With legs weak, the sickly stable boy became a mad regent.

When Prince Zhao's royal banner left the city, everyone in the palace breathed a sigh of relief.

Xiao Yunheng never believed that a man who had just gotten married and whose wife was pregnant could actually be transferred to the northern border by an imperial edict when he knew that something had happened in the capital.

Moreover, those people were too eager to hand over military power to Xiao Yunzhao, as if they couldn't wait to see him don his armor again.

A woman with gray hair was helped in through the window. Her back was bent, and there was an old scar on her face that stretched from the corner of her eye to behind her ear.

When Xiao Yunheng saw her face clearly, his body suddenly stiffened. "It's you?"

The woman looked up, tears welling up almost the instant she saw him. "Your Highness!"

She knelt on the ground, her forehead slamming heavily against the cold floor tiles. "This old servant is guilty."

Xiao Yunheng remembered her; her surname was Xu, and she used to be a palace maid serving his mother.

Not long after her mother's death, she was accused of stealing from the palace and was banished from the palace. Everyone said that she had fallen ill and died after leaving the city, but unexpectedly, she was still alive.

Where have you been all these years?

"This old servant dares not return to the capital." Granny Xu knelt on the ground, trembling with sobs. "Her Majesty the Empress has been searching for this old servant. If it weren't for His Highness Prince Rui sending people to find me, this old servant originally intended to take those things to my grave."

Xiao Yunheng looked at her. "What is it?"

Granny Xu took out a cloth bag wrapped in layers of oiled paper from her personal clothing. Inside were several yellowed prescriptions, an old wooden plaque with the mark of the Imperial Medical Academy, and at the bottom, a faded baby bib.

Xiao Yunheng recognized the pattern on it; it was embroidered by his mother.

"Your Highness wasn't born so weak that she couldn't get out of bed," said Granny Xu, her voice trembling. "When Her Highness was pregnant with Her Highness, her health was always very good. It was only a month before delivery that the Empress had something added to her pregnancy-preserving medicine, which caused Her Highness to suddenly give birth prematurely."

"The midwife was also one of the Empress's people."

"They deliberately delayed stopping the bleeding. After the Empress gave birth to the Prince, the bleeding continued, but not a single imperial physician was willing to come in."

Xiao Yunheng gripped the bodice, his knuckles slowly tightening. He had few memories of his mother. From childhood, everyone told him that his mother had a bad life and died of postpartum hemorrhage after giving birth to him.

He always believed that his birth had killed her.

Because of this, he didn't even dare to look at his mother's memorial tablet too much on the anniversary of her death. "Did she say anything before she died?"

Granny Xu wept uncontrollably.

"Her Majesty has never blamed you. She has been begging the imperial physicians to save you, saying that you are so young and came into this world so early, you must live well for her sake."

"Your Highness's name was also chosen by Her Majesty long ago. She said that Heng means jade, and she hopes that you will become a person as upright and resilient as jade, not the sickly person they describe."

Xiao Yunheng lowered his head, and slowly clenched the small bib in his palm.

He didn't cry, but the deathly stillness that had been suppressed in his eyes for over twenty years finally cracked. "And then?"

"After Her Majesty's death, the Empress originally intended for you to die young as well."

Xu Mama wiped away her tears, "But the Emperor felt guilty about the Empress's death and often sent the imperial physicians to see you. The Empress didn't dare to be too obvious, so she had someone tamper with your tonics."

"Those medicines won't kill you immediately, but they'll make you weaker year by year, forever unable to practice martial arts or have children. The imperial physician who worked for the Empress in the Imperial Hospital is dead. This old servant only managed to steal a few old prescriptions from him, and this wooden plaque for entering and leaving the pharmacy."

She hid these things and fled the capital, and because she was too scared, she didn't dare to come back for more than 20 years.

"This old servant knows she has no right to ask Your Highness for forgiveness." Granny Xu bowed again. "But Her Highness kept thinking of you before she passed away. If she knew that you had believed that you were the one who killed her all these years, she would not be at peace even in the afterlife."

Xiao Yunheng stared at the familiar name on the prescription. That imperial physician had taken care of him for more than ten years. Every time he took his pulse, he would say with a regretful tone that he was born with a deficiency that could not be cured.

It turns out it wasn't that there was no cure, but that no one ever wanted him to get better.

"Changqing," Xiao Yunheng suddenly spoke.

"Your servant is here."

Prepare paper and pen.

Changqing quickly brought out the brush and ink.

Granny Xu recounted everything she knew again and pressed her fingerprint on the written confession. Xiao Yunheng placed the prescription, the wooden plaque, and the confession together.

These things may not kill the Empress immediately, but they are enough to tear away the facade of virtue she has painstakingly maintained for so many years.

"Did Prince Zhao send you here just to escort her to the palace?" Xiao Yunheng looked at the person by the window.

"His Highness also said that the Crown Prince might make a move tonight. There is a young lady from the Shen family in Cining Palace who is with the Sixth Prince."

"If Your Highness still wishes to continue recuperating, these matters are none of your concern. If not, the palace is lacking a prince of the Xiao family who can speak for you."

Xiao Yunheng chuckled softly, "He certainly knows how to choose people."

Xiao Yunzhao has ostensibly left the capital, but if he were to lead his men to storm into the palace, he would inevitably be accused of treason.

Xiao Yunheng was different. He had been in the palace the whole time, and everyone thought he was a prince who was about to die. No one would be wary of a sick cat who couldn't even get out of bed.

"Tell him." Xiao Yunheng tossed the blood-stained handkerchief into the medicine cup.

"I...accept."

The person by the window quickly led Granny Xu away.

The bedchamber returned to silence.

Xiao Yunheng leaned against the headboard, raised his hand to open the window, and poured out all the medicinal juice that had accumulated over the past few days. There were no orchids under the window, only a barren patch of soil. The thick, black medicinal juice seeped into the soil, emitting a nauseatingly bitter smell.

Changqing looked at him. "Your Highness, what should we do next?"

"Summon the imperial physician." Xiao Yunheng lay back down on the bed, pulling the covers up. "Tell everyone in the palace that I've coughed up blood again. This time, it's more serious than ever before."

Changqing quickly understood.

A sickly but still able-to-open-eye third prince might distract the empress, but a third prince who is about to die would only make her completely lower her guard.

"Should we also send the message to the Empress's palace?"

"deliver."

Xiao Yunheng closed his eyes, his face still pale, and his breathing very weak.

Only the hand clasped under the covers remained tightly gripping the undergarment left by her mother.

"Please also convey a message to the Empress Dowager on my behalf."

"I told her that I was afraid I wouldn't make it through the night, and that before I died, I wanted to see her one last time."

Within half an hour, the news of the Third Prince's critical illness spread throughout the palace.

After hearing this, the Empress simply had another century-old ginseng sent over, and the Crown Prince didn't even ask a single question.

Cining Palace only sent a few words of comfort that were of little consequence. Everyone felt that the Third Prince, who had been ill for more than twenty years, was finally going to die.

As dawn approached, the message was delivered to Prince Zhao's residence.

Shen Nannan leaned against Xiao Yunzhao's chest, finished reading the words "Third Prince is critically ill" on the paper, and looked up at him. "He agreed?"

"Hmm." Xiao Yunzhao brought the paper close to the candlelight, the flames quickly engulfing the words. "A dying man, no one will be on guard."

At this moment, no one in the palace knew that Xiao Yunheng had thrown away the medicine he had been taking for more than twenty years.

He hid the evidence left by his mother and finally decided to stand up from the sickbed that had confined him for half his life.