Heaven Official's Blessing: Tian Guan Ci Fu (Novel) Vol. 2(66)
Qi Rong spat a mouthful of blood next to the feet of the statue.
“I know you too well. You love doing shit like this. Ancestors above, look at what a good descendant you gave birth to! Not only has the Xie Clan of Xianle lost everything, now even the bloodline is cut! XIE LIAN! YOU UNLUCKY STAR, YOU GOD OF MISFORTUNE! YOUR EXISTENCE IS XIANLE’S GREATEST TRAGEDY! WHY WON’T YOU DIE? HOW DO YOU EVEN HAVE THE FACE TO KEEP LIVING?!”
“But I saw with my own eyes that he killed my father with his sword!” Lang Qianqiu said. “How do you explain that?”
“If it’s not your blind, elderly eyes or water getting into your brain, then I can only think of one reason,” Qi Rong replied. “Which is that An Le indeed stabbed your old man, but he didn’t die.”
“Then…did he finish him off?”
Qi Rong howled, “What are you saying?! My good cousin is such a kind soul—as if he would do that straight off! When he arrived, he’d be too abashed to finish the king off right away—he’d have to do a little show of trying to save the poor guy first. But, heh, your dad probably killed himself.”
“What do you mean he killed himself?” Lang Qianqiu demanded.
“What’s the first thing someone saved from an attempt on their life would do?” Qi Rong asked. “After seeing so many massacred at the Gilded Banquet, what would your first reaction be?”
Lang Qianqiu still hadn’t completely figured it out. “…Find the murderer.”
“Wrong!” Qi Rong said. “After my good cousin saved your old man and he found his breath, he would’ve certainly said, ‘Quick, State Preceptor! It was Prince An Le who did it! Go and kill Prince An Le!’ No, no, no, not just that, he must’ve said something worse, like, ‘State Preceptor! Call upon everyone! I want the entire population of Xianle wiped out! I want to bury them all with the dead!!’”
His imitative tone of despair and fury was disturbing to listen to, and Lang Qianqiu was growing paler by the minute.
Qi Rong continued, “Even if he doesn’t order for their deaths on the spot, An Le also had the entire nest of your old hag’s relatives killed in front of the old coot, so sooner or later he would have to open fire on the people of Xianle. Your good shifu realized this, weighed the options, and decided, no, the old man couldn’t be saved, so PLORK and the old man’s heart goes kaput. That’s the kind of person my good cousin is, a saint who can’t have sand in his eyes, always doing shit that hurts both others and himself; he wants to please both sides but succeeds with neither, hee hee hee hee, ha ha HA HA HA ha ha h—”
“Qi Rong, you shut your mouth!” Xie Lian shouted.
Lang Qianqiu whipped his head around. “Why do you want him to shut up? Because what he said is the truth?! At that Gilded Banquet, you and An Le both struck; one killed my entire family, and the other finished the act on my father. You’re all lying to me?!”
Xie Lian started, “Don’t listen to—”
Qi Rong cut in. “OF COURSE WE’RE ALL LYING TO YOU! You’re so stupid, who else would we deceive if not you? If not for the interruption that spoiled our plans, Xianle would’ve already taken your damned life at the age of twelve, instead of giving you the luxury of growing up and ascending!”
“Twelve?” Lang Qianqiu repeated. The biggest incident that happened when he was twelve was that kidnapping, and he was saved by Xie Lian. He demanded, “That year, the culprits who invaded the palace to kidnap me were sent by the people of Xianle?”
“Duh!” Qi Rong spat. “Did you think ordinary assassins could just kidnap the crown prince from under the noses of hundreds of royal palace guards? Please. I was the one who helped An Le with that.”
Lang Qianqiu nodded. “Helped? Good. I understand now. So all my friends are fake. The people of Xianle never cared for our amity. Your Prince An Le never had good intentions and instead came for our lives.”
He turned to Xie Lian. “So everything you told me was false too.”
Qi Rong pretended to look surprised. “Come, come, come, quickly now, tell me what my saintly cousin told you!”
Lang Qianqiu ignored him completely and continued to address Xie Lian, “You said Yong’an and Xianle were but one nation at their roots; whatever conflicts the royals had with each other had nothing to do with civilians. Both sides used to be one family, and under our generation’s rule, there could be changes for the better. As long as the people were happy, it didn’t matter what the royal house was named, and both sides could let go of their grudge and unite in time. All that was false. All nonsense, bullshit, lies!”
This was precisely what Xie Lian didn’t want to hear. He cried out immediately, “No! It’s not false! Think: under your rule, weren’t there real changes?”
Lang Qianqiu closed his mouth, and the heaving of his chest faltered.
Xie Lian continued, “Didn’t you do really well? Didn’t the remnants of Xianle integrate peacefully with the people of Yong’an? There were fewer and fewer conflicts and riots, so how could any of it be false?”
There was a moment of silence. Tears rolled down Lang Qianqiu’s cheeks.
“But…but what about my royal parents? Yong’an and Xianle integrating was their greatest wish; that’s why they granted the princely title ‘An Le’ to the last of your royal bloodline. Their wish came true, but what of their end?”