The brother and sister gazed at each other beneath the translucent roof tiles of a small window at the rear of the East Warm Pavilion. 

In the entire imperial palace, only the rear eaves of Changle Palace were covered with tiles made from the shells of sea moon clams—translucent enough to let light through but not people—which made the entire area appear exceptionally bright and illuminated every awkward detail on the siblings’ faces, which bore a resemblance of three or four parts, making it nearly impossible to mistake one for the other. 

Neither of them spoke first, nor did either make a rash move.

Only Consort Huo was thinking, quite out of place for the moment, “These roof tiles are really bright. I wonder if Maomao saw them last time he was here. Would he like them? Should I find a way to get the Emperor to replace the tiles in the study at the Third Residence too? I can’t remember who told me this, but a brighter room is better for a child’s eyes.” 

Such an obvious lapse in concentration made it truly hard for General Huo to resist saying something: “My dear sister, do you even remember where we are?” 

Guards were stationed every three steps, sentries every five—this was the Emperor’s bedchamber, where they could be spotted by the guards at any moment!

Then, not far away, the only two remaining candles in the eastern side room suddenly flickered, casting an elongated shadow beneath the latticed window. Huo Hanguang gave a start. As her own brother deftly covered her mouth and dragged her into the hidden room next door—where boxes of memorials were stacked—she thought to herself, “I told you Huo Jintuo was a jinx!”

She clearly hadn’t run into a single soul on her way here, but now, thanks to his one remark, they’d been summoned right on the spot.

The curtain fell, blocking out the already faint light of the palace lanterns and candles outside the hidden room. All that filled her nostrils was the scent of ink and paper from the memorials inside, along with a faint, almost imperceptible whiff of blood—though she wasn’t sure if that was just her imagination.

General Huo had long been aware of this secret passageway connecting the East Warm Chamber of the Changle Hall directly to the Office of the Chief Clerk and Scribe of the Bureau of Ceremonial Rites. It was said that Emperor Yingzong had specifically commissioned its construction to facilitate his review of memorials.

Huo Jintuo had noticed this at the time simply out of a habit formed on the battlefield: no matter where he went, he would first survey his surroundings to identify defensive positions that were easy to hold but difficult to attack, or the weakest points that would be easiest to breach. 

Huo Jintuo had previously considered asking his sister to remind her husband that if someone with ulterior motives were to figure out the routines of the Bureau of Ceremonial Affairs’ office, it could easily create a loophole for infiltrating the Changle Hall from the outside, posing a major security risk. 

Now, however, there’s no need for such a reminder. 

Because he himself was that security risk.

The brother and sister tacitly agreed to a temporary truce in the secret chamber. They held their breath and listened intently for quite some time to confirm that no one was approaching from outside; realizing they’d merely been imagining things, they finally relaxed again.

They finally remembered to resume their “argument.”

One accused the other of being all talk and no action, saying they loved to scare people for no reason; the other retorted that a gentleman does not stand beneath a crumbling wall—sneaking into the Changle Hall in the dead of night was asking for trouble. Had they even considered how worried their family would be?

“Isn’t this my home?” What’s wrong with me being in my own home? Consort Huo argued with righteous indignation. This was also why she had remained unfazed from start to finish—not particularly afraid, and even somewhat defiant. She was used to acting with impunity in the palace; although she knew that breaking into the Emperor’s bedchamber at night was wrong, she felt that even if she were caught, nothing would come of it. 

Huo Jintuo said nothing, merely gazing at his sister with a stern, cold expression.

Huo Hanguang couldn’t withstand even a few moments of that naturally commanding gaze before she confessed everything.

As she confessed, she couldn’t help but wonder to herself: How strange—did her second brother ever have such a powerful aura before? That air of having long held a high position and being beyond question—she had only ever seen it in her eldest brother, who was bound by the constraints of his bloodline. 

In any case, the reason Consort Huo had suddenly decided to pay a visit was that Wen Maomao had come to see her that day to inquire about the fluctuations detected in General Huo’s aura.

Huo Hanguang invited the little boy to stay for dinner at her Zichen Palace. The child, who had already learned to use chopsticks on his own—without maids or matrons having to chase him around the room to feed him—gobbled down the delicacies on the table with gusto. After declaring the stir-fried chicken and venison “Little Heavenly Crisp” and the shredded lamb skin with flower-shaped strips as the day’s best dishes, he told Auntie Huo about a strange incident he’d discovered in the palace. 

To be precise, it was his little tiger, 666, who discovered it. 

—Among all the principal consorts, Consort Shun was the only one who had never sent Wen Maomao a gift. “So what?” Wen Maomao still couldn’t see how this story had anything to do with her.

【So just think about it: a concubine so eager to climb the ranks couldn’t possibly not want a child, right? Even if she really didn’t like children, seeing the exceptional rewards Emperor Yingzong bestowed upon you—and even Empress Pei, who’s so strict about protocol, followed suit by giving an extra 10 percent—how could Consort Shun, whose quarters are in Qixiang Palace right behind Changle Hall, remain completely unmoved?】 

Even if it were just for show. Anyone with even a little workplace experience knows to go with the flow of the top leader—not that you have to curry favor with the person the top leader favors, but to let the top leader see that you maintain a steadfast stance that’s always in line with his.

But Consort Shun did none of that. Something’s definitely up.

Cloth Tiger 666 commented: 【Consort Shun must really hate you—so much so that she’s stopped bothering to curry favor with the Emperor. This is the perfect move for you, Host, to establish a vicious reputation in the palace and make an example of others!】

Go on, go show them what happens to those who cross villains like us in this world! 

Wen Maomao was also fired up. Mainly because after seeing so many caricatures of him drawn by Little Tiger, he felt too embarrassed to keep acting like a spoiled brat, so he immediately unleashed the most vicious move he’d ever come up with…

Telling on them to his parents.

666: 【……?】 Where’s the malice?

The young general spoke with absolute certainty: “Hey, just trust me—this trick is really, really sneaky.”

Back in his hometown in Jiangzuo, he used to sneak off with his friends to catch fish in the little river outside the county seat. Every time someone on the bank would shout, “I’m going to tell your mom you snuck into the river,” the whole group would be so scared they’d throw on their clothes, scramble ashore, and scatter in a panic—and wouldn’t dare come back for at least three days. 

Or sometimes someone would show up three days later, limping, gritting his teeth and grimacing—it looked like it must have hurt terribly.

After the little boy had finished tattling to the Imperial Consort about this and that, feeling he’d fulfilled his daily quota of minor mischief, he hurriedly said to Aunt Huo, “Consort Shun must have realized her mistake by now. Let’s just punish her by not letting her put white sugar on her tofu pudding tomorrow morning.”

In Wen Maomao’s world, this punishment was truly severe—it meant no sugar. No sugar for an entire meal!

Speaking of which, Wen Maomao felt like complaining: these northerners in the Yongji region were truly unreasonable and petty—their meals often lacked any sweet dishes. Although he could eat anything and enjoyed everything he ate, every now and then, he still missed the cuisine of their Jiangzuo region. 

If it hadn’t been for the incident where his second older brother, Huo Jintuo, made a prophetic remark that later came true—and got hit by Wen Ye—Huo Hanguang might not have taken every innocent remark the child made to heart, but as it happened, his second brother had indeed… become the talk of the capital. 

So Huo Hanguang simply asked Jiuhua to keep a closer eye on Consort Shun, who had been seeming even more withdrawn than usual lately.

To be honest, Consort Shun’s acting was quite good; there wasn’t much to criticize or find suspicious. Yet, deep down, Huo Hanguang had a strange premonition—that kind of madness, desperately suppressed just before a storm breaks. For some reason, she felt she could empathize with it. 

She wasn’t actually sure what she was doing that night, but she still instinctively followed him, hoping he wouldn’t do anything foolish.

“And what you’re doing isn’t foolish?” Huo Jintuo sneered.

“Do you remember what you told the kids? If you’re not cut out for it, don’t force yourself. It’s fine to worry about Consort Shun, but why put yourself in danger alone? Don’t you know how to call on your family for help, or do you even look down on my skills?” 

For the first time in her verbal sparring with her second older brother, Huo Hanguang was left speechless. She knew she was in the wrong, and seeing that she couldn’t win the argument, she could only retort, “Then what are you doing here so late? Coming to the palace to assassinate the Emperor?” 

It was meant to be nothing more than a playful jab, but her brother fell silent. He had tacitly admitted it!!! 

Huo Hanguang’s beautiful eyes seemed to speak volumes. First, they widened in disbelief; then, filled with panic, she scanned the area to see if anyone had overheard, and finally, his gaze seemed to ask, “How far have you gone with this?” 

Then, in the blink of an eye, Huo Hanguang—who wasn’t particularly clever but wasn’t particularly stupid either—suddenly had a small epiphany. “It was Consort Shun who was going to assassinate the Emperor, and you came to finish the job!”

Huo Jintuo, having been largely figured out, spent a long time trying to find the right words to explain, but in the end, he could only squeeze out a feeble, “It was to ensure they could—”

“It should go smoothly.”

In his previous life, the Bingwu Palace Coup had caused a massive uproar. The Emperor, seated in the Mingtang, had nearly been strangled to death by a dozen lowly palace attendants. If word of such an incident got out, nine out of ten people would suspect a conspiracy, and the remaining one would suspect an even grander conspiracy. In short, it was unclear exactly where the chain of events had gone awry, but by sheer luck, Emperor Yingzong survived—and this led him to launch a bloody purge that lasted for months. 

Everyone in the imperial court and the harem lived in constant fear.

Although the investigation went on and on without yielding any concrete results, it was indeed a spontaneous uprising led by Consort Shun in alliance with a dozen or so palace attendants, who exploited a loophole in the guard shift rotation system to carry out a crude and brutal assassination attempt. It could only be said that Consort Shun, whom Emperor Yingzong had personally bestowed the title upon, did not bring him as much peace of mind as he had hoped. They felt that if they let the emperor continue his frenzied killing spree, they would be the ones to die sooner or later, so it was better to strike first. 

Emperor Yingzong remained unsatisfied with the findings of the Imperial Guard’s investigation and took his frustration out on many people as a result.

There was a major shake-up among the various factions in the imperial court, and in the harem, it was impossible to know how many had died; even Empress Pei was temporarily stripped of her Imperial Seal and confined to Qiwu Palace for over a year to reflect on her actions.

After this night, security around Emperor Yingzong would reach an unprecedentedly extreme level. That’s not to say the possibility of a palace coup had completely vanished—after all, the secret room where memorials were placed still existed. It would simply make an assassination attempt infinitely more difficult. Huo Jintuo went over the plan several times at home, and still felt that April 29 was the day when he would have the best chance of success.

He wouldn’t even need much preparation; he’d simply have to step in and deliver the finishing blow after the palace maids had struck.

The more perfect the plan, the greater the unexpected complications that arose during its execution.

Huo Jintuo, the greatest wild card, not only altered the life trajectories of these dozen or so palace maids but also changed his sister’s.

Huo Jintuo never wanted his sister to experience even the slightest bit of sorrow. He didn’t want her to hear anything about his past life—not even a single account of it; his sister deserved to live out her life happily and gracefully in high station with her children. 

He firmly believed this was the very reason Heaven had shown mercy and granted him a second chance to start over. They all deserved a better future—one without Emperor Yingzong.

But now his sister was forced, completely unprepared, to face the dilemma of her brother killing her husband. How could he have been so foolish? General Huo, having lived two lifetimes, truly wished his own nephew would hit him with a coconut again. 

Just as he was getting so anxious he felt like a cat on a hot tin roof and was about to start pacing in circles, he heard her younger sister say, “Okay, how can I help you?” 

Huo Jintuo wasn’t the only one to jump right in—Huo Hanguang was just as quick to follow suit. 

“You…” You just accepted that? Huo Jintuo stared at her younger sister in disbelief. This was regicide—and it involved the person you love. 

“What else could I do?” Huo Hanguang sounded aggrieved, so distraught she was on the verge of tears. But between His Majesty and her own brother, she would undoubtedly choose her brother unconditionally. She knew the current emperor’s character all too well—she’d only ever liked his looks, not because he was some kind of saint. He must have done something utterly unforgivable to force her brother to take such a desperate risk. 

And since the decision had already been made, there was no time for idle chatter—it was time to act quickly and eliminate the threat once and for all! Why linger here dithering? Was she waiting for the whole family to be arrested and put to death together? 

“Oh, well then, there’s nothing left to do.” General Huo feared his sister’s attitude more than anything; now that the matter was settled, he spoke the truth. 

The Emperor has already been stabbed to death. 

He couldn’t be any more dead.

Huo Jintuo had always been decisive and efficient in his actions, with a penchant for delivering the coup de grâce. When he first arrived at the Northern Frontier front lines, he was tasked with clearing the battlefield. The veteran soldier in charge of him would swing his blade with each stroke and tell him, “What’s the most important thing when clearing a battlefield? It’s to deliver a few extra blows to the enemy, no matter how much they already look like a corpse…” 

Before he could finish speaking, a fierce barbarian warrior—whose spine had been shattered—suddenly sprang up just as the veteran’s blade was about to strike, nearly landing a fatal blow in a last-ditch counterattack. 

“Got it now?” The veteran calmly wiped the blood from his face as he turned to Huo Jintuo—a figure he would never forget—implying that his lord must never show mercy or leniency from now on. 

Emperor Yingzong died in excruciating agony. Since these palace maids truly had no experience in killing, after they had seized his throat, they panicked and tied a tight knot—which prevented the rope from tightening any further. Struggling to breathe, his face swelled to a purplish-red hue. He was in a state where he could neither die nor live. When Huo Jintuo arrived, he understood at a glance why they had failed in their previous lives. Out of a desire to help, he casually picked up a candlestick nearby and put His Majesty out of his misery.

Huo Jintuo didn’t dare say much to his sister; after all, this was the man she had loved, and without knowing what had happened in their past lives, there was likely still some affection between them.

Theoretically speaking, Huo Hanguang really should have been heartbroken.

But for some reason, she simply couldn’t bring herself to feel sad, as if she had already cried out all the tears she was destined to shed in a lifetime. She could barely even recall what Emperor Yingzong’s face—the one that had made her fall in love at first sight—looked like; everything from the past seemed as blurry as a shadow puppet show. 

However, Huo Hanguang quickly pulled herself together. After all, she really wasn’t a good person, nor did she intend to be one. Good people have to worry about far too many moral considerations; we bad people just need to live happily while applying double standards.

Now, the villain Huo Hanguang was left with just one question: “Then what are we still doing here?”

Wait a little while to face interrogation and confess everything?

“Of course, we’re waiting for the smart ones to clean up the mess,” declared the burly General Huo, speaking with bold confidence despite his flimsy logic. As a military commander, he knew only how to kill—not how to wrap things up. Professional matters, after all, should be left to the professionals. 

Who? Little Sister Huo blinked.

Second Brother Huo blinked as well. Who else could it be?

Huo Qichuan, who happened to be on duty in the Cabinet that night, read his second brother’s note: “I told you, tonight is the perfect time”—as he swallowed the note and rushed breathlessly to Changle Hall, he cursed his bastard younger brother in his heart for the thousandth and first time. What did “I’ve killed the emperor—hurry over!” even mean?

Huo Hanguang looked at her second brother: “Did you do that on purpose?”

Huo Jintuo looked back innocently. “Oh, come on—we military men don’t understand all those twists and turns. In my last life, my little sister ran around for my eldest brother; in this life, my eldest brother runs around for me. We’re family—no need for formalities.” 

First he saw the emperor’s corpse, then a room full of palace maids trembling with fear, and finally realized that both his younger brother and sister were present. Minister Huo felt his vision go dark, again and again. 

To make matters worse, his younger sister was still stirring up trouble: “Can I go back now? It’s getting a bit late—I promised to have breakfast with Maomao tomorrow morning.” 

Consort Shun had already prepared herself to die and take all the blame upon herself through suicide. She never imagined that General Huo, who had been thought to be gone for good, would return with Imperial Consort Huo. As he knocked the candlestick she intended to use for suicide out of her hand, he said, “You want to be buried with someone you hate so much? Are you crazy?” 

Huo Hanguang had no idea how this would end; she only knew that her older brother was incredibly capable and would surely find a way. 

As for Consort Shun…

“Do you know how to cook Jiangzuo-style dishes?”

Consort Shun: Huh?

Please wait a moment

— Author’s Note —

Random Nonsense Skit: 

Consort Shun: “I suppose I can.”