According to Wen Chan's original plan, after her death, the Prince of Yan would ascend the throne, and Pei Rusong would at the very least have the merit of aiding a new emperor's accession. Lu Shuo, guarding the northwest, was guaranteed the position of a duke as long as he did not collude with the enemy and betray the nation. The influence she left in the court would become the new emperor's first move to control the imperial court... Virtuous talents and great generals, combined with a sharp and enterprising emperor, would be enough to invigorate the decadent atmosphere both inside and outside the court, and even bring about a prosperous revival for the Great Qi Dynasty.

Unfortunately, man proposes, but Heaven disposes, and reality is often cruel. The New Emperor died young. Pei Rusong, Lu Shuo, and others were excluded from the center of power. With a young ruler and a powerful minister, internal troubles and external threats, the Empress Dowager made a brilliant move that added frost to the snow of an already precarious court situation, ultimately leading to a complete collapse where everything was lost.

Why did no one dissuade Wen Zhuo when he was superstitious about occultists? Why did the Empress Dowager distrust the court officials and instead believe the Prince of Liang? When the Prince of Liang rebelled, why would she rather summon Mu Wen to the capital than ask Lu Shuo for help?

Since when did the people she trusted become completely unrecognizable?

Wen Chan slowly exhaled a long breath, calming herself down. "You and Wen Zhuo had a falling out. Why?"

Pei Rusong, however, changed his cooperative attitude of answering whatever was asked and said, "Could Your Highness answer a question for me first?"

"Go ahead."

Pei Rusong gazed at her face. Wen Chan was still the same. Regardless of her age, whether she was angry or smiling, even if the world was falling apart outside, as long as she sat there, she made people feel like they had a pillar of support in their lives.

Strategists, generals, emperors, imperial guards... men of great power and influence in the eyes of the world, all secretly relied on the same person behind the scenes. But no one realized it, not even Wen Chan herself.

It was not until several years after her death that they finally recognized this reality amidst their desperate struggles and tearing pain.

"Your Highness, back then, you sent a message for the Late Emperor to return to the capital and went to Ciyun Temple alone. You had long anticipated that the Prince of Yue would make a move against you first. Why didn't you try to avoid it? Even by feigning death..."

Wen Chan rested her cheek on one hand, shifting into a less formal posture. "You can't catch a wolf if you're not willing to part with the bait. If the Prince of Yue didn't kill me first, how would he dare risk it all? If he didn't fall into the trap, all our plans would have been for nothing. I was the most useful bait, where else could I have hidden? As for feigning death—" She glanced at Pei Rusong, seemingly hesitant, and spoke euphemistically, "If I had survived, my position would have become awkward. There would be no guarantee that the New Emperor wouldn't become a second Prince of Yue."

The Prince of Yue could not tolerate a princess vying for power with him, so would Wen Zhuo, an emperor propped up single-handedly by the princess, not be wary? Having one's own father as emperor and having a half-brother as emperor were two completely different matters; it wasn't something that could be smoothed over with a simple phrase like "flesh-and-blood kinship."

"Your Highness fought with the Prince of Jin and the Prince of Yue for so many years without ever backing down, yet when it came to the Prince of Yan, you were willing to go to your death and hand over everything you had accumulated over the years?" Pei Rusong asked softly. "Don't you find that contradictory, Your Highness? Do you ultimately trust him, or not?"

'He really knows how to touch a sore spot.' Wen Chan didn't want to be led by the nose and deliberately found fault. "Not calling him the Late Emperor now?"

"I've been disrespectful many times, this one more won't make a difference," Pei Rusong said coolly. "Since Your Highness is unwilling to be frank, then forgive me for continuing to offend."

"Did Your Highness think that after your death, I would no longer be the Prince Consort, free from the constraints of being an imperial in-law, and could advance further in the court by relying on the Prince of Yan's old faction and the merit of aiding his accession, is that right?"

Wen Chan: "...Young Master Pei, you're quite confident."

Pei Rusong: "If Your Highness doesn't agree, then give me the real reason to shut me up. Otherwise, I can only continue being this confident."

Wen Chan narrowed her eyes. "Are you threatening me, Pei Xuechen?"

"I wouldn't dare."

He seemed to have grasped the trick to handling Wen Chan. He transformed from a dejected Little White Flower into a vibrant, thorny rose, using the most deferential tone to speak the most forceful words. "Your Highness gave me the wrong impression, only to then abandon me. I want to know why. That's only human, isn't it?"

"Watch your words. Who abandoned you?" Wen Chan couldn't stand it and drew back. "You insist on getting to the bottom of this, don't you? Fine, there's no harm in telling you. I'm telling the truth; whether you believe it is your business."

"I was gravely ill when I was a child, the kind where medicine was useless and all I could do was wait for death. My father and mother summoned monks and Daoists from all over the land to pray for me. In the end, a certain Master Tongming from Juehui Temple told my father that my fate bore the mark of tribulation. Although I was a bit quicker-witted than others, I probably wouldn't live long. If I became a nun and severed my worldly ties, there might be a slim chance of survival; if left alone, I likely wouldn't make it past the hurdle of thirty."

"To submit to fate, or to change it," Wen Chan leisurely picked up the teacup lid, holding it above the bowl. "A long life without desire, or a short one stirring up storms? If you never try, who knows if destiny will change? And if you try, but still can't change the calamity in your fate, what else can you do?"

Pei Rusong: "..."

"If you were like me, thinking about these questions the moment you open your eyes every day, you'd get tired of it too."

Wen Chan picked up the teacup with her other hand, poured the remaining half-cup of tea into a potted plant, and simultaneously released her left hand.

With a soft clink, the lid fell, fitting perfectly over the tea bowl.

"Rather than anxiously guessing if the sword hanging over my head will fall, I'd rather decide for myself how to use it. Everyone has to die. While I can't say my death was weightier than Mount Tai, it at least had some significance."

This answer sounded absurd, yet held a thread of reason. The Pei Rusong of the past would never have believed it so easily, but after experiencing something even more absurd like rebirth, he didn't dare to disbelieve it now.

Moreover, Pei Rusong had a subtle intuition that Wen Chan was telling the truth this time, and that she was truly someone capable of doing such a thing.

"That being said, why was Your Highness so certain that the sword above your head truly existed?"

Wen Chan suddenly smiled. That smile was unlike any Pei Rusong had ever seen before; it held an indescribable sense of loneliness and sorrow.

"Mm," she nodded lightly. "It's there. I know."

Her intention to end the topic was clear. Pei Rusong understood this was the limit of what he could touch upon; she would not reveal any more answers to him.

He rolled up his sleeve, picked up the teapot, and refilled Wen Chan's empty cup with hot tea. Wen Chan was very satisfied with his perceptiveness, taking the cup and sipping from it. "Alright, now it's your turn. Tell me, why did you all fall apart when things were going fine?"

On this topic, Pei Rusong's spirited demeanor immediately subsided, and he reverted to the aggrieved Little White Flower. "After the news spread that Your Highness had been murdered by the Prince of Yue, Lu Shuo rushed back to the Capital City from Wuyuan and had a huge fight with the Late Emperor. He probably felt that the Late Emperor was only focused on entering the capital to seize the throne and failed to notice something was amiss in time, thus missing the chance to save you. Your Highness's passing was a heavy blow to him, and a rift formed between him and the Late Emperor."

"He remained in Wuyuan afterward. Your Highness's intention was probably for him to support the Late Emperor, but Lu Shuo... one can only say that some old sentiments remained. While the Late Emperor was alive, they could barely maintain their relationship, but he was no longer a trusted minister. The young ruler and the Empress Dowager, on one hand, did not trust him, and on the other, could not command him."

Wen Chan was stunned.

The shock of this news was no less than hearing that Wen Zhuo had "reigned for nine years." Wen Chan and Lu Shuo had known each other since youth, and it was she who had pushed Lu Shuo onto the northwestern battlefield. It was precisely because Lu Shuo guarded Wuyuan that the northwestern tribes had been peaceful for over a decade. The two shared the same stance and supported each other, but both knew clearly in their hearts that Lu Shuo was a general holding great military power. His true allegiance was not to any prince or princess, but to the realm of the Wen Clan dynasty.

Until her death, Wen Chan had been completely at ease about him, believing Lu Shuo was a sensible person who would surely support the New Emperor in stabilizing the court. Who would have thought that he would be the one to lead the charge in shirking his duties, his actions all but screaming "I am part of the Princess's faction" tattooed on his forehead.

Did he suddenly have a mid-life rebellion, or did his ideals clash with Wen Zhuo's? Wen Chan couldn't figure it out.

"As for me... I have nothing to say." Pei Rusong averted his gaze, a little guiltily. "After Ciyun Temple was rebuilt, I lived there the entire time. I didn't help the Late Emperor with anything and failed to live up to Your Highness's expectations."

Wen Chan sneered, "Of course. It takes at least two hours to get from Ciyun Temple to the Imperial Palace. Living there, you couldn't even make it to the morning court assembly. You clearly had no sincere intention of helping. You're quite something, Young Master Pei. You speak so eloquently about Lu Shuo's faults, but when it comes to yourself, you don't mention a single thing?"

The Little White Flower's eyes filled with moisture, on the verge of tears. "When I think of how that high-ranking official's robe was exchanged for Your Highness's life, how could I have the gall to wear it and speak of governing the state and bringing peace to the world in the imperial court..."

"What's there to be afraid of? It's not like it was dyed with my blood."

The moment Wen Chan finished speaking, he shot her a glare. "Your Highness, watch your words!"

Wen Chan: "...Fine, fine, you're not wrong, it's all my fault. With you and Lu Shuo leading the way, did the others also get fired up, refusing to serve the New Emperor, and even opposing him?"

Pei Rusong sighed softly. "Some people were only willing to be loyal to Your Highness and had no desire to die for the Late Emperor, including 'Deep Forest'... There were also court officials promoted by Your Highness who didn't care about factions and only wanted to do solid, practical work, but because the rift between the princess's old faction and the Late Emperor deepened by the day, they were inevitably affected. By the time the Prince of Liang became regent, the old faction was suppressed even more severely, and many people left the center of power..."

Later on, due to the aftershocks of the conflict between the old and new factions, the Empress Dowager gave up on Lu Shuo and chose Mu Wen, personally delivering her own throat to the butcher's blade of a foreign tribe.

The human heart is abstruse, human nature is subtle, and fate is unpredictable. No matter how much Wen Chan calculated, she could never have predicted this outcome.

Was Wen Chan wrong? Or was it Wen Zhuo's fault? Or perhaps Lu Shuo's and Pei Rusong's? Who could say for sure? It was as if everyone was pushing, yet the boulder rolled off in an unexpected direction.

If such a great flood ensued after her death, perhaps if she had lived until Wen Zhuo's ascension, it would have truly been as Wen Chan feared—she and the New Emperor would have eventually walked the old path of a life-and-death struggle.

The lesson from her past life was not far behind. To avoid the great pitfall of her previous life, must she find another emperor to prop up in this one?