My brother entrusted his child to me, and I livestreamed raising the baby, making the Empress cry wi

In the square, Du Mingyi, the Minister of Works, was looking up with his mouth open, his white beard trembling in the wind.

His mind was racing—burning charcoal braziers requires ventilation, but ventilation will let in cold air, and cold air will prevent the brazier from becoming too warm.

A heated kang (a traditional heated brick bed) can only heat one room, not such a large area.

Needless to say, a hot water bottle is tiny, barely big enough to warm a bed.

So what exactly is "heating"?

"This is impossible..." he muttered to himself, his voice dry and hoarse, forced from deep in his throat. "This place is so big, bigger than half a palace, how could it be warm enough for people to wear short sleeves? How much charcoal would they have to burn? Where would they vent the smoke? Wouldn't the heat just dissipate if they vented it?"

The more he thought about it, the more confused he became. He felt that he had spent his whole life building palaces, but in the end, he couldn't even understand how people kept warm.

Guan Yue, the Vice Minister of Works, was also looking up, his eyes fixed on the people in short sleeves and skirts on the sky, his Adam's apple bobbing up and down.

But it wasn't their arms and legs that were being observed; it was the composed expressions on their faces—no one was hunching their necks, no one was tucking their hands into their sleeves, and no one was stamping their feet to keep warm.

"They're not cold..." Guan Yue's voice was weak, like a sleepwalker talking in their sleep, "They really aren't cold..."

Shu Jingwei didn't look at them, but she could hear the gasps and hushed whispers of the court officials.

A cold wind swept in from the end of the square, lifting the hem of Shu Jingwei's dragon robe. She subconsciously pulled her collar tighter, her fingertips touching the icy brocade, and she shivered.

Her fingers gripped the cuffs of her sleeves, her knuckles turning white, her nails digging into the fabric, deforming the thick cloth embroidered with golden dragons.

Heating.

These two words were like a thorn, piercing her mind and making her temples throb.

In the palace of her Great Flame Kingdom, they relied on charcoal braziers in winter.

The best silver wire charcoal burns without smoke, but its heat output is limited; a charcoal brazier cannot warm a large area.

When holding court in the Hall of Supreme Harmony, more than twenty charcoal braziers are placed on the throne. The heat rises, keeping the dragon throne warm, but the guards standing at the entrance always have their lips turn purple from the cold.

But in that place on the sky, a place many times larger than the Hall of Supreme Harmony, the people inside were wearing short sleeves, exposing their arms and legs, and were still laughing.

They're not cold!

They even felt hot!

Shu Jingwei's chest felt tight again, as if someone had stuffed a ball of cotton soaked in ice water into it; it was cold and bloated, making it hard to breathe.

Zhou Yan, the Minister of Rites, did not notice the heating.

He just stared at the women's clothes, his face flushed, and veins throbbed at his temples.

"Women are barely clothed, with bare arms and legs, behaving frivolously and parading through the streets! Such behavior, in our Great Yan, deserves to be punished with caning and tattooing as a warning to others! This is utterly immoral! A complete collapse of propriety and music!"

Several other senior officials who also served in the Ministry of Rites had already turned their backs, with their hands in their sleeves, their necks stiff, and their eyes fixed on the ground, as if they would get a sty if they looked any longer.

One of them muttered to himself, "Women should dress modestly, as this is the foundation of propriety. If they were all as naked as women in the sky, then human desires would run rampant, social order would be disrupted, and the country would be in turmoil... This is a sign of national ruin..."

The guards standing at the edge of the square had shifty eyes, their gazes lingering on the white arms and legs. They swallowed hard, unable to resist the urge to drool.

But before they could take a second look, the camera shifted, and the scene that appeared on the sky made them lose all interest in the women.

Lin Ye handed the clothes in his hand to Uncle Liu, the driver who had parked the car and followed him in, picked up the little bag again, and walked towards the escalator.

Above him was a huge glass dome, with a steel frame structure extending outwards like a spider web. Sunlight poured down through the grid, illuminating the entire atrium in a golden glow, making even the dust motes floating in the air clearly visible.

Several huge crystal chandeliers hung from the sky. It was morning, so the light wasn't very bright, but just the sight of them hanging there was enough to draw the eye.

Each chandelier is made of hundreds of crystals, layered upon each other, like an inverted waterfall frozen in mid-air.

Each crystal is cut into a different shape.

Teardrop-shaped, olive-shaped, and rhomboid beads are strung together with a thin silver chain, refracting tiny spots of light in the sunlight pouring down from the glass dome.

The light spots spilled onto the floor below the chandelier, making the light-colored marble look like it was covered with a layer of scattered gold. They drifted slowly with the movement of clouds in the sky, sometimes bright and sometimes dim, as if they were alive.

Under the canopy, no one paid any attention to the women's bare breasts and legs anymore; everyone's attention was completely drawn to the enormous crystal chandelier.

The barrage of comments exploded like firecrackers being lit.

[Commoner Zhao Daniu: Good heavens!!! What is that? Crystal? Such a huge string of crystals? Hanging from the roof?]

[Common Wednesday: My goodness! How many crystals are in that? One string must have hundreds, right? So many strings, there must be tens of thousands of crystals! So many crystals! All hanging from the ceiling!]

[Commoner Zhou Yijin: Our village landlord had a crystal bead, about the size of a thumb, crystal clear, which he treasured as a family heirloom. And... here are so many hanging here?]

[Jewelry craftsman Ding Gou: Look at the shapes of those crystals! Teardrop, olive, rhombus—every single one is exactly the same, the same size! And those chains! So thin, yet they can hold so many crystals!? This craftsmanship isn't just skillful, it's divine!]

[Jewelry shop owner Tang Yinchuan: Priceless treasure…this is priceless…and you just leave it hanging there? What if the wind blows it away? What if the dust settles on it? This…this is such a waste! Such a waste!]

……

In front of the Hall of Supreme Harmony, Shu Jingwei subconsciously turned her head and glanced at the Hall of Supreme Harmony behind her.

The palace doors were wide open, and the midday sun shone obliquely in, illuminating the roof beams.

Those roof beams were made of the finest Phoebe zhennan wood, thick and sturdy, lying across the roof and supporting the eaves of the entire Hall of Supreme Harmony.

but--

Empty and desolate.

There are no crystals, and no decorations whatsoever.

Only wood.

A horizontal, thick, sturdy piece of wood.

Shu Jingwei suddenly felt—

That piece of wood looks so shabby! So shabby!

Her fingers clenched her sleeve, her knuckles cracking, but a longing rose in her heart.

Those crystal chandeliers...they're so beautiful.

Thousands of crystals, each one crystal clear and sparkling, scatter shimmering light across the ground when sunlight hits them.

She had never seen anything so beautiful.

There was also a crystal ornament presented as tribute in the palace. It was a red crystal fruit, about the size of a fist. She loved it so much that she placed it in the most conspicuous position in her bedchamber and would touch and look at it every day.

But compared to the crystals in the sky, that crystal red fruit was like a speck of dust that had fallen from that giant crystal string...

Shu Jingwei suddenly realized what was happening and hurriedly suppressed these thoughts, pressing her lips into a thin line and tightening her chin.

What's the use of looking good?!

Fake!all fake!

It's just a trick Lin Ye played! Sorcery! No matter how beautiful it looks, it's still fake!

Instead, we should think of a way to catch that damned Lin Ye as soon as possible!

They tore through the sky!

Let's expose all these fakes!

She thought this, but her gaze wouldn't leave, fixed intently on the huge crystal strings in the sky.

She saw and remembered every refraction of the crystals in the sunlight, every movement of the light spots on the ground.

The scene changed again very quickly.

This time it moved from top to bottom.

Everyone in the Great Flame Kingdom stared wide-eyed as if their eyes were about to pop out of their sockets—

What is this now?!