It was late autumn when Jia Fu was buried. She remembered clearly that the hibiscus in the Jinbi Palace was blooming very well, and from a distance, it looked like a cloud of glowing clouds floating in the air.
She also remembered the scene that afternoon very clearly.
She hadn't seen the emperor's face for several days. The palace staff said that the queen's clothes were unrecognizable and she had been serving the emperor's sickness.
She entered and saw that Empress Zhang had swollen eyelids and a haggard expression. Before leaving, she told her that the emperor had called her to serve her well.
The queen was genial, just like her usual appearance.
Between the overlapping bright yellow curtains, there was a bitter smell of spices and medicine mixed together. The hall was closed tightly, and the light in the deep hall was dim and heavy, like a shadow, shrouding her whole body.
Jiafu looked at the man named Xiao Yintang on the dragon bed, and knelt there for half a column of incense.
In just ten years, the imperial power of the Great Wei changed four times. The era names changed from Tianxi, Chengning, and Yongxiyi to Zhaoping of the late emperor Shizong's dynasty. There were also wars in the middle, which is not infrequent, but from the late emperor. At the beginning of the dynasty, the Great Wei completely ended the internal turmoil, the national strength became increasingly strong, and the people's livelihood was stable. After Xiao Yintang took over the imperial power from his father Sejong, the frontier of Saibei rose again. The new emperor was very ambitious. The next year he ascended the throne, regardless of the bitter admonitions and obstructions of the ministers, he poured all the troops of the country, and drove himself to conquer the Turks. Although the battle was difficult and he won, he was accidentally injured. After returning to the court, the injury deteriorated, and the imperial doctor was helpless. Now bad news has begun to spread in secret.
Xiao Yintang has been falling asleep. Suddenly, his hands are raised and fluttering in the air, as if he is struggling to resist something.
His eyes were still closed, but his brows were tightly packed together, his expression was painful and terrified, and cold sweat kept coming out of his forehead, as if he was suffering from a terrible nightmare.
Jiafu hurriedly got up, leaned over, and grabbed his cold, sweaty hand.
"Your Majesty, wake up—"
The next moment, she was pushed away by the emperor heavily, and she fell to the ground, regardless of the pain, got up and approached again, only to hear him make a few vague dreams.
"You'an! You'an! Is this the retribution you gave me? Let me go! Don't blame me! If you want to blame, blame the emperor! It's all his fault—"
Xiao Yintang's throat clucked, as if a pair of invisible hands were pinching him, making it difficult to breathe.
Jiafu's heart skipped a beat. Xiao Yintang in the nightmare continued to babble, but changed his tone.
"I am the emperor! I am the emperor of the Great Wei! Pei You'an, I am not afraid of you! You should never live in this world! Even if you become a ghost, how can you help me!"
He gritted his teeth, his face twisted, his fluttering hand just grabbed one of Jiafu's wrists, and immediately tightened his five fingers, his teeth rattled.
Jiafu felt as if her wrist bones were about to be crushed, she endured the severe pain and called him again.
Xiao Yintang finally woke up, opened his eyes suddenly, sweating in cold sweat, and fixed his eyes on Jiafu beside him.
Jia Fu's face was slightly pale, and she looked at him for a moment, then smiled at him: "Your Majesty, it's a concubine..."
Xiao Yintang released her wrist, and her arm hung down weakly.
Jia Fu wiped the cold sweat from his forehead.
He turned pale, closed his eyes for a moment, and asked in a weak voice, "Afu, did you hear what I said in my dream?"
Jiafu's hand holding the par lightly.
Pei You'an, the eldest son of the Duke of Wei, was born with insufficiency and sickness since he was a child, but he was gifted with extraordinary talent. The reputation of "white-clothed minister, young prime minister" was also highly regarded by the late Emperor Sejong. Three years ago, he died in the post of Jiedu envoy of Anxi, and he never married, when he was less than 30 years old.
It is said that on the night before his death, in Suye City, his old illness relapsed, he vomited blood, and when he saw the left and right subordinates who came to visit, everyone was crying. For Wu, it was once asserted that he would not live to be ten years old, and it has been 20 years since Wentian has continued to live, and there is no regret in death.
The bad news of Pei's death in a lonely city outside the Great Wall spread to the capital. It is said that the late emperor Sejong was so grief-stricken that he fainted at that time.
After his death, he was not buried in the Pei family's ancestral mausoleum, but was buried on the spot outside the city of Suye according to his own wishes. It's a matter of great honor.
In terms of relationship, Pei You'an and Jiafu are also cousins, but there has never been any contact between them except for the accidental meeting many years ago.
"The concubine didn't hear it."
She replied and continued to wipe the sweat for him.
Xiao Yintang slowly let out a breath, closed her eyes for a moment, her expression became calmer, she gently held Jiafu's hand, and said, "Afu, I love you like my life. Since the first time I saw you, I have placed you on the top of my heart. Over the years, in addition to not being able to give you a place, I have asked myself to be loved to the extreme. I'm going, and I'll make arrangements for the funeral. I've also made arrangements for your mother's house. The only thing I can't bear is you...
When I go, would you like to go with me
He opened his eyes slowly and turned his head to look at her.
His face was gray, and the blue air between his eyebrows, this originally handsome face was covered with a faint breath of dying.
Jiafu sat on her knees and sat halfway, looking at the emperor's eyes that were staring at her.
What, you don't want to accompany me anymore
he asked, half-smiling.
Your Majesty, concubine is willing.
She withdrew her hand and kowtowed in the direction of the dragon couch, touching the ground with her forehead, unable to kneel.
Come closer to me. He stretched out his hand to her again, hugged her tightly with the last strength, and let out a long sigh. In the sigh, there was endless resentment and unwillingness.
"I am afraid of the loneliness of the underground palace. After I go, no one will be able to explain the words like you, and I will forget my worries. I am even more afraid that I will leave and leave you alone in the world, and you will be lonely and helpless from now on. Why don't you go with me? , so I can rest assured."
"Afu, don't blame me. If there is an afterlife, I will promise you the position of a queen..."
His lips were against her ear, and he murmured, his voice full of tenderness.
…
In the autumn of the second year of Shenguang, Xiao Yintang, the emperor of the Great Wei Dynasty, who had been on the throne for less than two years, died young and was given the posthumous title of Dunzong.
The close family is called Dun. The tree is pure and solid, and it is called Dun.
Just as this posthumous title shows the virtue of the emperor, Xiao Yintang left a decree that everyone praised before his death.
He said, I can't bear to sacrifice people, so after I go, all concubines and concubines will be exempted from sacrifice and burial, so that they can take care of their lives.
Since the previous dynasties, there have been palace rules for the death of the emperor and the burial of women in the harem. Xiao Yintang died suddenly when he was only thirty years old. For the women in the harem, it was like a thunderbolt from the blue sky. Originally, they washed their faces with tears all day long, but only waited to hang themselves and be buried in the underground palace, but they did not expect that the emperor would pardon their deaths. Although the waiting fate is still a cold palace and a white head, it is still a blessing to be alive compared to being forced to follow him and die now. Everyone is grateful to Dade, and the cry before the spirit is especially sincere.
But all this has nothing to do with Jia Fu.
She had no sorrow or joy, and accepted such a fate arrangement.
In this whole life, she has been like a rootless pineapple. After devoting herself to Xiao Yintang, she has no name and no light, and it is not unexpected to have such an ending today.
But what she waited for was not the three-footed white silk that she should have.
Empress Dowager Zhang, who had just been promoted to the throne, ordered her to be nailed into the precious gold silk nanmu coffin specially prepared for her. In this way, she was buried in the underground palace for the late emperor.
The emperor ordered me to take care of your Zhen family. Don't worry, go with the emperor, I will live up to the emperor's entrustment.
Empress Dowager Zhang no longer had her usual generosity, stared at her, and spoke to her word by word in an undisguised voice full of hatred.
The heavy coffin lid was pressed up, and the last light in front of him was squeezed out.
Jiafu's final world became pitch black, and she was forever enclosed in the narrow space under this underground palace, and she could no longer go out.
No struggling, no calling. Because I know that whether it is struggling or calling, everything is in vain.
This is her home, her destiny.
It is not up to her to live, it is not up to her to marry, and it is not up to her to die.
The air was getting thinner and thinner, and her chest was aching because she couldn't breathe. During the long agony of dying, her fingernails began to uncontrollably grab the coffin that she could touch, and on Jin Jian's wooden board, Leaving a trail of scratches.
Only then did she know that she was also afraid of death, and the boundless oppression from the underground darkness that she could not imagine when she was in the human world that accompanies death.
She knew that, in fact, she wanted to live, to continue to live, no matter how difficult it was, she wanted to live.
But it was too late. In this life, she has come to an end. This is how her life ended.
If she hadn't married her second cousin in the past, and if she hadn't met Xiao Yintang later, what would her life be like
She began to cry, tears welling up, but crying only consumed more air and made her more miserable.
All kinds of bizarre hallucinations began to appear in front of her eyes. At the end of the light and shadow, in a trance, she seemed to see a man who pierced through the endless darkness of the underground palace and walked towards her with a smile.
She recognized that he was her father.
Many years ago, when she was only thirteen years old, her father went to sea, and she took him to the port. Before stepping on the deck, her father promised her that he would bring her back a string of purple sharks on this trip. made necklace.
Purple shark pearls are produced in distant and exotic places overseas. They not only shine in the night, but are also said to bring good luck to people. Those who walk on the sea are lucky if they can meet them.
"Wearing it, Daddy's Afu will have a smooth life, no disease or disaster."
The voice, face and smile of my father at that time are still vivid in my mind at this moment.
But after that trip, he never came back.
"Afu, Dad is back and brought you a necklace, do you like it?"
Her father looked at her with endless love in his eyes.
"father-"
Jiafu smiled and wept, stretched out her hand to him, and called her father, the man who loved her the most in the world.
The last breath of precious air escaped from her heart, her hands with broken and bleeding fingernails slowly lowered from the air, resting on the soft and warm chest, with a smile on her lips.