mtlumby2d Chapter 292 Hot Potato
Chapter 292 Hot Potato
"Shut up! Traitor, traitor!" Emperor Jing Zhao's eyes were bloodshot. He struggled to sit up from the dragon bed, but he was just gasping in vain, his eyes full of unwillingness and anger.
"Things have come to this, are you still not giving up, father? You have used power and trickery to gain the throne, but ultimately lost it because of your greed and selfishness. In order to consolidate the throne, you have not hesitated to sacrifice the lives of innocent people. In order to eliminate dissidents, you have not hesitated to create false cases and wrongful convictions. Lord Rong is right, the emperors of the Si family are getting worse with each generation..." Si Heng's tone was very cold.
"Imperial sister, imperial sister..." Emperor Jing Zhao turned his gaze helplessly to Old Madam Xie.
This was the person who had taken good care of him since his childhood and personally supported him in ascending the throne.
"Your mother was just a little palace maid. I pitied you for being so young and helpless, so I begged the Queen Mother to raise you. Later, I personally carried you to the throne. After you sat on the throne, the first thing you did was to wipe out the entire Xie family. If I had known that this would be the outcome, I should have left you in the cold palace to fend for yourself."
Old Madam Xie spoke calmly. There were hundreds of lives of the Xie family between her and Emperor Jing Zhao, and there was no way back to the past.
The brother-sister relationship that once existed between the two had disappeared without a trace in Emperor Jing Zhao's calculations.
"The Xie family deserved it! My father was worried about the interference of foreign relatives in politics, so he naturally wanted to eliminate all threats. I was just following my father's wishes..."
"I have never coveted the throne. You keep saying that you are following the wishes of my father, but you are just afraid that I will follow the example of the ancestor Empress and shake the foundation of your imperial power. For this throne, you have sacrificed so many loyal and good people in the court without caring about family affection and morality. Looking back, don't you feel guilty?"
Old Madam Xie's eyes were red, and every word she said as she pointed at Emperor Jing Zhao was like a heavy hammer, hitting Emperor Jing Zhao's heart.
You can never wake up someone who is pretending to be asleep. Old Madam Xie didn't want to talk to him anymore.
When she was young, Madam Xie was quite loved by the late emperor, and her mother was the empress who was doted on.
Her mother lost her young son in the conspiracy in the harem, and had always treated Si Yuanyi, whom she had raised, as her own son.
At that time, the late emperor's sons were fighting for the throne. Si Yuanyi was not the late emperor's ideal candidate for the crown prince because his mother was of humble origin.
It was Empress Xie and her daughter, the Princess, who held great military power at the time, who used all the family's strength to help him ascend the throne.
After Emperor Jingzhao ascended the throne, the previous emperor died of illness, and Empress Xie passed away the following year, leaving Old Lady Xie alone to continue to guard the precarious imperial family.
At that time, Dasheng was plagued by internal and external troubles. The new emperor's throne was not stable, and the local princes were ready to make a move. There was an undercurrent in the court. Wars broke out on the northwest border.
It was the eldest princess Si Nanmin who personally took charge and spent three years to quell the rebellion in the border areas and stabilize the territory of Dasheng.
It was Si Nanmin who used his iron-blooded tactics to intimidate the forces that were ready to make moves, thus winning a precious breathing space for Emperor Jing Zhao at that time.
However, when everything was settled, Si Nanmin returned from the battlefield covered in scars, but was greeted with the tragic news that the entire Xie family had been executed for treason.
Only then did Si Nanmin realize how cold-blooded and ruthless the emperor, whom she and her mother had supported, was.
She was fighting desperately outside to clear the crisis for him, but her good brother was secretly plotting to kill her mother's family.
Emperor Jing Zhao, who had been on the throne for three years, told her cruelly that this was the last wish of the late emperor.
"It is enough for Dasheng to have one empress..."
Once upon a time, Si Nanmin thought that she and Emperor Jing Zhao would become each other's strongest line of defense.
But I didn't expect that the sharpest blade that stabbed my mother's family came from the person closest to me and whom I trusted the most.
The emperor whom she had supported would become the culprit who destroyed her Xie family in this life.
It would be more accurate to say that it was Emperor Jing Zhao’s inner fear rather than the last wish of the late emperor.
What he was afraid of was that Si Nanmin, who held a large number of troops, coveted the throne and became the second empress of Dasheng.
It was not until he eliminated the Xie family that he realized that the late emperor had tricked him even after his death.
In order to make the eldest princess and Si Yuanyi check and balance each other, the late emperor actually gave the golden armor guard in his hand to Si Nanmin.
The golden armor guards made Emperor Jing Zhao hesitate to act rashly. Old Madam Xie had been enduring humiliation to redress the Xie family, and both sides were in a dormant state.
"Father, ever since you sat on the supreme throne, have you been worried day and night? Worried about your ministers monopolizing power, and afraid that your son will usurp the throne. You are afraid of this and that, and I really don't understand why the throne of the emperor is so good?"
The corners of Si Heng's eyes were slightly red, his tone was unusually calm, and there was even a hint of a smile on his face.
Emperor Jing Zhao couldn't get a word in. The veil of the past was lifted, his face became paler and paler, and a line of tears rolled down from the corners of his eyes.
"Father, who are you crying for? For the innocent souls who died in the struggle for imperial power, or for my second brother and his mother who are about to ascend the throne? Father, you have worked hard all your life, now you can take a break. This great country will be run by me and my seventh brother in the future."
Si Heng's bony hand had already touched Emperor Jing Zhao's neck while he was talking and laughing.
"Killing your brother and your father! This is extremely treasonous. I won't write an abdication edict, so forget it. If you dare to ascend the throne, you will be usurping the throne, which is not legitimate..." Emperor Jing Zhao gasped and roared in despair.
"Father, what are you thinking about? It will be New Year's Eve in half a month, and the common people want to celebrate the New Year happily. Besides, the emperor has passed away, and the whole country is mourning. The people of Dasheng and the officials in the court should not hurry up to get married and have children. I, your son, absolutely cannot do that, because you, father, have disturbed the peace of the people of the world."
"As for ascending the throne to become emperor, I have thought about it before, but now I think that my seventh brother is more suitable for the position of emperor. After all, I am used to being idle, and I feel a headache just thinking about going to court every day." There was a hint of teasing in Si Heng's smile. He moved his hand away from Emperor Jing Zhao's neck and brushed away the dust on his shoulders.
"You are good at taking some time off. You think it's a headache to go to court and face those old ministers who are unwilling to change their ways. Should I bear this heavy burden? Ninth brother, the emperor thinks that you are more suitable to be the emperor." Si Cheng rolled his eyes at Si Heng and waved his hand with disgust.
Emperor Jing Zhao looked at the two brothers pushing and shoving each other, and couldn't understand why he had worked so hard to get the throne, but in the eyes of his two brothers, it became a hot potato that they were trying to avoid.
Emperor Jing Zhao felt mixed emotions, and his two sons' disdainful attitude towards the dragon throne made him look like a clown.
"Get out! Get out!" Emperor Jing Zhao, with trembling hands, roared angrily at the brothers Si Heng and Si Cheng with great effort.