The Smiling Red Panda 微笑的红熊猫

Prologue

Someone once sang me a beautiful lullaby, while in truth there was only humming but that was perhaps the one happy thing I still remember from my childhood.

My mother was a weak woman, she was frail and more often stuck in her chambers, Father Emperor always stayed with her while Liu-gong took care of me. I don't remember her much, but I always knew she was the type of beauty that could freeze your heart at a glance, Father Emperor always took pride in how much I looked like my mother, never really associating me with him other than the fact he was clear that he was my father.

Some daring maids from the palace of the Empress once tried to brainwash me into thinking the Empress was my mother, unfortunately, I was smarter, so they changed tactics and told me that the Empress was the more favoured by my Father Emperor and that the Concubine who was my mother was only a toy to him that mattered so little, but I couldn't help but be unable to believe them, while I was young, even I knew no blind or deaf man would think Father Emperor did not favour my mother.

When this did not faze me, they told me a secret. That the true love of my Father Emperor was a man, but that couldn't be and even if it were true, that man was long dead, no one should care too much too long about the dead. Father Emperor did not show that he missed such a character in his life and seemed content with mother by his side so what did I have to worry?

I knew the Empress wasn't my mother, but then why wasn't my mother the Empress? Of course that thought crossed my mind, but what did I have to say on whether Father Emperor boils, fries or bakes that woman? In the end, he really did have her cooked, but it was all too late after my mother passed from an illness nobody would tell me about.

There were two times when I was able to slip away, I noticed someone was sleeping in my mother's Red Lotus Pavilion pond, but before I could inquire as to who it was, Liu-gong had caught me and told me off about wandering and risking to anger my Father Emperor. The second time I tried to be very sneaky, but I was scared off by the presence of my Father Emperor who did not notice me but was present at the scene.

Even after two years, I never had the chance to figure it out, because he was always there as if he was guarding it, before I was mourning before my Father Emperor's self-made grave, however loud and long I cried, he did not wake or make a single sound of displeasure as he would have usually done in the past.

It was a while before someone found me lying there next to his coffin, the man who found me was Xue Meng, who claimed he was my Father Emperor's cousin, which made him my uncle and last remaining family member. But I remembered his first words to me.

"You... what... who are you?"

Maybe it was just me, but he had an ugly expression on his face like he had discovered a horrifying secret.

"I—*sniff* I am Prince Jingtang— *sniff* you should know me!" I wailed despite my arrogant response.

His face went through various changes, from dark to an array of colours, his eyes going from squinting to wide as ceramic wine jars, he took a moment to speak again as if something was caught in his throat, he swallowed over and over, unwilling to blink as he stared at me fixedly.

"Do you really not *sniff* know me?" I asked, surprised while tears continued to stream down my face.

"I—I... I didn't." He then slowly knelt before me, his expression was frozen in a state of shock or disbelief, but his eyes which were already red began to water and he made no move of wiping his own tear-stricken face. "I didn't know you…"

Existed? Were still alive? I did not know what he meant to follow his unfinished sentence.

When Xue Meng noticed an incoming horde of trespassers, he had taken me away with him and we went into hiding, nevertheless, I found out that my father had been revived.

We were on the run and fought tooth and nail to survive, to evade him to no avail, Xue Meng protected me well, but I knew he only cared for me because of who my mother was and because of his guilt. He told me everything. And everything in short was the fact my father truly was monstrous and my mother was the most unfortunate.

When my father eventually caught me, he tried to reconnect with me, I felt strange, I had grown then, and I had matured enough that I knew not everything was black and white. He was still my father, but I couldn't stand him. Not after all I knew.

Then he killed Xue Meng and the people who protected me.

I tried running away, attempted leaving on my own terms, tried provoking father, everything. I thought I was doomed forever, but unexpectedly I had the last laugh.

Why couldn't we all be happy? Can somebody— somebody please help me? It hurts, I just want my mother back...

Those were the last things I had wished to say out loud before I submerged myself in the pond of the Red Lotus Pavilion, resigning myself to the afterlife.

As I was drowning, a thought kept nagging at me: what if the man my father loved never existed? Would he have loved my mother genuinely, and never turned into the tyrant he became? It was all because of that man that my father resented my mother. Would they have still wanted me? Would I have had a decent life? Maybe if that man never existed, there would have been people who would have loved me for who I am and not just because of their guilt for someone.