The Ugly Empress by Yun Guo Shi Fei / 丑娘娘 by 云过是非

Vol.2 Chapter 1 - The Encounter

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Xue Junliang was still smiling as he reached a hand to help Chen Yi stand. He said, "What are you saying?"

Chen Yi difficultly said, "My condolences, Your Majesty."

The veins on Xue Junliang hands almost burst. Suddenly he pushed Chen Yi away and swept the things on the table. The inside of the temple turned into a disaster zone in one second. Plates and bowls of offerings all fell to the floor and broke to pieces. The people outside who were about to pray in the temple were shocked and didn't dare coming in.

Xue Junliang laughed coldly, "Aren't you a wise adviser? The Empress convinced me to come here and help the commoner, yet you can't even protect her?"

Chen Yi knelt on the ground and saw Xue Junliang facing the altar when talking. He could only say, "Your Majesty..."

Xue Junliang didn't let Chen Yi finish his sentence. He said, "How did she die? It's Xue Yu, isn't it?"

Chen Yi lowered his gaze and didn't immediately answer. People who were wise enough could easily see that Xue Yu was indeed behind this incident. But right now, Xue Wang was consumed with rage. Chen Yi was afraid Xue Wang would order people kill Xue Yu in a fit of anger.

In the commoners' eyes, Xue Wang and Xue Yu were brothers. Brothers publicly killing each other was unacceptable according to social norm. Moreover, Xue Junliang was now right here in front of the commoners' eyes, if he said he wanted to kill Xue Yu, Chen Yi feared Xue Wang would lose the people's respect.

Xue Junliang noted Chen Yi's intention and his head cleared a bit. He quickly went out of the temple saying, "Back to the Palace."

He didn't say anything more after that.

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Teng Yun could only vaguely heard Xiu Yao's panicked screams. His head was heavy as lead and he could not think about anything at all. All he wanted to do was sleep.

He felt everything around him was engulfed in fire. Gradually, he found it difficult to breathe and in the end, he fell into a pit of darkness.

When he was aware again, he felt all of his internal organs were hurting. Pain was covering every inch of his skin and he couldn't even move one single finger.

Teng Yun opened his eyes difficultly. His whole face stung, and his head felt like it was being hit by a hammer repeatedly. He was tightly tied with ropes and his arm felt dislocated.

Just as he succeeded opening his eyes, he heard a swish followed by a lashing whip. The whip struck his face and Teng Yun's eyes closed again.

Teng Yun took a moment to gather his mind. He felt like he was having a long, long dream. In the ridiculous and long dream, he'd turned into someone's empress. As an empress, he'd helped that someone defeated his enemies. And when Teng Yun woke up from the dream, someone else was wielding a whip. Teng Yun had been tortured mercilessly every day since he was captured.

His skin all bore signs of torture; not an inch was intact.

In the room, there was the ward who was beating Teng Yun and another man who seemed to be the leader or some kind. The other man sat on the side, calmly drinking tea as if watching a show. The man said, "Whip him again, but take care not to kill him. Our superiors instruct us to beat him halfway to death, and then allow him a minute of rest. He should not be allowed to die easily. If he dies easily, where's the fun in that?"

The other ward said, "What grave crime had he done to be treated this way?"

The person who spoke first laughed, "You haven't heard? Such big thing and yet you didn't know? He had murdered Her Majesty the Empress, set fire to Yunfeng Palace and almost burned the entire Imperial Palace. I heard a palace servant said that at her last moment, the Empress' shout sounded quite miserable. Da Wang has gone very angry."