Thinking about the possibility of her own child dying young made her feel suffocated.
After setting up camp, the palace maids mostly ate hard flatbread, which was very tough.
At most, they could boil some bone broth to soak it in, but the taste wasn’t great.
Fang He, however, stuffed herself with the bread, trying to fill her stomach and push out the frustration.
She would try her best to prevent such things from happening.
Just as she was about to overeat, Li Dequan arrived.
He smiled,
“Miss, His Majesty requests your presence in the imperial tent.”
Fang He forced down the last bite of bread and half a bowl of broth, then freshened up and followed Li Dequan.
Before reaching the imperial tent, Li Dequan subtly reminded Fang He that the Emperor was in a bad mood and advised her to say something pleasant, avoiding upsetting him.
Ah!
Fang He thought, if he were in a good mood, she wouldn’t dare provoke him.
If he didn’t care about the loss of a child, who would dare offend such a beast?
Upon entering, Fang He found the imperial tent brightly lit.
Emperor Kangxi sat at his desk, writing without looking up.
She was too full to think clearly and had no mood to be a cheerful songbird, so she slowly walked to one side.
Seeing the inkstone was almost empty, she quietly walked over and began to grind the ink.
Kangxi merely glanced at her briefly before fully focusing on the paper in front of him.
Fang He peeked and saw he was copying the “Rebirth Sutra,” and not just one copy-there was already a stack of dozens beside him.
Fang He’s irritation subsided slightly, and she concentrated on grinding the ink.
Even though the wild historical gossip she had heard from her friends made her dislike Consort De, and she had never met the Sixth Prince, she couldn’t help but feel pity for the child.
Being born into the royal family was it a blessing or a curse?
After finishing the last copy of the “Rebirth Sutra,” Kangxi set down his brush, carefully folded the paper, and called Liang Jiugong in.
“Have these forty-nine sutras sent to the Cining Palace’s main Buddhist hall for enshrinement, and ask the shaman to place them in the Sixth Prince’s coffin.”
Liang Jiugong bowed, accepted the task, and hurried out.
Only then did Kangxi look at Fang He, smiling gently as he asked,
“How have you been eating and sleeping these past few days? I haven’t seen you gain any weight.”
Fang He obediently prepared to answer, but as soon as she opened her mouth, she let out a burp, instantly turning red.
She really hadn’t expected that.
Kangxi, however, was amused.
He didn’t need an answer to know.
Fang He sheepishly rubbed her nose,
“I’ve been eating a lot, but I’ve been more active than in the palace, so I haven’t gained weight.”
“You’ve been in the carriage the whole time?”
Kangxi walked around the screen and sat on the soft couch near the window, asking Fang He as she followed.
She thought for a moment and softly explained,
“Lady Li instructed me to carefully study the book she gave me. I couldn’t quite understand it, so I had to follow the poses in the book to grasp it better.”
At least not now; she really didn’t want to serve him yet.
When Kangxi realized what book Fang He was reading and how she had posed herself, he fell silent.
At this moment, he wasn’t in the mood for romance, but he couldn’t help but chuckle and point at Fang He.
“Then study it well. If you really can’t understand, I’ll teach you myself when I have time!”
Fang He: “……”
Your son hasn’t even passed the seventh day of mourning, and you’re cracking jokes!
She remained silent.
Outside, Li Dequan took the opportunity to bring in the Emperor’s untouched dinner.
Fang He came out to serve and, at a glance, couldn’t help but swallow her saliva despite being full.
The disparity between people was just too great.
She could only eat flatbread with bone broth, while the Emperor, even on a journey, had a dozen dishes per meal, complete with chicken, duck, and fish, all beautifully presented and fragrant.
She thought sourly, isn’t he afraid of overeating?
But she soon noticed that Li Dequan, serving the meal, didn’t touch any meat dishes, only picking vegetables.
Even the soup was not chicken broth but a bowl of Wensi tofu soup.
Fang He looked closely and saw there was no ham in it.
This slightly eased the knot in her throat.
It seemed the Emperor wasn’t entirely unaffected by the Sixth Prince’s death.
She wasn’t standing up for others, but she felt that if Kangxi could be humane, life in the palace might not be so unbearable after all.
After finishing their meal, Kangxi dismissed everyone else, leaving only Fang He by his side.
He stood by the curtain, lifted the bright yellow drapery, revealing another layer of sheer gauze.
Fang He thought,
“Even with torches outside, only the guards can see. What are they looking at?”
Kangxi faced the window, his voice faint as if separated by several layers of gauze.
“When you walked in just now, that look in your eyes, did you think that the Sixth Prince had passed away, and that I was acting as if nothing had happened, unworthy of being a father?”
In the past, this little rascal had been particularly talkative, but today, since entering, she had hardly said a word.
Surely she wasn’t holding back.
Fang He recalled that when she entered, he hadn’t even looked up, had he?
She merely thought it was inappropriate, but it earned her a light laugh from Kangxi.
“Enough, I’m not you. I can see through your little thoughts at a glance. But I am the emperor. If I show my sorrow to the outside world, the people traveling with me would surely mourn for me.”
Fang He imagined that scene and suddenly felt a chill.
Forget it; people are like that.
After being overly sentimental, they prefer to see others smile rather than cry.
Kangxi continued slowly,
“But I truly am not that sad; in fact, I feel somewhat comforted.”
Fang He’s eyes widened,
“Ah? Comforted? Did one leave and two come?”
Kangxi only had some indescribable emotions of sadness in his heart; he just wanted someone to talk to.
“Before leaving the palace, I went to see Xiao Liu. He, just like you, told me directly that he wanted to leave the palace.”
Previously, Kangxi had been afraid to care too much for Yin Zuo, fearing that too much emotion would harm him.
Every time Yin Zuo saw him, he was particularly well-behaved, as if he understood everything.
That child had been wise since he could remember.
Even though he had hardly had a comfortable day since birth, he never complained.
“The imperial physician has completely run out of options. Yin Zuo is entirely relying on ginseng soup to sustain his life; even breathing is difficult, yet his gaze is always looking outside.”
Kangxi asked him what he was looking at, and he didn’t even dare to cry, only silently shedding tears.
He was afraid of making De Fei sad, so he wrote to Kangxi.
He told Kangxi,
“Father, I don’t want to stay in the palace anymore. I want to fly kites, eat the snacks the palace maids talk about, and see the bridge the eunuchs mention…”
“Father… if there is a next life, I don’t want to be born into the royal family; I just want to be a commoner’s child, a sensible child…”
Kangxi calmly looked at the night sky,
“Now, he has gotten his wish. I hope he finds a good family and can grow up like an ordinary child, marry, and have children.”
Fang He gradually realized that Kangxi didn’t need her to speak; he just wanted someone to listen to his unremarkable melancholy.
But inexplicably, in his low and sorrowful narration, the pent-up frustration of only seeing people smile and not cry throughout the day gradually dissipated.
She looked up at the figure turned away from her, listening to him slowly recite the “Sutra of the Afterlife” into the night.
At this moment, Kangxi was gentler than she had ever seen him, almost making her think that accompanying him for a lifetime wouldn’t be so bad.
But soon, Kangxi finished reciting the sutra, turned, and instructed,
“Have someone bring water in; I want to bathe.”
“You’ve rested for several days. For the next few days, I won’t summon the concubines; you stay and serve.”
Fang He, with the numbness exclusive to a working person, tucked away her momentary wavering and went out to call for water, also asking Liang Jiugong and Li Dequan to come in to assist.
Since she was already vegetarian, she wouldn’t offer her meat to the boss; it was better to take care of herself first.
How was she supposed to sleep standing all night?
Fortunately, Kangxi didn’t treat her like an ordinary palace maid after they had already been intimate.
He told Fang He,
“You can sleep on the soft couch.”
Liang Jiugong assisted the master with changing clothes, while Li Dequan quickly called for people to come in and spread the bedding on the soft couch.
After extinguishing the candlelight, leaving only a candlestick at the entrance of the imperial tent, the two lay down and quieted in the darkness.
After a while, Kangxi suddenly spoke,
“If you still want to leave the palace after this trip back, I… will consider it. But I want you to stay by my side, to accompany…”
Before he could finish his sentence, Fang He had already started snoring softly.
There was no helping it; she had long passed her bedtime, and after eating too much, she was sleepy, completely unaware of what she had missed.
With the rhythmic sound of her snoring, Kangxi, as if doubting she understood anything, incredulously turned and sat up, silently approaching Fang He to look.
Fang He lay on her side, one hand propping up her chin, the other wrapped around the blanket, her little mouth slightly open as she slept.
After a few snores, she even smacked her lips and rubbed the blanket, but after a moment, she continued snoring.
Kangxi adjusted his mood; although she looked much more pleasing than when she was awake, his calm emotions from the past few days became somewhat unstable.
He wished he could pull her up and smack her on the knee.
He silently sighed; since she hadn’t heard him, it didn’t count as him having spoken.
This was something she had missed on her own; if she had the chance and didn’t seize it, she couldn’t blame him.
The next day, Fang He was awakened by Chun Lai.
Chun Lai’s gaze towards Fang He was particularly subtle.
Fang He wiped her lips; there was no drool.
She asked softly, “What’s wrong?”
Chun Lai tactfully said,
“The master has instructed that you need not practice those books anymore, saying he’s afraid it will tire you out, especially after you snored all night.”
Fang He thought,
“Alright, after hiccupping in front of Kangxi, now I’ve snored too. It couldn’t be better.”
Perhaps if she ate a bit more, gathering all the sounds of burping and snoring, even if she cried and begged to stay, this master would still find her annoying?
Wasn’t this much easier than her struggling to come up with lines to coax him?
As long as she wasn’t embarrassed, the one who felt awkward would be him.
Fang He washed up with a face that said nothing had happened.
When it was time for breakfast, she was just about to ask Liang Jiugong how she should have her morning meal when Kangxi called her over.
He pointed to the meat dishes set aside, a pot of lean meat porridge, and several small plates of side dishes.
“You can eat here.”
Fang He hesitated for a moment; she had to admit that the wavering feelings from last night had resurfaced a bit.
It wasn’t her fault for being indecisive, but… shrimp dumplings and crab roe shao mai!
These things couldn’t be bought from the imperial kitchen, and she loved seafood; she hadn’t had it in over a year!
But she was still a palace maid; was this appropriate?
Kangxi was eating a vegetarian spring roll, looking at her with a half-smile,
“If I had called you to serve last night, your drool would have fallen into the imperial dishes, so don’t stretch it out.”
Fang He: “…”
That made sense, so she wouldn’t be polite!
She sat beside the low table that Li Dequan had moved over, eagerly grabbing a crab roe shao mai.
The moment she stuffed it into her mouth, it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that tears almost fell from her eyes.
The smooth and soft rich aroma burst forth between her lips and teeth, intertwining with the particularly chewy shao mai skin, making her tongue seem to be coated with a sweet and fragrant taste, almost making her want to swallow it whole.
There were six shao mai in total, and Fang He finished them all in just a few minutes.
Reluctantly, she glanced at the empty steamer, her gaze shifting to the fresh shrimp dumplings placed on a plain white lotus-patterned plate.
Perhaps fearing Kangxi wouldn’t have a good appetite, each one was made into a gold ingot shape.
Although it wasn’t crystal skin, the wrapper was particularly thin and semi-transparent, clearly showing the small green onions and whole shrimp inside, with a hint of orange.
After biting into it, she discovered it was filled with carrot soaked in meat fat, giving off a sweet and rich aroma, accompanied by the fragrance of the green onions, which further enhanced the shrimp’s deliciousness.
And the lean meat porridge wasn’t made with pork but with beef, with distinct grains, the rice soft and glutinous, accompanied by the oily salted duck egg yolk…
Kangxi had just finished a bowl of porridge with the crispy spring rolls when he turned his head and was stunned after hearing Liang Jiugong say a few words.
In just a quarter of an hour, an entire steamer of shao mai, eight shrimp dumplings, a pot of meat porridge the size of a child’s head… oh, and six salted duck eggs, a plate of eight-treasure pickled vegetables-all empty.
The plate for the salted duck eggs was so clean that not a drop of egg yolk oil was left.
Kangxi: “…”
She licked the plate?!
Fang He seemed to notice Kangxi’s shock and, feeling embarrassed, covered her stomach to explain.
“I dipped the porridge in the egg yolk oil and drank it from the bowl; the imperial kitchen’s skills are truly amazing, haha, hahaha…”
After finishing, she realized she had been a bit exaggerated.
But these days, she had been sleeping alone and still had a midnight snack, with Chun Lai and Wei Zhu eating along with her, both of them having gained quite a bit of weight.
She secretly did yoga and hadn’t gained much.
But last night, sleeping in the imperial tent, she was already burning incense without having to stand, so how could she dare to mention midnight snacks?
If Chun Lai hadn’t pushed her, she probably would have woken up hungry in another quarter of an hour, dreaming of snacks.
Kangxi stared at her for a moment, suddenly laughing out loud.
After a while, he couldn’t help but say, “Now I understand.”
No wonder this little rascal hadn’t been attentive while serving in the past and didn’t want to stay by his side; it was because the monthly allowance and rations hadn’t been enough, and she had never been full, right?
In this way, he seemed to know better how to keep this little rascal around, and he no longer had to worry about her wanting to leave the palace.
Fang He was completely confused and tentatively asked,
“Your Majesty… what do you understand?”
Kangxi smiled without answering, stood up, and instructed,
“Pack up; we’re setting off again!”
Fang He muttered behind him:
“What? Just like this, with your dislike for wearing pants, you have the ability… to say half and not finish?”