After another cup of tea, Zheng Miao's wife, Mrs. Xiao Qin, also arrived.
Qiu Yizi had specifically instructed that she should be invited here politely, so the soldier in charge of this matter did not dare to use any force. He found a light sedan chair and carried her into the palace respectfully.
But when Mrs. Qin heard the news of her husband's death, she was heartbroken and fainted several times along the way. When she saw Qiu Yizi, the tears that had just dried up flowed out from her eyes that were as red and swollen as two peach pits. She cried, "Uncle, was my husband really killed?"
Qiu Yizi had been closest to her third brother Zheng Miao since childhood, and she also respected and loved her third sister-in-law Madam Xiao Qin very much. Seeing her in such tears, she could no longer control the sadness that she had suppressed with her constant busyness in the past few days, and she lay on the stone platform in the pavilion and burst into tears.
Mrs. Xiao Qin was used to seeing Qiu Yi's cheerful and optimistic appearance with a hint of frivolity, but had never seen him so sad. She guessed without asking any more questions that her husband had indeed been murdered. She fainted on the ground without even taking a breath.
Upon seeing this, Qiu Yizi hurriedly stood up and wiped her tears. Just as she was about to reach out to help, she remembered the important distinction between men and women, and quickly retracted her hand. She pointed and called a few palace maids and eunuchs who had just been driven out of the Queen's bedroom, asking them to help Madam Qin to the "Lizheng Palace", and then called the imperial physician to take her pulse.
In the midst of this chaos, Qin Guangyuan, the father of Madam Qin, was also invited. Qin Guangyuan was the emperor's relative, but he did not share in the wealth and prosperity. Instead, he spent his days with a group of literati and poets, and found a high mountain near Luoyang City to live in semi-seclusion.
Therefore, he was the last one to enter the palace, but he still put on the airs of a great celebrity, with his hands behind his back, he said to Qiu Yizi: "Oh, it turns out to be His Highness Yi. I heard that the Queen has an imperial decree to summon me to the palace. I wonder what it is about?"
Seeing that everyone had arrived, Qiu Yizhi did not respond to Qin Guangyuan's words, but only said: "Since it is the Queen's imperial decree, it must be a very important matter. Mr. Qin, please go in and greet the Queen first."
After saying that, Qiu Yizi let Qin Guangyuan into the "Lizheng Palace" and followed him in.
Qin Guangyuan and the queen were related by marriage, and he would go to the "Lizheng Palace" to chat with the queen and talk about their family relationship during festivals. But when he entered the palace today, he saw the queen and Madam Qin hugging each other and crying, while Madam Qin sat on a stool beside them and wiped her tears silently, while her two grandsons Zheng Chao and Zheng Qi knelt in the hall in silence.
Qin Guangyuan was very surprised to see the scene in the room. He first bowed to the queen, and then accepted the bows from his daughter and grandson. Then he asked tentatively, "What kind of incident has happened to make the queen so sad? Is it because of my two unimproving grandsons that the queen is angry?"
The Queen did not answer. She pointed at Qiu Yizhi who was standing behind Qin Guangyuan and said, "It's hard for me to say this. Let Yizhi speak."
Qiu Yizi came here to speak, and after hearing the Queen's instructions, he bowed, walked in front of everyone, and recounted the whole cause and effect of the matter to everyone present.
The Queen and Madam Qin sobbed again after hearing this sad story. The two brothers Zheng Chao and Zheng Qi, who were kneeling on the ground, lowered their heads and remained silent. It was the first time that Qin Guangyuan heard such a thing and he was so shocked that he was speechless.
Qiu Yizhi waited until the cries of the women in the palace died down before she continued, "Zheng Xin is a traitor and must be punished. However, 'a country cannot be without a ruler for a day', and the question before us now is who will inherit the throne."
He paused, coughed twice, and continued, "Just now, the Queen has issued an imperial decree to summon righteous men from all over the world to attack Zheng Xin, and has already determined the candidate for the new emperor—"
When everyone heard Qiu Yizi's words, they stopped crying immediately, and the air in the entire "Li Zheng Palace" became so quiet that it seemed to be frozen.
Qiu Yizi cleared her throat again, walked up to Zheng Qi who was kneeling timidly in the corner, stretched out her rosy finger, pointed at his head and said, "It's you! Zheng Qi!"
After hearing this, Zheng Qi opened his big eyes and looked at Qiu Yizi straightly with the eyes as if he was observing an alien, as if he didn't know this "uncle".
Qiu Yizhi didn't like Zheng Qi to begin with. Supporting him as the emperor was something she couldn't think of. So when she saw Zheng Qi crying with black eyebrows and black eyes and his face covered with snot and tears, Qiu Yizhi felt indescribable disgust and nausea in her heart. She replied unhappily, "I'm talking about you. Why don't you crawl over and thank your grandmother for her virtue?"
Only then did Zheng Qi realize that he had jumped over the head of his brother Zheng Chao, who was in front of him in the ranking, and became the supreme emperor. He suddenly felt happy and quickly crawled to the queen and kowtowed three times.
He was just racking his brains to say a few words of gratitude, but he heard Qiu Yizi say again: "Zheng Qi, let me ask you, your father Zheng Xin killed the king and his brother, what do you think about this matter?"
Zheng Qi was stunned when he heard this. He was just thinking about how to answer this tricky and demanding question when he suddenly saw his brother Zheng Chao jumping up and pointing at Qiu Yizi's nose and scolding: "My father did not commit treason. The one who committed treason was none other than you, Qiu Yizi. You privately led troops to plunder the palace and privately led troops to trespass into the palace. You have committed an unforgivable crime."
Qiu Yizi smiled coldly, suddenly raised her foot, and kicked the furious Zheng Qi hard in the stomach, causing the prince, who had always been pampered, to squat down, holding his stomach. Saliva flowed uncontrollably from the corners of his mouth, and he mumbled and cursed something.
Seeing that he was an eyesore, Qiu Yizi loudly called out to the personal soldiers outside the door and had Zheng Chao carried away.
Then the "Lizheng Palace" returned to silence, and Qiu Yizhi stared at Zheng Qi and asked, "Have you thought about how to answer the question I asked you just now?"
Zheng Qi raised his head and looked at Qiu Yizi innocently, then shook his head.
Qiu Yizi sneered and said, "What? You don't dare to say bad things about your father? Fine, I'll help you!"
After hearing this, Zheng Qi thought Qiu Yizi would not force him to express his opinion anymore, and he could not help but breathe a sigh of relief. However, Qiu Yizi actually said word by word: "From today on, Zheng Xin is no longer your father; from now on, your father is the Third Prince Zheng Miao, the Regent."
Zheng Qi didn't react for a moment, but his grandfather Qin Guangyuan figured out the ins and outs first, stepped forward and said, "Your Highness Yi, this won't do. The ruler is the ruler, the minister is the minister, the father is the father, the son is the son, this is the ethics of the saints. How can you just recognize someone else as your father?"
Qiu Yizhi sneered again, "What a great 'ruler is a ruler, minister is a minister, father is a father, son is a son', what a great 'ethics of saints'. Mr. Qin, why don't you calculate, among these four ethics, have you seen Zheng Xin follow even one or two of them? If Zheng Qi wants to be the emperor, how can he have a father like Zheng Xin who has no ethics and is worse than an animal?"
Although Qin Guangyuan never served as an official in his life, he was also a serious scholar. Qiu Yizi's words still couldn't change the obsession that was deeply rooted in his heart. He stammered, "But... but changing the paternal lineage at will is a loss in the way of the world. I'm afraid... I'm afraid that the throne will not be secure, right?"
Qiu Yizi didn't expect that no one present objected, but it was Qin Guangyuan, who was the most distant relative, who was entangled with him, so he said: "Is the throne not secure? It doesn't matter. The Han Dynasty has been passed down for nearly three hundred years, and there are countless descendants of the branch who are wandering outside. Among them, there are always those who want to secure the throne and be imprisoned. It will be very convenient for me to send someone to invite one over."
The queen, who had been silent for a long time, finally couldn't bear it anymore and said, "Qiu Yizi, what are you going to do? Enthroning an emperor is such a big thing, is it something you, a minister from another family, should be presumptuous of?" You must know that no matter what, Zheng Qi is the queen's grandson. After he becomes emperor, the queen will undoubtedly be the "Grand Empress Dowager" and can still command the harem. But if a so-called royal relative of unknown origin is found from outside to become emperor, the variables will be too great.
"Why shouldn't I overstep my bounds?" Qiu Yizi retorted bluntly, "To be honest with the Queen, before my third brother died, he had already appointed me as the acting regent to exercise all the powers of the regent prince. This identity of acting regent was recognized by former general Dai Luanxiang, left general Wei Hu, Jinghai general Li Shengjie, and even Bohai State's loyal and obedient king Dali Khan. As the saying goes, 'the country is more important than the emperor'. I supported the new emperor for the sake of the country, and everyone in the court and the country supported me, so naturally there was no such thing as 'overstepping one's bounds'. Please pay attention to this, Queen."
The queen's body tensed up when she heard this. She had never expected that Qiu Yizhi had quietly gained the support of so many people and had become an extremely powerful official whose words were as important as his own and whose achievements were greater than his own. Moreover, he had more than a hundred battle-hardened warriors at his disposal. They were nominally appointed as regents and were guarding outside the "Lizheng Palace". As long as he gave an order, they could rush in and force the people present to do whatever Qiu Yizhi wanted them to do.
The queen's dignity was finally ruthlessly overwhelmed by the gravity of reality. She sighed secretly and tried to persuade Qin Guangyuan: "Mr. Qin, Zheng Xin did commit an evil act that was unfaithful to the emperor and his father. I will also issue an order to remove him from the royal family. Zheng Qi is going to be the emperor, and it is not a glorious thing to have such a father. Now that he can recognize Zheng Miao as his father, it is also his blessing..."
After hearing that the Queen had nodded, Qin Guangyuan realized that it was meaningless for him to continue insisting, so he lowered his head, sighed, and said no more.
Then Qiu Yizi raised a smile and said to Zheng Qi who was crawling on the ground: "Your Majesty, now my third brother Zheng Miao is your father, and my third sister-in-law Madam Xiao Qin is your mother. What are you still standing there for? Why don't you go over and kowtow to Madam Xiao Qin?"
The "Emperor" Zheng Qi had no choice but to kneel down in front of Madam Xiao Qin, kowtowed three times, and called out incoherently, "Mother."
Qiu Yizi, who was standing aside, heard Zheng Qi's words clearly and breathed a sigh of relief. She walked to Madam Xiao Qin and said in a gentle tone, "Sister-in-law, from today on, you are the emperor's mother, the current empress dowager. You have to take care of the affairs of the harem in the future."
After that, Qiu Yizhi left everyone behind and walked out of the Lizheng Palace alone. When he came back, he had several papers covered with words in his hands. He waved them in the air and said, "This is the imperial decree I prepared for the queen. For the sake of being cautious and appropriate, please review it."