The low-key prince summons trainees from the Imperial Household Department at the start of the game.

Afterwards, Wang Zheng called out to Zhao Gao in the long corridor outside the office of the Directorate of Ceremonial.

He did not discuss this matter in the duty room.

He understood better than anyone the principle that walls are thin and that ears can be heard through the walls.

He chose this long corridor that was open on all four sides, with no obstructions for thirty steps in front and behind, so that anyone who approached could see everything clearly.

Zhao Gao stopped in front of him. Wang Zheng held a cup of hot tea and slowly stirred the tea leaves floating on the surface with the lid. After a while, he spoke: "Today, Consort Huang cried for half an hour in front of His Majesty, saying that you, Eunuch Zhao, were showing off your power and dragged out her old maid who had served her for decades and beat her to death in front of her, without even giving her a chance to plead for mercy."

"She asked you, Zhao Gao, where did you get such audacity? Did Chen Ju give you the courage, or did our family give you the courage?"

He paused, then raised his eyelids to look at Zhao Gao, "His Majesty has ordered me to investigate thoroughly and provide an explanation."

Zhao Gao stood under the corridor, his head slightly lowered, his posture as respectful as ever.

He didn't rush to defend himself, nor did he cry out for injustice like most people would.

He noticed that Wang Zheng's gaze seemed to glance unintentionally in the direction of the duty room when he spoke.

Zhao Gao did not turn around to look, but out of the corner of his eye, he caught a very subtle trace on the half-open window at the end of the corridor.

A very faint shadow was cast on the window paper. The shadow was completely still, not from the swaying of bamboo leaves in the wind, but from the silhouette of a person sitting upright behind the window.

There is only one person in the entire imperial city who can sit and listen attentively in the office of the Directorate of Ceremonial, and who can also make someone like Wang Zheng willingly play the bad cop.

He instantly understood Wang Zheng's true purpose in coming to find him.

"Eunuch Wang, I dare to speak frankly." Zhao Gao raised his head, his voice neither loud nor soft, his tone neither humble nor arrogant, "If Consort Huang says that I 'don't distinguish right from wrong,' I admit it."

"The palace rules are like mountains, and they are indeed indiscriminate; whichever rule is violated, one should be punished accordingly."

"But that old nanny committed a minor offense that was not without merit. She said that the Ninth Prince was 'unsupported.' The Ninth Prince is His Majesty's own son, and the Empress is the Ninth Prince's mother."

"When she said that His Majesty has no one to care for him, does she mean that His Majesty lacks the responsibility of a father, or that His Majesty the Empress lacks the compassion of a mother?"

Wang Zheng paused slightly as he stirred the tea leaves, but did not reply.

Zhao Gao continued, "When I entered the Directorate of Ceremonial, the first thing Eunuch Wang taught me was that we servants in the inner court only have one backer, and that is His Majesty."

"His Majesty is the master, and the princes are the junior masters."

"That old nanny dared to insult the young master in the Imperial Garden in front of the palace servants. Whose power did she rely on? My punishment of her is not to stand up for anyone, but to uphold the rules."

"If the rules are broken, if they dare to curse the Ninth Prince today, they will dare to curse the Second Prince tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow they will dare to point fingers at His Majesty behind his back."

Wang Zheng picked up his teacup, took a sip, and still didn't say anything, only humming in acknowledgment to signal him to continue.

Zhao Gao's voice suddenly lowered, carrying a solemn tone that could only be heard under the lamplight late at night: "Eunuch Wang, if I may speak frankly, His Majesty is busy with countless affairs of state, and may not be able to see everything that happens in the harem."

"But I've been watching this palace for two years, and there are some things I have to say."

"The maids and aunts around the ladies of the palace would fawn over whoever was favored and trample on whoever was not."

"The Ninth Prince is young and soft-hearted. He doesn't even have a head maid. He's been having his allowance reduced and being bullied and neglected for a long time."

"Today, this old nanny dared to slap the Ninth Prince's personal maid in front of everyone, and cursed 'no one takes care of her' with foul language."

"Was she really cursing the Ninth Prince? She was cursing His Majesty's own flesh and blood, and she was slapping His Majesty's face. No matter how unfavored a prince is, he is still a prince, a son of the dragon, and not someone that any servant can trample on."

He paused for a moment, then said, "How dare I say such a thing in front of His Majesty?"

Wang Zheng remained silent.

His silence lasted longer than ever before. He held the teacup in his hand, neither drinking nor putting it down, but simply looking at Zhao Gao thoughtfully.

The corridor was so quiet that only the faint sound of the water clock could be heard from outside the palace walls in the distance.

Just then, a deep voice came from behind the half-open window of the duty room.

"Come in."

Wang Zheng immediately put down his teacup, straightened his clothes, and pushed open the door to the duty room before going inside.

Zhao Gao followed behind him, and after entering the room, he knelt obediently at the door, head bowed, knees together, and hands on the ground.

He didn't look up at the person sitting in the rosewood armchair behind the screen.

The ochre-red dragon robe was already visible through the gap in the screen.

Emperor Wu of Zhou sat behind a screen, with a cup of tea that had long since gone cold beside him, his face revealing neither joy nor anger.

He rested one hand on the table, his fingers tapping slowly and rhythmically on the surface. The sound was not loud, but it struck everyone's heart like the beat of a drum.

"Zhao Gao." Emperor Wu of Zhou's voice was deep and slow, each word carrying the unique sense of propriety of an emperor. "I heard everything you said in the corridor."

"You're quite the smooth talker, but let me ask you this: how did you know that the Ninth Prince doesn't even have a head maidservant?"

Zhao Gao remained prostrate on the ground without raising his head, and replied in a steady voice, "Your Majesty, when I was organizing the personnel files of the various palaces in the Directorate of Ceremonial, I checked the personnel rosters of each palace."

"There are four registered palace servants in the Ninth Prince's side hall: two maids, one cleaning servant, and one eunuch running errands. According to the regulations for princes, there should be a head nanny, but this position has been vacant for many years."

"The file is marked 'temporarily unavailable, pending completion,' and this 'temporary' has been in place for several years."

Emperor Wu of Zhou stopped tapping his fingers on the table.

He did not investigate why Zhao Gao remembered the Ninth Prince's personnel file so clearly.

The eunuchs in the Directorate of Ceremonial Affairs were responsible for organizing the archives, and Zhao Gao's answer was rigorous and restrained.

Every word is verifiable; there was no deliberate attempt to claim credit for anyone, nor was there any deliberate attempt to cover up for anyone.

Emperor Wu of Zhou remained silent for a while, then suddenly changed the subject: "You worked in the Imperial Household Department for two years, rising from a menial servant to the Directorate of Ceremonial."

"Your adoptive father, Chen Ju, has praised you to me many times, and Wang Zheng also said that you are capable of great things. I ask you, of the twelve directorates, four departments, and eight bureaus of the inner court, what is the one that gives me the biggest headache?"

Zhao Gao finally raised his head slightly, but his gaze remained lowered, avoiding direct eye contact with the emperor.

He hesitated for a moment, then uttered two words steadily: "Rules."

"Go on."

"Your Majesty, the inner court has twelve directorates, four departments, and eight bureaus, with a staff of over ten thousand people, and the regulations are numerous."

"But with more rules, some people feel that the rules are set for others, not for themselves."

"Each supervisor oversees their own area, each palace maid serves their own master, and each palace maid and eunuch has their own territory."

"If things are peaceful on ordinary days, that's fine, but once something goes wrong, everyone pushes the blame onto each other, and in the end, it all ends up with Eunuch Wang and His Majesty."

Zhao Gao's voice was unhurried, but every word seemed to have been carefully chosen beforehand, landing with a resounding tone: "This servant dares to speak frankly, it was no accident that the old nanny dared to insult His Highness the Ninth Prince in the Imperial Garden this time."

"It's because some people in this palace have forgotten the rules, forgotten who the masters are and who the servants are."

Emperor Wu of Zhou looked at the sixteen-year-old boy kneeling on the ground and remained silent for a long time.

In this imperial city, there were people who dared to speak the truth to him.

But he had seen very few people who could speak the truth so flawlessly, logically, and with such composure.

This Zhao Gao, just as Wang Zheng said, was indeed a man capable of great things.

"Since you see things so clearly, I will give you a task."

Emperor Wu of Zhou's voice suddenly became formal, carrying an air of imperial authority: "From this day forward, Zhao Gao, the eunuch of the Directorate of Ceremonial, will temporarily assume the responsibility for maintaining order and discipline within the inner court."

"You are responsible for investigating and dealing with any servants or maids in the palaces and courtyards who disobey the rules, act insubordination, or neglect their masters."

"For serious cases, report directly to Wang Zheng for approval, without going through the various supervisors."

He turned to Wang Zheng, "Wang Zheng, assign him a few men, some of them need to be quick-witted."

Wang Zheng bowed and replied, "This old servant obeys the decree."

Zhao Gao prostrated himself on the ground and kowtowed respectfully: "This servant obeys the decree."

As he straightened up, Emperor Wu of Zhou suddenly raised his hand, signaling him not to leave yet.

Emperor Wu of Zhou leaned back in his chair, his gaze passing through the half-open window as he looked towards the distant, layered palaces.

He didn't look at Zhao Gao, nor at Wang Zheng, but stared out the window in an uncertain direction.

As if looking at someone he hadn't seen in a long time, his voice lowered, losing the authority he had when issuing the decree, and instead showing a hint of weariness and a subtle softness.

"How old is Lao Jiu this year?"

Zhao Gao's heart skipped a beat, but his face remained unchanged. He merely bowed slightly, his voice completely calm: "Your Majesty, the Ninth Prince is nine years old this year."

"Nine years old," Emperor Wu of Zhou murmured, tapping his fingers twice on the table as if calculating what time it was.

He suddenly remembered that before the last spring hunt, he had casually instructed the imperial physician to check on the Ninth Prince's foundation-building process; that was last year.

He sees the child only a handful of times a year, the number of times he sees him can be counted on one hand.

I only caught a glimpse of him from afar at palace banquets. In my memory, he was a thin, small child who always kept his head down and was not close to anyone.

He sighed, then picked up a blank reward list from the table, wrote a few lines on it, and handed the list to Wang Zheng. "Issue my decree: Ninth Prince Zhou Xing has been in the palace for many years, and has been well-behaved, diligent and studious. I am very pleased."

"Give him ten bolts of brocade, a set of writing implements, and twenty gold ingots. Also, have the Imperial Household Department select a reliable head maid for him, so that he is no longer 'temporarily vacant and awaiting replacement'."

Wang Zheng accepted the reward list with both hands and bowed in response.

Zhao Gao lowered his head, carefully suppressing the curve of his lips, but his lowered eyelids concealed the fleeting glint in his eyes.