Two hours later.
Censor Zhang looked around warily at his colleagues. At a rough count, there were more than twenty of them. He couldn't help but be shocked. Had the emperor really gathered so many people for this play?
Meanwhile, the emperor in the Qianqing Palace was also surprised. "Why is the Yin family here? Could they have misheard the news and thought it was about pleading for the deposed crown prince instead of against him?"
The grand eunuch craned his neck to take a look. Remembering the news he had heard, he replied, "Your Majesty, they may not have misheard. Yesterday, this servant happened to hear something about the Fengyi Palace. The Third Prince not only bullied the young princess and the young grandson of Lord Yan, but also physically attacked the daughter of Lord Yin."
The emperor paused. He hadn't expected the Third Prince to be so lawless as to beat his own cousin. No wonder he had bullied Shen Baozhu.
The Yin family, like the Empress Yin, was obedient and rarely caused trouble. The emperor wanted to do Lord Yin a favor, so he ordered someone to summon him.
As soon as Lord Yin entered the Qianqing Palace, before the emperor could speak, he knelt on the ground and pleaded guilty. "Your Majesty, for the future of the Great Yong, please depose the crown prince!"
Hearing the sincerity in Lord Yin's words, the emperor almost lost his composure. He even wanted to summon the Third Prince and grab his ear to ask what on earth he had done to offend his own uncle!
The emperor controlled his emotions. Looking up at Lord Yin again, he hinted, "You're the Third Prince's uncle. How can you join them in this ruckus? Go back quickly."
"Your Majesty..." Lord Yin's words were suddenly interrupted.
A man in simple cloth clothes with a gold hairpin on his waist strode in. "What a lively scene in the Qianqing Palace! If Lord Yin Wenbo can't join the ruckus, what about this king?"
When the emperor saw the man, his eyelids twitched. What was this ancestor up to now, coming to the palace to stir things up?
Lord Yin bowed. "This subject pays respects to His Highness, the King of Rui."
The King of Rui waved his hand, excusing the palace servants from their salutations. He looked around and complained, "Not only are there no chairs, but there aren't even any cups today."
"Forget it, this king won't argue with you young people. Come, tell this king what's going on."
The King of Rui had a very high seniority. Even the late emperor had to call him "Uncle Royal." He was unrestrained by nature and loved to travel, rarely staying in the capital.
The emperor immediately ordered someone to move in chairs and tables for the King of Rui and prepare some snacks.
Right in front of the emperor, the King of Rui unceremoniously sat down, crossing his legs. "Your Majesty, I heard that the crown prince is arrogant and often curses for you to die soon. Is that true?"
Lord Yin was shocked by this, while the emperor tried to smooth things over and speak well of the Third Prince. "Uncle Royal, that's an overstatement. The crown prince is just young and impetuous, spouting some nonsense."
"This king came in a hurry. I heard that the crown prince has been bullying others. Your Majesty is the father of the nation. You should be just." The King of Rui had owed the empress dowager a favor before. Last night, he had stayed up late reading storybooks and didn't see the gold hairpin until the third hour of the day. While still inquiring about the situation, he heard that someone was kneeling and pleading with the emperor to depose the crown prince, so he rushed into the palace.
The empress dowager's favor wasn't enough to make the King of Rui charge into battle. At most, he would mention it to the emperor a couple of times.
So after saying these few words, the King of Rui started eating. He even complained that the emperor hadn't prepared any tea for him and ordered Ping Hai to get him some sweet water.
The emperor pondered the King of Rui's words. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the gold hairpin on his waist and guessed that he had been invited by the empress dowager.
Although the empress dowager had invited the King of Rui, it didn't change the emperor's mind. He planned to delay the matter of deposing the crown prince for a couple of days to avoid making the Third Prince resent him. But just as the emperor had a good plan in mind, Lord Yan knelt his way in.
Lord Yan was quite old, and the sight of him kneeling in was truly pitiful. He was also the empress dowager's younger brother and the emperor's nominal uncle. The emperor's eyelids twitched, and he got up personally to help him up.
The King of Rui was happy to watch the show, waiting for Lord Yan to speak up about deposing the crown prince and for the emperor to defend him. Little did he know that Lord Yan was looking for him.
"Your Highness, the King of Rui, I heard that when you were traveling, you met a divine doctor and had a bit of a connection with him. Could you please introduce me to him? My young grandson is only eight years old, but he has a long scar on his face. Because of this scar, he doesn't even dare to go out..." As he said this, Lord Yan's eyes gradually welled up with tears.
He had also invited the chief physician of the imperial hospital, asked the empress dowager for the secret medicines in the palace, and even tried all the folk remedies, but none of them had worked.
The chief physician said that his young grandson had a special constitution and was prone to scarring, making it very difficult to remove the scars.
As Lord Yan spoke, he used his hand to gesture the size of the scar, which was about an inch long.
The King of Rui gradually stopped eating and sighed. "I only had a chance encounter with the divine doctor. Moreover, the divine doctor is good at bone - setting and wound - healing, not very proficient in scar - removal. I'm afraid I can't help Lord Yan."
"Did your grandson accidentally bump into something? How could he have such a long scar on his face?"
The emperor's heart tightened, and then he heard Lord Yan talk about what the crown prince had done.
Hearing that the crown prince had also beaten the youngest daughter of Princess Jingning yesterday, breaking the little girl's head, the King of Rui's face changed. He suddenly stood up and cursed, "You little brat! At only seven years old, you're so arrogant. If the Great Yong falls into your hands, won't it perish prematurely?"
"Depose the crown prince! We must depose the crown prince! If the crown prince isn't deposed today, this king will stay in the Qianqing Palace and not leave!"
Lord Yan silently praised the King of Rui for scolding so well, but on his face, he said bitterly, "Your Highness doesn't know. That child is even more pitiful than my grandson. There's a big hole in her forehead, and the gauze wrapped around her head is dyed red with blood. She hurt her head. We don't know if there will be any after - effects in the future."
The injury of Shen Baozhu was told to Lord Yan by Lord Yin. Lord Yin had described it vividly, and Lord Yan simply repeated it word for word.
The King of Rui got even angrier. He slapped the table in anger and even pointed at the emperor and cursed, "What a little devil! Your child is a child, but other people's children aren't?!"
"As an emperor, it's a failure to let your own subject be bullied like this!"
"As a father, it's a dereliction of duty to watch your son go astray!"
No one could stand being scolded in the face, especially not the emperor. His face grew darker and darker, not only because of the King of Rui's scolding but also because the King of Rui was right.
The emperor couldn't figure out how the well - behaved Third Prince had become like this.
But before the emperor could explode, the King of Rui preempted him. "If Your Majesty is dissatisfied, just execute this king's nine generations of kin."
The King of Rui said this so boldly that it made the emperor's face turn ashen. Execute nine generations of kin? He was also part of the King of Rui's kin.
The emperor couldn't think of a way to get rid of the King of Rui for a moment. Amidst the King of Rui's noisy scolding, he became more and more annoyed. In the end, he simply agreed to the King of Rui and directly drafted the imperial edict to depose the crown prince.
After watching the emperor personally finish writing the edict, the King of Rui sat back on his chair contentedly. Eating the snacks, he calculated in his mind to ask Yan Mingli about Shen Baozhu's injury this afternoon. He still had some century - old ginseng and could give a ginseng root to Baozhu to nourish her.
If Shen Baozhu were here, she would surely recognize that the King of Rui was the Grandpa Gu that Yan Mingli had recognized.