NOVEL NEXT Chapter 311: The Emperor’s Eyes
The palace was quieter than it had been in years.
Mingyu walked its corridors in the hour before dawn, when servants whispered instead of spoke loudly and the stone floors held the chill of night.
Lanterns burned low, brass hooks glinting where Longzi had already seen to the fittings. Even the bells above the galleries hung with new cords, their clappers tested by soldiers who understood now that mistakes in rope could kill.
Everything looked in order.
At least, on the surface.
He paused beneath the cypress eaves, watching breath mist from the guards who straightened when they saw him. They bowed low. He inclined his head, no more, then continued on.
Order had never been the problem.
His wife was too ruthless for disorder to linger for long. She had shifted pieces until every gap was covered. Yaozu in shadow, Deming at her side, Yizhen wherever walls turned soft, and now Longzi where Mingyu himself was weakest.
A Captain of the Guard installed at his back, chosen by her hand, not his. He had yielded, as he always did when she moved the board first.
But Mingyu had eyes, and he knew what all that order cost.
He saw Deming's silence hardening into something brittle, a man who spoke less and less because each word threatened to betray what his mouth wouldn't confess. He saw Yizhen's humor sharpen at the edges, every lazy quip hiding the hunger that leaked through when he thought no one was watching. And Longzi—Longzi wore discipline like armor, but no armor hid the way his gaze caught on her, too steady, too exacting, as if by watching hard enough he could undo time itself.
Xinying did not notice. Or if she did, she filed it alongside troop numbers and supply lines, another fact that did not demand response.
And that was the heart of it.
His wife could cut a Dowager in half with words and send ministers fleeing with a single raised brow, but she would never invite affection, never pause long enough to figure out the difference between longing and loyalty.
If they waited for her to ask, then they would die of old age before she ever looked their way.
And Mingyu— the lawful husband, Emperor by might, and one of only two men in her eyes—knew it fell to him to resolve what she ignored or just didn't see.
He reached the inner chamber.
Shadow's tail thumped once against the floorboards in greeting, the beast lifting his head from Lin Wei's pallet. The boy slept soundly now, breathing slow, curls damp with the heat of the brazier.
That small mercy was Xinying's doing, though she pretended it wasn't. Mingyu let his gaze linger, then turned toward the brazier where Yizhen sprawled, half-asleep with his fan dangling.
"You didn't go to your own quarters," Mingyu remarked.
Yizhen cracked one eye, a lazy grin tugging his mouth. "What's the point? The good tea is here."
The fan twitched. His eyes slid toward the pallet, then toward the closed door of Xinying's study. Mingyu didn't miss the tension behind the grin. He never did.
He left without further comment.
In the west gallery, he found Deming drilling three men though the hour was indecent for it. His mask caught what little light the torches gave, scarred metal gleaming like a warning.
The basket of apples that Deming had purchased days ago sat unopened on a table—forgotten, like gifts too heavy to offer.
"Training before dawn?" Mingyu asked.
Deming's jaw tightened. "A soldier who hesitates dies."
Mingyu studied him, the way his shoulders locked when he heard the sound of footsteps in the east passage. Xinying's footsteps, even when she wasn't there. Deming turned back to the drills too quickly.
Mingyu said nothing, but the weight in his chest grew heavier.
By the time he crossed into the north court, the morning light was creeping pale through cloud.
Longzi was there already, reviewing posts with the Guard Commander. His voice was clipped, efficient, nothing wasted. Yet Mingyu saw the way his hand lingered an instant too long on the map of the inner corridors—the places she walked most often.
Mingyu let the two men bow. He dismissed the Guard Commander with a flick of his fingers.
"You've made yourself thorough," he told Longzi.
The man inclined his head. "If I am to be your shadow, Majesty, it will not falter."
Not his shadow, Mingyu thought. Hers.
But aloud he only said, "See that it doesn't."
He walked away before the truth could thicken in the air.
----
That night, Mingyu sat with his wife while she reviewed petitions by lamplight.
She leaned against her hand, her hair unpinned, and her fingers tracing numbers that would decide who ate this winter and who starved.
She was magnificent.
But she was also blind.
"It's been months now. Lady Huai's mother won't return," she murmured without looking up. "Too many pearls wasted already. Too much face lost."
"Good," Mingyu answered.
"You sound distracted."
He smiled faintly. "I'm thinking."
She didn't ask what about. She never did.
He watched the lamplight gild her profile, sharp as the edge of a blade. He loved her for it, and he feared for the men who could not help themselves. Deming with his scarred silence. Longzi with his rigid devotion. Yizhen with his dangerous ease.
Xinying would never see them until it was too late. She would walk past their hunger as if it were another corridor to measure.
So Mingyu decided then—quietly, firmly, as he did with all things—that he would act. He would not let his wife be surrounded by men gnawed hollow by silence. He would not let them eat themselves alive while she did not notice.
He was the Emperor.
It was his duty to hold the line where others faltered. Even here. Especially here.
-----
The next morning, he stood on the steps of the eastern cloister and watched the palace wake.
Guards moved into position. Servants scattered. Ministers arrived with scrolls clutched in nervous hands. Above it all, he saw the same rhythm repeating: men circling his wife like wolves that didn't know how to bare their teeth.
Deming at her side, buying gifts he never offered. Longzi stationed at his post, his gaze too steady. Yizhen lurking in shadows, smiling too easily.
And Xinying, walking through them all without pause, as if none of it mattered.
Mingyu's hands folded behind his back. His decision hardened.
He would bring them together. He would cut the silence open. He would make them speak, because if they didn't, this house would rot from within, no matter how many ropes they replaced or how many corridors they measured.
He had given them all places. Yaozu the knife. Deming the iron. Yizhen the shadow. Longzi the spear. But if they were to survive her, and if she were to survive them, then they would have to be more than pieces.
They would have to be honest.
And if they lacked the courage to be, then he, Emperor Zhu Mingyu, would drag the truth out of their mouths himself.