Ryuga while chasing them had noticed that silver-haired rival of his and was perplexed, so he is not dead! So why is she inside the palace? He fisted his hands controlling his anger. He really left her alone in such a treacherous place and went on to follow his ambitions? He felt more angry towards Chenglie and more pity towards Xing."Is that him? Really?", he asked Xing when he returned. Please tell me he is not and I am wrong! He prayed in his heart. As long as he is there she"d only love him!
"Yep", she answered after she snapped out of her daze.
Oh, b.u.mmer! Won"t fate give me a chance! He sighed.
"Why is he with s.h.i.+hong"s people?", he asked.
"s.h.i.+hong?", Ayane chimed in. She was bewildered by what she had seen.
She attacked those people without even lifting her fingers, right? And she could have done a lot.. Captured all of them or killed them and why did she let them escape?
Well, if she asked Xing, her answer would have dumbfounded her.
I just wanted to talk to my man! Also if she"d killed s.h.i.+hong"s men, she"d have to at least wound Chenglie to be fair not to rouse s.h.i.+hong"s suspicions. She didn"t find that fair to wound Chenglie!
"All of you know s.h.i.+hong?", Xing was surprised.
"Recently... in the past couple of months we"ve been hearing about him a lot. Isn"t he from your kingdom?", Ayane was curious. She wanted to talk about this issue before too.
"Yes, a royal too. That person is too screwed up in their head and decided to become a criminal overlord. There"s a lot to talk about s.h.i.+hong ", Xing tried to find something to eat as she felt hungry and she found that sword in her hand which was useless and gave it to Ryuga to return it to his Emperor.
They had a glance at Yukiko"s tent to see it closed and they didn"t want to disturb them. The doctor was still there and one of her maid was there to help and they didn"t want to.... More like none of them didn"t know what to do in such situation and just decided to stay away.
Xing would have stayed with her if her husband was not with her but now she cannot b.u.t.t in right? It is after all a big tragedy to lose a child for the both of them. Even though Xing didn"t like the Water Emperor because he looked too much like Chenglie and accused her, his love for Yukiko cannot be denied. His love really showed in his eyes.
At that time Ayane"s stomach grumbled too and everyone went to the other tent and sat down to eat. Only after eating something did Xing felt better. The food was delicious, may be because it was prepared by men, Xing thought.
After they finished eating, Xing explained to them everything she knew about s.h.i.+hong and his operations in their kingdom and how most of them were ruined anday be that"s the reason he is trying to expand into the other kingdoms.
But Ryuga and Ayane insisted that they only got wind of his name just now but his operations have been going on in their kingdoms for long.
"And one more thing, he is our Emperor"s sister", Xing gave the final information.
"My sister?", the Emperor was shocked. Why wasn"t he informed previously of that?
"s.h.i.+hong is a woman?", Ayane was surprised.
"Yes, I... The "Divine Ruler" is a woman... And you are the first woman to sit on The Dragon Throne. So why can"t a criminal overlord be a woman? I dress as a man, you do too and s.h.i.+hong does that too... He went a little extreme making himself no longer a woman by medications though", Xing raised her eyebrows and shrugged.
"Hmm... Agreed!", Ayane gulped a cup of wine, "But I am not the first woman to sit on the Dragon Throne, you are" she pointed at Xing.
"How?", Xing didn"t understand.
"I sat on the Throne as the Emperor hiding that I am a woman while you sat on the place that accepts no woman, as a woman.... Aren"t you the first woman to sit in the Throne then?", Ayane spoke with her eyes s.h.i.+ning.
" Is it that much of a difference though? ", Xing asked," But have you thought about... how there might be other Emperors who could have been female like you in the past ?"
" Wow! I"ve never thought that!... ",
Ayane and Xing continued to talk when the Emperor and Yi Kwan were talking about other things when a loud smas.h.i.+ng noise was heard from the next tent followed by a shout and they could faintly hear what Yukiko was saying from their tent.
" Get out! I don"t want you here!", followed by another clattering noise.
Xing and Ayane stood up to get to the next tent asking the men to stay here and went there. Yukiko didn"t stop there and continued on to shout,
"What"s the use of trying to help me now? You never listen to me at other times"
Ximg could understand the pain she was feeling... And they could not hear the Water Emperor"s reply to her..
But she couldn"t understand why she is this mean to her husband just because he thought that his wife is being poisoned by the venom and stopped it from reaching her.
Yukiko still continued, "You see... This is our son... I carried him halfway through... If he was let to, he"d have lived. But....", she started to bawl again, "Look at him!", she screamed.
Is she showing him the unborn child? Xing wondered, that is brave! That would hurt a lot!
In a way my condition is better, Xing thought. I have no hope of having a baby and I could understand that but Yukiko had hopes for a child but it was ruined. Truly she"ll be feeling really bad right now!
Xing and Ayane felt like they were overhearing, they decided to move away when she called for them.
"Mingxia! Byeol! Come here!"
"Get out!", Yukiko shouted at the Water Emperor and he left without any choice but to leave.
As he got out of the tent he saw the two women standing outside and both could see the disappointed look in his face but he tried to compose himself,
"Empress Huang, I was wrong to accuse you of trying to poison my wife. Hope you would forgive me",he bowed and Xing just nodded.
She didn"t like to hold grudges for these kind of things... He was angry at her because he thought she put his wife"s life in danger... That is fair!
"Please take care of her", he said before leaving. He was obviously in pain too. Xing felt a little bad for him even though she didn"t want to.
Xing and Ayane went inside to see the entire tent was in messy with various things sprawled everywhere and her maid was cleaning everything.
Xing poured Yukiko some water and both of them sat beside her in the bed until she calmed down.
"You are lucky", Yukiko said pointing at them, "You have the power to do what you want!"
Xing wanted to laugh hard at her comment but decided against it and Ayane had almost similar reaction too.
"I"m forced to be an Emperor", Ayane said.
"Me too... The will of the heavens....", Xing snorted, "Both of us would give up this place to be with the ones we love!"
Yukiko looked at them with deep thoughts and smiled bitterly, "You have a choice to leave... I don"t! "
She is right, Xing thought. If she doesn"t want to be the Empress anymore, Chenglie would get her out of the Palace, no questions asked.
The same might be true for Ayane too. Yi Kwan would help her out too... Or may be she would be fine by herself too...!
But for Yukiko...