening he started having diarrhea and a high fever.

Yesterday, he was too tired to work anymore, and Wang Fu thought he was bad luck, so he kicked him out and told him to "go away and die."

"This servant has nowhere to go..." Xiao Luzi wiped away his tears, "I remembered that no one comes to the Cold Palace, so I... I hid here... thinking that even if I died, no one would know..."

Jinshu's eyes welled up with tears as she listened.

Although she was also a palace maid, she had at least come from the Shen family with the Empress, and she had never suffered like this before in the Shen family.

Life was tough after she entered the Cold Palace, but the Empress never beat or scolded her. She even taught her to read and write and to practice medicine.

Compared to Xiao Luzi, she was already very lucky.

After hearing this, Shen Qingci's face remained expressionless, but her eyes grew even colder.

This cannibalistic palace.

This cannibalistic world.

"Xiao Luzi," she began, "after you recover, do you want to go back and be bullied by Wang Fu and his gang, and maybe even die someday? Or... do you want to live a different life?"

Xiao Luzi looked up at her blankly: "Change...change your way of life?"

"Yes." Shen Qingci looked at him. "Follow me. Help me with my work. I'll make sure you're well-fed and clothed, and no one will dare bully you. But—"

She paused, her voice serious: "What I want is absolute loyalty. If you dare betray me, I will make you die ten times worse than you are now."

Xiao Luzi trembled all over.

He looked into Shen Qingci's eyes.

In those eyes, there was a depth and sharpness he couldn't understand, but also a kind of... earnestness he had never seen before.

The Empress is serious.

She really will protect him.

And they really will kill him.

Xiao Luzi suddenly rolled off the bed, ignoring his still-aching stomachache, and knelt on the ground with a thud, kowtowing three times heavily.

"This servant is willing! This servant swears that I will only ever acknowledge Your Majesty as my master! If Your Majesty commands me to go east, I will never go west! If I dare to betray you, may I be struck by lightning and die a horrible death!"

He spoke quickly and urgently, his forehead hitting the ground with a thud.

Shen Qingci helped him up: "Alright, I believe you. From now on, you don't need to call yourself a servant, just call me Your Majesty. And you don't need to kneel all the time."

Xiao Luzi stood up, her eyes red-rimmed: "Yes, yes..."

"Now I'm giving you your first task."

Shen Qingci said,

"Get well soon. Once you're better, I need you to keep an eye on the movements in each palace, especially Consort Rou in Huayang Palace."

Tell me everything you can find out: who she met, what she said, what decisions she made.

Xiao Luzi's eyes lit up.

Stalking?

This is something he excels at!

He spent three years in the palace. Although his status was low, it was precisely because of his low status that no one was wary of him.

He was constantly running errands and delivering things, and he heard a lot of gossip.

"Your Majesty, rest assured!" He straightened his thin chest. "This servant... no, I will definitely find out!"

"Be careful," Shen Qingci instructed. "Safety first. Finding out is secondary; don't let anyone find out."

"I've got it!"

Just then, Jinshu brought in some hot porridge.

It was a very thin rice porridge with only a few grains of rice, but it was piping hot.

Xiao Luzi held the bowl, and tears fell again.

He hadn't had hot porridge in three years.

"Drink up," Jinshu said softly. "After you finish, get a good night's sleep."

The medicine prescribed by the Empress is very effective; I should feel much better tomorrow.

Xiao Luzi nodded vigorously and drank it in large gulps.

The porridge was very hot, but he couldn't bear to stop.

It's hot.

It was given to me by the Empress.

Shen Qingci looked at the thin child and sighed softly in her heart.

Subduing Xiao Luzi is one step in the plan.

But seeing him like this, she still felt a little upset.

"Jinshu," she instructed, "find my old padded jacket and alter it to make it a little smaller for him. Also, find some thick fabric and make him a pair of cotton shoes."

"Yes." Jinshu hurriedly went to rummage through the drawers and cabinets.

Xiao Luzi held the empty bowl, staring blankly at Shen Qingci.

"Your Majesty..." his voice choked with emotion, "You've been so good to me..."

"It's not that I'm being nice to you," Shen Qingci shook her head, "it's that I'm being nice to my own people. You're mine now, so naturally I have to protect you."

She paused, then said, "From now on, walk with your back straight in the palace. If anyone bullies you, tell me. Even though I'm in the Cold Palace now, I can still protect you."

Xiao Luzi nodded vigorously, tears falling into the bowl.

Just then, the little one inside my belly suddenly moved.

It was very gentle, like a greeting.

Shen Qingci lowered her head and placed her hand on her lower abdomen.

Bao'er doesn't seem to have any malicious reaction to Xiao Luzi?

Not only that, but when Xiao Luzi swore just now, Bao'er even gently nudged him, as if to say: Mother, this person can be trusted.

Shen Qingci's lips curled up slightly.

It seems that BoA's "human radar" can also measure loyalty?

This is so useful.

"Alright, get some rest." She stood up. "I'll come see you again tomorrow morning."

Xiao Luzi quickly lay down and covered himself with the tattered quilt that Jinshu had found.

The blanket is thin, but it's better to have something than nothing.

And... it's warm.

Shen Qingci walked out of the inner room, and Jinshu followed, asking softly, "Your Highness, do you really believe him? What if he was sent by Consort Rou..."

"No," Shen Qingci stated definitively, "His illness is real, and so is his fear and despair. And..."

She smiled and said, "Bao'er didn't give me any warning."

Jinshu suddenly realized.

Yes, the young master can sense malice!

If Xiao Luzi was here to harm the Empress, the young master would have kicked him out long ago.

"That's wonderful!" Jinshu said happily. "With Xiaoluzi, we'll be able to keep up with news from the outside world!"

"Yes." Shen Qingci nodded. "But that's not enough. We need more people."

Her gaze drifted out the window.

The palace is very large.

Eyeliner, of course, the more the better.

Xiao Luzi was the first piece.

Next, there will be a second, a third...

She wants to weave her own web in this cannibalistic palace.

A net that can save lives, or it can kill.

Late at night.

Xiao Luzi quickly fell asleep in the warm blankets.

He had a dream.

In his dream, he wore a warm cotton-padded coat, ate a hot meal, and walked proudly down the palace road. The eunuchs who used to bully him all bowed and scraped when they saw him.

Behind him stood the Empress.

The empress was dressed in red, her beauty unparalleled, her eyes as cold as ice.

But when she looked at him, it was with tenderness.

"Little Luzi," the Empress said, "follow me, and no one will dare to bully you in the future."

He nodded vigorously.

Then he laughed.

I laughed until I cried.

At this moment, Shen Qingci sat by the window, holding a stick of charcoal for drawing in her hand.

She wrote a name on the paper:

"Xiao Luzi."

Then, next to the name, a small circle was drawn.

This is the first piece.

Next, it's time for the second step.

She looked out the window into the depths of the palace.

There, the lights were on.

That place is the center of power.

It was also the end of her revenge.

"Just wait," she said softly.

The sound was soft, yet carried immense weight.

The night wind blew, stirring up the snow on the ground.

But the lamp in the cold palace remained lit.

It was bright until dawn.